The Senate and the Republic

Senator Jeff Merkley (D, OR) has said the quiet part aloud (to coin a phrase). His immediate venue is the coming Progressive-Democrat effort to Federalize our nation’s elections, which by our Constitution are set by each State’s own legislatures and only modifiable under narrow circumstances by the Federal Congress.

You can think of January as a moment when two different forces are converging. One is the functionality of the Senate and the other is the functionality of our republic.

No, these are not different “forces” at all. The functionality of our republic depends on our Federal Senate remaining the bipartisan body that it was designed to be. In the present case, that requires the Senate’s filibuster function to remain as it is, which enforces the Senate’s bipartisan nature.

It gets worse, though:

[Progressive-]Democrats have called passing new elections legislation their priority, arguing that minority voters need protections from new state rules.

This is Party being openly, loudly and proudly racist. There are no minority voters or “other” voters or non-minority voters. There are only American voters. As a man said not so long ago,

There is not a Black America and a White America and Latino America and Asian America—there’s the United States of America.

Even if that man turned out actually to not believe his words, the concept he pretended to espouse is true, nonetheless.

But, then, this is just another aspect of the Progressive-Democrats’ drive to fundamentally change America. The next year, and the two years after that, are going to be very dangerous times for our Republic.

Child Abuse

Now the New Orleans government is requiring children as young as five years old to get vaccinated, whether they need it or not, whether their parents want it for their children or not.

Mayor LaToya Cantrell said she is implementing the policy “to keep the omicron variant at bay,” amid surging cases in Orleans Parish.

And

“The vaccine mandate will expand to include children ages 5-11,” she said. “We will require proof of vaccination or negative tests at bars and restaurants and other locations for everyone ages 5 and older.”

(I’m not aware that patrons as young as five years are allowed in New Orleans bars, but that’s another story.)

And, she orders:

Starting in January, you MUST ensure that your children are getting vaccinated!

This too closely approaches child abuse. There is virtually no risk to children—or from them to others—from the Wuhan Virus, especially from the mildest of all the variants, Omicron. It’s also true that the risk of dangerous side effects from the vaccines against the virus seems very small.

However.

We have more than two years of empirical data from a sample size that is the population of children on Earth with which to assess the level of risk to children from a Wuhan Virus infection. We have a much smaller set of data, collected over a much shorter period of time, with which to assess any risk to children of serious side effect from any of the virus vaccines.

Stipulate, though, that the vaccines’ serious side effect risk really is quite small. The comparison of interest is not whether the vaccines have an absolute level of risk in isolation of other factors or risks. The proper comparison is the level of risk to a child from being unvaccinated compared with the risk to the child of serious side effect from the vaccine.

If the two levels of risk are comparable—and they seem to be, even with the so-far assessed optimistic side effect risk—then the risk from the vaccine is not worth the risk to a child from going unvaccinated.

Forcing that second risk onto the child is too risky, to the point of abuse.

Censorship in New York State

Now the wonders of the New York State Senate want to ban, formally by statute, speech of which they disapprove.

A New York Senate bill if passed would criminalize the promotion of content that “includes a false statement of fact or fraudulent medical theory that is likely to endanger the safety or health of the public.”

This is rank censorship. Whose definition of “likely?” Whose definition of “fraudulent theory?”

Here are just a few items that are threatened by this censorship:

  • Advertising
  • Political ads/speech
  • Satire
  • Comedy
  • Ridicule
  • Exaggeration for effect
  • Irony

This is an all too typical effort by Progressive-Democrats to control our speech.

O brave new world, that has such people in ‘t in this new year of New York.

Training for the New Corporate World

A new cottage industry (here, the cottages are mansions) is springing up.

US companies are turning to programs aimed at preparing women and people of color for corporate board roles in a bid to comply with calls from regulators and investors to diversify their directors.
Law firms, universities, and current directors of companies have launched new or expanded programs over the past few years to coach prospective board candidates, offering training on topics from corporate governance to committee work. Some programs are free or sponsored by companies, while others can cost thousands of dollars.
Sponsors are hoping to broaden the pool of people who are ready to fill board roles….

What are these folks doing to improve things from the ground up—improving the quality of K-12 education (real education, not CRT garbage or other “equity, diversity, inclusive” claptrap)? That’s where the real preparation for the world occurs, and preparation for the peaks of the corporate world will fall out of that.

Absent any of that basic prep aid, all these wonders are doing is virtue-signaling so they can feel good.

Woke DoJ

A Portland ANTIFA…person…has had all Federal criminal charges dismissed, with prejudice, after doing a whole 30 hours of “community service.”

Eva Warner of Beaverton, Oregon, who police said was also known as Joshua Warner, was charged in September 2020 with felony civil disorder.

Her deeds, during the Portland Summer of Riots:

Portland Police said Warner directed a high-powered laser into the eyes of law enforcement officers trying to disperse the crowd. Warner resisted arrest, prompting officers to use force, the DOJ said. A laser pointer was found on Warner.

About a week later, Warner was arrested again and charged with second-degree criminal mischief in connection with another riot.

A week after that, Warner was arrested a third time in connection with yet another riot and charged with interfering with a peace officer and second-degree disorderly conduct.

Each time, too, she was released, with those violent crime charges pending, without bail so she could do those things again.

Then,

Scott Erik Asphaug, acting US Attorney for the District of Oregon, filed a motion December 21, 2021, asking the court to “dismiss with prejudice the indictment against (Warner), in the best interests of justice.” The motion noted that the defendant had performed “at least 30 hours of community service.”

Which the court did.

In the best interests of justice? Whose justice? Where is the justice for the victims of Warner’s actions?

This what Biden-Harris/Merrick Garland are doing to our Justice Department.