Category Archives: culture

Feinstein’s Weapons Distortion

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Senator Dianne Feinstein (D, CA) isn’t only dissembling in the course of her Progressive-Democratic Party’s shambles-making of the Judge Kavanaugh Supreme Court Justice confirmation process.  She’s dissembling regarding our right to keep and bear Arms, also.  Using the hoo-raw the Party created during the Senate Judiciary Committee hearings (she’s the Ranking Democrat on that committee), she had this comment in the lead up to a question she had for Kavanaugh:

I’m talking about your statement on “common use.”  Assault weapons are not in common use.

There are two cynical distortions in that claim.  One is her “assault weapons” nonsense.  There are no assault weapons available to civilians in the United States.  Assault weapons are weapons capable of fully automatic fire (some of which can be possessed, but not borne, by collectors under very narrow circumstances) and heavy weapons—antitank weapons, crew-served fully automatic weapons, and the like.  Feinstein is carefully conflating the term “assault weapons” with semi-automatic rifles, which most assuredly are in common use in our nation, as she tries to emotionalize a completely rational matter with her scary term.

The other is her business about common use.  Here’s the 2nd Amendment in its entirety:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

There’s nothing in there about common use.  The Supreme Court has ruled on the need for common use, but this flies in the face of that Amendment on two grounds: one is the Court’s manufactured standard—it’s law-making from its bench—of commonness of use.  The other flies in the face of history and of the environment in which We the People ratified our Amendment: a significant fraction of the cannons used by our side during our Revolutionary War were privately owned.  Plainly, given their expense in obtaining, maintaining, and operating, they were possessed only by the wealthy—they were not in “common use.”  The Court’s ruling simply wants reversal so as to bring the matter back in line with our Constitution.

That second point might be a bit obscure, but the first is blindingly obvious.  Even to a Progressive-Democrat.

Pompeo’s Correct Path

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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had this to say in a Sunday interview about team play at State and in the other Cabinets of the Federal government.  Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace asked Pompeo about The New York Times‘ manufactured story about Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein wearing a wire and moving to invoke the 25th Amendment:

I’m not going to comment on that in any way, other than to say this: I’ve been pretty clear since my beginning of service here in this administration, if you can’t be on the team, if you’re not supporting this mission, then maybe you ought to find something else to do.
I’ve told that to my senior colleagues, I’ve told it to junior folks at the CIA, and the State Department; we need everyone who’s engaged in helping achieve President Trump’s mission. And I hope that everyone in every agency: DOJ, FBI, State Department is on that mission.

It’s not the subordinate’s role to do as he wishes, or to countermand the boss’ instructions, or to run a shadow government, or to follow his bliss in his civil service—or Senate-confirmed—position.  The subordinate’s role is to give his best advice, and after the boss has made his decision, to carry it out to the best of his ability.  If the subordinate thinks—or feelz—he cannot, his only option is to resign.

Yewbetcha.

Another Witness Demurs

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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].

Another witness identified by Dr Christine Blasey Ford, Patrick J Smyth, also has denied being at the alleged party, saying

…earlier this week that he has “no knowledge” of the party. He told the committee that he understands that “I have been identified by Dr Christine Blasey Ford as the person she remembers as “PJ” who supposedly was present at the party she described in her statements to the Washington Post.

White House spokeswoman Kerri Kupec summed things up as they currently stand, as reported in a pool report:

One week ago, Dr Christine Ford claimed she was assaulted at a house party attended by four others. Since then, all four of these individuals have provided statements to the Senate Judiciary Committee denying any knowledge of the incident or even having attended such a party.

It’s clear to me that something traumatic happened to Ford all those decades ago, but it’s clear that Kavanaugh had nothing to do with it, whatever it was.

No wonder Ford’s lawyers are continuing to stall regarding her appearance before the Committee—even those lawyers’ “agreement” that Ford would appear this week is a sham; they’re still manufacturing disagreement over “details” of the appearance’s terms and conditions.

Promise

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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….

Get too low a score, and citizens will be punished:

…los[e] the right to travel by plane or train, social media account suspensions, and being barred from government jobs.

The system isn’t all bad, though, assuming private citizens can learn their scores.  Those with low scores are showing themselves to be trustworthy—at least by their fellow citizens—and high scorers expose themselves as puppets of the government.

Bots and Comments

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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].

[T]he decision’s timing risks deepening the already bitter trade fight by starting another tit-for-tat round of tariffs.
And
The tariffs are bound to complicate—if not derail—talks with top Chinese officials, which are currently scheduled in Washington for Sept. 27 and Sept. 28, say people familiar with the plans.
Another interpretation, carefully ignored by the authors, is that in any conflict, it’s necessary to keep pressure on the opposing side while negotiations occur.  The battlefield shapes the talks, and the talks shape the battlefield–the battlefield encompasses both the talks and the conflict.

I emailed the WSJ‘s comment facility, per their blocking message, asking what the offending word or words were and why they were not identified in the blocking message.

I got a same-day response to my email; kudos to the WSJ.

“Thank you for contacting us. Our filter blocked your comment for the word ‘tit’; we have approved your post and apologize for any inconvenience.”

I asked the obvious question: why is “tit” allowed in the article itself if it’s not allowed in the comments?  Their answer:

Our filter is automatically set up to block certain words that may be used in a less than pleasant manner in the comments sections. We will review this word, however.

This is an example of the failure, here including outright hypocrisy, of using AI bots in place of actual judgment.  I won’t comment on the snowflakiness of “less than pleasant manner;” that speaks well enough for itself.