Another Witness Demurs

Posted on 24 September 2018 by eehines

In an email to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Saturday, Leland Ingham Keyser, a former classmate of Ford’s at the Holton-Arms all-girls school in Maryland, said she doesn’t know Kavanaugh or remember being at the party with him.
“Simply put, Ms Keyser does not know Mr [sic] Kavanaugh and she has no recollection of ever being at a party or gathering where he was present, with, or without, Dr Ford,” lawyer Howard J Walsh III of Bethesda, MD, conveyed in an email to the committee that was obtained by Fox News [and by Politico].

This is a preview of Another Witness Demurs. Read the full post (329 words, estimated 1:19 mins reading time)

Promise

Posted on 22 September 2018 by eehines

The People’s Republic of China has been rolling out its system for spying on surveilling its citizens for a while now. This is the system that develops social scores for every PRC citizen, and the system has bennies for achieving high scores:

…waived deposits on hotels and rental cars, VIP treatment at airports, discounted loans, priority job applications, and fast-tracking to the most prestigious universities.

Things that can detract from those high scores include

[j]aywalking, late payments on bills or taxes, buying too much alcohol, or speaking out against the government….
Other mooted punishable offences include spending too long playing video games, wasting money on frivolous purchases, and posting on social media….

This is a preview of Promise. Read the full post (212 words, estimated 51 secs reading time)

Bots and Comments

Posted on 20 September 2018 by eehines

As a result of a bit of censorship in which The Wall Street Journal engaged on a comment of mine over the weekend, I had the following exchange with them.

On Sunday, in responding to their piece on trade and tariffs, I tried to post the comment below to the WSJ‘s Comments section, but they blocked it: there were, they claimed, one or more offending words in it [the non-italicized sentences are cut/paste quotes from the article].

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Whose Side?

Posted on 18 September 2018 by eehines

On whose side is the current Pope? What is his purpose, his goal?

First, the Pope condones covering up—even delaying a “conference” for chit-chat about the abuse for as long as possible—massive child abuse by Catholicism’s priests and bishops.

Now we have the Pope saying the Catholic Church—the Vatican—doesn’t even need to be the authority that selects the Church’s bishops.

…Catholic concession in a far-reaching deal between Rome and the Vatican announced Friday. The Vatican has agreed to recognize as legitimate seven Chinese priests who had been excommunicated by Rome for accepting their bishop hats without Vatican approval. Two bishops who had remained faithful to Rome will retire to make room for bishops more to Chinese President Xi Jinping’s liking.

This is a preview of Whose Side?. Read the full post (161 words, estimated 39 secs reading time)

Trial? We Don’t Need No Stinking Trial

Posted on 18 September 2018 by eehines

Progressive-Democratic Party candidate for Texas Senator Beto O’Rourke wants a cop fired. At a rally last Friday, O’Rourke was asked whether Officer Amber Guyger should be fired. You remember the case: the officer seems to have entered the wrong apartment, mistaking if for her own, saw a man in the still darkened apartment, the man did not respond to Guyger’s commands, and she wound up shooting him. O’Rourke’s response to the rally-goer’s question:

I don’t understand given the actions how anyone can come to any other conclusion.

This is a preview of Trial? We Don’t Need No Stinking Trial. Read the full post (373 words, estimated 1:30 mins reading time)

Mao and Xi

Posted on 17 September 2018 by eehines

Deutsche Welle reported on Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro’s visit last Friday with People’s Republic of China President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang in the PRC. A couple of things jumped out at me that are separate from the emphasis the article put on the visit and the aid the PRC has promised Maduro. Maduro tweeted

We began our state visit to the People’s Republic of China, paying tribute to its founder, the Great Helmsman, Mao Tse Tung. His example and revolutionary struggle marked the twentieth century.

That was in connection with this:

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Shades

Posted on 16 September 2018 by eehines

US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley has new ambassadorial digs, and those digs have new curtains. The rent for the digs is 58 large each month, and the curtains were almost $53k. If you think those numbers are outlandish for some office space and window coverings, you’re right.

Then we get The New York Times castigating her for spending that kind of taxpayer money. Never mind that the NYT carefully buried some key facts regarding these expenses. Facts like it being the Obama administration that committed to the rent and that bought the curtains; Haley had no say in the matter. Facts like the rent in particular, to Obama’s credit, being much lower than other administrations have spent on their UN ambassador’s digs.

This is a preview of Shades. Read the full post (175 words, estimated 42 secs reading time)

Jumped the Shark

Posted on 15 September 2018 by eehines

The Progressive-Democratic Senator from San Francisco, Dianne Feinstein, has done it. The Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee has “released a memo” purported to cast doubt on Judge and Justice nominee Brett Kavanaugh’s character.

This is a memo, too, that she’s been sitting on for the last couple of months, waiting for just the right time to “release” it. Its source is secret, though, and its contents are not to be revealed to the public. Her cronies at The New York Times, never fear, claim to have the…skinny…on the content: in a textbook example of projection, that outlet hints that the “memo” is all about sexual misbehavior.

This is a preview of Jumped the Shark. Read the full post (263 words, estimated 1:03 mins reading time)

Book or Smear?

Posted on 14 September 2018 by eehines

Bob Woodward wrote a book about President Donald Trump, and his “on-the-record” sources are coming out of the…woodwork…to deny they said the things Woodward claims they said or that they were misrepresented in misleading ways (redundancy deliberate).

I have to ask: does Woodward have any “on the record” sources about whom he hasn’t seemed to have lied? He claims to have tapes and transcripts of those conversations and of his claimed conversations with anonymous “sources.”

Regarding the latter, he should explain why we should believe anonymous sources who’ve demonstrated their dishonesty by speaking against their terms of employment if not their oaths of office.

This is a preview of Book or Smear?. Read the full post (299 words, estimated 1:12 mins reading time)

Timidity

Posted on 11 September 2018 by eehines

Sadanand Dhume had an opinion piece in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal decrying Dutch politician Geert Wilders’ decision to cancel a contest through which ” participants were invited to lampoon the prophet Muhammad.” Wilders pleaded “security concerns” because of some protests in Pakistan.

On the whole, I agree with Dhume. However, I’m less concerned with Pakistani whinings than I am with the cowardice displayed by Wilders and his cronies in canceling their contest.

A few short years ago, a similar “Draw Muhammad” contest was held in Dallas. The terrorists who tried to disrupt that contest were stopped in their tracks by ordinary American citizens. The Dutch are not Danes, but I wouldn’t have thought them this timid.

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