Things I don’t care about enough to write a post on

The New Neo Posted on by

But you can talk about them amongst yourselves, if you like. And I suppose that this list qualifies as a post about them.

The Gates divorce.

The ins and outs of the Liz Cheney brouhaha, except for the fact that I’m in favor of ousting her from a leadership position. The other day, however, I realized that her cause had been picked up by the leftist MSM, and she is being hailed as a champion against the deplorable GOP. I learned this from the fact that a Democrat friend of mine suddenly, in a conversation that was otherwise devoid of political content, said that she was “so upset” about what was happening to Liz Cheney. I doubt this person even knew Cheney’s name until recently, but I took it as a sign as to what the MSM message du jour is these days.

Whatever Jeff Bezos has to say about child-rearing (that link is to an article that Pocket sent to me as being of special interest).

Watching or listening to Joe Biden. I certainly read a great deal about what he says and does, and I also watch a short clip now and then, but that’s it for me.

And Kamala Harris? Who’s that? Although she may move to the forefront of the public eye at some future date, right now she’s the woman who isn’t there. Which is fine with me, because I don’t want to watch or listen to her, either.

On the COVID vaccine and beyond

The New Neo Posted on by

By the time the COVID vaccine was approved for the public, I knew that I was eager to get it as soon as possible. I wanted to be able to do a host of things I hadn’t done in nearly a year, such as travel.

And just about everyone I know on both left and right seems to have felt the same, because they all have been vaccinated at this point, except children. I do know one person who can’t be vaccinated because of a medical problem, and also one who doesn’t want to be vaccinated, at least not yet.

That latter person is somewhat of an eccentric in terms of health decisions, even before COVID. She’s not quite an anti-vaxxer, but she’s very close. Her distrust of the medical establishment is vast, and it covers a lot of things that most people take for granted. Nothing about the COVID experience has increased her trust, either, which is completely understandable.

But basically, why should I care what she does, except for concern for her health? As I see it, enough people either have had the virus or are getting vaccinated that COVID will have a tough time spreading throughout the population. And if the vaccine works in the 95% range, the combination of that and the slowed spread should help tremendously in returning us back to normal.

Of course, we’ll never return to normal. There have been socio-political and economic and psychological changes in people – many of the changes being the result of purposeful government efforts on the left – that I see as permanent. None of them are positive changes, either.

Perhaps the only positive change has been a single medical one, described in this Reason article. I believe the author is a bit too optimistic, but the point he makes has some validity:

Safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines were produced far faster than any expert expected. Yet almost all of the time that it took to bring the vaccines to market was due to safety testing and other governmental mandates that could have been sped up without endangering anyone. By January 13, 2020—only two days after the Chinese researchers shared the genetic sequence of the COVID-19 virus and before most Americans had heard of the disease—the biotech company Moderna had devised the formula for its vaccine. BioNTech launched its COVID-19 vaccine program in January and had partnered with Pfizer to manufacture it by mid-March of last year. The first volunteer was injected with Moderna’s vaccine on March 16, 2020, yet it was only approved by the FDA last December 17th, a week after Pfizer’s vaccine met the agency’s approval. Had the agency been faster off the mark and used human-challenge trials and other innovative testing techniques, the vaccines could have been brought to market months earlier with no compromise in safety. That would have conceivably saved hundreds of thousands of lives globally.

Bailey stresses that mRNA vaccines represent a whole new way of fighting diseases. “It’s a platform vaccine,” he says. “If we have another microbe, virus, or bacteria, we’ll be able to quickly identify its genetics and just plug it into the particles that are the base of the vaccine and roll it out within three to four months as opposed to a year.”

If that turns out to be true, that would be a wonderful thing.

The left goes after Caitlyn Jenner

The New Neo Posted on by

When Jenner came out as a trans woman named Caitlyn, the fawning attention was overwhelming.

When Caitlyn mentioned that she’s a Republican, that dampened things a bit. In fact, Jenner at the time said that coming out as a Republican was much harder than coming out as transgender.

But she seems to have adjusted, because she’s running for California governor as a Republican, and she’s made some bold statements such as this one:

…I oppose biological boys who are trans competing in girls’ sports in school. It just isn’t fair. And we have to protect girls’ sports in our schools,”

Just a short while ago that would have been a pretty non-controversial statement. But not anymore. As trans activist Charlotte Clymer says:

Listen, every marginalized community has members that work against the equality of that community. It’s, you know, every community has that. For trans folks, Caitlyn Jenner is the Phyllis Schlafly of the trans community, that’s who she is. She has always worked against LGBTQ equality. She has always worked against our interests. And so when we saw her throw trans children under the bus and directly attack trans children in the interview, we were not surprised — this is who she is.

Whether it be black people, Hispanic people, trans people, gay people, or anyone else who is a member of one of the left’s designated victim groups, those who go against the prescribed leftist thought are labeled as traitors to their race or ethnicity or sexual identity. No freedom of thought is allowed, and the left gets to decide what the people in these groups are required to think. The groups are wholly-owned subsidiaries of the left, as it were.

This is just a variant of the old leftist “class traitor” designation:

Class traitor is a term used mostly in socialist discourse to refer to a member of the proletarian class who works directly or indirectly against their class interest, or what is against their economic benefit as opposed to that of the bourgeoisie. It applies particularly to soldiers, police officers, bounty hunters, loss prevention, workers who refuse to respect picket lines during a strike and anyone paid a wage who actively facilitates the status quo. According to Barbara Ehrenreich: “Class treason is an option at all socioeconomic levels: from the blue-collar man who becomes a security guard employed to harass striking workers, to the heirs of capitalist fortunes who become donors to left-wing causes”.

In Russia before and during the Russian Revolution, the Bolsheviks and other socialist revolutionary organizations used it to describe the Czarist Army and any working class citizen who directly opposed their notion of the “dictatorship of the proletariat”. The term was later extended to include the Menshevik Russians and other supposedly counter-revolutionary socialist organizations under Joseph Stalin.

Modern leftism has substituted race and other identity groups for class, while retaining a little bit of the class thinking as well.

But back to Jenner. Does the left really think she’s got a chance in California politics? It’s hard for me to believe it, even though it wasn’t all that long ago that celebrity Schwarzenegger was elected there as a Republican-lite. Jenner is a celebrity too, and a member of an identified victim group, so the left can’t attack her quite as full-bore as they otherwise might prefer. But attack her they must, even if she doesn’t have a chance of winning office – and that’s because her mere existence as an activist Republican threatens to shatter the idea that all people in designated wholly-owned victim groups must march in lockstep with the left.

The legislature has become obsolete

The New Neo Posted on by

Hitler got the Reichstag to effectively dissolve itself and turn its powers over to him when it passed the Enabling Act.

Nowadays in the US that’s not even necessary – just go around Congress through executive orders, and if no one can stop you, then you’ve got it made without any pesky legislative squabbling. After all, kingships are so much more efficient in their lawmaking.

This is how the practice has evolved:

It took Barack Obama seven years to go from “A president is not above the law” to “We’re not just going to be waiting for legislation … I’ve got a pen and I’ve got a phone.” Joe Biden did it in just three months. In October 2020, candidate Biden explained, “[Y]ou can’t [legislate] by executive order unless you’re a dictator.” Three months later, President Biden issued 29 executive actions within three days of taking office. Now, after 100 days, Biden has issued more than 100 executive orders, proclamations, memoranda, and other executive actions; a display of executive unilateralism that would make even President Obama blush.

Actually, it wouldn’t. Firstly, I believe Biden has Obama’s blessing on this and probably even Obama’s direction. Secondly, whatever restraint Obama initially exercised during his own presidency was the result of gauging the readiness of the American public. Obama slowly paved the way, keeping an eye on what people were ready for, and when the frog was good and boiled it was decided that the public was ready for the Biden administration’s extension of the tactic:

As of April 29, Biden had issued 41 executive orders, more than twice the number issued by either Obama (19) or Bush (11), and two-thirds more than Trump (25). Counting other unilateral executive actions, but excluding mostly symbolic actions like, say, declaring a National Agriculture Day, Biden issued 64 compared to 54, 41, and 20 for Trump, Obama, and Bush, respectively.

There are some nifty graphs and charts there which show how incredibly far ahead Biden is not only of Trump or Obama or Bush, but of most previous presidents except FDR.

Under Article II, the president’s authority to issue executive orders must come either from a power granted to him by the Constitution or by a law passed by Congress. The President can wield only the power he already has. He can’t give himself new powers, such as the legislative powers reserved to Congress in Article I of the Constitution. When the President exceeds his authority by legislating via executive action, he violates the fundamental system of checks and balances embedded in our constitutional form of government.

The temptation of unchecked executive power is strong. Even former constitutional law professors can eventually give in to the temptation of unchecked unilateral executive action, even though they know darned well they shouldn’t. Just ask President Obama, who was correct in 2010 when he said of immigration reform, “I am president, I am not king. I can’t do these things just by myself.” He was right again in March 2011 when he said, “With respect to the notion that I can just suspend deportations through executive order, that’s just not the case.” And again in May 2011, he could have been teaching a class on constitutional law when he explained “[I can’t] just bypass Congress and change the (immigration) law myself. … That’s not how a democracy works.” But the law professor lost out to the unitary executive and, in 2012, he went ahead and did it anyway. Whether or not you consider DACA to be good legislation is neither here nor there – it is legislation unlawfully handed down by the Executive Branch.

Not only is President Biden on track to seize and use more administrative power than any president since FDR, but he seems just as serious about ignoring and bypassing the legislature. A president’s first 100 days normally see him with a groundswell of support that he can use to push important legislation in Congress. But not Biden. Biden has signed only 11 bills into law during his first 100 days. By comparison, Donald Trump signed 28 by this point in his presidency.

We still have the power of the Supreme Court to act as a check on the executive branch, right? … Right?! You … might want to sit down. In addition to snubbing the Legislative Branch, President Biden fired a warning shot across the bow of the Judicial Branch with his order on April 9 establishing the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States. The purpose of the commission is obvious to those with eyes to see: to provide political cover for plans to engage in FDR-style court-packing, or else to hold the threat of such a move over the head of the Court like an Administrative Sword of Damocles.

That’s a lucid summary of some trends we’ve noted on this blog for years. Anyone who is surprised by it hasn’t been paying attention. And anyone who is pleased by it is happy with partisan far-leftist tyranny.

I’ll also add that many of Biden’s orders are unsupported by the American people and that are in stark contrast to the way he and his PR people painted him during his campaign. He was the conciliator and the moderate – something that should never have fooled anyone, but which fooled a lot of people. Even now, although he’s been the opposite of moderate, that’s still the way many people write about him, and I would guess that a lot of low information voters continue to think it’s true.

Trump’s orders were a contrast in that they were exactly what one would expect, congruent with the way he campaigned. I can’t think of any topic on which Trump fooled the American people.

[NOTE: It should be understood that in this and in all other posts of mine, the term “Biden” may either be referring to Biden himself or whatever group of aides and advisors might actually be running the show.]

Open thread 5/5/21

The New Neo Posted on by

Did you know that the song “We’ve Only Just Begun” started out in life as a bank ad for Crocker Bank? Richard Carpenter – always looking for songs he could use – noticed, and ten gazillion weddings were launched.

The older blond woman in the clip is Petula Clark, the pop singer with whom Glenn Gould had a strange fascination.

Another aspect of the 2020 election that might have affected the results

The New Neo Posted on by

Adjudication:

Retired senior DoD analyst Ray Blehar has examined an underreported election story pertaining to write-in and minor party ballots/votes. His investigation has resulted in some startling conclusions and a working theory: that Biden’s margin of victory in several key states could have been provided by shifting write-in and minor party ballots through ballot adjudication.

Hard to say, but it’s another interesting angle.

Bias: Chauvin juror Brandon Mitchell

The New Neo Posted on by

This article in the British Daily Mail is headlined, “Derek Chauvin juror LIED about protest: Cop’s hope of appeal boosted after picture emerges of juror at BLM rally wearing ‘Get Your Knee Off Our Necks’ T-shirt despite telling court he’d never been on a march.”

I have to say I assume that many jurors either either lied outright or simply were unaware of their preconceived notions or the strength of them and how that would affect their ability to be fair in Chauvin’s trial. This is always a hazard in a high-profile emotionally- and politically-laden case such as Chauvin’s. It’s one of the reasons the judge should have bent over backwards to do everything he could to minimize the risk, such as changing the venue or at the very least allowing more challenges for cause when jurors seemed to have biases.

However, even with the case of this man – Brandon Mitchell – whose photo has emerged contradicting his sworn testimony, I doubt the revelation will spark a successful appeal. Many of the same forces that worked against Chauvin’s getting a fair trial in the first place, including fear of riots, will work in any appeal because judges are hardly immune to such fears as well as politics.

From the Daily Mail article:

Questions have been raised about the impartiality of one of the 12 jurors who convicted Derek Chauvin of murder after it was revealed he attended a rally last summer where George Floyd’s relatives addressed the crowd.

A photo, posted on social media, shows Brandon Mitchell attending an August 28 event in Washington, DC, to commemorate Martin Luther King Jr’s ‘I Have a Dream’ speech during the 1963 March on Washington.

It shows Mitchell, a high school basketball coach, standing with two other men and wearing a T-shirt with a picture of King and the words, ‘GET YOUR KNEE OFF OUR NECKS’ and ‘BLM’. He is also wearing a baseball cap printed with Black Lives Matter.

Mitchell has admitted the photo is of him from that date, but defended attending the rally, claiming it was not explicitly a protest against police or a commemoration for George Floyd.

That is despite the fact that Floyd’s brother and sister, Philonise and Bridgett Floyd, and relatives of other African Americans who have been shot by police addressed the crowd that day.

Mitchell said he answered ‘no’ to two questions about demonstrations on the questionnaire sent out before jury selection.

The two questions were specifically about attending demonstrations to protest police brutality, however. So technically speaking, although this was part of the DC rally that Mitchell attended, it’s not clear that it was explicitly advertised that way. Nor does it matter, because once Mitchell had attended, he would have known or should have known because of the speakers that a prominent part of the proceedings was to protest supposed police brutality against black people. To me, the thing that implicates Mitchell the most as being biased is the “Get your knee off our necks” T-shirt. That is a specific reference to the Chauvin case, and he wore it to the rally. It is an explicit protest against the actions of police in the case and elsewhere.

The rest of the Daily Mail article is actually a quite comprehensive look at many of the sources of bias in the trial, including statements by Maxine Waters and Joe Biden.

Mitchell also had more to say:

“I mean it’s important if we wanna see some change, we wanna see some things going different, we gotta get out there, get out into these avenues, get into these rooms to try to spark some change,” [Mitchell] said. “Jury duty is one of those things. Jury duty. Voting. All of those things we gotta do.”

Now that’s obviously problematic because you’re not supposed to be sitting on a jury to “spark some change.” You’re only supposed to be deciding guilty or not guilty based solely on the facts and evidence presented in the case, nothing else.

That certainly seems like a political motive to me.

[NOTE: Another take away from Mitchell’s interview is that Dr. Tobin’s testimony – you know, the doctor who said (among other bizarre things) that he knew from watching the video the exact moment Floyd died – was highly influential as far as the jurors were concerned. I touched on some issues with Tobin’s testimony here. The jury seems to have ignored the exculpatory evidence and seized on testimony like Tobin’s to justify their pre-existing belief in Chauvin’s guilt, as well as seemingly ignoring the important issue of intent for the murder charges. Mitchell said that he thought the jury should only have taken about 20 minutes to reach a verdict. In a case as complex and as fraught with conflicting expert testimony as this one, such a contention is preposterous.]

Roger L. Simon says get off Twitter. Now.

The New Neo Posted on by

This is why (it’s premium content, so you probably won’t be able to read the whole thing, but a big chunk of it can be found here):

Twitter’s stock fell 15 percent last week apparently because they’re not getting sufficient numbers of new users to please the market. People are not as intrigued as they used to be with an allegedly open social media platform that’s not really open, in fact is something of a dictatorship…

So now is the time—there may never be a better—for all good men and women to leave Twitter—no excuses.

I know it’s hard not to promote your latest whatever, I know it’s always tempting to pronounce on Hunter’s laptop—assuming they let you—I know it’s fun to take potshots at this week’s inanity or insanity from AOC, but if you actually believe in the First Amendment, if you believe in Freedom of Speech, and if you are on Twitter, you are collaborating with and enabling people who by their actions—do I need to go through them?—don’t.

Ergo, you are a hypocrite.

That’s not so bad. Most of us are, to one degree or another. There’s a reason Diogenes spent so long looking for an honest man.

But in this case it is remarkably easy to harmonize your beliefs with your actions. As Nancy Reagan said in another context, “Just say no.”

In other words, deactivate your account. I promise you, difficult as it may seem, you will be relieved in the long run. I know I am.

More than that…you will be taking a small step toward breaking the malign Big Tech hegemony.

Agreed. I’m surprised that anyone of conservative bent is still on it.

However, come to think of it, maybe I’m not so surprised. There is a desire to have a platform for responding in a clever manner to the egregious lies and bigotry and stupidity and hypocrisy exhibited by the left on Twitter. There is a desire to put out an alternative message from the one advanced by the left and to have it be heard by those who are not already in the conservative camp. If Twitter becomes an unopposed leftist echo chamber, is that better or worse? To me it seems it might be worse.

And how much will a leave-taking by the right really hurt Twitter? I hope a lot, but perhaps there are enough people already on the left there that Twitter will survive albeit in slightly reduced form. Meanwhile, Twitter might not even lose much power, except the power to ban the right – because the right will have self-banned. I think the left goes on Twitter not to have a substantive discussion with the right but to virtue-signal and fire itself up, as well as to cancel people right and left.

I have never posted on Twitter at all. At first I didn’t even recognize that it might help me as a blogger. But even when I came to realize that it could, I hated Twitter with such a passion from the start that there was no way I was going to engage with it. It seemed to reward the superficial thought and the cruelty that is rampant these days, and although I can’t say I saw the enormity of the danger right away, I certainly saw enough danger and I found it repellent and didn’t want to be part of it.