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

JUNE 29, 2022

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE

A DYING CITY:   Chicago fades away, and all the mayor does is curse Clarence Thomas.  From Fox:  A business owner in Chicago, Illinois tells Fox News Digital that skyrocketing crime in the city forced him to quit doing business in town, adding to the list of individuals and businesses that have fled Illinois over the past couple of years, amid surging crime.  Gary Rabine, founder of the Rabine Group and owner of 13 businesses, told Fox News Digital this week that surging crime in Chicago was a driving factor in his decision to pull his road paving company out of the city after his crews were repeatedly robbed, sometimes in broad daylight, even after adding security to the jobs.  "We would do thousands of jobs a year in the city, but as we got robbed more, my people operating rollers and pavers we got robbed, our equipment would get stolen in broad daylight and there would usually be a gun involved, and it got expensive and it got dangerous," Rabine told Fox News Digital.  Rabine said that the additional cost of security and insurance for the "thousands" of jobs in the city each year eventually caused jobs to cost "twice as much as they should be." Rabine explained that the higher costs ultimately hurt the ratepayers, many of them with modest financial means, who ended up paying more for utility services.  And it's not getting any better.  The mayor, who cursed out Justice Thomas after last week's abortion decision, has all the qualifications one needs to be mayor of a Democratic city – she's female, black, and lesbian.  It's sad, but Chicago shows the cost of identity politics.  More people in the city are being murdered as this is written. 

June 25, 2022       Permalink

NOW HERE'S AN INTERESTING IDEA:  There's much talk on our side, and at Urgent Agenda, about the lack of intellectual diversity in the institutions that pass for schools these days.  Here is a Louisiana legislator who's actually doing something about it, and seems like a very serious guy.  From College Fix: 

A new task force to be established by Louisiana lawmakers will examine tenure policies at the state’s colleges and universities and suggest possible reforms.

The review comes amid concerns about intellectual diversity and ideologically driven tenure criteria in Louisiana and nationwide.

The bill’s sponsor, Louisiana state Sen. Stewart Cathey, a Republican, said he sees a lack of intellectual diversity in higher education both nationally and in Louisiana.

“We should be seeking intellectual diversity in higher education, not running from it,” he told The College Fix in an email. “…[A]ny professor, no matter their political persuasion, trying to coerce students towards one side of the political aisle is unhealthy for academia.”

The bipartisan resolution approving the task force’s creation stated that “no party or intellectual faction has a monopoly on wisdom. … [T]he role of tenure policy in postsecondary education should be routinely reviewed and discussed.”

Approved in May and scheduled to be formed in August, the task force will facilitate an “in-depth review of the merits of and need for tenure, to study public postsecondary tenure policies, and to propose any recommendations regarding tenure policies, including any specific proposals for legislation.”

It will include both Republican and Democratic state lawmakers as well as faculty and administrative representatives from the state’s colleges and universities.

Intellectual diversity is specifically mentioned throughout the resolution. The document describes diversity of thought as “paramount to achieving the central purposes of postsecondary education.”

There are over eight times as many professors registered as Democrats than Republicans, according to a 2020 study from the National Association of Scholars. The disparity widens further at elite universities.

The Louisiana resolution notes that “postsecondary education students should be confident that they are being exposed to the spectrum of viewpoints, including those that are dissenting.”

Another concern addressed in the resolution is the potential for indoctrination.

Students should feel that “they are graded solely on the basis of their reasoned answers and appropriate knowledge” and “that faculty members are not using their courses for the purposes of political, ideological, religious, or antireligious indoctrination,” it states.

Cathey, in his email to The College Fix, cited a 2020 incident in which a biology professor at Louisiana State University pledged to police student’s social media, saying any student who posted content she deemed racist would be blacklisted from her classes.

“If @LSU won’t take action, we as professors can. Keeping a list of names and if I see them enrolled in my course, I will drop them. It’s not just free speech, it’s hate speech and it’s a threat to student safety,” the professor had stated on Twitter.

Cathey told The Fix that “certainly, I don’t condone racism or racist remarks, but for a professor to claim to be able to play judge, jury, and executioner is not a good look for academia.”

Cathey said that while the task force is not a response to any direct student concerns, some students—fed up with dogmatic, pushy professors—later thanked him for the pending scrutiny.

COMMENT:  Good so far, but it's only a start.  The left, which is powerful in many universities, will try to shut this down, as they have shut down almost every attempt at real diversity.  I think there's a chance our side is getting strong enough on some campuses to fight back.

June 25, 2022       Permalink

JUNE 28, 2022

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE –  OVERNIGHT:

ONE SMALL STEP FOR SANITY – FROM COLLEGE FIX:  Brown University has backtracked on offering a “mindfulness” course exclusively to black, Latino and Indigenous students after a complaint was made to the Foundation Against Intolerance & Racism.
Last month’s online “teacher training class in mindfulness-based stress reduction” was open only to “BIPOC” students, which stands for black, indigenous and people of color — although Asian students were not included in that category, the New York Post reported.
Brown reportedly established the course because “mindfulness instruction in the West has historically … failed to include and address the needs, life experiences, and priorities of marginalized communities,” according to a letter from a FAIR attorney Leigh Ann O’Neill.The universities represent the worst examples of political correctness and Marxist agitprop.  Rooting this stuff out will not be easy, as many professors and administrators have built their careers around know-nothingism.  We have a chance of progress with the newest generation of students, some of whom seem to understand what's being done to them.  We need more.

MOVING VAN POLITICS – FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER:   As the Washington Examiner reported this week, the end of the COVID-19 pandemic has done nothing to arrest the trend of people fleeing large cities in liberal coastal states for more pleasant and orderly locales, particularly in the Mountain West and the Sun Belt.
A mixture of unreasonable pandemic restrictions, rising crime, lawlessness, and hostility toward employers has forced this continued urban exodus.  A Census Bureau report released late last month shows which cities and towns have gained population and which have lost it. The data demonstrate that the states and cities that imposed the most draconian COVID-19 restrictions were very likely to lose population. But the fact is that the data are quite similar for the period between 2018 and 2019, when COVID-19 was not a consideration. What towns and cities gaining population generally have in common both before and during COVID-19 is that they generally live under laws made by Republicans. What towns and cities losing population have in common is that they generally live under Democratic rule.  It is hardly a coincidence that all 15 of the 15 fastest-growing cities and towns between July 2020 and July 2021 are in states that Republicans govern: Arizona, Texas, Florida, Tennessee, and Idaho. And 14 out of the 15 fastest-declining cities during the same period were in states that Democrats governed at the time.  What towns and cities gaining population generally have in common both before and during COVID-19 is that they live under laws made by Republicans. What towns and cities losing population have in common is that they live under laws made by Democrats.  Ah, it is so great to have good news, and this is good indeed. Now we have to translate the reality into votes in November.  The Dems will use every device to keep their power.

June 28, 2022       Permalink

A NATION OF LAWS?  WELL, MAYBE – Senate Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Chuck Grassley, is taking on the Justice Department over its odd way of enforcing the law.  About time.  From Just the News:

Ranking Senate Judiciary Committee member Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) slammed the Department of Justice on Monday for "repeated failure to prosecute employees" who were caught lying during internal investigations. 

"An unsettling pattern has emerged from the Department of Justice (DOJ) whereby criminal referrals by the Department of Justice, Office of Inspector General (OIG), against DOJ employees for making materially false statements are rarely prosecuted," Grassley wrote in a letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland.

Grassley said the "most shocking example of this pattern" occurred last month after the DOJ declined to bring charges against the former FBI agents who botched the investigation of Dr. Larry Nassar, the former U.S. women's national gymnastics team physician who was sentenced to prison for assaulting gymnasts. 

The Iowa Republican listed a dozen other cases in which the United States Attorney's Office declined to prosecute staffers. For example, the OIG substantiated allegations that an employee made inaccurate statements in an investigation report and the staffer even admitted to lying, but the attorney's office decided to not prosecute.

In another case, the OIG supported the claim that an employee received about $350,000 worth of excess worker's compensation disability payments, but the office did not file charges. 

"Laws are meant to deter criminal activity, but when DOJ does not enforce those laws but rather shields their employees from consequences, it has the opposite effect. It creates a sense of entitlement and signals that DOJ employees are beyond reproach," Grassley said, adding that "DOJ employees should be held to a higher standard" or else the department risks losing Americans' trust. 

Grassley asked how many employees were prosecuted over the last five years. He also wanted to know more about why the department declined to prosecute agents suspected of wrongdoing in the Nassar case.

COMMENT:  I doubt if Garland will do a thing.  He seems to be a very political attorney general, with little sense of independence, and no sense of urgency.  But I'm glad Senator Grassley spoke out.  If Republicans take the Senate, he'll return to his old job as chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and will be in a position to conduct his own independent investigations.

June 28, 2022       Permalink