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I appeared on Silvio Canto Jr's talk show from Dallas.  It's here.

JANUARY 24,  2022

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – OVERNIGHT: 

SURRENDER AT DARTMOUTH – OVERNIGHT:  An Ivy League institution caves to the mob.  From Legal Insurrection:   Dartmouth College administrators canceled an on-campus appearance by conservative journalist Andy Ngo Thursday night after a deluge of online threats from Antifa members.  Ngo, who has built a national reputation covering violent, far-Left protests often given little attention by the mainstream media, was set to appear at an event hosted by the Dartmouth College Republicans and the conservative activists of Turning Point USA.  New Hampshire Journal was turned away at the door of Moore Hall by Dartmouth security on Thursday evening. The college security officer said the event was changed to be an online appearance, but he would not say why the change was made.  “That’s a decision above my pay grade,” the security officer said.  We all know why.  Pressure from leftist extremists.  The cave-in by Dartmouth is disgraceful, and will only mean more bullying in the future, and more threats of violence. 

January 24, 2022       Permalink

ADAMS'S BIG APPLE – OVERNIGHT:  In office less than four weeks, New York Mayor Eric Adams is already facing intense pressure over crime and the murder of cops.  As mayor of America's largest city, what he does, or doesn't do, will influence the nation.  And people here are demanding quick, effective solutions to rising crime.  From the New York Post: 

Mayor Adams’s long-promised plan to make New York safe landed on the table with a big fat plop Monday. It’s dauntingly complicated, it’s over-stuffed with concessions to grasping social activists and it’s impossibly dependent on actors far beyond the mayor’s control.

But it just might make a difference.

Urban America’s public-safety debate — absolutely unhinged two years ago — seems to be coming full circle.

Back then, the radical battle-cry was: “Get cops off the street!!”

Lately it has become “get guns off the street” — and this is the theme of the Adams plan. But confiscation is never going to happen, at least not soon, and certainly not in sufficient numbers.

So now we are hearing the first faint hints of a return to common-sense law-enforcement — an acknowledgment that it’s now time to get actual criminals off the street. Or, to quote Adams speaking from City Hall yesterday, “We’re going to [target] the trigger-pullers.”

Adams said he plans to reinstate the anti-crime patrol unit, which former Mayor de Blasio disbanded.

To that end, he promised that the NYPD’s hugely successful anti-crime patrols — dissolved by Bill de Blasio — will be reinstated. And that they’ll be deployed to 30 violence-wracked police precincts within three weeks.

Strong words and a promise of swift action, just 24 days into a new administration. This is a hopeful combination.

It’s true that the plan comes with obscure details, beside-the-point gun-trafficking rhetoric and pedestrian pledges to address social concerns linked to crime — and so on and so forth.

The NYPD confiscated 6,000 illegal guns last year, and has collected 350 more in 2021.

Indeed, the lard is so thick that it gets in the way of what seems to be a clear-eyed exposition of what really enables violent street crime: weak-willed policing complicated by wrong-headed penal-code “reforms” driven by deeply problematic radical state and local politicking.

This isn’t limited to New York, of course. It’s driving urban chaos across the country — and the effect is not limited to gun violence. Out-of-control vagrancy, publicly expressed untreated mental illness, organized shoplifting/looting and so on all need to be addressed. Happily, the Adams plan seems aware of these challenges.

COMMENT:  The question, as always, is whether the Adams plan will ever go into effect.  Will Adams be independent enough to take on the wildly left City Council?  Or will he eventually cave to that body, and the radical black establishment, and The New York Times?  New York's first black mayor, David Dinkins, caved in, and that resulted in his being defeated for re-election by Rudy Giuliani.

We await breathlessly.  We fear there may be more killings of cops.  And more pressure on the mayor. Crime may get worse in the summer months.  It always does. 

Late polls show that, overwhelmingly, rising crime is a key issue with the public, with nine months to go until the 2022 midterms.  We live in a decisive year.

January 24,  2022    Permalink

JANUARY 23,  2022

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – OVERNIGHT:

THE MARCH OF HYPOCRISY – FROM FOX:  Michigan State University allowed basketball games to continue at 100% attendance capacity despite shutting down in-person learning for nearly the entire month of January.  Attendance at all of Michigan State University's home basketball games in the month of January at the Breslin Center was at 100% capacity with 14,797 fans in attendance, according to ESPN.  However, in a Dec. 31 message to the campus community, Michigan State University President Samuel Stanley Jr. said that classes would begin remotely for the spring semester due to "the state of Michigan reaching an all-time high in cases per day."  "Given this intense surge in cases, we now feel the best decision for our campus is to start classes primarily remotely on Jan. 10 and for at least the first three weeks of the semester," Stanley wrote in the announcement.  I guess basketball brings in more money than classes. 

January 23, 2022       Permalink

UKRAINE CONTINUED – OVERNIGHT:  Ukraine has now jumped to the top of the worry list.  A Russian invasion may be imminent.  This is what presidents are for.  Where do we get one?  From Fox: 

President Biden is considering sending a few thousand troops to Eastern Europe and the Baltic States as part of a broader NATO effort to bolster NATO allies that border Russia and Ukraine, given recent tensions, Fox News confirms.

Advisors presented Biden with various options to respond to Russia's aggressive stance in Eastern Europe in a Sunday briefing at Camp David. The president is considering sending 3,000-5,000 U.S. troops to Romania and to Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia as part of a broader NATO effort. Other NATO countries may also contribute troops to warn Russian President Vladimir Putin not to try to move into neighboring countries.

The president is also considering deploying naval vessels to make port visits to NATO allies who may feel threatened. Some equipment and troops in these proposed actions would come from Europe and some would come from the U.S.

COMMENT:  I believe this is the first time that the sending of troops has been mentioned.  Even the words themselves represent a dramatic escalation.  Last night we called for a presidential address to the nation.  We make the same plea today.  We also ask that the president meet with Congressional leaders of both parties, a tradition when a foreign crisis erupts.

There was a time when we asserted, in this country, that politics stops at the water's edge.  The saying derived from the practice of placing members of both parties in high defense positions when the nation was in danger. We didn't have a Defense Department in World War II.  We had a War Department and a Navy Department.   Franklin D. Roosevelt, a Democrat, was in the White House, but he appointed a Republican, Frank Knox, as secretary of the Navy, and another Republican, Henry L. Stimson, as Secretary of War.  Our enemies saw a united American front.

Today, sadly, nothing stops at the water's edge.  Foreign policy ceased being bipartisan years ago.   Already our Ukrainian policy is being pulverized by politicians.  Only the president can try to establish some bipartisanship as we wade through the crisis.  I don't see any attempt in that direction.

January 23,  2022     Permalink