Censorship

Posted on 14 June 2017 by eehines

The Chinese Communist Party’s powerful disciplinary wing is taking aim at the country’s internet censors for not pushing a party-line agenda, saying they were “irresolute” in implementing the policies of President Xi Jinping and “not trying hard enough to ensure political security.”

Read: political purity.

…authorities now want people to become absorbed by politics as defined by the party.

“If you let people get too sucked into entertainment, no one will care about what the leaders are saying. If you don’t do this [crackdown], no one will watch the ‘Network News,'” he said, referring to the staid evening news program of the official state broadcaster, China Central Television.

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A Couple of Disparate Thoughts

Posted on 13 June 2017 by eehines

Thoughts triggered by a piece by Richard Fernandez on the dislocation of the Left…triggered…by The Brits voting to leave the EU, Donald Trump’s election as President, Emmanuel Macron’s election as French President, the resounding defeat of Theresa May and her Conservative party’s defeat in Britain’s snap elections, and Macron’s La République En Marche! party’s in-progress accession to strong power in the French National Assembly.

One thought is this. Van Jones, ex ex-President Barack Obama’s advisor, complained about the selfishness of Democrats’ spending in the last Presidential campaign season while speaking to a crowd at the People’s Summit in Chicago’s McCormack Place.

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A Party’s True Character

Posted on 11 June 2017 by eehines

A Party’s True Character

The Progressive-Democratic Party leader of the time, President Woodrow Wilson, said of segregation, “segregation is not a humiliation but a benefit, and ought to be so regarded by you gentlemen.” The Progressive-Democratic Party also is the party of Jim Crow and the Ku Klux Klan.

The Progressive-Democratic Party is the party that made national minimum wage laws for the explicit purpose of keeping blacks on the plantation—literally—instead of migrating north and competing for jobs by being willing to work for less than white union members were.

The Progressive-Democratic Party is the party of racist and sexist affirmative action programs.

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Hollywood, Too

Posted on 6 June 2017 by eehines

A month into the summer movie season and the box office is already suffering from poor performances by a number of widely panned films.

Box office gross receipts are off nearly 5% through the summer compared to the same period last year and its this-year Memorial Day weekend wasn’t this bad since 1999.

Megan Colligan, Paramount’s President of Worldwide Marketing and Distribution on her studio’s Baywatch:

The cast could not have done more work in aggressively promoting “Baywatch.” Dwayne [Johnson] gave this 150%[.]

It is to weep. They tried so hard—where’s their participation ribbon?

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This is Why We Can’t Have Qualified Non-STEM Graduates

Posted on 5 June 2017 by eehines

Joyce Chaplin, Professor of Early American History and Chair, American Studies at Harvard—Harvard American history!—illustrated why that is with this tweet of hers:

Joyce E. Chaplin @JoyceChaplin1

The USA, created by int’l community in Treaty of Paris in 1783, betrays int’l community by withdrawing from #parisclimateagreement today

Think about that. Don’t be distracted by her foolishness on things climate, just think about what the simulated expert on American history tweeted.

Senator Ted Cruz (R, TX) did, also, and he had a couple of tweets.

Ted Cruz @tedcruz

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“Full Responsibility”

Posted on 28 May 2017 by eehines

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has said, regarding leaks to the New York Times tabloid and others,

We take full responsibility for that and we obviously regret that that happened. With respect to the release of information inappropriately…certainly we condemn that.

The same sort of questions I’ve put to Hillary Clinton applies here: what are you going to do with that “responsibility” you’ve taken? What concrete actions will you take?

How’re the criminal and civil investigations into the leaks going; what progress are you making in identifying the criminals and the miscreants?

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The Rise of the PRC

Posted on 26 May 2017 by eehines

Graham Allison, Director of the Kennedy School Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at Harvard, had some thoughts in The Boston Globe. Here’s one that’s not in the usual political or military race discussion.

In STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics)…[the PRC] annually graduates four times as many students as the United States (1.3 million vs 300,000).

A better measure would compare the quality of those graduates and their programs so as to arrive at similarly qualified graduates.

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Trump Gifted Francis

Posted on 25 May 2017 by eehines

During his visit to the Vatican, President Donald Trump gave gifts to Pope Francis, a normal exchange of gifts between heads of state.

Trump gifted Pope Francis a first-edition set of writings from Martin Luther King, Jr. The White House said the set includes the five books King wrote in his lifetime. Each one is custom-bound and the books are in a custom display case. It also included a piece of granite from the Martin Luther King, Jr, Memorial in Washington.

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Safe Spaces and Clarity of Thought

Posted on 22 May 2017 by eehines

As The Wall Street Journal pointed out in an interview with Northwestern University’s President Morton Schapiro, the University of Chicago’s President Robert Zimmer has a view of the nature of safe spaces and the relationship between them and collegiate education.

incoming freshmen [should expect] to expect discomfort—not safe spaces—on his campus.

Schapiro, instead, wants to coddle his pupils as though they’re still two years old.

Northwestern President Morton Schapiro takes a gentler approach.

He believes that because learning is frequently uncomfortable, students need safe spaces—which for him means places where people who share an identity can retreat, relax, and recoup.

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Heckler’s Veto

Posted on 19 May 2017 by eehines

It’s alive and well in Canada, too. A Canadian named Lorne Grabher had a vanity license plate on his car, one that he’s had for 25 years. The plate had his name, GRABHER. You’d think there’d be no problem here, both on its face and from the fact that there’s been no problem for that quarter century.

But no.

The Toronto Sun, as cited at the link, says that “at least one person complained” about that plate, and that’s all it takes. One special snowflake with more time on her hands than productive work decided she was going to be offended by the plate—she decided it reminded her of then TV star Donald Trump’s remark about where to grab women—and she went crying to the Canadian authorities. Those authorities agreed with her.

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