Interesting Items 01/28

Howdy All, a few Interesting Items for your information.  Enjoy –

In this issue:

1. Shutdown
2. Covington
3. Abortion
4. Stone
5. Goolag
6. Salmon
7. 5^th Circus

1. Shutdown. President Trump announced the end of the 35-day partial government shutdown Friday afternoon.  He signed legislation to reopen the government, pay the employees, and authorize spending for the next 21 days.  There was nothing in the legislation that would pay for a wall.  This was portrayed over the weekend as a complete and total cave-in to Pelosi and Schumer, gleefully so, by media.  The back story comes out of Sean Hannity, who has been tracking a working group of democrats and Republicans in both houses of congress that support the wall.  The leaders of those joint groups went to President Trump and asked for 3 more weeks to hammer out a deal, whatever that means.  At the end of that time, there will either be a second shutdown or declaration of a national emergency.  This episode demonstrates the way Republicans will work around Nancy Pelosi and her leadership in the House, not unlike how House Republicans and supportive democrats passed legislation that Tip O’Neill despised in the early 1980s in the House.  Whether they come up with anything or not remains to be seen.  Not only were the democrats and their media enablers (leaders?) gleeful at this apparent cave-in, but so were all the never-Trumpers, who spent the entire weekend gleefully predicting the demise of the Trump administration.  Enter now Scott Adams, who on his blog has gone to an audio vehicle for presenting his information.  He calls these sessions Periscopes.  Friday – Sunday he broadcast three episodes describing what just happened from his persuasion perspective.  Adams viewpoint on what Trump is doing and how he is doing it carries a lot of weight with me based on his predictive record of Trump’s campaign, election, and the last couple years in office.  Basically, Adams argues that Trump had to set the stage, turn border security into the most important thing to the general public.  The 35+ day long shutdown did just that.  It also got all democrat leadership on record in public in strong support of improved border security.  Part of the agreement was to set up a group of experts – the users of the improved infrastructure and engineers – to recommend what was needed and where it was needed.  When these people issue their report, expect it to be rejected by democrats, who will cleverly put themselves on the side of rejecting recommendations by the experts and users.  The extended festivities also allowed Trump to morph his demands from a 2000-mile long concrete wall to a series of border security improvements based on the recommendations of experts and users.  This is what he always does, make a blunt, moderately outrageous demand, and walk it back incrementally during negotiations to whatever he was willing to accept in the first place.  The only things missing here are the suggested DACA and Dreamer deals during the latter stages of the festivities which are now off the table, at least for a while.  When this is all over, Trump will end up tightening border security significantly, which is what he promised.  In changing the stagnant shutdown game, he ends up looking like the only adult in the room, which is good persuasion-fu.  And he will have brought the general public along with him in his efforts.  If Adams is right, this will be a significant victory and will cement his support among far more Americans than anyone on the democrat / media side would ever consider as evidenced by his 50% approval rating among Latinos.  https://blog.dilbert.com/2019/01/27/episode-393-scott-adams-democrats-once-again-winning-the-game-no-one-was-playing/

2. Covington. Last week’s Two minutes Hate was aimed at a group of high school students wearing MAGA hats from Covington Catholic School.  They attended the March for Life in DC last weekend and were waiting on their bus when they came to the attention of a group of black nationalists that call themselves Black Hebrew Israelites who spent and extended period of time bombarding them with all manner of racial and sexual invective possible.  These guys appear to be the functional equivalent to the Westboro Baptist Church.  During the festivities, a group of Native American professional protesters joined the fray and targeted the kids.  One of them, a Nathan Phillips invaded the personal space of one of the kids and banged a drum in his face for a bit.  The kid, wearing a MAGA hat, did not back down or push back.  Phillips group released a video which went viral along with Phillips incendiary description of the kids acting like a mob and going after the Black Israelite group.  By the time the actual complete video was released, the media and a large number of anti-Trump people on the right decided that the kids were at fault and by definition evil and selected for destruction based on their color (white), religion (Catholic) and attire (MAGA hats).  And destroy these kids, the media-led mob mightily tried to do.  The school and local diocese immediately threw them under the bus, criticizing their actions based on Phillip’s lies to the media immediately afterwards.  By week’s end friends and family of the kids were preparing lawsuits against the media and others who joined the piling on.  None are filed as yet.  One interesting fallout of this is the complete destruction of the MAGA hat as positive persuasion.  Scott Adams believes this was one of the reasons that Trump did not proceed with a State of the Union speech at an alternate venue.  The other thing is logic out of the media, embracing the notion that wearing a MAGA hat gives any crazy an excuse to attack its wearer.  Think about that for a moment, as it is the functional equivalent of blaming a rape or sexual abuse victim for the attack / assault based entirely in what the victim was wearing at the time of the attack.  Equal rights under the law?  Presumption of innocence?  Not anymore, especially when the target is conservative, white or Christian.  https://www.breitbart.com/the-media/2019/01/20/critics-covington-maga-critics-push-back-against-portrayal-of-catholic-high-school-as-racist-to-native-american/

3. Abortion. The NY legislature passed, and Governor Cuomo signed into law one of the most radical pro-abortion laws in the nation.  It was passed on the anniversary of Roe v Wade to the cheers and applause of the assembled members.  The event echoed one of George Lucas’ quotes out of the first 3 Star Wars movies “So this is how liberty dies … with thunderous applause.”  So sad to see Lucas in his worst moves, correct about this part of human nature.  Among other things, the new law enshrines abortion as a fundamental right in New York’s constitution.  It allows non-physicians to perform abortions.  It allows abortion through the third trimester, up to birth, for babies with conditions that would cause them to die shortly after birth.  It removes protections for babies following abortion procedures, meaning they can be left to die if they survive an abortion and are born alive.  Prevents pregnant women whose babies are killed in an attack from seeking justice for the death.  Unborn children cannot be the victim of homicide by redefining the word “person” to a human being who has been born and alive, that is unless that person is an abortion survivor.  All in all, a truly evil piece of legislation.  https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/01/24/8-shocking-facts-about-new-yorks-radical-abortion-law/

4. Stone. Robert Mueller’s attack dog Andrew Weissman orchestrated a FIB raid on the residence of Roger Stone last week.  They had a CNN camera crew in tow to broadcast the whole affair.  CNN was the only media.  Stone was arrested, released on a $250,000 bond, and arraigned on 7 process crime charges.  Once again, the technique appears to be an effort to impoverish Stone with legal fees to the point where he will say whatever Mueller’s team wants him to say in court to go after Trump.  So why was CNN the only media on site?  The guess is that they were either camped out full time or were tipped by the FIB.  Both the reporter and his producer claimed their presence was simply good journalism.  Others have not been so kind, with at least one claim that Shortell is former FIB and was hired under James Comey for a bit.  I have seen no confirmation about this as yet but do find the lack of bio rather convenient.  https://dailycaller.com/2019/01/25/cnn-films-roger-stone-arrest-mueller/

5. Goolag. Looks like Goolag may be on its way to putting itself out of our misery.  A Goolag executive sparked a company-wide backlash when he used the word “family” in a weekly company-wide presentation.  Many Google employees became angry at the use of the term in connection with a product aimed at children.  Backlash was bad enough that a Google VP addressed the controversy and solicited feedback how the company could become more inclusive.  The presentation was March 2017.  One employee stormed out at the notion that “family” was used as a synonym for “household with children.”  This snowflake went on a public rant, well received by fellow employees, that linking families to children was “offensive, inappropriate, homophobic and wrong.”  So why does this mean the end for Goolag?  Because they have managed to create an environment where snowflakery is more important than major product presentation.  And when that happens, the ones left behind are an overall cost to the company rather than the source of new ideas, new products, new sales, and any internal improvement.  The article ends with the phrase “Dead company walking.”  http://phantomsoapbox.blogspot.com/2019/01/google-end-is-nigh.html

6. Salmon. One of the things that Cook Inlet commercial fishermen have done in recent years is attempting to take their endless fish wars into federal court, removing exclusive control of the resource from the State of Alaska and forcing at least some of it into the management structure of the Magnussen – Stevens Act, the North Pacific Fishery Management Council, which they hold exclusive control.  Last month, a consultant to the Council blew large caliber holes into a favorite claim from commercial fishermen that over-escapement – too many salmon allowed up river to spawn – which damages the fishery because too many spawning salmon are believed to harm future returns.  Those of us among the other user groups have long viewed that claim as a crock, as there are salmon rivers, particularly in Bristol Bay that regularly overescape with no noticeable negative impact on future returns.  Commfish forced the discussion into federal court which in turn forced allocation into the hands of the feds.  Imagine the horror of Cook Inlet commercial fishermen when their new BFFs find their most powerful argument to be utterly bogus.  Over-escapement issue is less important on the state level than under the federal system with a primary goal of preventing overfishing.  Cook Inlet commfish wanted to talk about underfishing to a group of folks charged with preventing overfishing.  Council staff did manage to include the position in the report but would not be presented as a recommendation.  It is always sad when your carefully selected and nurtured attack dog turns on you.  And it couldn’t happen to a nicer group of people.  https://craigmedred.news/2019/01/23/here-to-help/

7. 5^th Circus. A federal court in Texas just shocked Planned Parenthood and the national media with an opinion that the sting videos produced by David Daleiden and the Center for Medical Progress were not deceptively edited, debunked, or anything else.  Instead, they unanimously ruled that the videos presented compelling evidence of misconduct by Planned Parenthood discussing the sale of fetal tissue of aborted babies, the chop shop for baby body parts that Planned Parenthood managed to turn itself into over the years.  This vacated a lower court opinion that blocked the State of Texas from defunding Planned Parenthood and disqualifying it from Medicaid.  This ruling gives appeals court weight to the sting videos.  This opinion is at odds with a federal judge in Louisiana that rejected its efforts to defund Planned Parenthood, mostly because the State of Louisiana hadn’t actually cited the videos as their reason to terminate funding.  The appeals court rebuked the trial judge for his opinion that the videos are unauthenticated.  Given that we have two different opinions in two different states. I expect this will finally get in front of the SCOTUS just in time for Trump’s third nominee to assume his or her seat on the Bench.  https://hotair.com/archives/2019/01/18/fifth-circuit-drops-bombshell-planned-parenthood-defunding-comes-one-step-closer/

More later –

– AG