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Saturday, August 29, 2020

Two Views Of America--And Hope

There are a lot of disturbing things happening these days, and we can't help but be immersed in them. It's the man bites dog stuff that gets covered. I've been talking about the same stuff, too, and will be doing more of that today. So, I thought I'd lead off the day on a somewhat upbeat note, by quoting Roger Kimball:


After the RNC, I am confident Trump will triumph
The Democrats own the anarchy they have unleashed and abetted
In most cases, prediction in politics is a mug’s game. ... There are just too many future unknowns that can intrude and spoil your carefully reasoned calculations. ...
Which is why I hesitate to leap from the Democratic and Republican conventions that just ended to the natural prediction that Donald Trump is likely to win in something approaching a landslide. Were the election held right now, today, I believe that he would win with a commanding margin, far beyond the margin of fraud or (as a lawyer friend likes to put it) beyond any margin of litigation. But November 3 is still some 60 days off.  And the party that brought us the Robert Mueller entertainment, the Ukrainian telephone call distraction, the party that managed to weaponize a novel virus developed by China and deploy it against President Trump, and then encourage its proxies to riot and scream that everyone (except themselves) was racist — well, such a party is essentially unaccountable. Who knows what they will do next? Lincoln’s words, quoted by  Ben Carson in his masterly speech last night, are to the point. ‘Your purpose,’ said Lincoln in 1860, ‘is that you will destroy the government, unless you be allowed to construe and enforce the Constitution as you please, on all points in dispute between you and us. You will rule or ruin in all events.’ Now as then, the opponents of the President are not engaged in politics but the sedition that follows when politics fails. 
... 
In a way, Trump’s observation that ‘Americans build their future, we don’t tear down our past’ epitomized the essential difference between Trump’s vision and that of the Democrats. As I say, political prediction is a mug’s game, and I won’t venture one now. I will say, however, that this election will be, and will be seen to be, between two sharply different ideas of America. One sees America as the sinful impediment to human flourishing whose only hope, as Joe Biden (echoing Barack Obama) put it, lies in being ‘fundamentally transformed’. The other holds up the country as a land of hope and opportunity, ‘the last best hope of earth’ (Lincoln one final time). My sense is that an overwhelming majority of people prefer the latter to the former, especially as the Democrats have been courteous enough to demonstrate what ‘fundamental transformation’ is likely to look like on the streets of Portland, Chicago, Minneapolis, Kenosha, DC, St Louis and elsewhere across the country. The Democrats own the anarchy they have unleashed and abetted. People almost never embrace anarchy. Ergo, Donald Trump is likely to win. I offer that not as a prediction, merely a confidence.

Commentators have described what's going on using slightly different words, but the thrust is basically the same--the Dems and their Antifa/BLM proxies are trying to hold America hostage, to extort America: Give us total power or else--as Rand Paul put it the other night--America will become Portland.

Kamala Harris has been quite explicit about that, in a video clip I picked up from Kamala puts a gun to our heads:



They own it, but the American people have it within their ability to disown them.

16 comments:

  1. If the police don't stop this nonsense, private citizen groups will unite to do it for them IMHO. Everyone's patience is wearing thin.

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    1. B - I keep saying: this is how you get vigilante justice.

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    2. Why is it vigilante justice per se? Maybe we need a discussion of what distinguishes a citizen defending his life and property from a mob and a vigilante. We may be too quick to use the term, vigilante, which assuredly carries (and is meant to carry) a pejorative effect.

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  2. Kimball’s essay is excellent. This one is worth a read, too. The Dems’ negativity, their mendacity and malice, and their desire for control was on full display. The contrast between the upbeat RNC convention and the meanspiritedness of the DNC was dramatic.

    From David Marcus at The Federalist:

    https://thefederalist.com/2020/08/28/why-this-ex-never-trumper-wants-four-more-years/

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    1. More anecdotal confirmation of the truth: Nobody knows anyone who voted for Trump in 2016 and is switching to Biden this year, but there are plenty switching TO Trump.

      Read Don Surber today.

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  3. Beijing Biden's handlers promise to order their BLM/Antifa army to stand down, but only if their hapless, confuzzled trojan puppet is elected.

    Sounds legit.

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    1. There's a bridge in Brooklyn they'll throw into the bargain, too. But I don't think they really have any control at this point. They're not the ones paying for it.

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  4. "They're not the ones paying for it."
    I can't help ask, if you feel at liberty to say, who you think is paying?

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    1. For starters, aNan, July 20 announcement:

      Tides welcomes Black Lives Matter as a new partner.

      Tides Foundation has launched the Black Lives Matter Support Fund, which will support BLM’s grantmaking activities. This unique partnership will further amplify the extraordinary, unparalleled successes of BLM’s chapter-led, decentralized organizational model, while also allowing BLM to build the necessary infrastructure for sustainability.

      BLM formalized its relationship with Tides Foundation, after BLM’s prior fiscal sponsor, Thousand Currents, made the strategic decision to sunset fiscal sponsorships in order to focus on its core grantmaking work. BLM is creating impactful, historic social change, not only in the U.S. but throughout the world, and Tides is proud to be their partner.

      More here:
      https://www.tides.org/our-community/partnerships/tides-welcomes-black-lives-matter/

      Tides is a favorite of Teresa Heinz Kerry. And Thousand Currents’ board includes Susan Rosenberg, convicted terrorist member of the Weather Underground.

      You can bet Soros is in there, too.

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    2. NYT headline July 13, 2020:

      George Soros’s Foundation Pours $220 Million Into Racial Equality Push
      Mr. Soros’s group will invest $150 million in grants for Black-led racial justice groups, and another $70 million toward local grants for criminal justice reform and civic engagement opportunities.


      https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/13/us/politics/george-soros-racial-justice-organizations.html

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    3. And it gets scarier. From the NYT article on Soros linked above:

      Between the local grants and the millions for Black-led organizations, however, Mr. Soros and his foundation have helped answer the question of whether the social justice groups that have dominated the current moment are here to stay.

      Alexander Soros, who serves alongside his father as the deputy chair of Open Society, said in a statement that the new investment was a response to a time “for urgent and bold action.”

      “These investments will empower proven leaders in the Black community to reimagine policing, end mass incarceration and eliminate the barriers to opportunity that have been the source of inequity for too long,” he said.


      So it won’t necessarily be over when the Old Boy pushes off...

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    4. Unless such monsters have *major* cover from (allies of) the DS, Barr shouldn't have that much trouble nailing them.

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    5. Listening to Alexander, we hear “investments”…. We’ve heard that before. From Barack Obama. His expression. Interesting.

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    6. "Civic engagement opportunities".

      Savor that one.

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  5. IMO the state elections need to ramp up and leverage this energy and grab hold of the momentum. Those running for Congress especially but almost as important are the State assemblies, Governors and local elections. Take these messages being shared and use them for their advantage quickly and pound their Democrat opponents.

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