Tactically Sound?

Posted on 3 September 2019 by eehines

Perhaps, but perhaps strategically disastrous. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson asked the queen to prorogue the current parliament, and the queen agreed, in order to block it from blocking him from taking Great Britain out of the European Union on schedule 31 October without a deal in the likely event that the EU continues its intransigence in negotiating. Prorogation is the formal end of an existing session of Parliament, and normally it’s done just prior to the beginning of the next session, to clear the decks for that session.

This is a preview of Tactically Sound?. Read the full post (487 words, estimated 1:57 mins reading time)

There’s BDS

Posted on 29 August 2019 by eehines

…and there’s BDS. As Antonia Tamplin wondered in her Letter to the Editor of The Wall Street Journal,

Regarding Jillian Kay Melchior’s “Dissent Against Beijing Is Becoming a Firing Offense” (op-ed, 19 Aug): Where is the international BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) movement against China?

What she said.

Permanent link to this post (82 words, estimated 20 secs reading time)

Red Flag Laws, Again

Posted on 27 August 2019 by eehines

Now The Wall Street Journal is beating the drum for red flag laws that would authorize seizure of weapons from anyone, and anyone associated with that one, that Government, or a Government-appointed/approved body deems a threat.

Consider one of the three cute anecdotes the WSJ cited via its drumbeat.

Police were tipped off by school officials that a 14-year-old boy had praised mass shootings. He used campus computers to search firearms and terms like “white power.” Taken to a psychiatrist, the student said he was joking.
The boy’s father owned a rifle and a pistol. A short-term red-flag order was obtained, and the two firearms were relinquished. After a hearing a one-year order was issued. [In all three anecdotes cited, the outcome was a “one-year order.”]

This is a preview of Red Flag Laws, Again. Read the full post (491 words, estimated 1:58 mins reading time)

A Hypocrisy in Texas

Posted on 25 August 2019 by eehines

The Texas State government has passed a law making it illegal for government entities in the state of Texas to enter into a transaction with an abortion provider or an abortion provider’s affiliates.

Austin, the State’s capital, thinks it knows better and is working to get 150 stacks folded into its 2020 city budget to fund abortion services. Here’s Austin city council member Greg Casar, making plain the hypocrisy:

In Austin, we believe and announce that everyone has a right to healthcare. We believe and announce that abortion is healthcare, and we refuse to back down on protecting our continuance basic rights.

This is a preview of A Hypocrisy in Texas. Read the full post (204 words, estimated 49 secs reading time)

Gun “Control”

Posted on 24 August 2019 by eehines

The Wall Street Journal‘s student-written Future View column turned to gun control recently, and Rasmus Haure-Peterson, a philosophy and economics major at the University of Oxford, had a thought in his letter. He wrote, in part,

Given the spree of mass shootings, some targeted gun-control measures are needed for the sake of a safer America, even if they curb some people’s rights on the margins. But gun-rights advocates won’t make that concession unless they know that giving an inch won’t cost them a mile.

This is a preview of Gun “Control”. Read the full post (207 words, estimated 50 secs reading time)

Standing Tall

Posted on 22 August 2019 by eehines

Great Britain has said that it will abide by British law regarding cross-border movement of persons. European Union law will no longer have applicability, with effect from 31 October, Great Britain’s departure date from the EU. Unless the EU agrees, and begins concretely, to negotiate in good faith a serious departure régime.

Oh, the hoo-raw. How dare those Brits follow through instead of kowtowing to their betters in Brussels?

Rebecca Staudenmaier, writing at the link, also mischaracterizes the move.

This is a preview of Standing Tall. Read the full post (613 words, estimated 2:27 mins reading time)

Naivete and Hong Kong

Posted on 22 August 2019 by eehines

Bill McGurn usually does better than this. He suggested

If the governments in Beijing and Hong Kong would show an ounce of that humility, the protests might be over tomorrow.

Presumably that would include an apology by Hong Kong’s Chief Executive Carrie Lam, per his piece’s headline.

It’s hard to believe, though, that McGurn would be this naive. Lam’s apology, and PRC and Hong Kong government “humility” would be nothing more than empty, unbelievable words. Lam needs to fully withdraw and cancel, as though it had never existed, the extradition bill that her PRC masters instructed her to put forward, not merely HIA it.

This is a preview of Naivete and Hong Kong. Read the full post (219 words, estimated 53 secs reading time)

People Power

Posted on 20 August 2019 by eehines

Hong Kong style.

Hong Kong’s pro-democracy demonstrators braved torrential rain to hold their largest rally in weeks [last Sunday], a show of strength led by more moderate protest leaders who advocated peaceful resistance to Beijing’s tightening grip on the city and sought to ramp up pressure on officials to respond to their demands.
Hundreds of thousands of mainly black-clad protesters of all ages rallied in Victoria Park, the starting point of some of the biggest demonstrations through 11 weekends of unrest, with crowds overflowing into the streets. The organizers said more than 1.7 million people attended the rally.

This is a preview of People Power. Read the full post (387 words, estimated 1:33 mins reading time)

Democracy is Terrorism

Posted on 16 August 2019 by eehines

That’s the openly stated position of the People’s Republic of China. PRC President Xi Jinping now has said, through his government’s Hong Kong and Macao Affairs of the State Council spokeswoman Xu Luying, that he

condemned what [the State Council] described as “terrorist-like” attacks on its citizens by pro-democracy protesters.
“We express the strongest condemnation of these terrorist-like actions[.]”

Because pro-democracy demonstrators—who are the citizens of Hong Kong—in objecting to Xi’s weeks-long attempt to take complete control of the erstwhile semi-autonomous city, are terrorists.

And this from Xu:

This is a preview of Democracy is Terrorism. Read the full post (281 words, estimated 1:07 mins reading time)

They Do

Posted on 14 August 2019 by eehines

Hong Kong closed its airport for several hours Monday because protesters were thronging the terminals in protest of the People’s Republic of China’s Hong Kong—Carrie Lam—government’s attack on the “semi-autonomy” of the city, and of the police’s growing violence against what have been fundamentally peaceful protests over the last several weeks. The movement into the airport is a recent development of these peaceful protests.

Then Lam’s Chief Secretary Matthew Cheung said this regarding the protests at the airport:

[P]eople should cherish the future of Hong Kong, which is the collective hard work of everyone over many years.

This is a preview of They Do. Read the full post (221 words, estimated 53 secs reading time)

A Plebe's Site

Quam bene vivas referre, non quam diu.

Tag Archives: rights