Posted on

Techie Lefties

California’s hard left lurch is a matter of much discussion.  As a side-bar but related matter, there exists tech’s similarly hard left climate of opinion, much of it originated and housed in the state.  Tech’s leftist orientation was made glaringly obvious in a Stanford Graduate Business School study of December 2017.*  Next question: Does tech’s hard left lurch correspond to California’s transformation into a hard left bastion?

I’ll start off by saying, I don’t know. Correlation ain’t causation.
There’s no doubt, though, that tech is an overbearing piece of California’s fiscal and economic puzzle.  Has its prevailing ideological bearings bled into the state’s political bloodstream?  A connection can only be intimated, not necessarily proven.

The Stanford study makes clear that an incoherent blend of self-interest and lefty tropes blanket Silicon Valley and its offshoots like a thick layer of smog.  Techies overwhelmingly, almost militantly, stand four-square with the cultural left in the culture war. LGBTQ everything, multiculturalism, racial/ethnic/gender victimology, environmentalism, gun control, unrestrained abortion, a rejection of traditional institutions, open borders – the usual stuff of the left-wing orthodoxy – feature prominently.

All the while, techies don’t like anybody telling them what to do, especially the government.  Yet, government isn’t treated like Christianity, something for the unenlightened and hide-bound rubes.  While they don’t like regulation, they seem to be fully on-board with government-directed redistribution.  Is the inconsistency an attempt to paper over their guilt about their riches?  Could be.

Somehow their brains allow them to harbor “no government” alongside “lots of government”.  All the isms and assaults on traditional institutions, and the Robin Hood regime, mandates a whole lotta government.  I suppose that they want government to make everybody else live and believe like them.  At heart, then, this is Stalinism.

Some have attributed this motley collection of beliefs to the hippies of yore as there appears to be a line of mental and lifestyle, if not genealogical, descent.  The hippies were a mess, though.  Their hedonism and gross naivete about human nature gave us STD’s, a drug epidemic, and a new generation of Democratic Party activists.  Have the techies taken over where the hippies left off? Quite possibly.

The hippies of yore (1960’s).

Now we have the techie industry taking root throughout the country, and with it, implanting its mental smog and lifestyle.  In that sense, California is the future – a dystopian one.

RogerG

* The sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/06/technology/silicon-valley-politics.html?fbclid=IwAR1kVh0oXukXJxvSR8XO88SJAqIHZRmZj8OzRrb5-ERZQrU-q6qvUnjn630

https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/faculty-research/working-papers/political-behavior-wealthy-americans-evidence-technology?fbclid=IwAR0n0px25Vc_mdi-m5CueF8EchRsFmS7jA6ZoNs3xh72LkKZStRHjJIC5eU

 

Posted on

Viva la Gilets Jaunes!

Californians in November meekly went to the polls to shoot down an attempt to lower their gas taxes.  Over the recent number of days, rural and blue-collar French hit the streets of Paris to riot against a 5% increase in taxes on gasoline prices already exceeding $6/gal.  The contrast is striking (no pun intended).

Why the outburst in Paris?  The citizens in the countryside and the blue-collar middle class are tired of shouldering the burden of the climate-change fixations of their urban and wealthier “betters”.  “Climate change” is more than a scientific matter.  It’s code for the fixers in the nomenklatura/academy alliance, buttressed by the upscale elect and their fashionable beliefs, to manipulate the lives of those not so privileged.

So, we get with the French a replay of 1789; while in California, docility.  Interesting.  Will the meek inherit the earth, or will it be adult firmness?  My bet is on “meekness” till it becomes unbearable.

Viva la gilets jaunes (yellow vests)! But put a hold on the violence.

RogerG

Posted on

What Its Like to be a Real Man

Watch Vice President Mike Pence’s eulogy for President George H.W. Bush.  He says it far better than I could write it.

Compare the senior Bush with those presidents that came after him.  Bill Clinton was, and ultimately remained, a frat boy with a lefty tinge at Bush’s age but George was flying an Avenger torpedo bomber and being shot at by the Japanese (downed twice).

A young George Bush, center, with Joe Reichert, left, and Leo Nadeau during World War II. (Robert B. Stinnett/National Archives)
George HW Bush is rescued by USS Finback, Sept. 2, 1944. (Credit: PHOTOSHOT)

His son, George W., went into the Air National Guard.  Then we have Barack Obama who at the same age went to Occidental and later Columbia to major in poli sci, smoke some pot, and dabble in socialist glamfests (for instance, the Socialist Scholars Conference), all in preparation for a life as a lefty agitator.  Finally, we have our current and petulant twitter-in-chief, Donald Trump.  He inherited daddy’s wealth and spent the rest of his life as a celebrity developer at the same time as many of his peers were risking their lives in jungles across the Pacific, as the elder Bush did in WWII.

Barack Obama in college. Occidental or Columbia? (Getty images)

Some have placed the moniker of “wimp” on the elder Bush.  Such labeling is evidence of how present clichés insult the past.  George H.W. Bush came from a time when a calming tone of voice and a code of decency were signs of good upbringing.  How could he be a “wimp” when he was the youngest Navy aviator, survivor of two splashdowns, and still persisted in being launched from a carrier till the war ended (50+ launches)?  We are so shallow today that voice and propriety can be used against you.

We could have done so much worse as we did with 3 of the 4 (maybe 4 of 4 depending on your rankings) that came after him.  I salute you, President George H.W. Bush.

RogerG

Posted on

Another Puff Piece Within the Society of Progressive Mutual Admirers

The “Society” in the title refers to a loose body of people and organizations who have similar backgrounds and enough of a common orthodoxy to distinguish as an identifiable social element, like, for instance, Protestants. In this case, it’s the background identifiers of degreed/middle-to-upper-class/urban/seemingly-professional and progressive/left in their philosophical orthodoxy. The “Puff Piece” in the title is the all-too-familiar journalistic softball interview with overtones of saccharine flattery that’s reserved for prominent people in the news who confirm the Society’s biases.

Case in point: “Seeking a Safe, Green Colombia” in National Geographic Magazine of January 2018 about Colombia’s ex-president, Juan Manuel Santos. He gets the treatment because he’s said to be about “peace” and he chants the clerisy’s doctrines on “climate change”. He knows the lingo and says all the right things. Thus, he’s beatified. Look at the magazine’s saintly photo from the article.

Saint Juan Santos

The “peace” part of his beatification has to do with his cramming down the throats of Colombians a detested agreement with FARC, the narco-terrorist organization. When put on the ballot, Colombians rejected it despite the weight of the world coming down on them to approve it. So, Santos got around those pesky voters with a jam-down in the legislature.

And what of the agreement? First off, Colombians hate FARC. Next, the settlement gave amnesty to murderers, bribed the killers to stop the killing and mayhem, and rewarded them with seats in parliament. For millions of FARC’s victims, what’s not to like?

Victims of FARC protest in Colombia during the peace talks with FARC.

And for that, the guy wins the Nobel Peace Prize. But what really earns his elevation to sainthood is his expressed worship of the clerisy’s iconography of “climate change” with statements like “… we are destroying Mother Earth”. For the Society’s parishioners, that’ll do it.

No such treatment was accorded the previous president, Alvaro Uribe, the winner of the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2009. But he doesn’t sing the Society’s doctrines and he opposed the terrorist cave-in. What a flawed world we live in.

Ex-Colombian President Alvaro Uribe receiving the Presidential Medal of Freedom from Pres. George W. Bush in 2009.

RogerG

Posted on

Millennials With Another Black Eye?

I know, I know, it’s faulty thinking to draw grand conclusions about an entire generation on a sample of one or a few individuals. For millennials, they’ve been given a bad rap for a host of alleged sins. Yet, a certain type is beginning to recur among them in my explorations of news and information: the ill-informed college-educated in positions of societal influence. A classic example of the phenomena appeared yesterday in an interview of Luke Zaleski by Hugh Hewitt.

Luke Zaleski with son.
Hugh Hewitt in his broadcast studio.

Zaleski seems to be in his mid-to-late 30s, a U. of Delaware graduate in Philosophy, and is currently Legal Affairs Editor for Condé Nast publications. He exhibits much of the hyper-progressivism of the deeply-entrenched left in today’s media, replete with a dislike for Trump and Republicans, an embrace of identity politics, and rampant victimology. And its all wrapped in a thin verneer of knowledge and understanding.

For example, here’s Zaleski on Hewitt’s lack of “diversity” in the previous day’s guests – Mike Lupica (sports writer), Sen. Tom Cotton (R, Arkansas), and Sen. John Cornyn (R, Texas):
“I feel like the sports world … would benefit from having more people of color and women … prominent in the conversations.” The diversity schtick on parade, eh? As for Cotton and Cornyn, he says, “… these guys are kind of the enemies of progress”.

Zelaski on his level of understanding of history as it relates to today’s issues and climate of opinion:
Hewitt asked him, “…was Alger Hiss a communist spy?” Zaleski dodged the question by mentioning Wikipedia and “I’m not a historian. I’m not an expert. I’m not interested in conspiracy theories. I’m not interested in debating Alger Hiss”. Mmmmm.

Another example of more recent history, Hewitt asked him, “Have you read The Looming Tower?” The quick and short of it, No! Since he didn’t mention any other book on the rise of international terrorism, I can assume he doesn’t read in depth, particularly on that topic.

Zaleski’s unfamiliarity with the principal characters involved in Iran’s export of its brand of Islamic extremism was evident when Hewitt asked him, “What is your opinion of Qasem Soleimani?” Zaleski’s answer: “I’m not familiar with that person.”

Remember that this guy, Zaleski, is an editor in a major media organization (look up Condé Nast).

Zaleski showed profound ignorance of nuclear weapons. Hewitt asked him, “So which part of the nuclear triad needs fixing the most?” Zaleski jumped to an unresponsive generality, “I’d like to see global denuclearization.” Related questions about our weapons systems were similarly met with befuddlement.

As a “Legal Affairs Editor”, one would think Zaleski has some legal training or even a law degree. Well, no. His background is as a “fact checker” for 20 years. Since “legal” is his beat, you’d think that he would be aware of the Supreme Court’s recent 8-0 smackdown of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for its abuse of the Endangered Species Act. But no.

I could present more on the interview but I think that you get the idea. A modern college education does not, ipso facto, dispel ignorance, let alone promote wisdom.

RogerG

Here’s the link to the transcripts of the interview:   http://www.hughhewitt.com/luke-zaleski-legal-affairs-editor-at-conde-nash-former-director-of-research-at-gq/?fbclid=IwAR3Scthy-2tCxV5gKtPCKq5A79eMp-FkG7mK5R0n7UrtrbZSDqtqBEhiq3A

 

Posted on

One Final Thought: The Perfect False Allegation

Christine Blasey-Ford testifying on Sept.27.

This is my planned (emphasis on “planned”) final thought on the Kavanaugh fracas since Justice Kavanaugh is now safely on the Court. The Blasey-Ford story was truly the perfect false allegation. She weaved a tale without a place and time, leaving aside the complete lack of witnesses. Thus, how could it be refuted? Any statement missing these details cannot be empirically examined. A defense based on alibis is almost impossible. It’s the perfect charge for igniting the mob for a political lynching.

Blasey-Ford’s tale should be treated no different from a clearly proven false allegation, with the exception of fitting a new pair of handcuffs on the perjurer. The story can’t elicit any action by anyone with adult reasoning, and needs to be handled with discretion and not in a public forum under the glare of partisan predators and their street mob. If it were otherwise, we’re back to political vengeance meted out by the Paris mob of the French Revolution.

A Parisian mob storms the Hotel de Ville in 1789.
Deja vu all over again.

Sad that the Democratic Party has become the leading advocate of mob rule.

I plan no further comments, barring the elevation of Jerry Nadler (D, NY) to the chairmanship of the House Judiciary Committee. He promises impeachment-mania to satisfy the bloodlust of the lefty street mobs.

RogerG

Posted on

The Wrong Question

Illustration showing a woman executed by hanging, for the practice of witchcraft, 1692. Published in ‘A Pictorial History of the United States’, 1845. (Photo by Interim Archives/Getty Images)

In the Salem Witch Trials of the 1690’s, the judge admitted “spectral evidence” (dreams and visions) into court, something criticized by Cotton Mather. The boosters for the Kavanaugh accusers are demanding the return of “spectral evidence” when they demand the accusers’ stories be accepted despite the evidence, lack thereof, or counter-evidence. They circumvent simple reason with the wrong question: Why would she (the accuser) lie? The proper question is, Did she lie?

Blasey-Ford testifying before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sept. 27, 2018.

The “why” query solely relies upon a window into the accuser’s mind – the “spectral evidence” of 1692 Salem. Rather, the latter question moves us in a fact-based direction, even though the matter still may have no quick and easy resolution.

Did Blasey-Ford lie? I don’t know. That requires some evidence of intent. Though, it must be admitted that her testimony was riddled with an absence of critical facts and the presence of probable untruths. Her role in the saga is increasingly looking like a willing participant in a smear campaign. Her story isn’t aging well.

As for the others (Ramirez, Swetnick), their’s are fictions that belong in the “lie” category. The scorecard: 2 lies and 1 highly questionable tale.

RogerG

*Thanks to Kevin D. Williamson for raising the topic.

Posted on

A Preferred-Gender Exemption to the Rules of Decency

The new lynch mob: Senate Judiciary Committee member Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., joined by from left, Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., and Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas.

Decency requires much more from an accuser than a ballistic and life-changing charge against another person. Try proof. Instead, we are getting a claim of preference for a person with the preferred genitalia. Lacking any evidence – and as the evidence mounts contradicting the veracity of the accusers – we are asked to jettison the requirement of simple proof and accept the story solely based on the gender of the accuser and nothing else – indeed, in spite of everything else. In the meantime, the accused’s life and name are left hanging in the balance for all time.

Making perjury acceptable? Christine Blasey-Ford, Deborah Ramirez, Julie Swetnick (l-r).

Please, don’t come to the defense of Blasey-Ford’s unsupported story by citing other unsupported stories. That’s just lining up the attention-seeking partisans willing to take one for the partisan team. Their stories are dissolving like salt in boiling water.

Blasey-Ford’s story is taken as “compelling” only because she performed in a sincere manner. It’s a performance-based judgment. If you support her, I hope that you don’t face an accuser who only performs well.

Well, her whole story is teetering like a drunk after the Super Bowl. The fear of flying, ha! (See the transcripts – see my previous post for the reference) The second door installed in her house due to claustrophobia, ha! (See the contractor’s notes) The unfamiliarity with polygraph tests, ha! (Her ex-boyfriend’s letter) The claim of supportive witnesses, ha! (3 denials and 1 “can’t remember”) The claim of ignorance about the Judiciary Committee’s willingness to come to her, ha! (Grassley submitted 4 documents asking to interview her in California)

All she’s got is her performance before the committee … and the zealousness of the looney-Left and their blue-bubble followers in the media. Maybe that’s the crux of the matter. Stories like this can only gain traction among people who lack self-awareness of their social isolation in the Malibu-SF and Acela corridors.

The lefty smear-merchants of today are actually making a case for the white female accuser of Emmett Till back in 1955. He was falsely accused and murdered. Always believe the woman, right? I only present the picture below to drive home the consequences of gender-based “justice”. It ain’t pretty.

Emmett Till’s mother, Emmett Till, Till’s open-casket funeral photo.

RogerG

Posted on

How to Create a Furor Out of … NOTHING!

Christine Blasey-Ford as she appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sept. 27, 2018.

In their perpetual-motion fabrication of accusations against Kavanaugh, stories stripped of even elementary proof are enlisted in defamation for partisan political purposes. The one labeled “compelling” – Blasey-Ford’s (B-F) – is no more credible than the other Bigfoot-type sightings.

In an effort to legitimize the illegitimate, B-F’s press advocates – meaning most of the press – parrot her best friend’s lawyers in denying their client’s denial of knowing Kavanaugh and the infamous party. Got it?

Yeah, her bff (Leland Ingham Keyser) didn’t contradict B-F; she just wouldn’t confirm the story, nor could she since she wasn’t there and doesn’t know Kavanaugh, according to bff Keyser. Come to think of it, for investigatory purposes, bff clearly contradicts B-F’s tale.

Leland Ingham Keyser (l) and Christine Blasey-Ford.

Judge for yourself. Bff Keyser’s lawyer, speaking for his client, said, “Simply put, Ms. Keyser does not know Mr. Kavanaugh and she has no recollection of ever being at a party or gathering where he was present, with, or without, Dr. Ford.” Simply put, how does that sound to you (besides too many b’s and f’s)?

Oh, but bff Keyser believes B-F … but won’t confirm. I think that we’ve entered one of Dali’s surreal paintings.

At Thursday’s kangaroo court, when confronted with her bff’s non-confirmation [translation: “denial”], B-F answered with a loopy, cobbled-together non-response. Judge for yourself:

* Rachel Mitchell, special counsel for the Senate Judiciary Committee, reminded B-F of the denials of the 4 people mentioned in her written account, including bff Keyser.

* B-F’s response: “Leland has significant health challenges, and I’m happy that she’s focusing on herself and getting the health treatment that she needs, and she let me know that she needed her lawyer to take care of this for her, and she texted me right afterward with an apology and good wishes, and et cetera. So I’m glad that she’s taking care of herself.”

Go ahead, parse that. Bottom line: B-F’s story is one that won’t add up. The best-friend-forever doesn’t appear willing to commit perjury, but the Dem goon squad on the committee and the lefty hive are at the ready to swarm.

This isn’t the stuff that makes for “compelling”. It is good enough for demagoguery.

Read the hearing transcript here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/…/kavanaugh-hearing-transc…/…

RogerG

Posted on

Have You No Decency, Sirs and Madames

Joseph Nye Welch, general counsel for the US Army, at the McCarthy Hearings, June 9, 1954.

I can think of no better response to the shameful display of Democrats at the Kavanaugh hearings than the one given by Joseph Nye Welch, general counsel of the US Army, to Sen. Joseph McCarthy in 1954: “Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency? Senator.”

No, few Dems in the US Senate have any sense of decency. Following the Lenin/Alinski playbook of the ends always justifying the means, they have championed baseless charges against Kavanaugh. Their goal is to stop the nomination at all costs, even if it means destroying people’s lives.

Blasey-Ford isn’t any help. Still, she can find no one to validate her story other than her personal feelings. Others mentioned in her story deny it. That’s not validation, Christine; it’s therapy.

If anyone thinks that there is any credibility to these wild claims, that person should stay away from the Kool-Aid punch bowl being served at MSNBC. In summary, there is no corroboration for any of it. And if there is no corroboration, there’s no there there. The whole thing is reminiscent of the child sex-abuse hysteria of the 80’s and 90’s and false accusations of campus rape by Mattress Girl, and those directed at a UV fraternity and the Duke lacrosse team. All won $$$$ in settlements for false charges and slander.

The Dems are playing the more-investigation card. Cut the crap. Translation: delay the nomination … forever. Their modus operandi involves making a baseless allegation no matter how wild, call for an investigation by anyone and everyone, gin up more baseless allegations, ad infinitum, till the Republicans or the nominee withdraws the nomination.

The problem for the more-investigations crowd: there’s no limiting principle. Easily conjured and baseless charges can be cooked up at any moment. There’s no end to it, particularly if you’re a conservative and Republican.

These claims would not be the stuff of investigation by a detective division or DA for long. There’s no corroboration and plenty of counter evidence. A statement would be taken and then the person would be shown the door. End of story. And that’s how real justice works.

Make no bones about it. From the gitgo, this is an attempt to prevent the president from exercising his Article II duty. And no concession is to be made for honor and decency.

Don’t conflate the Merrick Garland case with Kavanaugh. Garland’s nomination was treated according to the Biden Rule: no SC nomination approvals during a presidential election year. Sen. Biden (D, Delaware) stated it; the Republicans were faithful to it.

Shame on you, Democrats!

RogerG