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Area: WoT Operations    WoT Background    Non-WoT        Politix   
Salafists blow up 16-century mosque in Yemen
Today's Headlines
Headline Comments [Views]
Page 4: Opinion
18 21:45 746 [6] 
5 16:39 lord garth [7] 
23 22:07 Thing From Snowy Mountain [7] 
3 13:47 Iblis [2] 
1 10:00 Skidmark [6] 
12 21:40 Blossom Unains5562 [7] 
5 20:18 Bright Pebbles [2] 
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Page 3: Non-WoT
5 23:47 Shipman [2]
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2 23:37 Richard Aubrey [5]
5 20:43 Dale [2]
8 16:36 Besoeker [2]
10 23:49 gorb [5]
6 17:20 Procopius2k []
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Page 6: Politix
6 16:40 NoMoreBS [4]
13 22:20 Procopius2k [5]
5 15:53 Frank G [3]
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Home Front: Politix
Bernie's supporters are abandoning the Democrat Party and are voting for Trump
[Liberty Alliance] Awesome! Bernie’s supporters are fired up. They were hosed by the Democrat Party, and they are leaving in droves, many now planning to vote for Donald Trump.

In this video Bernie supporters make some very good points. One young man claimed that Bernie supporters and Trump supporters stand for some of the same things, which is true, especially Plank #1, that the status quo establishment is corrupt and looking out for themselves only, to hell with the people.

Where Trump and Bernie differ is in the solutions to the problems created by the "good ol’ boy" corrupt establishment. While Bernie believes we can tax our way to prosperity and build an even larger, more voracious beast (our federal government) along the way, Trump believes the opposite. He has studied the JFK/Reagan model of lower taxes equals greater incentive within the private sector, thus a burgeoning economy and greater volume of tax revenue, and although it may be counterintuitive, it is historically proven, and The Donald plans to return to this proven fiscal sanity.

It is also Trump’s plan, in strike contrast to Bernie’s, to drastically cut our federal government spending and regulations, to balance the budget finally, and begin the process of shrinking the voracious beast to its intended servile function.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/01/2016 04:01 || Comments || Link || [7 views] Top|| File under:

#1  More likely abandoning the Dems and voting for Stein.
Posted by: Glenmore in Mt Vernon || 08/01/2016 11:22 Comments || Top||

#2  I suspect at the end of the day roughly half Bernie supporters will vote Hillary and half will stay home. Any remains will vote Green.

Bernie supporters are of the left and the peer pressure is insanely powerful for them. To powerful to cross the aisle.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 08/01/2016 11:26 Comments || Top||

#3  Do we care?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/01/2016 11:27 Comments || Top||

#4 
Posted by: Vast Right Wing Conspiracy || 08/01/2016 13:22 Comments || Top||

#5  rjs

I would phrase it, that half will vote for Clinton, half will stay home and the other half will vote Green, Libertarian or Trump
Posted by: lord garth || 08/01/2016 16:39 Comments || Top||


Valerie Jarrett was our First Female President
[AmericanThinker] The rest, as they say, is history. Not only did Valerie Jarrett become a mentor to the young Barack Obama, she soon became what Investor's Business Daily called Obama's Rasputin, someone who had more security than our personnel did in Benghazi:
When "The Hidden Hand's" daughter got married, Chicago airspace was subjected to a Temporary Flight Restriction ("No Fly Zone Lite") for the entire event, start to finish. I can understand it being in effect for M/M Obama's attendance, but the whole damn thing? She is, indeed, a Rasputin "Re-Boot."
Posted by: Blossom Unains5562 || 08/01/2016 00:00 || Comments || Link || [7 views] Top|| File under:

#1  As well as the first Iranian.
Posted by: Cravirt Flusong7056 || 08/01/2016 3:31 Comments || Top||

#2  FBI Files Document Communism in Valerie Jarrett’s Family

Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) files obtained by Judicial Watch reveal that the dad, maternal grandpa and father-in-law of President Obama’s trusted senior advisor, Valerie Jarrett, were hardcore Communists under investigation by the U.S. government.

Jarrett’s dad, pathologist and geneticist Dr. James Bowman, had extensive ties to Communist associations and individuals, his lengthy FBI file shows. In 1950 Bowman was in communication with a paid Soviet agent named Alfred Stern, who fled to Prague after getting charged with espionage. Bowman was also a member of a Communist-sympathizing group called the Association of Internes and Medical Students. After his discharge from the Army Medical Corps in 1955, Bowman moved to Iran to work, the FBI records show.


Judicial Watch Link to June 2015 article.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/01/2016 4:20 Comments || Top||

#3  She isn't going to have security after he's gone.
Posted by: One Eyed Fleatle6138 || 08/01/2016 5:04 Comments || Top||

#4  Bets?
Posted by: Pappy || 08/01/2016 10:45 Comments || Top||

#5  Rasputin...

So true
Posted by: newc || 08/01/2016 11:16 Comments || Top||

#6  Puppetmaster who is hidden but pulls Obama's strings.

And who do you think pulls ValJar's strings?
Posted by: CrazyFool || 08/01/2016 12:18 Comments || Top||

#7  Same people who pull John Brennan strings. Perhaps he 'pulls his own' and hers as well.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/01/2016 12:49 Comments || Top||

#8  Communist infiltration of the White House and the Presidency....where is McCarthy when you need him?
Posted by: NoMoreBS || 08/01/2016 16:45 Comments || Top||

#9 
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/01/2016 16:52 Comments || Top||

#10  Valerie Jarrett was our First Second Female President

Fixed it for you.

Edith Bolling Galt Wilson (October 15, 1872 – December 28, 1961), second wife of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, was First Lady of the United States from 1915 to 1921. She met the President in March 1915 and they married nine months later.

President Wilson suffered a severe stroke in October 1919. Edith Wilson began to screen all matters of state and decided which were important enough to bring to the bedridden president. In doing so, she de facto ran the executive branch of the government for the remainder of the president's second term, until March 1921
- Wiki
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/01/2016 17:01 Comments || Top||

#11  "History is hard!" - Pundit Barbie
Posted by: Pappy || 08/01/2016 17:29 Comments || Top||

#12  @#10: You are exactly correct. But, by pointing this out, you have engaged in a microaggression against me. I'm entitled to my own facts...and your wallet. ;)
Posted by: Blossom Unains5562 || 08/01/2016 21:40 Comments || Top||


Syria-Lebanon-Iran
Unification, federalism, dissolution -- what’s ahead for Syria?
[RUDAW.NET] The head of the US Central Intelligence Agency John Brennan added his voice to those who have been openly pessimistic regarding the reunification of Syria in a post-civil war era.

"I don't know whether or not Syria can be put back together again," Brennan said on Friday at the annual Aspen Security Forum in Colorado.

Brennan went on to add that "there’s been so much blood spilled, I don’t know if we’re going to be able to get back to [a unified Syria] in my life time."

John F. I was in Vietnam, you know Kerry
Former Senator-for-Life from Massachussetts, self-defined war hero, speaker of French, owner of a lucky hat, conqueror of Cambodia, and current Secretary of State...
, US Secretary of State, expressed similar fears back in February, stating that the coalition was moving towards "Plan B," implying a potential partitioning of Syria if a meaningful ceasefire could not materialize.

"It may be too late to keep it as a whole Syria if we wait much longer," Kerry told the US Senate foreign relations committee.

Staffan de Mistura, UN envoy to Syria, also acknowledged that the possibility of a federal division of the country had not yet been ruled out.

He told Al Jazeera in March, "All Syrians have rejected the division [of Syria] and federalism can be discussed at the negotiations."

US President Barack Obama
The point I was making was not that Grandmother harbors any racial animosity. She doesn’t. But she is a typical white person...
has been accused of adopting a more disengaged approach to Syria. In an interview with the BBC in April, Obama said all parties needed to "sit down at the table and try to broker a transition." Adding, "That’s difficult."

He described Syria as a "transnational" issue that needed a similar response, saying that without international cooperation, "we are far weaker and we won’t solve these problems."

Brett McGurk, Special Presidential Envoy for Global Coalition to Counter ISIS, also speaking at the conference in Aspen, accused Russia of being either "unable or unwilling to deliver on the removal of Assad."

Up to date, 400,000 people have been killed due to the ongoing civil according to UN estimates, with driven about 11 million people from their homes, a figure that leaves officials on all fronts disillusioned over the prospect of reunification.

While the Syrian opposition seek to overthrow the government, Hereditary President-for-Life Bashir Pencilneck al-Assad
Despoiler of Deraa...
has pledged to "liberate every inch" of the country lost to rebel forces.

Riad Hijab, coordinator for the opposition's High Negotiations Committee (HNC) at the Geneva peace talks, said that "any mention of federalism or something which might present a direction for dividing Syria is not acceptable at all," when the idea was first brought up in March.

In contrast, the Syrian Kurdish PYD party, which has wide influence over the country's Kurdish areas, and several allied groups have announced plans to create an autonomous federation in the northeast of the country, including the three Kurdish cantons of Jazira, Kobani and Afrin.
Posted by: Fred || 08/01/2016 00:00 || Comments || Link || [6 views] Top|| File under: Govt of Syria

#1  Well, the looming question is: Who cares?
Posted by: Skidmark || 08/01/2016 10:00 Comments || Top||


Terror Networks
Pope sez love of money causes terrorism, not Islam
[Daily Monitor] Pope Francis said Sunday that Islam could not be equated with terrorism and warned Europe was pushing its young into the hands of extremists.

Pope Francis said Sunday that Islam could not be equated with terrorism and warned Europe was pushing its young into the hands of extremists.

"It's not true and it's not correct (to say) Islam is terrorism," he told journalists aboard the papal plane during the return journey from a trip to Poland.

"I don't think it is right to equate Islam with violence".

Francis defended his decision not to name Islam when condemning the brutal jihadist murder of a Catholic priest in France in the latest of a string of recent attacks in Europe claimed by the Islamic State (IS) group.

"In almost every religion there is always a small group of fundamentalists. We have them too."
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/01/2016 08:35 || Comments || Link || [6 views] Top|| File under:

#1  that Islam could not be equated with terrorism

Nazism could not be equated with Luftwaffe raids.

"In almost every religion there is always a small group of fundamentalists. We have them too."

I sure hope the Swiss Guard is on the alert against Roundhead fanatics.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/01/2016 9:10 Comments || Top||

#2 
"In almost every religion there is always a small group of fundamentalists. We have them too."

And every great religion chooses a dud leader from time to time. Today, you're it.
Posted by: Dave D. || 08/01/2016 9:37 Comments || Top||

#3  This pope is a typical leftist ass.

Love the pic.
Posted by: AlanC || 08/01/2016 10:03 Comments || Top||

#4  The Pope should realize that speaking in such generalities is deliberately deceptive and such equivocation is clearly political and dangerous to all.
Posted by: Tennessee || 08/01/2016 10:21 Comments || Top||

#5  so useless.

I miss Pope Urban
Posted by: newc || 08/01/2016 11:03 Comments || Top||

#6  So I imagine our good Pontiff will shortly announce the cessation of the collection during Mass.

No?
Posted by: GORT || 08/01/2016 12:46 Comments || Top||

#7  The Pope should realize that speaking in such generalities is deliberately deceptive and such equivocation is clearly political and dangerous to all.

The guy is a Leftist, deception and equivocation are part of his ideology. He's Left before he's Catholic. There are lots of clergy that are in the church because it's a comfortable lifestyle. They don't really believe.
Posted by: Spinesing Gray3122 || 08/01/2016 12:47 Comments || Top||

#8  Someone should ask our dear Pope how they can use money when they're dead.
Posted by: Charles || 08/01/2016 13:26 Comments || Top||

#9  12 Times Pope Francis Has Openly Promoted A One World Religion Or A New World Order (linked)
Posted by: Vast Right Wing Conspiracy || 08/01/2016 13:29 Comments || Top||

#10  Good Lord, this Pope ISN'T Catholic!
Posted by: Rob Crawford || 08/01/2016 14:30 Comments || Top||

#11  OFFS
Posted by: swksvolFF || 08/01/2016 16:21 Comments || Top||

#12  Now we just have to find a bear that doesn't shit in the woods.
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 08/01/2016 18:46 Comments || Top||

#13  Most mainstream Christian sects seem infested with chardonnay liberals these days.

And conflate their politics with their religion.
Posted by: phil_b || 08/01/2016 19:09 Comments || Top||

#14  'Who conflate'
Posted by: phil_b || 08/01/2016 19:21 Comments || Top||

#15  A reminder of why I am Ex catholic.
Posted by: Angaimble Elminemble1032 || 08/01/2016 20:34 Comments || Top||

#16  No doubt the cardinals will go in a different direction for the next pope, and the Church will survive. In the meantime, good Catholics will ponder the lesson the pope provides.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/01/2016 21:16 Comments || Top||

#17  "In almost every religion there is always a small group of fundamentalists. We have them too."

Damn Jansenists!
Posted by: charger || 08/01/2016 21:44 Comments || Top||

#18  too bad the romans took such control over the west. the Coptics got it "more" right than the armenians, the greeks, the romans, or the russians.

actually they nailed it.
Posted by: 746 || 08/01/2016 21:45 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Culture Wars
Byron York: Khizr Khan, Donald Trump and the debate over Muslim immigration
h/t Instapundit
There's a sensation building over the Democratic convention speech of Khizr Khan, a Pakistani-born Virginia lawyer whose son Humayun was killed in action while serving as a captain in the U.S. Army in Iraq in 2004.

In seven minutes on the national stage, Khan, a naturalized U.S. citizen who came to this country in 1980, excoriated Trump for proposals to build a wall along the Mexican border and to temporarily ban the entry of foreign Muslims into the U.S.

"Let me ask you: Have you even read the United States Constitution?" Khan said to Trump. "I will gladly lend you my copy. In this document, look for the words 'liberty' and 'equal protection of law.'"

...It may be that building a wall, deporting illegal immigrants, and temporarily banning the entry of foreign Muslims are all terrible policies. But among the Democrats and anti-Trump Republicans touting Khan's performance there appears to be a belief that if something is a terrible policy, it must also be unconstitutional. That's not necessarily so.
Leaving aside some relevant facts, IMO, cognitive elites simply don't understand the use of probability theory in making decisions.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/01/2016 03:29 || Comments || Link || [7 views] Top|| File under:

#1  About Khizr Khan, by Clarice Feldman:

I was surprised that a NY law office would list a D.C. telephone number, so I called it to check and was told by the man who answered it was not Khazir Khan's law office, but the man who answered would not tell me who it was.

So I did more digging and learned that is also the phone number of a group called American Muslims Vote, which says its mission is to:

To create an enlightened community by providing and developing Patriotic American Muslim leadership and Encouraging American Muslims to participate in the democratic process at local, state and national level and vote on the election day.

I did some further research into who registered this domain name and when? Khizr Khan registered it on July 23, 2016.

He's looking increasingly like a plant to me -- a Muslim Cindy Sheehan playing on people's sympathies to foster a Democratic Party political agenda. And of course, in that goal he has the full throated support of the American media:

Posted by: badanov || 08/01/2016 8:33 Comments || Top||

#2  Now, I can't help wondering: there's a lot of "Hispanics" in US military, especially the Marines. And, I suppose, they've taken their share of casualties. So why no "Hispanic" casualty's parents speaking against "Trump's wall"?
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/01/2016 8:58 Comments || Top||

#3 
So why no "Hispanic" casualty's parents speaking against "Trump's wall"?

I'm not entirely sure, but I suspect the Democrats have simply decided they won't get quite as much mileage using Hispanics as their "Officially Recognized Poor Helpless Victim Identity Group" as they will using Muslims.

They still pander to Hispanics and the cause of unrestricted immigration, of course, but it seems clear that for the time being, they've chosen Muslims as their Pander Partners.
Posted by: Dave D. || 08/01/2016 9:33 Comments || Top||

#4  I expect, for reasons known to many in this community, there is a 'cultural gravity' that attenuates the pseudo-random unit assignment process. Soldiers of Persian descent go to the middle east where their possible experience with the local customs, and appearance(profiling!) is considered an advantage. Soldiers of Spanish descent may get routed to points south where they will become notable casualties during a Carribean uprising, should Mexico attack Costa Rica or Brazil decides they want a canal...
Posted by: Skidmark || 08/01/2016 9:50 Comments || Top||

#5  I suspect Hispanics who've chosen military careers live conservative lives and vote Republican. So there'd be no support there.
Posted by: trailing wife || 08/01/2016 13:29 Comments || Top||

#6  You can always find somebody.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/01/2016 13:37 Comments || Top||

#7  There is an article at Breitbart about this. Brietbart. Keyser Soze and the "Usual Suspects." Walid Shoebat has some info at his site: Shoebat. These articles say basically that the guy was used by the Clinton campaign (albeit a willing usee). Now all the Donks and Rinos are going nuts. The son can be honored for serving our country without buying into the rest of the B.S. created for political purposes. It only takes a glance at the DNC/Clinton emails to recognize these people are capable of anything. Trump has the right approach in dealing with them--hit them hard; keep them on the ropes because they will hit you hard.
Posted by: JohnQC || 08/01/2016 13:43 Comments || Top||

#8  Another voice screeching "this isn't the battle". Sorry, heard that endlessly for the last few decades. Tired of it. Someone who may fight unnecessary fights is preferable to the spineless weasels we've had up to now.
Posted by: Rob Crawford || 08/01/2016 14:35 Comments || Top||

#9  I don't know if you are trolling or serious

I'm pretty about you, One Eyed Ulaque7770.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/01/2016 15:10 Comments || Top||

#10  aw jeez not this shit again photo: Aw Jeez, not this shit again! ajntsa.jpg
Posted by: Cluck Ebbolugum4892 || 08/01/2016 15:12 Comments || Top||

#11  Sure. Pretty sure.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/01/2016 15:26 Comments || Top||

#12  You post Trump stuff you're going to get responses you don't like. Sadly, I agree with the the critics on this. Continuing to attack the Khans just keeps the spotlight on them, instead of on Hillary. Its basic Clausewitz - you want to concentrate your attacks on decisive points of your choosing. The Khan's are the Dems choice of fight, they have the press lined up to help them with this. Beating the Khans are hardly a decisive victory if you "defeat" them. And this is not going to stop Trump unless he gets stuck on it, so ignoring it is not that big of a risk.

From what I can tell, this is purely emotional and anger based action, and a distraction from the main goal: to win the election. That is your main goal, right? Then ask yourself why you cannot just let this go and go after Hillary on things that will stop her. This is not one of those things. Go after the real target.

Now do you see why us Trump opponents were so worried during the primaries? You guys are so angry you're going to blow this election on payback and being pissed off. Get some discipline and get serious about taking Hillary out. You want my vote? That's how you will earn it. Not by this petty bullshit of attacking anyone and everyone that disagrees with you.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/01/2016 16:07 Comments || Top||

#13  For better or worse, the fellow on the lower right got the ring. it's a bit late for wishing otherwise, or bovine retort. Or am I wrong and there is yet some other solution? Please advise.
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/01/2016 16:18 Comments || Top||

#14  These who don't fight don't win (e.g. McCain, Romney). And, I doubt very much that most Americans are so stupid they'll let one Muslim casualty, out of --- what it is by now: 5000, 10000 --- force them to forget dozens of Muslim terrorists in USA alone.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/01/2016 16:34 Comments || Top||

#15  My fellow VFW members are with me on this one - Trump is wrong. And so are you who are backstopping him on this. Just stop it, and move on. You're wasting valuable time and effort and doing the notHillary effort damage by continuing this fight.

http://www.vfw.org/News-and-Events/Articles/2016-Articles/VFW-Supports-Gold-Star-Families/

Grom, what I'm doing is trying to keep Hillary out of office, and now it appears that the Trump people aren't serious about that at all. All they want is to get payback. That doesn't win national elections.

That is why you are in this? You sure aren't acting like it.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/01/2016 17:36 Comments || Top||

#16  FYI Grom, you're confusing fighting everything in sight and being a thin skinned idiot with actually fighting effectively. There is a difference.

This kind of "fighting" you praise is like the spray-and-pray, attack anyone that angers me at the moment idiocy that loses war after war for the Arabs. It takes discipline and direction. And that's what Im busting you and the other Trump people's chops about.

You claimed to be in it to beat Hillary? Then show it. Show some discipline, show some concentration on the real target, show some minimal amount of intelligence in who you target.

Otherwise you are the jackasses many of us accused you of being in the primaries.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/01/2016 17:43 Comments || Top||

#17  By the way mods, silencing opposing voices doesn't make them false. It makes you wrong.
Posted by: OldSpook || 08/01/2016 17:44 Comments || Top||

#18  Ok, OS, I'll own up. I support Trump because he's a nasty son of a bitch - and us NSBs should hang together so we won't hang separately.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/01/2016 18:12 Comments || Top||

#19  I move that we accept g(r)om's report regarding NSB's, and that the Adjutant so annotate the minutes and official record. Do we have a second?
Posted by: VFW Quartermaster || 08/01/2016 18:23 Comments || Top||

#20  You got it Bad. DNC Media collusion plant.
Posted by: Dale || 08/01/2016 20:36 Comments || Top||

#21  #19 I do hereby second the above motion.
Posted by: Dale || 08/01/2016 20:40 Comments || Top||

#22  So Dad is a Democratic party shill and Son is a war hero. Shades of Cindy Sheehan! And everything old is new again. But why not? The play worked well against BushHitler.

and us NSBs should hang together so we won't hang separately.

In order to be President, you have to get elected. One reason Romney lost was he played nice - as expected of a gentleman. So he had no defense to the media memes of dog on the roof, binders full of women, etc. I'm willing to stipulate that Trump has huuuuge flaws. But as Lincoln said about Grant, “I like him; he fights.”

One last thing: Remember that *everything* you hear about Trump is filtered thru a media machine determined to stop him, by any means. I shouldn't have to point this out on a website where playing Intelligence Analyst, Junior Grade is a major sport, but there you have it.
Posted by: SteveS || 08/01/2016 21:24 Comments || Top||

#23  I also shouldn't have to point out that the media were boosting Trump until he got the nomination, and are (as we predicted) suddenly coming down on him like a load of bricks now that he's The Nominee We're Stuck With. It's McCain Part Deux.
Posted by: Thing From Snowy Mountain || 08/01/2016 22:07 Comments || Top||


Scientists' Failure to Report Abortions as ‘Cause of Death' Masks Massive Racial Disparities
BLUF: [Breitbart] Using data from 2009 of pregnancy outcomes -- including estimates of induced abortions as collected by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention and deaths due to all causes -- the researchers report that induced abortions represented only 16.4 percent of NHW deaths, but 61.1 percent of NHB deaths and 64.0 percent of Hispanic deaths.

"For Hispanics and NHB, deaths from abortion are 4.2 and 3.5 times, respectively, the number of deaths from all diseases of the heart and malignant neoplasms combined," they write.

The authors find that for Hispanic and blacks, abortion deaths were 79.3 and 57.5 times the number of homicide deaths, respectively and, for whites, abortion deaths were 12.4 times the number of suicide deaths.
The facts about 'racial disparities' - Who needs them ?
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/01/2016 03:07 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Margaret Sanger is rejoicing if in any small way her stated goals are being achieved.

The authors find that for Hispanic and blacks, abortion deaths were 79.3 and 57.5 times the number of homicide deaths

The same people who believe we need severe gun controls, don't believe in controls on these 'rights' even though one is protected literally in the Constitution and the other is a judicial fabrication.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/01/2016 6:59 Comments || Top||

#2  Additional seldom discussed 'disparities' from this past week end in Chicago.

5 dead, 14 wounded in Chicago shootings
Posted by: Besoeker || 08/01/2016 8:01 Comments || Top||

#3  For the Left, killing off poor and minority babies is a feature, not a bug.
Posted by: Iblis || 08/01/2016 13:47 Comments || Top||


A Distant Elite: How Meritocracy Went Wrong
[HedgehogReview] We need to find ways to restore and preserve a less regimented, less class- and status-stratified, less school-sorted, more open-ended America, one more respectful of men and women of all stations and educational levels. We need an economy and legal structures that are as open as possible to enterprise and innovation. We need an educational system that is open to all, and geared not to the manufacturing of credentials (or artificial and dysfunctional rites of passage) but to the empowering of individuals. We need a society that concerns itself with the knowledge and skills a person can acquire, not where or how they were acquired. Why could we not restore the practice of bringing talented and ambitious young people into professions such as the law through apprenticeships, as was done in the era of the founders, instead of insisting that they expend hundreds of thousands of dollars on a law school credential that means less and less with each passing year, and only serves to delay their entrance into the work force and the productive life of the community? Why could we not do the same with engineers, accountants, teachers, health-care professionals, and the like? Would not such changes move us back in the direction of a restoration of essential merit?

So that these statements not take on an air of wistful abstraction, let me conclude with a flesh-and-blood example from the American past. Consider Abraham Lincoln, a common man born in a log cabin to humble circumstances, whose character and outlook were molded not by the advantages of birth or pedigree but by his own relentless striving toward self-betterment, and his labor to wring a better life out the hard opportunities presented to him. We see, and rightly so, a considerable portion of our national ethos bound up in his story. We see an image of meritocracy rightly understood.

Lincoln was not particularly proud of his humble origins, and did not like to go into detail about them. His early life, he once said, could be summarized in a single phrase: “the short and simple annals of the poor.”11 Hence, our knowledge of his early life is scrappy. We know that he moved from Kentucky to Indiana to Illinois, a typical pioneer farm boy, burdened with the tasks of hauling water, chopping wood, plowing, harvesting. We know that he hated farm work so much that he would seize the opportunity to do almost anything else. We know that he had little educational opportunity yet was a voracious reader, with a great love of language and oratory.

When young Lincoln arrived in New Salem, Illinois, as, by his own description, “a piece of floating driftwood,” he was an uncredentialed nobody.12 But he soon found employment as a clerk, insinuated himself into the life of the community, became well known and well regarded by all, was appointed postmaster, ran for and on the second try was elected to the Illinois General Assembly, borrowed money to buy a suit, then found himself thinking about a career in the law. And from then on, there was no holding him back.

You could say that this was a rather unpromisingly hand-to-mouth pattern of development. Or you could say that Lincoln benefited from the looseness and easygoing disorder of frontier society, with its fluidity and absence of confining rules and regulations, its steady succession of fresh challenges demanding a fresh response. He did not live in a world where all of life hinged on his parents getting him into the “right” kindergarten so that he would have a plausible path into the ruling class. He could come to a town like New Salem and, in a matter of weeks, persuade his neighbors that he was a plausible candidate for office. He did not have to be defined as his father’s son. He could begin over again, and again.

Not everything about this frontier world was good, and Lincoln especially regretted the absence of educational opportunities in his own life. But one cannot separate the resourcefulness of his character from the fact of his frontier origins. Nor can one separate those humble origins from his iconic and enduring meaning in American life. There was nothing ordinary about Lincoln. But his ascension to the presidency was a clear example of the common man’s potential in a land open to men of merit. As Lincoln said in announcing his candidacy for the General Assembly in 1832, he “was born, and [had] ever remained, in the most humble walks of life,” without “wealthy or popular relatives or friends to recommend me.”13 But he had been given unprecedented opportunity to realize his potential by the right set of conditions.

We would do well to leave room for the Lincolns among us—especially if they are as raw and uncredentialed as the man who would become our sixteenth president was. Think of his great speech at the dedication of the cemetery in Gettysburg in November 1863. As many know, there were two notable speeches that day. The first, and the longest and most learned and most florid, was given by the supremely well-pedigreed Edward Everett, former president of Harvard—and the first American to receive a German PhD. But it was the self-educated frontiersman president who gave the speech whose accents ring down through the ages. Perhaps there is a pattern here to learn from.
Posted by: Pappy || 08/01/2016 00:00 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  A class and status society is preferred by exactly the sort of amoral, postmodern, post-Christian women that populate much of America and the decaying West.

They will fight to prevent the reversal. The kind of up-by the bootstrap society that allowed regular guys to prosper and have access to women and a happy family life is not what pampered women who each think of themselves as a goddess deserving of only the very best man want for a social system.

A society with Judeo-Christian social norms and which values lifelong monogamy promotes regular guys having access to women for companionship, sex, and procreation. But to a woman who operates on basic primate mating strategy, this is the worst possible world. It means that it is very difficult to choose between alpha and lesser males. It means she must settle for someone who doesn't have the most alpha of alpha genes. In a highly classist society, even the lowest serving maid has a chance for 15 minutes with the lord of the manor and his genes, and the lord is easily identified.

DNA analysis of some of the first city building agricultural societies indicates that only about one in fifteen or so men ever got to pass on their genes. Monopolization of the women by a well identified ruling class is the reason. Undoubtedly some women protested. Also undoubtedly, many if not most loved this arrangement. To the sort of amoral, self-absorbed woman who can't rise above our baboon-troop ancestors, the arrangement was awesome. Alpha genes to mix with her own for offspring, the material means to raise those kids, and never having to deal with those horrible regular guys who would make great lifelong companions.

If this sounds cynical or overstated to you, perhaps you should open your eyes. The divorce industry is huge in no small way due to this dynamic.

Posted by: no mo uro || 08/01/2016 5:56 Comments || Top||

#2  Part of the problem is that they separated the implied link of militia duty and the franchise. The potential to face the need to give the "last full measure of devotion" that had always been part of the 'contract' was abolished by extending the power of the vote to those who would never face the requirement involuntarily. It stop being a right and became a privilege. You reap what you sow.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 08/01/2016 6:52 Comments || Top||

#3  Excellent article! Lincoln sought a "new birth." Those in power today seek a final burial and global utopia.

But it was the self-educated frontiersman president who gave the speech whose accents ring down through the ages. Perhaps there is a pattern here to learn from.

Gettysburg Address:

"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate, we can not consecrate, we can not hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us—that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion—that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth." Emphasis added.

Posted by: Besoeker || 08/01/2016 7:52 Comments || Top||

#4  Once merit went out of the window...
Posted by: g(r)omgoru || 08/01/2016 8:21 Comments || Top||

#5  "How Meritocracy Went Wrong", it stopped being on merit...
Posted by: Bright Pebbles || 08/01/2016 20:18 Comments || Top||



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