Colorado “justices”: we had to destroy democracy …

The New Neo Posted on by

… in order to save it.

The quips practically write themselves. But of course it’s not the least bit funny.

That’s the first of a series of tweets from Turley on the subject. The rest go like this:

This ends a string of losses for advocates of this dangerous novel theory. They finally found a court that would embrace what the court admits is a case of “first impression.” My first impression remains that same. The court is dead wrong in my view…

…It is striking that the court relies on Schenck v. U.S., where the Court upheld the denial of core free speech rights of a socialist opposing a war. The opinion of the Colorado Supreme Court is so sweeping that it would allow for tit-for-tat removals of candidates from ballots …

…The opinion is remarkable in how the four justices adopted the most sweeping interpretations to get over each barrier. The result is lack of a limiting principle. I view the opinion as strikingly anti-democratic in what it now allows states to do in blue and red states alike.

If you go to “X” and read some of the replies to Turley’s tweets, you’ll see that there are quite a few that take this form: “I don’t like Trump, but this is wrong.” One actual example: “I don’t want Trump anywhere near the presidency, but this is not the way to do it.” If such tweets are for real – and I tend to think they are – there are many people who don’t support Trump but who understand that this tactic of the left, and this action by the Colorado court, is extremely dangerous and should be opposed by all.

Here’s a roundup of GOP reactions (and also RFK Jr.), mainly outraged. And the Colorado GOP has plans:

The Colorado Republican Party said it would start using a caucus system rather than participating in a primary election if the state supreme court’s decision banning former President Donald Trump from the primary ballot remains in place.

What’s the Democrat game plan here? After all, Colorado has been a blue state in presidential elections for about two decades and I very much doubt Trump has any chance of winning there in the general anyway. Unless the Democrats know something I don’t know about that, what’s the point of this move of the Colorado judiciary? Is it to force SCOTUS to rule on this? That may be seen as a win/win situation. Either SCOTUS rules that Colorado can do this (win) or it rules against the state but Democrats get to continue to trash the Court and to use the supposedly way-too-conservative Court as a campaign issue (win?).

But along the way they risk having moderates – even Trump-hating moderates – turn against them. They seem not to care about that, perhaps because the left (at least in Colorado) feels very secure in its ability to stay in power indefinitely, now that it has the reins.

The left’s rhetoric – which we’ve seen in evidence time and again in recent months and even years – is this: If Trump is re-elected he will destroy democracy and therefore all is permitted in order to stop him. How many people actually believe that? Plenty. Propaganda works.

I suppose it’s time for this clip again, but the problem – as I already indicated – is that the left doesn’t think the “devil” will ever “turn ’round” on them:

Someone is giving Nikki Haley a lot of money

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve noticed for a while that Haley is being very heavily advertised on YouTube.

And a short while after I wrote the above sentence as a draft for a post, I saw this article that seems to provide the source:

The Koch network-backed super PAC endorsing presidential candidate Nikki Haley is reportedly set to spend $70 million in a bid to get her a “strong showing” in Iowa behind GOP frontrunner Donald Trump.

The large chunk of change indicates that the Charles Koch-funded Americans for Prosperity Action hopes Haley has enough fuel to surge past 2024 rival Ron DeSantis and is not recruiting Trump supporters, Bloomberg reported.

I guess I missed the official announcement a few weeks ago that the Koch group had endorsed Haley as a Trump alternative. But I sure have noticed the result: the ads.

But I still wonder, why Haley? I know the Koch group doesn’t like Trump, and Haley is less conservative than DeSantis, but do they really think she can gain the nomination? The idea that they are positioning her as Trump’s VP candidate doesn’t make a whole lot of sense, either. Perhaps they’re counting on Trump being in prison by November of 2024, and they want her positioned in second place to take over?

Caroline Glick on what’s going on between the Biden administration and Israel

The New Neo Posted on by

Much of this we knew already. I’ve long said that the Biden administration has to walk a tightrope of appearing to support Israel while also placating the large Israel-hating Democrat left flank and chastising Israel and blocking many of its efforts and/or threatening to do so. Glick discusses all that, and adds many depressing details:

And while you’re at it, I recommend this video on NGOs and their help for Hamas and other terrorist groups:

Texas passes border law: will it stand?

The New Neo Posted on by

Here’s the gist of the state law:

Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed a bill making Texas the first state in the union to give law enforcement officers the authority to arrest migrants who illegally enter the state. …

Senate Bill 4 from Special Session #4 makes illegal entry into Texas from a foreign country a criminal offense. The law is the latest attempt by the state to crack down on migrants illegally entering the state between ports of entry. By creating the offense of illegal reentry, offenders can be penalized with sentences of up to 20 years in prison. It also provides the mechanism to order an offender to return to the foreign nation from which they entered or attempted to enter this state. The law provides civil immunity and indemnification for local and state government officials, employees, and contractors for lawsuits resulting from enforcing these provisions.

The law is similar to a current federal statute under Title 8 of the United States Code 1325, which makes illegal entry into the United States a misdemeanor offense for a first-time offender and a felony for a second offense. Under the current administration, the federal statute is not pursued to any significant degree.

I’m not sure this law will be allowed to stand. SCOTUS has already ruled on something very similar regarding the state of Arizona, back in 2012. And although the makeup of the Supreme Court was different back then, there’s always the possibility of respect given to precedent. To refresh your memory, here’s a post I wrote about that Arizona decision. An excerpt:

The Court’s decision in Arizona v. US can be summarized as follows: the federal government is boss in immigration law. If the federal government wants to ignore its own federal immigration laws and refuse to enforce them, a state can’t pass its own laws that are more stringent than the federal ones on the books.

And from Scotusblog:

Although federal law already makes it illegal for someone to be in the country without proper authorization, Section 3 of the Arizona statute also makes it a state crime, subject to additional fines and possible imprisonment. The Court held that this provision was preempted and cannot be enforced. The Court held that Congress has left no room for states to regulate in this field, even to implement the federal prohibition.

However, you can see – if you follow that link – that the conservative justices dissented. To me that means that the decision of SCOTUS could go differently this time, if the Texas law were to be challenged by the Biden administration.

In their own words: an example of how Hamas embeds in hospitals

The New Neo Posted on by

It’s a war crime to take hostages. It’s a war crime to hide them in hospitals. It’s a war crime to conduct military operations and/or terrorist operations from a hospital. Hamas does this regularly, the world knows it, and the world – except for just a few countries – doesn’t care, or actually approves:

In addition, you’ve probably seen many videos or read many articles in which Palestinian doctors or nurses talk about the number and nature of casualties. Although there is no question there are indeed Palestinian civilian casualties, you cannot trust a single word the Palestinian doctors or nurses say as Hamas operatives or sympathizers, . We simply don’t know how many civilian casualties there are – and virtually all of them are the fault of Hamas purposely using the population of Gaza as human shields.

We have known this for decades. And yet the fiction goes on that it’s not happening, and no amount of evidence convinces many – most? – pro-Palestinians otherwise.

Fetterman 2.0 continues to go his own way

The New Neo Posted on by

And Fetterman’s own way is not the way the Democrats expected:

Isn’t this, though, a throwback to the days when Democrats wanted to protect American workers?

The abysmal ignorance of the young voter in the US

The New Neo Posted on by

Yesterday I wrote a post about some of the shocking results among respondents ages 18-24 in the recent Harvard Harris poll. But I missed a few viewpoints that group expressed in the poll that are especially revealing. See this chart and pay particular attention to the last three items on the list:

The ignorance involved in believing that “Israel is not a democracy” is bad enough, but it palls in comparison to “Hamas lets gay people live together openly.” Almost half of young people live in a fantasyland in which they believe that is so. The disconnect from reality is tremendously profound – and remember, these people are of voting age. They are not children. They are our future.

Will time and greater maturity change them? I’m not at all sure that will hold true for the most part for this group or its successors. Social media has become a powerful force in people’s lives and particularly for younger generations, and that is a huge part of the problem – along with our educational system, of course.

The young have gone way way off course: poll

The New Neo Posted on by

Very disturbing:

Here’s a link to the entire poll.

The opinions expressed by the younger generation reflect the fact that the young have been increasingly indoctrinated in post-modern Marxist theory of oppression uber alles. The figures are astonishing, and the contrast with the elderly is enormous. In this poll, you can see in stark relief the transformation of American thought. Nice work, Obama! Hope and change! Not that he’s solely to blame by any means. This started long before he became president.

Other results of interest:

According to the poll, the majority of Americans also think that Trump committed crimes for which he should be convicted: 59% (on page 21).

DeSantis is the strongest second choice to Trump for the GOP nomination, 31% to Haley’s 20% (on page 22). And surprisingly, at least to me, Kamala Harris is the strongest substitute for Biden at 28%, with Newsom at 7% (on page 23).

Two-thirds of voters think the GOP should hold up aid to Ukraine and Israel for a secure border (on page 38).

On page 46, 27% of respondents think the October 7 attack was justified by Palestinian grievances. And that’s where we have another awful linear progression of age-related opinions, because 60% of those between 18 and 24 said it was justified by Palestinian grievances. Say what you will about Boomers, above age 65 the figure agreeing with that was only 9%. But what is odd – at least, I think it’s odd – is that the answers on whether Hamas’ attack was genocidal are different, although the trend is the same. In that same age group of young 18s-24s, 66% think the attack was genocidal on Hamas’ part. Does that mean they think genocide against Jews is justified? Apparently.

Or they have no idea what Hamas is, or much of anything else. Probably the case. Indoctrination feeds on ignorance, and is helped along by social media.

We are in big big trouble with these generations. But of course you already knew that.

There’s plenty more in that poll that’s interesting as well. Most respondents hate identity politics on campus, anti-Semitism, and think the three university presidents who testified before Congress should resign. Again, the young are at odds with the rest of the country. For example, 79% of the youngest age group supports “There is an ideology that white people are oppressors and nonwhite people and people of certain groups have been oppressed and as a result should be favored today at universities and for employment. Do you support or oppose this ideology?” although 65% total oppose. 67% of the 18-24 crowd think Jews (not Israelis – Jews) are oppressors although 73% as a whole oppose. Is this because “Jews” are defined as “white”? And yet (on page 57) 65% of that 18-24 age group think Israel has a right to exist. What? Maybe they think it has a right to exist as a Palestinian state?

On page 64 you can see that 81% of respondents think that Hamas should not be allowed to run Gaza, and even among that 18-24 age group, 58% agree that Hamas should not be running Gaza. Among the over 65, however, it’s 95%. And on page 66, the question of whether Israel has a right to defend itself is asked, and 80% of that young group says yes. This is also typical of other groups, although a little lower than the over 55 and over 65 groups.. What gives? On page 67, 62% of those 18-24 seem aware that Hamas uses civilians as human shields, but on page 68 that same youngest group is evenly divided about who is provoking a humanitarian crisis in Gaza.

On page 69, 51% of those 18-24 say that Israel should be ended and given to the Palestinians; how that is supposed to be accomplished isn’t touched on. Perhaps that answers my earlier question, though, about the young approving of genocide if the ones being killed are Israelis or Jews. Only 4% of over 65 agree that Israel should be handed over to the wonderful and deserving Palestinians.

Decades of leftist and anti-Israel, as well as anti-Jew, indoctrination in our educational system have borne poisonous fruit. I’m not at all sure you’d have gotten higher figures of Jew-hatred from polls of college students in Nazi Germany.

Qatar and the Empire State Building

The New Neo Posted on by

Wow. Just wow.

This:

The iconic New York landmark announced on X Sunday: “Tonight from midnight until sunrise, we will shine in burgundy and white to celebrate Qatar National Day.” Back in 2016, Qatar shelled out $622 million to buy 9.9 percent of the Empire State Building, and so if the building’s managers wants to honor one their principal shareholders, that’s their business. The timing in this case, however, is particularly ghastly, and raises questions about the propriety of having not-quite-friendly states owning a piece of American landmarks.

Qatar is a supposed ally – but one which supports Hamas monetarily and provides its leaders safe haven.