Behavior

The Senate sent it back to the House to finalize. Stella Morabito says If Marriage Can Mean Anything, It Will Soon Mean Nothing — “This will happen the same way such things always happen — through a demonization campaign that frames skeptics as bigots who are guilty of discrimination.” — nothing special about the male-female union and it’s appropriate to get involved in intimate interpersonal relationships of any sort?

Who’s your heroes? Josh Shepherd says If You Like ‘Top Gun’ You’ve Got To See Korean War Film ‘Devotion’ — “If we’re to become better people as Americans, to grow as a country and culture, we have to remember our heroes.” – This film is a ‘true story’ that “recounts how two long-overlooked pilots led a mission that turned the tide in the Korean War’s most brutal battle.” It does present the struggle to racially integrate the military as a part of the story is about a Navy pilot who raised himself above the nonsense. — “I think patriotism is a great unifier, and we realize it usually when our country is in trouble,” he said. “That’s when we’re suddenly patriotic, and we’re all together.”

Redemption isn’t on their minds: The Guilty Justify Their Cruel and Anti-Social Values. E. Jeffrey Ludwig starts with Darrell E. Brooks then finds other examples with Bernie Sanders and Henry Wallace. The standard of reference? “unjustifiable according to conscience which is an inborn understanding of the Golden Rule” — “The wicked leaders of the Left in the USA might sound good at times, but they advance ideas and behaviors antithetical to the well-being of society and the order needed for domestic peace and tranquility.  Like Brooks, at times they may make a good point or two, but they are disruptive of our well-being as a society and are promoting wrongdoing.”

“Without a shared understanding of fundamental principles, what can we expect besides hostility and resentment?” Josh Herring thinks Western Liberalism Is Doomed Without Philosophical Consensus — “There can be no common ground or compromise between these two metaphysical dreams, only ideological warfare.” — 

“Classical liberalism has produced immense civilizational wealth. It’s led to the lowering of trade barriers, which encourages the free exchange of goods, ideas, and people across national borders, and the affirming of human rights through documents like the Declaration of Independence and the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It’s led to unprecedented levels of international collaboration through organizations like the UN, European Union, and the International Monetary Fund, each of which has profoundly affected the world. This way of collaborating in a common political and economic sphere is called classical liberalism.

Classical liberalism tends to produce substantial wealth but cannot explain what societal wealth and individual human flourishing are for. If we no longer have an answer to that kind of grand, civilizational, and teleological question, how long can the liberal order endure? Christianity once framed classical liberalism and provided both a telos (purpose) and a set of moral principles governing the practice of liberalism; Christianity’s decline reveals that classical liberalism cannot provide a moral framework for itself. 

“There is a reason why we chose the Pilgrims and their establishment of the Plymouth Colony in 1620 as our origin myth, not the Virginians who settled in Jamestown over a decade before that date.” —¡No Pasarán!: Thanksgiving: Can the Élites’ Contempt for American History and for the Voters’ Desires in the 21st Century Be Traced All the Way Back to the Jamestown and Plymouth Colonies? It’s all about ‘who are your heroes’.

Elections

It’s about being on top of a stampede. Jay Valentine explains Here’s How They Did it: Real-time Election Fraud — “Rather than wasting time on batch NCOA, we get a daily copy of the election roll. That’s expensive!  The list in Wisconsin is $12,000! But did you know your Democrat friends bought it 28 times before the 2016 election?” — discontinuities in the curve are a big deal in calculus and physics classes. They show as glitches that evoke and action that is then corrected so as to make it appear nothing happened. But it did. en masse.

The money advantage by the Democrat in Georgia is something like 3:1. That buys a lot of media time. But look at the reality: Exclusive — Walker: I Built a $100 Million Company, Warnock Got ‘Money from Parishioners and Taxpayers’. Robert Kraychik looks at another conundrum where success is maligned and corruption and grifting becomes the hero. Are the voters that gullible? Again?

green

Looks like it. John Hinderaker wonders if it’s Time to Start Eating Bugs? — “We have seen it in Sri Lanka, where the government mandated “organic” farming and as a result, the Prime Minister’s residence was stormed by a mob and he was forced to flee the country. We have seen it in Canada and in the Netherlands, where the government is making war on that country’s highly successful ag industry.” — “The international war on agriculture, which focuses mostly on the use of synthetic fertilizers, without which the productivity of modern agriculture is impossible, and on animal husbandry, is of course driving up the cost of food world-wide. If the war on agriculture continues, residents of wealthy countries will be impoverished by higher food prices while many residents of poor countries will starve.”

but it’s the other guy, not me.

It’s coming to Nevada. It got the ballots to enshrine it into law in the last election. Selwyn Duke explains The New Voting System that Gave Democrats a GOP House Seat is Dangerous. Here’s Why. — “The result is that while it seemed the voters were being given more of a choice, they essentially were robbed of choice by a system” — 

Charles Lipson is talking about fifty years of black privilege and it isn’t just a slathering of allegation and accusation but rather measurement and observation. The Zombie Survival of Affirmative Action — “How will they skirt the high court’s ruling? By eliminating statistical evidence that they are actually discriminating, even as they continue to do so.” … “The differences have remained large and persistent.” … “A judicial ruling won’t end this debate. These issues are among our country’s most profound and vexing, legally and historically. Blacks were denied equal education for centuries.” .. That last is a canard that illustrates the core issue. There has been no ‘denial’ as education is not something given or denied but rather something earned. The question is why one racial group has not earned it despite many examples of members of that group have earned it. This shows in the topic Lipson uses for measures – standardized testing – and it also shows in crime statistics. The ‘deny’ idea is removing responsibility for behavior and imposing a victim status that, like socialism, fails every time it is exposed to the light. Glen Reynolds cites PROF. ROBERT STEINBUCH: Measuring qualifications by merit — “Objective merit is bad because it limits the discretion of people in power, thus hampering their ability to favor people they like and harm people they dislike.” — Conrad Black gets to the question Conrad Black: Is America In Decline? — “Those of us who are appalled by the weakness, incoherence, corruption, and hypocrisy of the Biden administration would do better to recognize the implications of the disaster in the midterm elections and the extent of the task that confronts those—apparently a significant majority—who believe that Bidenism is a straight boulevard to catastrophe.”

For the majority who still believe in the traditional America, sensibly updated and cleansed of discrimination, the country is entering mortally perilous times. The midterms were a wake-up call, but has anyone awakened?

A part of this ‘why?’ is another behavior. David Zukerman observes that the New York Times notices ‘political violence’ and blames…Republicans — “For the left, officeholders, media, and elsewhere, dissent is equated with “extremism” that must be banned, extinguished, erased from the homeland, and to hell with the First Amendment.” — This is another example of a canard based on a slathering of allegation and accusation without clear definition or example and in blatant contradiction to what can easily be seen. — “The New York Times should really be asked to show cause why its November 27, 2022 editorial is not a demand for limited popular government, preferably under the stranglehold of just one political party, the Democrat party.”

The election introspection continues. Robert Merz: Why the Midterms Didn’t Surprise Me — “what can you expect when it isn’t a level playing field, and the non-socialist team is fragmented?” — “This brings us to trying to understand what propaganda (disinformation) is, where it came from, and how it is used.” — Victor Davis Hanson: Was Trump Our Captain Queeg? — “Fact-checkers” doted on every Trump statement, nitpicking them to find some exaggeration, or untruth. Fine. But then these same hypercritics simply went comatose during the Biden Administration, with little care that Biden spins fantasies daily, from a son lost in the Iraq War to insulting claims that he passed his student loan amnesty in the Congress by a close vote, and on and on. With Trump, voters got real achievement with coarseness, with Biden utter failure with near senility.” — The analogy to a movie highlights the injustice being done and the damage it causes.

Medicine is a worry as its bureaucracy failed in applying established principle and practice resulting in a pandemic panic. That was costly in money, public health, and deaths. William A. Jacobson: The incoming House of Representatives should hold hearings on the destructive racialization of medical schools and medicine — “Medical School education is in crisis, with ‘social justice’ and race-focused activism being imposed on students, faculty, and staff,”

Don Surber thinks “the 12 Republican senators who recently voted for the Bake My Cake law will capitulate next on guns.” – Republicans likely will give Biden gun control – “Biden knows he has a dozen Republican senators willing to help him thwart the will of the people by stripping hunters and others from owning rifles.” This is being rather sour on the Republican establishment in the swamp, for evident reasons and history. 

The J6 outrage continues. Will notes that Tucker Highlights Sickening Treatment of January 6th “Political Prisoner” — “So I assume you guys vote Republican? Did any politicians come to your aid? Or do they just continue to ignore you like everybody else in Washington?” — A new long train of abuses by Henry Pelifan provides some context for the DC Gulag and other governmental abuse. — “Laws badly administered, abused, or ignored were the injustices that caused this country’s founding.” — The shenanigans of governmental prosecution get another example by Sundance: DOJ Once Again Changes Trump Seizure Evidence List Dropping “Empty Classified Folders”, and Continues Refusing to Give President Trump Lawyers the Affidavit Used for Search Warrant. — “In this case we are watching the DOJ National Security Division (DOJ-NSD) deny the production of the material that supports the framework of their search warrant.  Again, if Main Justice has nothing to hide, then why are they not willing to stand openly behind the predicate for their search.” — what happened to the Bill of Rights?

The attempt to rewrite history has a favorite target with Thanksgiving. ¡No Pasarán!: Is Thanksgiving a “Myth ” or a “Problematic Holiday”? What Nobody Tells You About Indians and Other Native Americans does a takedown. — “Do the calamities also include the theft of the lands of the Apaches? Does the genocide, real or alleged, of the Native Americans also concern the extermination of the Huron tribe (Huronia)? … From Roman times, at least, it has been a reasonable rule (no, not a white/European rule; an entirely common-sense rule) that you cannot claim land as your own unless you devote a minimum of time inhabiting it and tending to it.” — Context and the ‘whole truth’ conflict with the modern fantasies that seem to predominant.

Nevada is going full woke from legalized ballot harvesting to anyone vote any way any time any how. The last ‘election’ approved more confusion and potential for misrepresenting the will of the people. The Flaws of Ranked Choice – Brendan Patrick Purdy provides the theory lesson for the occasion. Concepts define include Majority, Condorcet,  Pareto efficiency or Monotonicity, Independence from Irrelevant Alternatives (IIA), Arrow’s Impossibility Theorem, — ranked choice voting sounds so simple and nice but with many social endeavors, the devil is in the details and the complexity too often gets swept under the rug. It can be very hard to learn from history and experience.

Perhaps a mathematically superior voting method like Pairwise Comparison could win out, but until all states, territories, and districts of the United States of America are able to count all of the votes within a few hours of the polls closing like Florida, we should stick with first-past-the-post.

The 2022 election is beginning to show the lumps in the rug. Joe Fried: Surprised by the Midterm Election Results? Take a Look at the Data. — “I believe that there are only three likely explanations for the unexpected results: late campaign surges, polling error, or aggressive ballot-harvesting.” … “Some Republicans say that the GOP needs to start large-scale harvesting operations, to compete with Democrats. I hope they do not do it because it is a dirty, dishonest practice that should not be tolerated. It is a real “attack on democracy.”

The warp in reality and its dangers is described by David Zukerman: Supreme Court smacks Trump. — “This is to suggest that the justices decided not merely “against Trump,” but for oppressive, unlimited government. … these Deep State blows are no coincidence.”

An argument that has become significant with the technology capabilities making it cheaper to copy, transmit, and store information not only gets into the Musk Twitter brouhaha but also into property rights. That is why Danny Chadwick says You Should Still Buy Blu-Rays and DVDs, Here’s Why. — “You Don’t Own Digital Content, Even if You “Buy” It” — Al Williams picks up on this with a problem encountered by those who don’t even own the equipment they ‘buy’ as it, too, is intellectual property belonging to someone else. How To Repair? The Death Of Schematics. This is another one that seems to simple but isn’t. Look at how libraries are handling digital content, for example. Even when you have the media in hand in your personal library, it can become obsolescent – even printed books can need special expertise to read (Beowolf, anyone?). 

Were they even thinking?

 Vermont’s Constitution enshrines ‘right’ to kill babies by Eric Utter — “We do not have the “right” to decide to have unprotected intercourse resulting in a baby in a womb…only to kill that baby for our convenience.” — By a ratio of 3:1 Vermont voters set aside the new life’s right to it’s life in favor of the convenience of the mother except when the state figures it has what it thinks is a “compelling” interest in the matter. Shouldn’t that compelling interest be something like the God given natural right to life itself? Many voters seem to think not. 

VDH says it’s the The Same Old, Same Old Deja Vu and he is talking about the latest TDS episode. — “We know the script that will follow because we suffered through it for 22 months and spent $40 million for it under Robert Mueller’s special counsel team. … Yet one thing that will be different this time around is that the Biden administration is in power. Garland remains an unapologetic, embittered partisan. He is fresh off siccing a now-weaponized FBI on school kids’ parents and various MAGA enemies of the state.” — and one thing leads to and from another: — “Sudden ballot “drops” will start pouring in during the wee hours. … “Get out the vote” left-wing, electronically fueled projects … There will be new, even richer virtue-signaling billionaires … wounded by nearly four years of inflation … Unemployment and stagflation will still be termed “transitory.” Growth will continue to be slow but dubbed “steady.” High gas and energy prices will be near permanent but “coming down.” A wide-open border will still be termed “secure.” Talk of historic crime rates will still be “racist.” … President Joe Biden will still shake imaginary hands, talk of passing legislation through the Congress that he bypassed with executive orders, and still claim gas was $5 a gallon when he entered office. Fact-checkers will ignore all that mythology and still obsess over Republican “lies.” … The left-wing nexus will still warn of back-alley abortions that threaten millions of women … more pre-election October surprises … more post-election, November surprises” — all this is known yet it doesn’t seem to sink in that the voters are being had.

This is why Dr. Jha can be so blatant as John Hinderaker describes More Misinformation From the Feds. — “Dr. Jay Bhattacharya of Stanford was a co-author of the Great Barrington Declaration, and has proved to be right regarding just about everything relating to covid. But being prematurely right is dangerous.” But Dr. Jha is not alone. The Lancet bows down to the COVID cult, too. H.P. Smith describes a paper where the conclusions are at odds with the data presented. — “Despite their very clear findings, in the “interpretations” section of the paper they pay tribute to the vaccine narrative … They directly contradict themselves and ignore the findings from a decent attempt at actual science” … “Even after all we’ve learned and all we’ve been through, those who were wrong at nearly every turn simply cannot stop furthering the lies.”

Then take a look at the 2022 election fallout in Arizona, Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Alaska. That’s this visible part. What is happening in Nevada is still the beach ball being held under water (as Bongino has it).

Why? How to explain this? 

The media is in the news. CBS had a twitter fit and then agreed with the obvious that the Biden laptop was real. AP is also having problems dealing with this laptop. What Elephant? AP Denies that There is Any Evidence That Joe Biden Discussed Hunter’s Business Dealings – JONATHAN TURLEY — “this weekend, the Associated Press made a whopper of a claim that there is no evidence even suggesting that President Joe Biden ever spoke to his son about his foreign dealings. … The statement of the Associated Press at this stage of the scandal is breathtaking but telling” — But wait! there’s more! The Climate Cons – Issues & Insights — “The world’s climate criminals aren’t the energy companies selling the fossil fuels needed to power a modern economy, nor those that make the products that burn those fuels. The real offenders are the global warming alarmists who have once again revealed what the game is, and it has nothing to do with protecting the environment.” … “We hate that the lie has become the truth in the West, regarding the climate and so much more. It’s gone on for far too long. The game needs to end.” — See also The ‘Insurrection!’ House of Cards Is Collapsing where Julie Kelly warns that “The American people should prepare for more stunning revelations about the FBI’s key role in the events of January 6. … More likely than not, Wray’s latest claim that the FBI didn’t  instigate or orchestrate what happened that day will be the latest in a long list of his falsehoods.” 

VDH calls it an “expression of the most toxic and creepy culture in America.” The Strange Morality of the Bay-Area Billionaire Left . That’s all about an effort to make Mr. Ponzi’s scam look tame. Sundance looks at another example in Sunday Talks, Paul Ryan Dismisses 75 million Member MAGA Movement, Claims Corporations Will Win Power Struggle Within GOP Battle. Lloyd Billingsley pulls up Pious Candy-Ass Sidewinder from Blazing Saddle to describe another of the Ryan ilk. 

On the warfare front, William A. Jacobson describes the nature of the conflict: We Are Transitioning (again). “It’s tough out here in the real world.” Bonchie has a rundown on the latest TDS assault. Special Counsel Investigating Trump Has an Eyebrow-Raising History. — “Smith led the corrupt prosecution of former Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell. The DOJ went to such absurd lengths to broaden the federal bribery statute to target the Republican politician that the Supreme Court eventually overturned the conviction.” — he’s got more at Another Ridiculous Criminal Investigation of Donald Trump Emerges.

Back to the “climate criminals” is The EV Boondoggle. John Hinderaker. It’s all about the money — “This whole sordid business is hopelessly corrupt, and it is antithetical to America’s economic and strategic interests. Nevertheless, it appears that EV mania will march on until it becomes obvious that the entire project is impossible.” — Medicine is also suffering from similar pressures. The gods of diversity are killing the ‘golden age’ of medicine. Andrea Widburg notes that “Those who came of age in the second half of the 20th century or later, have been blessed to witness a time of extraordinary medical progress. Now, though, thanks to academia’s mindless push for diversity, we are almost certainly on the precipice of a steep decline in the quality of medical care in America.” … “Everything the left touches it destroys and, when leftism destroys medical schools, we will all suffer.” — an example of where this leads is in The Truth About Ivermectin by Marina Zheng via The Epoch Times.  

Worry about a fall is getting a lot of discussion. With The Democrats are literally reverse-engineering progress Andrea Widburg cites “Steven Pinker’s 2011 book, The Better Angels of Our Nature: Why Violence Has Declined. Pinker argues that, despite the horrific convulsions of the 20th century and the first decade of the 21st century, Western man had improved—if you believe, as I do, that a civil society controlled by law and order is an improvement over the stone-age model of endless warfare and violence.”

“What happens, though, when a society deliberately reverses all the brakes on violence and cultivates stupidity (by degrading education, entertainment, and the media)? Then, argues evolutionary psychologist Ed Dutton, you get what are called “spiteful mutants.” … This is all theoretical, of course, but when one looks at the shriekers and groomers today, it’s a theory that suddenly makes a whole lot of sense.

The DoJ illustrates the point. Monica Showalter explains how Garland’s special counsel appointment more sinister than just Getting Trump. 

This is truly nasty stuff affecting all Republicans, not just President Trump. It’s the doing of a banana republic dictator of huge unprecedented and unprosecuted corruption, as indicated in the Hunter Biden laptops and witness statements, who is now on the skids because he’s lost the House and that puts an end to his far-left agenda as well as propensity to spend the country into bankruptcy.

But it’s just a continuation of a long series of failed efforts. Tristan Justice: Garland Moves To Make J6 Inquisition A Permanent Prosecution — “The timeline of Garland’s announcement three days after Trump’s announcement was surely a political calculation. As the Soviet-style Jan. 6 inquisition began to wind down on Capitol Hill with nothing to show this summer, Garland personally signed off on an unprecedented raid of a former president.” … “All Americans want — and deserve — is an attorney general who cares about the law. Garland, however, is far from it.”

“Had Garland appointed a special counsel to investigate Hunter Biden, the attorney general might have a leg to stand on. Instead, the nation’s chief law enforcement official has spent the last two years covering for the incumbent Democratic president while dispatching agents on political enemies, including parents concerned over inappropriate content presented in their children’s classrooms.

Other essays being considered include The Z Blog | Sports, Culture and Other Stuff cited by Widburg and “Hoist the Flag and Sound the Trumpet” – CDR Salamander discussing the history of the navy in foreign affairs that touches on the current U.S. military preparedness. That gets into Manushag N. Powell’s Great Courses lectures on The Real History of Pirates. Besides the international intrigue, colonial exploration, and Pinker’s thesis (above) there is the question of why it was mostly the European Western Culture that had widespread worldwide naval communications and commerce. Where are all those other ‘indigenous’ peoples on an outreach this massive? 

Fishermen and their patience with their pursuit can’t hold a candle to this fishing expedition. Sundance: I’m Impressed – Biden DOJ Assigns Special Counsel to Investigate Republicans in Congress and President Trump for Insurrection, Additionally Investigate Trump for DOJ Defined Classified Documents and Obstruction. — “Primary goal, create enough of a legal mess as to obstruct any republican legislative effort against the Biden White House” — Turley says its the obstruction claims that have the most risk as that is a constructed claim where a prosecutor’s imagination and a dedicated DC trial jury can hang their hats despite the evidence or reality. Andrea Widburg calls it Merrick Garland’s despotic decision to investigate Donald Trump. — “Given the complete absence of evidence of any wrongdoing, it’s very clear that the Democrats are terrified of Trump and that they will do anything they can to destroy his candidacy. My suspicion is that this will backfire and, instead, solidify Trump’s support.”

The special prosecutor is only one post election revealing. There are others. Matt Margolis has his list of Four Developments That Waited Until After the Midterms. Kevin Grieve’s list cites Nine recent developments that did not fit the left-wing narrative. — “Truth has never been a left-wing value.” —

There is also a lot of comment on the election and the ‘shoulda, woulda, coulda’. Process is one issue and the pandemic panic provided a cover for establishing balloting measures that assault integrity. Ranked choice voting is another means to corrupt the candidate selection process as that tends to aggravate party diversity in favor of block blind voting. The cut off the nose to spite the face routine is also a factor. Don Surber says Trump won without you, National Review. The Lincoln project is another TDS group that has suffered. But, remember Ross Perot? All up and down the ballot on the Republican side there were ideologues who insisted on going their own way and the few votes they were able to pull enabled what they most detested. Changes were made. Awareness of these issues is prompting discussion about how to tackle them. It’s back to the fishermen’s patience and perseverance,

About those white privileged dudes … Al Bienenfeld thinks Leftists are dangerously dehumanizing their political opponents. — “Two very different people but both doing something extremely dangerous, which is to dehumanize people. David Livingstone Smith has dedicated an entire book to this problem: Less Than Human: Why We Demean, Enslave, and Exterminate Others. … It requires dehumanization to liberate aggression and exclude the target from the moral community. … For the left, nothing must interfere with the dehumanization of the White non-liberal community. Once that’s done, the way is open for genocide.” — Stella Morabito says The ‘Whiteness’ Smear Is Really An Attack On Universal Values. — “Identity politics aims to humiliate ‘whites’ by constantly accusing them of their presumed ancestors’ role in things they didn’t do themselves.”

most people just want to live and let live. In general, an ordinary black person just wants what every ordinary white person wants: a place of his or her own to call home; close family; satisfying friendships; good schools for their children; good cheer; and the opportunity to explore, to discover, to build, to work, and to have a purpose in life. There’s nothing supremacist about that and certainly nothing white.

I recall a quote from a Soviet dissident who described the yearning for such freedom as a desire simply to own a little plot on which to grow one’s own tomatoes. I think that sums it up.

The differences are stark between those that want to be left alone and those who can’t stand it. Dennis Prager explains Between Left and Right, How Do You Know Which Side Isn’t Telling the Truth? — “In its suppression of scientific dissent, the American medical establishment mimics the medieval Church’s treatment of Galileo.” — Betsy McCaughey provides an example in The January 6 Committee Travesty. — “After conducting hundreds of depositions and closed-door hearings, committee staff were notified last week that most of their findings — about domestic extremist groups and about law enforcement’s failure to protect the Capitol — will be excluded from the final report.” That is why we have the Key Takeaways from the FBI Whistleblowers Report. Charles Sullivan provides a few of the salient points and provides a link for more. The central topic there is how The 2022 Mid-Terms Exposed the Existence of Two Americas and the Overwhelming Importance of the 2024 Election. Steve McCann says “Far too many, particularly the younger generations who voted overwhelmingly Democrat, dwell in mindless loyalty to a collectivist tribe, its leaders and its attendant ideology.  In their addled thinking this fidelity outweighs the well-being of themselves or the nation and its citizenry. … There is no middle ground as this nation is beset with dichotomous ideological and societal differences that are irreconcilable as one side (blue America) is hellbent on defeating and subjugating the other (red America).”

What to do? One warrior is at a decision point and Victor Davis Hanson wonders Will Trump ride off into the sunset, or play the broken hero? The answer came Tuesday. Trump’s stellar presidential announcement reminds us why we voted for him in 2016. Monica Showalter says “He didn’t get scattered, he didn’t descend into ad libs, and he didn’t attack other Republicans. … He focused on specific issues that are absolutely foremost in voters’ minds, according to polls.” What is of note at this is that the former President is being held to standards of perfection not applied to anyone else, even by those who struggle to deal with their agreement with his achievements.

“I won’t be analyzing this election too, because I already know how it’s done. I’ve seen how the sausage is made. And I know there were no real election integrity reforms between 2020 and 2022 except in Florida” — Dan Gelernter thinks This Wasn’t an Election.

“this is all up to you now. I can’t pretend that Pennsylvania actually preferred a severely disabled stroke victim to a Trump-endorsed candidate. I can’t pretend that, while incumbent presidents lose seats in the midterms, Biden is so much more popular than Obama was that he escaped a similar “shellacking.” I can’t pretend that abortion was a bigger issue for the young voters than taxes, lost jobs, inflation and war. I can’t pretend this election wasn’t stolen. But you can.

A core issue is When Election Day Lasts For A Month – Issues & Insights. — “Hard to believe that many of us grew up going to bed on election night knowing not only who won the presidential election, but who came out on top of many other races, as well. But that’s changed.” — J.B. Shurk calls it America’s Great Political Unraveling. — “What’s worse—how much of a joke America’s “elections” are or the contempt with which election officials treat voters who have the nerve to demand answers on election night?” … “How does a good American citizen work within that kind of naturally corrupt system?” — Jay Valentine describes one approach in How Wisconsin Streetfighters Disrupted a Democrat Ballot-Gathering System. — “Let us all how remember anonymous electoral streetfighters, with few resources, showed how even a little gravel tossed into the Democrats’ ballot-gathering apparatus can disrupt a frictionless system in place for 30 years.” — Nick Arama gets a big picture About the GOP Winning That Popular Vote in the House Races – RedState. — “how to explain all the polls indicating things were breaking for the Republicans, that independents were breaking for Republicans as well? Were they all wrong?” … “So that might be the way to reconcile some of the polls: inefficient vote distribution, the red areas got redder and Republicans picked up black and Latino votes, but in areas that didn’t flip races. – But some of the other things don’t make sense to me.”

What Trump labeled as sanctimonious that got the usual suspects panties in a wad was noticed by David Solway who asks DeSantis 2024? Think Again. — “It should be clear by this time that popularity has nothing to do with electability.” … “this would be the time to rally the troops and to work indefatigably, as I argued previously, toward cleaning up the Augean Stables that are now the condition of American politics.”

Trump filled rally after rally in state after state with countless, full-house, full-stadium crowds, and such numbers do not lie. There really was a red wave in the midterms, but it was macro-engineered to a trickle, as should have been expected. The scam of  “malfunctioning” voting machines, the shortage of paper ballots, the tsunami of mail-in and late ballots, the temporary closing and slow-downs of polling stations, and so on would have been sufficient to determine an electoral result. 2020 was an early run for 2022, which in turn should be regarded as a template for 2024. I am absolutely sure that the Dems are now, even as we speak, preparing favorable ground for the next presidential election. As Stalin is reputed to have said, “It’s not the people who vote that count, it’s the people who count the votes.” To make Trump responsible for Democrat malfeasance is wholly misguided.

Both climate and pandemics provide examples of intellectual corruption today as well. Viv Forbes explains why Why green energy is not green at all and John Hughes says 2022 Ivermectin Research Study Shows Modern Medical Research Can Be Propaganda, Not Science. — “Medical research is supposed to be non-biased and professional to insulate legitimate scientific inquiry from personal and financial interests.” [so is climatology] — “Ivermectin may be effective.  It may not.  The problem is that it was vilified before any scientific data could objectively and sufficiently weigh its merit.” … “The major danger is that this tactic will be repeated in the next pandemic and doctors will again be told to prescribe nothing until an expensive designer drug from the company that has provided more ad revenue to TV than any other company saves the day.”

“Just a few short year ago, protocols executed by openly biased and unprofessional doctors would have likely been dismissed as invalid due to egregious researcher bias and financial conflict of interest.  The simultaneous rise of online censorship with unprecedented influence of pharmaceutical corporations has created a new era of medicine and medical research.  It will be good for drug profits and politicians leveraging medical crises for power.  It will not be good for American patients. 

Weaponized is the term being bandied about. Outcomes are pre-determined and anything goes when it comes to rationalizing the need and the means to achieve that outcome.

The polling didn’t do so well in predicting results. Anomalies like a ‘Biden Bump’ keep cropping up. Delayed results in close races are showing up in the usual places. Equipment malfunctions seem to have a pattern, too. Mia Cathell notes that These Counties Experiencing Election Issues Have One Thing In Common. — “These five jurisdictions supposedly under in-person DOJ supervision throughout Tuesday suffered major muck-ups.” — Richard Moss has What Really Happened in the Midterms and Why – “This was their chance to bury Trump and avoid a great deal of damaging unpleasantness at very low to no real cost.”

The fear is that whenever one is dealing with the devil, or playing with fire, or even failing to do one’s level best, the risk of serious loss is much higher than the players are willing to believe going in.

Roger Kimball picks up on this as the NeverTrump Fraternity Parties On. Find fault and blame it on Trump but “Was it? Ninety-three percent of the hundreds of candidates Trump endorsed won their primary contest in the 2022 election. Eighty percent won in the general. That is a far higher percentage of wins for Trump-endorsed candidates than ever before.” Square this with the stories about some high profile Trump backed losses and Democrat campaign meddling? Then, on another front, consider Tim Graham with Democracy Dies in Climate Panic. — “The United Nations is one of the most sacred political cows in the liberal media. This is especially true when they convene the global elites on the perils of “climate change.” — The current president is apologizing for his predecessor calling the fraud in Paris. — “Journalists consider anyone who questions this my-way-or-hell viewpoint as not only a “denier” of science but an enemy of the people.”

Powerline is getting pushback on their Trump’s fault opinions, The Gateway Pundit has several election integrity stories such as Poll Pads Caught Adding *Hundreds* of Voters in Real Time as Poll is Being Closed and WAYNE ROOT: You’ve Been Gaslighted – Democrats Just Stole Another Election and Behind Closed Doors: More on Runbeck Election Services in Maricopa County and the Scanning of Ballot Envelopes and then there’s Tens of Billions of US Dollars Were Transferred to Ukraine and then Using FTX Crypto Currency the Funds Were Laundered Back to Democrats in US. Another set of opinions is looking at election wins and wondering why. Why vote for crime, infanticide, socialism, inflation, election fraud, conditional basic rights, political corr8ption, and myths about energy, disease, weather, and economy? Enough ballots were counted to support these issues to put irrationality in place as policy. Bongino and others are wondering just how much pain will be inflicted before enough people wake up to smell the odors.

Sundance says “There is a big difference between “votes” and “ballots.”  The Republicans focused on winning votes; the Democrats focused on gathering ballots.   The ballots won.” The game has changed and ‘hearts and minds’ rules no longer apply. Despite this and the propaganda efforts Lauren Boebert Wins Colorado CD-03, Also Arizona and Nevada Solid GOP Wins – Delays Are Media Anti-Trump Narrative Engineering Efforts. “The narrative engineering on the current vote/ballot outcome delays in Nevada, Arizona, Colorado (and more) are all related to the organized anti-Trump corporate media agenda.  It’s not coincidental the entire apparatus of the media and professional political establishment are trying to frame a ‘failed Trump’ narrative.” This is called looking for a convenient villain. Don Surber also notes that After the election, the truth emerges. — “I told Republicans to learn to ballot harvest. They didn’t. The rules changed and Republicans failed to adapt.”

There are many who think the pre-election propaganda was effective.Steve Rose explains Why Democrats Accuse Us of What They Do. He calls projection a tactic, a well known tactic described by top propagandists throughout history.

Of course, these accusations seem absurd to us. We fit none of their ridiculous, delusional caricatures.

But if they’re accusing us of what they’re doing themselves, this should tell us much of what we need to know.

They’re revealing a great deal about themselves.

Reparations are an attempt to buy one’s way out of dissonance stimulated by ad hominem  assaults. John Hinderaker calls one example A Terrible Idea Whose Time Has Come [Updated]. — “Britain’s “conservative” administration led by Rishi Sunak has opened the door to paying “climate reparations” to poor countries.” The thing is that it is the poor countries doing more to taint the atmosphere. At least, it appears to be a cheap play. The outcome of such thinking may not be. Luana Maroja discusses An Existential Threat to Doing Good Science. — “We each have our own woke tipping point—the moment you realize that social justice is no longer what we thought it was, but has instead morphed into an ugly authoritarianism.” … “The censors and gatekeepers simply assume—without evidence … The dangers of closing off so many avenues of inquiry is that science itself becomes an extension of ideology and is no longer an endeavor predicated on pursuing knowledge and truth.”

Don Boudreaux says Certainty is Dangerous. He is talking about ideological certitude where there is no examination of faith. The stimulus is “Ken Burns’s, Lynn Novick’s, and Sarah Botstein’s moving new documentary, The U.S. and the Holocaust.”

“Our passions are inflamed by certainty and dampened by doubts. Only when we feel certain that members of that ‘other’ group are dangerous to us do we not hesitate to imprison or kill them. Only when we feel certain that imperiled ‘others’ are not deserving of our assistance do we, without qualms, withhold help. Feelings of certainty suppress sympathy or fellow-feeling for anyone or anything not fully on board with whatever tasks we are certain must be carried out. … 

Some examples. People who are certain that global warming will soon destroy humanity unless we radically restructure our way of life by abandoning fossil fuels have no sympathy for anyone who disagrees, nor who merely points to downsides of restricting fossil-fuel use. Those who were certain that COVID was destined to kill tens of millions of people annually across the globe, until and unless governments instituted draconian lockdowns, had only contempt and scorn for those who questioned this claim or who pointed to the downsides of lockdowns. Those who are certain that today’s income inequality reflects nothing but the pure happy chance lucked into by, or the predations committed by, the rich have no patience for arguments about how the rich might have earned their wealth honestly, nor how confiscatory taxation might destroy our economy. … 

Certainty shuts the case on whatever matters the certainty enfolds. Certainty closes off further thought, conversation, and debate. Certainty demands unquestioning loyalty and the enthusiastic performance of whatever actions are prescribed by those who are certain. Certainty tolerates no dissent.

A contrast for this is Christianity where certitude exists but it is marked by examination and debate. Compare that history with The Democrats Told Us Who They Were When They Locked Us Down – Issues & Insights and the characteristics Boudreaux noted in the documentary. — “Voters should be enraged, so alarmed at the Democrats’ systemic violations of liberty that starting today they spend the next three to four election cycles throwing the bums out. Our republic is at stake.”

Robert W Malone describes the witness of James A Thorp, Board-Certified Obstetrician cries “STOP” – “Promoting SARS-CoV-2 genetic vaccination in Pregnancy is an unprecedented ethical breach” … “This is a disaster of unparalleled proportions. I have reviewed the frightening drop in birthrates in countries all over the world since the rollout of the “vaccine”. This is emphasized by An Existential Threat to Doing Good Science where Luana Maroja says “What scientists are able to teach and what research we can pursue are under attack. I know because I’m living it” … “We each have our own woke tipping point—the moment you realize that social justice is no longer what we thought it was, but has instead morphed into an ugly authoritarianism.” Authoritarianism is based on a false certitude so now we are back at the top.

The Frontpage Editors bring up “Left’s increasingly brazen miscarriages of justice” demanding to Free Catherine Engelbrecht and Gregg Phillips. “What’s really going on is an attempt to cover up what Engelbrecht and Phillips have discovered.” But they aren’t the only ones uncovering Chia access to American elections data. The LA DA has a related case on this topic. sundance reports BREAKING: Catherine Englebrecht and Gregg Phillips Released from Imprisonment by Order of Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals. This leads to John Hinderaker take on a Congressional report: Can the FBI Be Saved? — “The report is 50 pages long, but it also includes an appendix of approximately 1,000 pages consisting of letters Judiciary Committee members have written to DOJ and the FBI, requesting information that, I take it, has rarely if ever been forthcoming. The report’s contents will not be surprising to anyone who has been paying attention.” Leaks and doxing when they serve. Recalcitrance and evasion when that serves. The truth of the matter is struggling to be free.

Rajan Laad says Media propagandists become more brazen as the midterms approach. This is about Democrat and Media selective informing to maintain a narrative using the Paul Pelosi attack and then proceeding to comments by Obama, Clinton, and other examples. As Murder Rates Rise, The Left Lies And The FBI Denies – Issues & Insights takes up another gaslighting with creative statistical interpretations to place culpability for crime on Republicans. Victor Davis Hanson provides background with The Pathetic Democratic Pantheon.

The problem with the ossified Democratic Pantheon is that they are of no use to the Left in the midterms because it is their own radical ideology over the past two years that was finally enacted and wrecked the country. And all the shrieks about abortion, semi-fascists, and democracy dying cannot put back together what they shattered.

Besides the Party and the Media, there is academia.Crickets: Illinois Professor Publishes Racist Attacks Against Herschel Walker With No Outcry from the Faculty or Media – JONATHAN TURLEY. Extreme racism but “The lack of any protest or statement at the university is another example of how such controversies are handled when they involve faculty on the left as opposed to right” … “The response explains the sense of fear and intimidation for some faculty in speaking out on campuses. There is a general view that a conservative or dissenting faculty member will be given little quarter or protection in any controversy.” But what happens when reality bites? The Unforgivable Request for Shamnesty – Issues & Insights. Emily Oster’s Atlantic mea culpa is still reverberating. — “Amnesty is pretending something never happened – this episode in our history must never be forgotten if we are to preserve our nation.” There are others on this line. Pandra Selivanov says Declaring a pandemic amnesty would be like forgiving the Holocaust.

You may have seen recent headlines trying to build a Trump v DeSantis conflict and reinforce a Trump denigration meme. If you look, it appears empty. Trump did not insult Ron DeSantis, it was merely a joke by Rajan Laad provides some perspective. 

The attempt to ban a book by Justice Amy Coney Barrett hits where it hurts: Censoring in the Name of Free Speech: Publishers and Editors Call for Banning Barrett Book – JONATHAN TURLEY — “In the last ten years, censorship has become the rage from the halls of Congress to college campuses. … This crisis of faith is no more evident than in the call of writers and journalists for books to be banned or speakers to be silenced.” … “What is most striking is how these editors and publishers are insisting that they are supporting free speech by silencing others.”

“She does not deserve such attacks but these individuals are the face of rage in our society. It is a general psychosis that overwhelms every countervailing value; it allows writers and editors to oppose free speech and expect us applaud them for it.

Another form of this phenomena is from William Sullivan. The Big Lie about ‘The Big Lie’. — “Newsweek buries this particular poll’s more interesting observations. … A far more accurate way to characterize these data, though, is to recognize that there are more Americans confident that the election was rigged than there are Americans who are confident that it was all on the up and up.”

“The campaign we’ve witnessed for two years to present the former group as fringe radicals and the latter group as an incontrovertible consensus is nothing more than gaslighting on a national scale, conducted by that very same “well funded cabal of powerful people” in order to delegitimize, discourage, and destroy its political enemies.

Time to vote. Time to take notice of the deceit and dishonesty and psychosis and be very careful you don’t fall for the propaganda.

No, both sides are not the same even though both wonder how on earth the folks on the other side can think they way they do. From the left, the definitions are usually vague and arguments ad hominem. From the right it’s usually issue based and chapter and verse. The slate is full this morning. M.B. Mathews wonders The Democrats — Mass Psychosis or Pathological Lying?

Are the Democrats experiencing mass hallucinations? Mass psychoses? What is happening? Is their media bubble so air-tight that truth never gets in? How does it happen that an entire political party’s hierarchy and much of its rank-and-file cannot discern what is true from what is demonstrably false? Or is it that the Democrats know precisely what the truth is and have made the corporate decision to lie, lie, lie all the way to pathology? … When wise people are mentally ill, they get help. When a party is sick they should cleanse the wounds and get healing help from wiser heads.

The tippinsights Editorial Board says “Voters see through dishonesty” as Dems’ Untruths Worsen Ballot Box Woes. — “The same pattern continues on J6 and the risk to the Capitol, the Mar-A-Lago raid (which has taken a back seat these days), abortion, and the severe rise in urban crime. The Dems always take positions with which the average voter disagrees and say things that are fundamentally untrue.” The I & I Editorial Board wonders Could Our Politics Be Even More Childish? — “Turn on the television, listen to the radio, or take a stroll through the internet. Democrats and their media confederates are busy dishing out the nonsense in helpings large enough to choke a giant. Either they are intentionally trying to deceive, or they are extraordinarily puerile. Or both.” Victor Davis Hanson says if The Left Were the Mad Scientists, We Were Their Lab Rats. — “We are now headed for a decisive midterm election. Strangely the hard-left architects of the last two years neither offer a defense of their failing agendas, nor agree to change them.”

Then there’s the media. David Strom takes on the WaPo: hide the evidence. — “Philip Bump of the Washington Post argues that releasing the video from the Paul Pelosi break in/assault would only fuel conspiracy theories. Best to stick to the official Narrative™ so that we plebs don’t get any uppity ideas that we aren’t being told the truth.” David Zukerman is Deconstructing the New York Times anti-GOP coverage of the attack on Paul Pelosi. — “Of course, for the Times base, “good people” cannot possibly be Republicans, conservatives, or MAGA suppoters.  For The New York Times and “its ilk” anyone who does not march in lockstep with the left is, of course, a threat to democracy.”  Miranda Devine describes How the government hid the truth behind Hunter Biden’s laptop. — “The more we find out about the collusion that has been going on among the Biden administration, the security agencies and Big Tech, the more alarming it is — and the more unrepentant they are.”

And that leads to other institutional corruption. Rebecca Behrends describes The latest scheme to rig elections In Michigan. — “We need to stop allowing the Democrats to poke more holes into the attempts to keep elections fair, honest and secure.  It has become a game of whack a mole.  Get rid of one assault on security and another one pops up.” Nick Mastrangelo and Laura Elizabeth Jenkins think Government Testimony Raises More Questions Than Answers in Oathkeepers Trial — “It appears that the prosecution stringing together a broad narrative that doesn’t fit what actually happened? … Is the government trying to confuse legal conduct with criminal conduct because it is hiding something? … it is becoming more and more obvious that Judge Mehta and his cohorts in the DC District are corrupt and have no business overseeing any court proceedings.” For the medical establishment there is Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times reporting on the Medical Board Moves To Strip Dr. Peter McCullough Of Certifications | ZeroHedge. — “McCullough said he’s concerned that ABIM will “continue to cherry-pick data and claim they have ownership over the ‘truth’ when in reality we are simply discussing data from a rapidly evolving pandemic.” This is what California has put into law. too.

There is a ‘that’ to any ‘this’ and Dee Chadwell has examples in The Cart Before the Horse. “you can’t have freedom without law.  Not only that, but you can’t have law without punishment” … “rights without responsibilities … prosperity without production … comfort without the use of fossil fuels … food without farmers and we can’t have farmers without fuel … schools without discipline and without expectations … medicine without compassion … science without integrity … the benefits of trust, but we don’t much like truth … goodness without God, without Jesus Christ.” 

Brown University econ professor Emily Oster’s mea culpa in the Atlantic has been noticed in the Nuremberg trials sort of way. el gato malo calls it emily oster’s no good, really bad, terrible idea. — “when we were in the dark about covid” is not a useful excuse for bad behavior.” Neo weighs in with Emily “Litella” Oster in The Atlantic: let’s have a COVID amnesty. — “the reaction was overdone might be more inclined to forgive and forget except for one thing: naysayers to the lockdowns and all the rest, as well as the unvaccinated, were demonized unmercifully by the left.” Tyler Durden calls out “You Murderous Hypocrites”: Outrage Ensues After The Atlantic Suggests ‘Amnesty’ For Pandemic Authoritarians. — “It was not a simple matter of overreaction, there was collusion to remove all counter-information … Perhaps the mainstream media is suddenly realizing that they may have to face some payback for their covid zealotry?  “We didn’t know! We were just following orders!”  It all sounds rather familiar.” Sundance: Leftist Professor Writing for Atlantic Magazine Wants to Let Bygones be Bygones and Accept a “Pandemic Amnesty” – Sorry, Not Happening. — “For two years they shoved their intolerant fingers in our faces, destroyed lives and livelihoods, made ridiculous demands in order to sustain their own fear, threatened our children, destroyed the economy, used COVID as an excuse to destroy families and steal an election, attempted to force us to kneel at the altar of their mask wearing and never-ending vaccine crap, took our jobs if we refused their mandates… and we’re just supposed to what, forgive them?”

This has roots in a whole treasure chest of deceit and dishonesty. Michael Senger describes the action in Lockdowns: The Great Gaslighting | ZeroHedge. — “in order to see that reality is starting to dawn on the mainstream left, one must read between the lines of how their narrative on the response to Covid has evolved over the past two years.” … “The collective denial of these horrors, and the refusal of media, financial, and political elites to report on them, amounts to nothing less than the greatest act of gaslighting that we’ve seen in modern times.” There is a lot of denial. Richard McDonough describes The Democrats’ ‘election denier’ sophistry. — “one need only determine whether one is prevented, perhaps by using deceptive language and time-worn sophistical tricks, from even being permitted to discuss it. If they won’t let you discuss it then it was likely stolen.” George Shuster  has Election fraud deniers at the Wall Street Journal. — “committing serial cognitive dissonance.”

John Green says You’d Better Be Prepared for the Perfect Transportation Storm. “This is what a man-made storm convergence looks like.” This particular apocalyptic has specific concerns to worry about.  

Behavior patterns are telling. Victor Davis Hanson delves into Permissible and Impermissible Incendiary Speech? to provide an example. “As we enter the final week before the midterms and likely near-historic Democratic losses in Congress, this effort to manipulate violence in the news for last-minute political advantage will increase—but certainly it is not new.” He lists three predictable characteristics: Things Just Happen to Conservatives, Acceptable Violent Rhetoric? and Projection Again with description and example. “let us by all means tone down the political fireworks lest the nation’s unhinged translate such rhetoric to violence. But let us also remember that for many on the Left, what most see as incendiary and violent rhetoric is simply contextualized as the necessary talk of social justice.”

That’s one way to try to explain how The Press Has Officially Lost Its Grip On Reality – Issues & Insights. “hyper-partisanship hasn’t improved the public’s knowledge or understanding of events. It has destroyed the public’s trust in the media.”