Two are killed in Kenosha, 17-year-old arrested

The New Neo Posted on by

[See UPDATE below.]

The story so far:

lllinois police have arrested a 17-year-old after two people were shot to death during another night of Black Lives Matter protests in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

Kyle Rittenhouse, of Antioch, Illinois, was taken into custody Wednesday in Illinois on suspicion of first-degree intentional homicide…

Two victims in the shooting, a 26-year-old Silver Lake resident and a 36-year-old Kenosha resident, died following the shooting.

A 26-year-old West Allis resident suffered non-life-threatening injuries.

Police said their investigation is ongoing. They do not know if both of the people killed were killed by the same person.

Video footage may indicate a self-defense situation for the second killing, but even if that’s the case, I’m not sure that Rittenhouse wouldn’t be charged with murder anyway. That’s the way things have been going these days. Here’s one description of the video:

Cellphone video circulated on social media showing a young, White male running down the street with a long gun, as he was chased by demonstrators from behind. He fell to the ground, and someone tried to grab his weapon and came at him with a fly-kick. The individual then opened fire in the middle of the street, and screams could be heard from the frantic crowd.

As usual, this is just a fragment of what occurred. I’m waiting for more information and for the fog to clear before I give an opinion on what may have actually happened and why.

As usual with these things, the British Daily Mail has more information than the American papers. It’s not always correct, but in the past I’ve generally found the British source to be more reliable as well. Here’s what it’s adding at the moment:

–The arrest of the teen came hours after video emerged of him walking up to police with his hands in the air and his rifle slung across his body just moments after the shooting
–He was apparently allowed to walk by despite members of the crowd yelling for him to be arrested because he had shot people, according to witness accounts and video footage
–Footage from earlier in the night appeared to show the teen guarding a local car shop with a group of armed militia members
–Another video showed police thanking an armed group, of which the teenager appeared to be part of, and offered them water…

Much of Rittenhouse’s Facebook page is devoted to praising law enforcement, with references to Blue Lives Matter – the movement that supports police. He also can be seen holding an assault rifle in several photos…

Witness accounts and video show that the shootings took place in two stages: The gunman first shot someone at a car lot, then jogged away, stumbled and fell in the street, and opened fire again as members of the crowd closed in him.

Police apparently then let the young man walk past them with a rifle over his shoulder with his hands in the air.

…As for why the gunman was allowed to leave, Sheriff David Beth on Wednesday portrayed a chaotic, high-stress scene, with screaming, chanting, nonstop radio raffic and ‘people running all over the place’ – conditions that can cause ‘tunnel vision’ among law officers.

Rittenhouse [was] identified in court papers as a lifeguard at a YMCA in Lindenhurst, Illinois…

It is not yet clear what happened in the lead up to the initial shooting but police fear it may have stemmed from a conflict at a gas station between ‘self-styled militias’ defending local businesses from looters…

So we have very little idea about the first shooting; the second seems to have been the result of a chain of events in reaction to the first. I’m surprised that more of this sort of thing hasn’t happened already. The situation is a powder keg that has been allowed to become extremely dangerous. I note, also, that many of the witnesses or victims (plus Rittenhouse himself) mentioned or quoted in the article do not appear to live in Kenosha. If this is typical, it’s as I suspected.

[ADDENDUM: From some of the comments in a thread at RedState:

…[A]pparently there were two separate shootings by this guy – one when he’s first confronted in the dealership parking lot and another after he’d run a ways into the street. The second one appears clearly to be self defense, the first one is ambiguous from the video and will require more evidence -e.g. additional video, testimony from eye witnesses, etc.

…[in] the first shooting in the parking lot he’s already been running away from a pursuer before turning and firing shots after the pursuer throws something at him. That also seems like a pretty strong case of self-defense, though not quite as strong as the shooting a few seconds later of people actually attacking him lying on the ground.

It’s two separate incidents. [Rittenhouse] killed the first guy after [the first guy] threw the Molotov cocktails at him. The other two were shot during his retreat running down the street. One of those died as well.]

UPDATE:
Here’s an analysis at RedState by shipwreckedcrew. It concerns both shootings. An excerpt:

As is almost always the case, the “hot takes,” which hit Twitter in the first minutes after an incident such as this, are almost always wrong…

The first fact you see from the video is that the shooter was chased by the person he shot, and as they passed through the parking lot of the boarded-up gas station, the “victim” threw something at the shooter. There are reports that the item thrown was an unlit “Molotov Cocktail,” but you can’t know for sure from the video.

It seems like the shooter points the rifle at the “victim” at that point but does not fire. He instead turns to run again, and the “victim” continues to chase him. At that point, you hear the gunfire start, but you can’t see what happens. You hear a single shot, then four shots in rapid succession followed by three more shots in rapid succession. It seems like there is only one firearm, but I can’t be certain from the audio.

[There] is a video that supposedly shows the car lot being vandalized a few moments before the first shooting incident…

The shooter was apparently attempting to protect this business, and the “victim” was one of the individuals in this group damaging cars. I have seen Twitter comments claiming that the “victim” and others were preparing to start lighting some of the cars on fire when the shooter stepped in to intervene. What happened during that initial intervention is not recorded on video anywhere that I have found, but that confrontation ended with the “victim” chasing the shooter out of the car lot and down the street. That is where the YouTube video at the top first captures the two, leading directly to the first shooting in the gas station parking lot where the “victim” was killed.

The nature of that first confrontation in the parking lot is important to the overall event. If the shooter was threatened with violence, and then chased down the street to the gas station, he very likely has a strong case for self-defense. The “victim” is the aggressor, and the nature of their initial confrontation will establish the extent to which the shooter can claim he feared serious injury or death if he had not defended himself in the way he did. The actions of the “victim” in the car lot will also be significant. If there is video of him engaging in violent acts of vandalism that the shooter observed, the case for self-defense improves as well.

Again, under Wisconsin law, the shooter had not committed any illegal act by being present on the streets of Kenosha carrying a loaded long-gun…

As for the second shooting episode, the shooter is clearly attempting to get away from the people who are pursuing him. Who all those people were will be difficult to establish with certainty, but there are numerous videos with audio that captured what they were yelling.

This is the video that has been most widely circulated…

There seems to be little question about whether the shooter had anything to fear from those pursuing him. One individual managed to catch up to him and appears to try to hit him in the back of the head with some object. He evades that person and continues to run down the street, but then seems to stumble and fall. You can clearly hear someone yell, “Get his ass” at that point. The shooter gets himself into a seated position facing back at the people pursing him. The closest pursuer manages to run over the top of him, with both of them going down, but the shooter maintaining possession of his long gun. At that point, at least three different pursuers closed in on him from three different directions — all closing to within approximately 10 feet of him. A second individual attempts to grab the long-gun away from the shooter, but he still has the shoulder strap around his body.

It is hard to tell from the video, but it seems like the second individual is shot as a result of the long-gun discharging while they both have their hands on it, with the muzzle pointed at the second individual. He “runs” only a couple steps before he goes down in the street, and he does not move again during the remainder of the video while he is in the frame of the camera.

The shooter fires a few more shots as the people who were pursuing him all scatter in different directions.

There’s much more at the link. Shipwreckedcrew is a lawyer who’s quite knowledgeable about these things. I suggest you read the whole thing.

A few more thoughts on the RNC so far

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve said many times that I don’t like political speeches. But so far I’ve listened to a lot more of this year’s RNC than usual, and that’s a surprise to me.

One reason – probably the main reason – I’m watching it is that I’m enjoying the speeches of the non-politicians. For the most part, they’re eloquent, and their stories are actually interesting – more interesting than most speeches by politicians. They also speak with the conviction of sincerity.

Another reason I’m watching more than I expected is that I like the message. It’s a refreshing throwback to a time when both parties talked about America as a great place of opportunity and energy. Everyone knew that there was suffering here, too, as well as injustice. But we were striving and we were trying and for the most part we were actually getting it right.

Note my emphasis on the word “both” in the above paragraph. Yes, those of you who aren’t “of a certain age” like me may not realize that a message like that was the norm for many years. But it was, and no one questioned it. That’s what the word “again” is about in Trump’s campaign slogan.

Joe Biden can speak of himself as a lightbringer and curse the Republican darkness, and the MSM can echo the message, but I think that anyone actually watching the RNC with an open mind would have to see that Biden and company have the polarities reversed.

Fentanyl and George Floyd

The New Neo Posted on by

The fact that it’s highly likely that George Floyd died of a fentanyl overdose is old news. A lot of us put two and two together quite some time ago – in particular, the levels of fentanyl and other drugs in Floyd’s system, as well as the police videocam transcript and video – and have concluded the most likely cause of death was not the actions of the Minneapolis police.

Now, nearly three months after Floyd’s death, we get this news as part of the court filings connected with the defense of one of the police officers charged:

New exhibits filed in the George Floyd case against four former Minneapolis police officers suggest that the Hennepin County Medical Examiner found a “fatal level” of fentanyl in Floyd’s system…

Upon reviewing the blood test, it was incidentally noted in a Microsoft Teams meeting that this level of fentanyl can cause pulmonary edema as Floyd’s lungs were reportedly two-to-three times their normal weight during autopsy.

“[Baker, the county head medical examiner] said that if Mr. Floyd had been found dead in his home (or anywhere else) and there were no other contributing factors he would conclude that it was an overdose death,” the June memo read.

And then there’s this:

New exhibits filed in the case against the four former Minneapolis Police Officers accused of murdering George Floyd suggest the Hennepin County Medical Examiner thought George Floyd’s fentanyl levels were at a potentially “fatal level”, but his and other medical examiner’s findings showed he died of a combination of factors.

Six pieces of evidence were filed in the case Tuesday one day after former officer Tou Thao’s attorneys requested the release of the full autopsy reports from the Hennepin County Medical Examiner, the Armed Forces Medical Examiner and the private medical examiners hired by George Floyd’s family.

The Armed Forces Medical Examiner filed a memorandum agreeing with the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s final conclusion that Floyd’s death was a homicide, saying, “His death was caused by the police subdual and restraint in the setting of severe hypertensive atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, and methamphetamine and fentanyl intoxication.”

As a friend of mine used to say, clear as mud. Meaning: that’s not coming to a conclusion, that’s just listing every single possible factor. “In the setting of…” might mean the precipitation of a heart attack from fear. It doesn’t seem to mean asphyxiation. And if the fentanyl dose was a fatal one, wouldn’t that be the most likely cause?

It’s the same circles we’ve been running around in since the beginning. And the press has been singularly unhelpful in getting at the truth, as usual. But that’s by design. They aim to inflame rather than to soothe or to seek the truth.

Some on the left plead for the rioters to stop…

The New Neo Posted on by

…because it seems to be helping Trump.

Can’t have that.

At a certain point, it may become clear even to some people who would otherwise vote for Democrats that it’s not in their best interests to vote for people whose immediate goal is to hurt Trump and who filter every single action through that motive and who therefore will not protect their constituents from violence.

It may also be becoming clear that, if Democrats are successful in this election, they have even more nefarious plans for the American people.

At the moment, what we’re seeing in the polls is this:

Buoyed by blacks and independent voters, as well as urban dwellers shocked by the Black Lives Matter protest violence raging in some cities, President Trump’s approval rating has hit a new high, according to a survey heavy with minority voters.

The latest Zogby Analytics poll just shared with Secrets had Trump’s approval at 52%. “The president has recorded his best job approval rating on record,” said pollster Jonathan Zogby.

What’s more, his approval rating among minorities was solid and, in the case of African Americans, shockingly high. Zogby said 36% of blacks approve of the president, as do 37% of Hispanics and 35% of Asians.

“Shockingly high” at 36%? I would call that rather low under the circumstances. But as we know, a mind is a difficult thing to change.

I don’t know whether the polls reflect a change that will last and will translate into votes in November, or not. But I do know it’s a totally foreseeable change. So why didn’t Democrats foresee it? I think it’s for a number of reasons, among them:

(1) They are used to causing and/or exacerbating crises and blaming the results on the right. Many times – as with certain budget crises – this tactic has been successful.
(2) They are used to having the press promote their favored story with vigor. and cover for them.
(3) They rely heavily on minority voters, and so they felt they needed to support groups such as BLM. Once the violence got bad, if they called on the feds for help, they feared it would make Trump look like a hero. So they waited it out, and so far that’s also made Trump look good because he’s offering help and they’re refusing it.

The RNC, night two

The New Neo Posted on by

A few observations –

(1) This night seems to be designed to highlight the idea of America as that old-fashioned thing, a great land of opportunity. It used to be a message given by both parties. But no more.

(2) I was very impressed with the presentation about Jon Ponder.

(3) Nicholas Sandmann – the Covington kid – spoke at the RNC and I caught his speech. He’s only eighteen now, and I find it hard to imagine going through what Sandmann has gone through at such a young age. It’s the sort of thing that either breaks you or makes you stronger. Luckily, Sandmann seems to be in the latter group. Not long after he started speaking, I suddenly had the thought: He’s going to end his speech by putting a red MAGA hat on and saying “Make America Great Again!” And sure enough, that’s what he did.

(4) Tiffany Trump has a surprisingly mellifluous voice. A lot of young women these days sound like a cross between a Valley Girl and an electric coffee grinder.

Who is rioting in Kenosha, Wisconsin?

The New Neo Posted on by

I’ve seen precious little serious discussion of that question.

Kenosha is a small city of about 100,000 people, about 10% of whom are black. In the videos I’ve seen so far of what’s going on in Kenosha, many of the rioters are white and young – very young, actually – particularly the ones doing the smashing and the burning. Are they from the town? Somehow I doubt it for many of them, although I’ve seen nothing illuminating that subject. Are they Antifa or are they BLM, or is there any distinction anymore? Apparently they’ve been chanting BLM slogans, for what that’s worth.

I am skeptical of the idea that this is some sort of grassroots uprising of Kenosha residents, at least for the most part. I could be proven wrong, of course. But I think these are the type of well-organized and roving anarchist-leftist groups that have apparently been forming for years in many areas around the country.

I doubt these are the same exact people rioting in Seattle and Portland, however. Both cities are huge centers of leftism and Portland in particular has been Antifa’s US headquarters for years. But they are far away from Wisconsin.

I think it more likely that there are cells of these groups in various sections of the country, ready to go at a moment’s notice to the place in that area where a police shooting has taken place, so they can get there rather fast. I notice, looking at the map, that for example Kenosha is a five and a half hour drive from Minneapolis (where George Floyd was killed) and only an hour and fifteen minutes from Chicago, where there was recent destruction of a very similar kind that’s happening in Kenosha. So groups from Chicago could arrive in Kenosha at almost a moment’s notice. It is also near Madison, a leftist city that is the headquarters of the university and that probably has plenty of young people to spare.

As I wrote yesterday, we simply don’t have enough information yet to understand what actually happened between Jacob Blake and the police, and whether his shooting was justified or not. Not that that stops the MSM, the governor of Wisconsin, or most celebrities and sports figures from opining and condemning the police.

I’m going to be writing a later post on that topic of what we know about the shooting. But I’d like to keep this post to the simple question I asked in its title: who is rioting in Kenosha? If you can direct me to any reliable links that discuss that question, please do so in the comments. I think it’s an important one to answer – not that the MSM is going to do so. They would like to preserve and promote what I believe is the fiction that this is entirely or mostly local dissatisfaction, and that each local riot is sparked by the shooting that has happened in that place. Although there’s probably some of that, I believe that the shootings are actually just the excuses. And if the facts don’t justify the outrage, they’ll twist the facts or invent them, and hide the facts that support the possibility of a justified police killing.

The police used to be called “the thin blue line” because of “the belief that law enforcement is a thin blue line between society and chaos.” Well, if we ever needed a demonstration of that, we’ve had it during the last two and a half months. But anarchists and leftists want chaos. It is their goal, in order to destroy the current order and install – well, never mind what.

Utopia, no doubt.

But what better way to get chaos than to make it impossible for the police to do their job? And in today’s climate, the forces of anarchy have the cooperation – at least, in blue states and cities – of the civic leaders who are elected and tasked with helping to keep order and protect citizens.

The Republican National Convention, Day 1

The New Neo Posted on by

I did watch a little bit of it after all, because it actually held my interest more than usual. One of the things about which I was curious was how the low-energy situation of an almost-empty hall would be handled, and I was surprised to see that they did about as well as could be expected under the circumstances – so well, apparently, that C-SPAN ratings were six times a high as for a similar night of the DNC (the general ratings aren’t in yet).

Here’s a selection of videos of the best speeches:

Herschel Walker – I saw this one last night, and it was both impressive and effective. They should make portions of it into a campaign ad.

Maximo Alvarez.

Andrew Pollack. His speech is especially important because it references the “restorative justice” policy that helped facilitate the Parkland killings. In a way, “restorative justice” is what Biden and the Democrats want to institute around the country for other offenders.

Kim Klacik:

There were plenty more. The basic theme was upbeat about Trump’s accomplishment and his plans, and in particular about America. But the MSM has its marching orders, and that’s to frame the message as “dark.” See this, this, this, this, and this, to take just a few example out of many.

The MSM isn’t even pretending to be unbiased anymore – at least, not in a way that could fool anyone other than a three-year-old child (and perhaps that’s unfair to three-year-old children). In addition, although they aren’t explicit about it, they are echoing the main theme of Biden’s acceptance speech at the DNC, in which Biden contrasted himself as the force of light with Trump as the force of darkness, a la the early Star Wars:

Give people light and they will find a way.

Give people light.
Those are words for our time.
The current president has cloaked America in darkness for much too long. Too much anger. Too much fear. Too much division…

I will be an ally of the light not of the darkness…

America’s history tells us that it has been in our darkest moments that we’ve made our greatest progress. That we’ve found the light. And in this dark moment, I believe we are poised to make great progress again. That we can find the light once more…

Light is more powerful than dark.
This is our moment.
This is our mission.
May history be able to say that the end of this chapter of American darkness began here tonight as love and hope and light joined in the battle for the soul of the nation.

Biden’s speech was the usual Orwellian inversion of the truth in which the left specializes.

I’ve never felt that speeches move voters very much. But for any undecided voter who might watch these two conventions, I’m pretty sure the RNC speeches would win out in terms of optimism and hope. And the Trump administration has the added advantage of having accomplished many things worth bragging about, as well.

I hope the positive energy continues and goes forward into the election. And there’d better be a lot of it, because they’ll need it to overcome mail-in voting and the opportunities it presents for fraud.

Now it’s Kenosha, Wisconsin: the recipe is phone video plus social media plus mob plus MSM plus rush-to-judgment governor

The New Neo Posted on by

Kenosha, Wisconsin is a small city of about 100,000 people and a population that is ten percent black. Not your typical big blue urban environment. But last night it shared some big blue urban problems, because after the shooting (he’s still alive, however) of a black man by white police, parts of the city were burned by a mob.

The damage appears to have been done by only a couple hundred people. But a couple hundred people can do a lot of damage if they believe they won’t pay many penalties, and if they are encouraged by groups like BLM and Antifa and the rhetoric of so many public and political figures as well as the MSM.

It’s the toxic brew of the left.

The story this time is a familiar one, although (and this is also typical) we know only a small part of the story [emphasis mine]:

The unrest stemmed from an incident in which police shot a man in the 2800 block of 40th Street sometime after 5:11 p.m. Sunday, the encounter partially captured in a video that showed an officer firing several shots at close range into the man’s back.

Wisconsin officials identified the shooting victim as Jacob Blake, a Black man. He was in serious condition at Froedtert Hospital in Milwaukee as of early Monday…

David Ferguson of Racine rode his bicycle to the scene of the damage.

“I can’t believe this is in Kenosha. This is unreal,” he said.

He said police across the country are again and again treating white suspects with more respect than Black suspects.

“People are upset. It just keeps happening,” he said, surveying the damage.

He was horrified at the circumstances of the Kenosha shooting, with Blake’s children in the car.

“There’s got to be another way to resolve these issues. I mean, this is an epidemic,” Ferguson said.

In the aftermath of the shooting Sunday night, large crowds soon gathered at the scene of the shooting. A livestream from podcaster Koerri Elijah showed small fires in the street and a person, possibly an officer, lying prone on the ground, surrounded by officers.

You can see how successful the BLM narrative has been, that innocent black men are being wantonly killed by police. Statistics indicate its falsehood, but that doesn’t matter to those who would spread the word, the better to foment trouble.

Most of the headlines I’ve seen so far emphasize the “shot in the back” element. If you read the description of the incident, however, you discover this:

According to Wisconsin Circuit Court Access online records, a Jacob S. Blake, same age and with an address in the same block where the shooting occurred, had a warrant issued for him on July 7 on pending accusations of misdemeanor criminal trespass to a dwelling with domestic abuse as a modifier; felony third-degree sexual assault with domestic abuse as a modifier; and misdemeanor disorderly conduct with domestic abuse as a modifier. A support action was dismissed, and the only other case that comes up is for not having a driver’s license.

A 2015 story in Racine Eye described how “Racine police say K9 Dozer had to help officers take a man into custody when the man refused to go quietly into custody after he pulled a gun at a local bar.” The man was described as Jacob Blake, 24, of Racine, which makes him the same age as the man shot by police on August 23. The Racine Eye story said he was charged with “one felony count of resisting arrest causing a soft tissue injury to a police officer and one misdemeanor count each of carrying a concealed weapon, carrying a firearm while intoxicated, endangering safety-use of a dangerous weapon, and disorderly conduct.” Those charges don’t show up on the circuit court website though.

That story further alleged, “Blake and two women were at the Brass Monkey tavern, 1436 Junction Avenue, Saturday when Blake got into an argument with another patron and pulled a black handgun. Blake pointed the gun at the other man, and the magazine fell to the floor. The bartender told Blake to leave, and he did but then pointed the gun through the window at patrons inside the bar before walking south on Junction Avenue.”

Police stopped Blake in a “high risk traffic stop” but he “exited the SUV and started walking toward officers and ignored commands to get down on the ground,” the story said. That’s when officers forced him to the ground and used a K9 when he kept resisting, the story added.

Is this the same Jacob Blake? I would say probably, although we don’t know for sure. And we know next to nothing about the circumstances of the shooting other than the short and incomplete video. The police have said very little. We don’t even know whether they were wearing videocams. The video we do have is very short and gives no context. The police were called to the scene of a domestic dispute, which is the sort of situation that can be highly volatile. A relative and/or neighbor said that Blake was trying to settle the dispute, but whether that’s true or not is totally unknown.

And Tony Evers, the Democrat governor of Wisconsin, wasted no time in saying this [emphasis mine]:

Jacob Blake was shot in the back multiple times, in broad daylight, in Kenosha. Kathy and I join his family, friends and neighbors in hoping earnestly that he will not succumb to his injuries. While we do not have all the details yet, what we know for certain is he is not the first Black man or person to have been shot or injured or mercilessly killed at the hands of individuals in law enforcement in our state or in our country.

We stand with all those who have and continue to demand justice, equality and accountability for Black lives in our country — lives like those of George Floyd, of Breonna Taylor, Tony Robinson, Denise Hamilton, Earnest Lacy, and Sylville Smith. And we stand against excessive use of force and immediate escalation when engaging with Black Wisconsinites.

At this point we don’t know what actually happened between the police and Jacobs and I’d wager that Evers doesn’t know much more than we do. It’s certainly possible that Jacobs was shot unnecessarily and wrongly – and especially dangerously, considering there were young children in the car. Was there any alternative, such as tasering for example? Was there some reason that was not done instead? Looking at this article, I can see one good possibility:

From a practical perspective, police officers need to be within a relative mid-range, as far as 15 and 25 feet, in order to use a Taser. But if a subject is too close, then a Taser wouldn’t be effective either.

What transpired before the shooting? What had the police said, and what had he responded? Was he about to be arrested when he reached into the car? It’s also possible that Jacob wasn’t reaching for a weapon, although it’s certainly possible that he was. We may never know, because if he survives – and even if there turns out to have been a weapon in the car – he will almost certainly deny that was his intent.

Shooting someone in the back is sometimes the only way police can defend themselves if in fact they have reason to believe that a person is reaching for a weapon – if they wait, it can be too late. That’s one of the most intense and difficult dilemmas involved in policing: the necessity of making a split-second decision that can cost the police officers their own lives or involve them in wrongly taking the life of an innocent person.

As for Evers’ words that I highlighted there, of course black people are sometimes shot or killed at the hands of police officers in Wisconsin and elsewhere. For that matter, so are white people, but Evers isn’t going to be talking about that. Nor is he talking about the black and white officers who are killed at the hands of perpetrators, both black and white. Police work is dangerous. And not following the orders of police when stopped is dangerous.

And what of this adverb Evers uses: “mercilessly”? How inflammatory. But that’s part of the game that’s being played.

Is it really so stupid to wear masks in the car while alone?

The New Neo Posted on by

People often state that they think it’s especially ridiculous when they see people driving their cars, all alone, and wearing their masks. And on the face of it (ha!) it would indeed seem to be. After all, who’s the driver protecting?

But I think there’s a simple explanation in many cases, and it’s not mass stupidity. Or, maybe I’d just like to believe it’s not mass stupidity. But I think a lot of them are probably just going from errand to errand, on fairly short trips. After all, longer road trips are somewhat curtailed these days.

So on short trips there’s an argument for not taking your mask off in the car. After all, you’d have to handle it each time (perhaps after touching things and interacting with people in stores), find a clean place in the car to put it, and then handle it again to put it on for the next store. If you have a comfortable mask and are just driving a short hop, why bother?

As for walking or jogging alone in a park or on a beach and wearing a mask – you might be alone at a certain moment, but someone can come close to you, and again you’d then have to put the mask on again, off and on, off and on, with no good place to put it in-between and handling it every single time. And if you don’t wear the mask and someone walks along a path and comes close to you, that person might reprimand you. So I think many people might just elect to keep the mask on to avoid the hassle.

I don’t wear a mask when outside at all, unless I’m visiting someone who has asked me to. Almost every day, I do a fast walk outside for nearly an hour, without a mask. But it’s not on a narrow path. I haven’t yet encountered any SJWs, at least not any vocal ones who give me a tongue-lashing about it. I do wear a mask in stores (it’s required for the most part), and I take it off in the car because I hate wearing it. But I think I understand why someone else might have good reasons to keep it on.

[ADDENDUM: In response to some comments in the thread, I want to add that we don’t have to wear masks while outside in order to avoid giving offense. That’s our decision, to do it or not to do it. I don’t do it.

And you may think that those who give into it and do wear masks under circumstances such as jogging or bicycling in order to avoid a hassle are cowardly. But I don’t think they are stupid. There is a logical reason for it.

As far as how long the COVID-induced madness will last, I think a long time, unfortunately. I think if a vaccine comes along the majority of people will abandon it, but some will persist. And I think many young children in particular will be permanently harmed by the idea that the world is such a dangerous place and they must avoid contact with others in order to be safe.]

The Republican “Convention” starts

The New Neo Posted on by

Neither of this year’s conventions are the least bit conventional, as political conventions go. But the Republican one promises to be somewhat more conventional than the Democratic one was, a low bar to be sure.

It’s already started, and Trump is actually in attendance in his usual 3-dimensional physical form:

“I felt an obligation to be here,” Trump said. “You have a governor who’s in a total shutdown mood. I guarantee on Nov. 4, it’ll open up.”

The president claimed Democratic governors “love shut down until after the election is over, because they want to make our numbers look as bad as possible for the economy.”

Trump and his fellow Republicans have been expected to aggressively counterattack the Democrats and their presidential nominee at this week’s GOP convention, a four-day affair that is expected to make the case it is Trump and not Biden who can revive the pandemic-battered U.S. economy.

Republicans POUNCE!

In addition to Trump, there will be 336 state delegates in attendance.

There are some potentially interesting speakers scheduled. To name just a few (the whole list is at this link): South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem, the widow of retired police officer David Dorn, Baltimore Republican candidate Kim Klacik whose video went viral, Nicholas Sandmann (somewhat more grown up), and plenty of others. I don’t usually watch these things, but I’ll read about it and probably see some clips. And you?

Raissa Struchkova: lightness and air

The New Neo Posted on by

You won’t see anyone dancing in this style today. You may be glad of that, because it’s somewhat old-fashioned and mannered. But I love Struchkova, just love her. Her dancing is the essence of three things: lightness, charm, and speed. How she manages to look weightless as she moves I really don’t know.

I don’t speak any Russian so I don’t understand the narration in the film I’m about to link, but there are some fine examples of Struchkova dancing in her prime during the 1940s and 1950s. Unfortunately, playback is disabled except on YouTube, but if you click on the video and watch from 7:35 to 8:00, and then again from 9:00 to 10:08, I think you’ll consider it well worth the click.