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MARCH 28,  2021

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – OVERNIGHT:

NOW WE KNOW WHO THE ENEMY IS – FROM DAILY MAIL:   The University of Oxford is considering scrapping sheet music for being 'too colonial' after staff raised concerns about the 'complicity in white supremacy' in music curriculums.  Professors are set to reform their music courses to move away from the classic repertoire, which includes the likes of Beethoven and Mozart, in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement.  University staff have argued that the current curriculum focuses on 'white European music from the slave period', according to The Telegraph.   Documents seen by the publication indicate proposed reforms to target undergraduate courses.  It claimed that teaching musical notation had 'not shaken off its connection to its colonial past' and would be 'a slap in the face' to some students. And it added that musical skills should no longer be compulsory because the current repertoire's focus on 'white European music' causes 'students of colour great distress'.  It is thought that music writing will also be reformed to be more inclusive.  I'm so relieved that this oppressive weight will be lifted from our shoulders.  The next generation of musicians will undoubtedly be great.  Choke.

DIDN'T I ONCE READ SOMETHING ABOUT FREEDOM OF THE PRESS? – FROM FOX:    Sen. Mike Braun, R-Ind., told Fox News that a Biden official asked Republican senators to delete photos they took at a border facility they were touring on Friday.  Braun originally made the remarks to the Washington Examiner.  "There was one of Biden's representatives. I felt sorry for the lady because she actually talked to me about deleting a picture, but by the time she got to me, all those other pictures were taken, and that shows you the hypocrisy."  Braun told the Examiner of a migrant processing and holding center in Donna, Texas.  "None of us would have gone down there if we were going to be muzzled," said Braun, who added that Border Patrol also asked that no photos were to be taken, but that "they were telling us that because they had to."  Braun and 18 of his Republican colleagues, including Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas inspected the holding center this week, which is at 700 percent capacity amid a surge in migrants.  The photos showed children sleeping on the ground in an enclosed area.  Braun told the Examiner that as the group stopped with border agents at the edge of the Rio Grande, where migrants often try to illegally cross, a group of "coyotes," who guide migrants across the border for money, jeered at the group in Spanish.  It would be nice if the mainstream media, which is presumably devoted to its own freedom, would show a bit more outrage at the Biden administration's attempts to censor news coming from the border. 

March 28, 2021     Permalink

WHO'S ON FIRST? – AT 11:30 P.M. ET:  The mystery deepens.  Who actually is running the United States Government at this time of peril?  Strange things are happening in the nation's capital.  The president even met with a group of historians to discuss his legacy.  And the stationery is weird.  From Fox: 

The White House, breaking with tradition, now lists the "Biden-Harris Administration" on its website rather than simply, "the Biden Administration."

The move appears to have been one of several moves seemingly intended to elevate Vice President Kamala Harris’ position within President Joe Biden’s administration.

Both Biden and Harris are also listed on the White House’s main Twitter page, with the bio reading: "Welcome to the Biden-Harris White House!"

The move is unprecedented. Neither of the previous two administrations listed both the president and vice president on their main website or social media channels.

Biden has flubbed more than once in referring to his VP as "President Harris." Earlier this month he misspoke in a speech offering updates on a vaccination progress in the U.S. and referring to his vice president as "President Harris."

"When President Harris and I took …" Biden said, before momentarily pausing, "a virtual tour of a vaccination site in Arizona not long ago, one of the nurses on that tour injecting people, giving vax each shot, was like administering a dose of hope."

The president has made such gaffes before. In December he mistakenly referred to Harris as "president-elect," also during a speech on Covid-19 vaccines. "I took it to instill public confidence in the vaccine. President-elect Harris took hers today for the same reason," Biden said.

The comments ignited speculation of cognitive decline from the right, following a campaign where Biden repeatedly appeared tongue-tied.

Harris, too, once accidentally dubbed herself commander-in-chief. "A Harris administration, together with Joe Biden as the president of the United States," she said at a virtual roundtable in September.

The White House has not responded to Fox News’ multiple requests for comment.

COMMENT:  My own sense is that Biden actually is in charge, but is heavily influence by the Obama crowd.  Also, he was part of the Obama administration, as vice president, and wants to show it respect.

As for Kami, I'm not sure what she actually does.  The vice president is basically stand-by equipment, taking the president's temperature every day.  He or she presides over the Senate and breaks ties when appropriate.  Other than that, vice presidents usually do what they're told, and go to funerals of foreign leaders.  Some vice presidents, like Dick Cheney, who served under George W. Bush, become highly influential.  Some become president.  Others, like Alben Barkley, vice president under Harry S. Truman, are largely forgotten, although Barkley towers above all the others in the way he exited politics.  After his term as vice president was up, he was re-elected to the Senate from Kentucky.  When he rose to give his farewell address, having finished that job, he gave the best speech of his career, and then proceeded to drop dead.  Can't beat that.

March 28, 2021       Permalink

MARCH 27,  2021

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – OVERNIGHT:

A WELL-DESERVED HONOR – FROM FOX:   A fallen Missouri police officer will be awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor Society's Citizen Honors Award after he died protecting a friend's business from looters during police brutality protests last year.  Capt. David Dorn was named Thursday as a recipient of the 2021 Single Act of Heroism Award, recognizing his service after he was shot in June 2020 while responding to an alarm at a pawn shop.  Dorn, who was retired at the time, is one of two recipients, the society announced. The award is given to those who risked their lives for the benefit of others in a dire situation.  "To find out that Dave was awarded this great honor just floored me," Ann Dorn, his widow, told "Fox & Friends" on Saturday. "It’s a bittersweet moment."  Dorn said her husband died "doing what he loved."  "He would have been humbled and honored by this," she continued. "I can see him smiling right now, saying ‘No, I don’t deserve this.’ That would be his reaction, but, yes, he deserves this."  He certainly does.  And so do other brave officers, including several wounded in the last few days.  If we don't honor law enforcement people, male and female, we'll never get the best officers.  Time to send the "defund the police" crowd back to their "we love Lenin" meetings.

A VICTORY FOR THE DECENT GUYS – FROM JUST THE NEWS:   A public university violated a professor's constitutional rights by punishing him for refusing to use a transgender student's preferred pronouns, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday.  In a unanimous opinion written by Judge Amul Thapar, a Supreme Court short-lister for former President Trump, the court compared the Ohio university's behavior to a "McCarthy era" law against "subversive" government employees.  Philosophy professor Nicholas Meriwether, a "devout Christian," sought an accommodation under which he would not have to address the student as a woman in classroom discussions, which often touched on gender identity as a cultural controversy.  Shawnee State University officials belatedly ordered Meriwether to stop addressing the student only by name and instead use female pronouns. They also shot down his offer to tell students in the syllabus that he was being forced to use preferred pronouns.  Provost Jeffrey Bauer "openly laughed" when Meriwether's union representative explained why his religious beliefs forbade him from using the student's preferred pronouns, the professor claimed. Bauer twice rejected the faculty grievance on Meriwether's behalf — first as provost and then as interim president of the university.  Oral argument didn't go well for Shawnee State last fall. Judge Thapar asked then if the university would force a Jewish professor to honor a student's request to be addressed as "My Fuhrer."  The tide is still against us, but our side is, one by one, winning some significant victories in the courts and in state legislatures.  If we are firm in our belief in the basic Constitutional rights of Americans, we can win.  The 2022 elections, now only 20 months away, loom large as an opportunity to correct some of the madness we see before us today.

March 27, 2021     Permalink

SOMEONE WAKE THE PRESIDENT – AT 11:30 P.M. ET:  The Gallup organization has some timely information for the presumed president of the United States.  Maybe it can be put on 3x5 cards and slipped under his basement door.  From American Greatness: 

The CEO of Gallup has publicly warned President Joe Biden that approximately 42 million people south of Texas want to migrate into the United States.

In a blog post published on Wednesday, Jim Clifton, the chairman and CEO of the Gallup polling company, warned Biden as he and his administration struggle to deal with the surge of migration at the border:

Here are questions every leader should be able to answer regardless of their politics: How many more people are coming to the southern border? And what is the plan?

There are 33 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean. Roughly 450 million adults live in the region. Gallup asked them if they would like to move to another country permanently if they could.
A whopping 27% said “yes.” This means roughly 120 million would like to migrate somewhere.
Gallup then asked them where they would like to move. Of those who want to leave their country permanently, 35% — or 42 million — said they want to go to the United States.

Seekers of citizenship or asylum are watching to determine exactly when and how is the best time to make their move.

In addition to finding a solution for the thousands of migrants currently at the border, let’s include the bigger, harder question — what about all of those who would like to come? What is the message to them?

What is the 10-year plan?

330 million U.S. citizens are wondering. So are 42 million Latin Americans.

According to the Breitbart report, the United States already has very high rates of legal and illegal migration.

There are around “four million young Americans who turn 18 each year and begin looking for jobs, careers, spouses, homes, and families, yet the federal government imports roughly one million legal immigrants per year, each of whom compete for the jobs and housing sought by Americans,” according to the Breitbart report.

According to the Western Journal, “Clifton is no right-wing pundit," his warning shows that the border crisis is not only a concern to conservative Americans as Gallup is not a right-leaning pollster.

COMMENT:  Once again we point out that we can only deal properly with the crisis at the border if the facts are given to the American people. But what happens when a good chunk of the news media has a chronic loyalty to the political left?  What happens is the kind of shallow, indifferent reporting we see today, with little sense of outrage and a clear attempt to soften the truth.

The problem will get worse.  And of course it will be Donald Trump's fault.  CNN told me.

March 27,  2021     Permalink