GOV/MIL Leftists Call For New "Secret Police" Force To Spy On Trump Supporters (AN ABSOLUTELY MUST-READ THREAD)

[marsh]

Zerohedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

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'Biden Took An Oath To Uphold The Constitution, Not Violate It': Turley Opines On CDC's Revised Eviction Moratorium

TUESDAY, AUG 03, 2021 - 04:20 PM

Update (1905ET): Weighing in on the CDC's moratorium extension is constitutional scholar Jonathan Turley, who says "President Biden took an oath to uphold the Constitution, not to violate it when he can use the delay in any final order to get the money out the door."


* * *

Update (1825ET): In a decision unlikely to hold up to legal scrutiny - which we assume will include an injunction, the Centers for Disease Control has issued a revised eviction moratorium - in complete defiance of the Supreme Court.

"This order will expire on October 3, 2021 and applies in United States counties experiencing substantial and high levels of community transmission levels of SARS-CoV-2," according to a statement, which adds that the moratorium "allows additional time for rent relief to reach renters and to further increase vaccination rates."


Scribd doc on website

As noted earlier, the CDC's order flies in the face of a Supreme Court ruling that only Congress has the power to extend the moratorium.



Looks like Maxine Waters gets her way, once again.





* * *
Update (1710ET): During remarks on vaccines, President Biden said that the CDC would be announcing an extension of the eviction moratorium - which we assume will be promptly nullified after landlords sue.

View: https://youtu.be/JG1O9Tm2Wfw
31:15 min

According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, it will be a 60-day moratorium which would protect areas where 90% of the population lives.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has identified a legal authority for a new and different moratorium that would be for areas with high and substantial increases in COVID-19 infections.

The extension helps to heal a rift with liberal Democratic lawmakers who were calling on executive action to keep renters in their homes as the delta variant of the coronavirus spread and a prior moratorium lapsed at the end of July. Administration officials had previously said a Supreme Court ruling stopped them from setting up a new moratorium without congressional backing, saying that states and cities must be more aggressive in releasing nearly $47 billion in relief for renters on the verge of eviction.

Even Biden said he's not sure if the moratorium extension will hold.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1422664942193463309

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1422664942193463309
3:38 min

The speech was not without at least one gaffe.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1422659822768558088

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1422659822768558088
.19 min
* * *

After the Democrat-controlled Congress adjourned for 6 weeks without taking action on the now-expired eviction moratorium, mass finger pointing ensued on the left.



Responding to calls for the CDC to extend the moratorium, the Biden administration originally pointed to a June Supreme Court decision which made clear that only Congress has the authority to extend the program.

On Tuesday, however, the Washington Post reports that the Biden administration "is expected to announce a new action to limit housing evictions, moving swiftly after intense pressure from liberal House Democrats."

The exact details of the measure were not clear, the people said. The people spoke on the condition of anonymity to reflect a matter not yet made public.

The congressional pressure campaign intensified in recent days after a national eviction moratorium created by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention expired at the end of July. The Biden administration has repeatedly insisted that it lacked the legal authority to renew that program. However, the delta variant has renewed concerns about the impact of the expiring moratorium on millions of renters and White House officials have explored other options. -Washington Post

According to the New York Times, the extension could consist of a freeze which would remain in place until October 3, however final decisions are yet to be made.

On Tuesday, tensions between the White House and lawmakers intensified - with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) ruling out bringing lawmakers back from vacation to address the issue via new legislation.

After speaking with Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen on a private call, Pelosi said that the consensus amongst the Democratic caucus was that the House should stay on vacation - and that it was up to the Biden administration to extend the moratorium. As the Post notes, "even if an extension were to pass the House, the measure is almost certain to fail in the Senate, given that Democrats would need 10 Senate Republicans to support the effort to overcome the filibuster."

"We will not relent until families and landlords have been protected from this crisis," Pelosi said in a Monday letter, despite doing absolutely nothing to meaningfully address the matter when Congress was in session.

During the call, Yellen answered questions from lawmakers over delays in disbursing over $46 billion in emergency rental assistance - which the Treasury Department has struggled to execute.

According to Moody's, over six million Americans are behind on rent.

On Monday, White House official Gene Sperling told the press that the administration was encouraging state and local officials to enact their own eviction moratoriums - while also working on federal agencies such as the USDA to extend eviction moratoriums if possible.

"States and cities need at least another couple months to get this money out, and there’s no sticks or carrots Treasury can wield to make that happen faster.

What we need is time," said housing expert Paul Williams, a fellow at the nonprofit Jain Family Institute and the author of an analysis on the current crisis.

Williams says officials from several city governments he's spoken to are doing everything they can to tap into federal funding, however they've faced nothing but roadblocks from the Biden Treasury.

"There’s no stick you can beat them with to make them go faster. They’re limited by technical and staff capacity to actually get this done," said Williams.

 

[marsh]

Zerohedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

A New State Of Segregation: Vaccine Cards Are Just The Beginning

TUESDAY, AUG 03, 2021 - 11:45 PM
Authored by John W. Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

“The things we were worried would happen are happening.”
- Angus Johnston, professor at the City University of New York

Imagine it: a national classification system that not only categorizes you according to your health status but also allows the government to sort you in a hundred other ways: by gender, orientation, wealth, medical condition, religious beliefs, political viewpoint, legal status, etc.


This is the slippery slope upon which we are embarking, one that begins with vaccine passports and ends with a national system of segregation.

It has already begun.

With every passing day, more and more private businesses and government agencies on both the state and federal level are requiring proof of a COVID-19 vaccination in order for individuals to work, travel, shop, attend school, and generally participate in the life of the country.

No matter what one’s views may be regarding the government’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, this is an unnerving proposition for a country that claims to prize the rights of the individual and whose Bill of Rights was written in such a way as to favor the rights of the minority.

By allowing government agents to establish a litmus test for individuals to be able to engage in commerce, movement and any other right that corresponds to life in a supposedly free society, it lays the groundwork for a “show me your papers” society in which you are required to identify yourself at any time to any government worker who demands it for any reason.

Such tactics can quickly escalate into a power-grab that empowers government agents to force anyone and everyone to prove they are in compliance with every statute and regulation on the books. Mind you, there are thousands of statutes and regulations on the books. Indeed, in this era of overcriminalization, it is estimated that the average American unknowingly breaks at least three laws a day.

This is also how the right to move about freely has been undermined, overtaken and rewritten into a privilege granted by the government to those citizens who are prepared to toe the line.

It used to be that “we the people” had the right to come and go as we please without the fear of being stopped, questioned by police or forced to identify ourselves. In other words, unless police had a reasonable suspicion that a person was guilty of wrongdoing, they had no legal authority to stop the person and require identification.

Unfortunately, in this age of COVID-19, that unrestricted right to move about freely is being pitted against the government’s power to lock down communities at a moment’s notice. And in this tug-of-war between individual freedoms and government power, “we the people” have been on the losing end of the deal.

Now vaccine passports, vaccine admission requirements, and travel restrictions may seem like small, necessary steps in winning the war against the COVID-19 virus, but that’s just so much propaganda. They’re only necessary to the police state in its efforts to further brainwash the populace into believing that the government legitimately has the power to enforce such blatant acts of authoritarianism.

This is how you imprison a populace and lock down a nation.

It makes no difference if such police state tactics are carried out in the name of national security or protecting America’s borders or making America healthy again: the philosophy remains the same, and it is a mindset that is not friendly to freedom.

You can’t have it both ways.

You can’t live in a constitutional republic if you allow the government to act like a police state.

You can’t claim to value freedom if you allow the government to operate like a dictatorship.

You can’t expect to have your rights respected if you allow the government to treat whomever it pleases with disrespect and an utter disregard for the rule of law.

If you’re tempted to justify these draconian measures for whatever reason—for the sake of health concerns, the economy, or national security—beware: there’s always a boomerang effect.

Whatever dangerous practices you allow the government to carry out now, rest assured, these same practices can and will be used against you when the government decides to set its sights on you.

The war on drugs turned out to be a war on the American people, waged with SWAT teams and militarized police. The war on terror turned out to be a war on the American people, waged with warrantless surveillance and indefinite detention for those who dare to disagree.

The war on immigration turned out to be a war on the American people, waged with roving government agents demanding “papers, please.”

This war on COVID-19 is turning out to be yet another war on the American people, waged with all of the surveillance weaponry and tracking mechanisms at the government’s disposal. You see, when you talk about empowering government agents to screen the populace in order to control and prevent spread of this virus, what you’re really talking about is creating a society in which ID cards, round ups, checkpoints and detention centers become routine weapons used by the government to control and suppress the populace, no matter the threat.

No one is safe.

No one is immune.

And as I illustrate in my new novel, The Erik Blair Diaries, no one gets spared the anguish, fear and heartache of living in a police state.

That’s the message being broadcast 24/7 with every new piece of government propaganda, every new law that criminalizes otherwise lawful activity, every new policeman on the beat, every new surveillance camera casting a watchful eye, every sensationalist news story that titillates and distracts, every new prison or detention center built to house troublemakers and other undesirables, every new court ruling that gives government agents a green light to strip and steal and rape and ravage the citizenry, every school that opts to indoctrinate rather than educate, and every new justification for why Americans should comply with the government’s attempts to trample the Constitution underfoot.

Yes, COVID-19 has taken a significant toll on the nation emotionally, physically, and economically, but there are still greater dangers on the horizon.

As long as “we the people” continue to allow the government to trample our rights in the so-called name of national security, things will get worse, not better.

It’s already worse.

We’ve been having this same debate about the perils of government overreach for the past 50-plus years, and still we don’t seem to learn, or if we learn, we learn too late.

Curiously enough, these COVID-19 mandates, restrictions and vaccine card requirements dovetail conveniently with a national timeline for states to comply with the Real ID Act, which imposes federal standards on identity documents such as state drivers’ licenses, a prelude to a national identification system.

Talk about a perfect storm for bringing about a national ID card, the ultimate human tracking device.

In the absence of a national ID card, which would make the police state’s task of monitoring, tracking and singling out individual suspects far simpler, “we the people” are already being tracked in a myriad of ways: through our state driver’s licenses, Social Security numbers, bank accounts, purchases and electronic transactions; biometrics; by way of our correspondence and communication devices (email, phone calls and mobile phones); through chips implanted in our vehicles, identification documents, even our clothing.

Add to this the fact that businesses, schools and other facilities are relying more and more on fingerprints and facial recognition to identify us. All the while, data companies such as Acxiom are capturing vast caches of personal information to help airports, retailers, police and other government authorities instantly determine whether someone is the person he or she claims to be.

This informational glut—used to great advantage by both the government and corporate sectors—has converged into a mandate for “an internal passport,” a.k.a., a national ID card that would store information as basic as a person’s name, birth date and place of birth, as well as private information, including a Social Security number, fingerprint, retinal scan and personal, criminal and financial records.

A federalized, computerized, cross-referenced, databased system of identification policed by government agents would be the final nail in the coffin for privacy (not to mention a logistical security nightmare that would leave Americans even more vulnerable to every hacker in the cybersphere).

Americans have always resisted adopting a national ID card for good reason: National ID card systems have been used before, by other oppressive governments, in the name of national security, invariably with horrifying results.

After all, such a system gives the government and its agents the ultimate power to target, track and terrorize the populace according to the government’s own nefarious purposes.

For instance, in Germany, the Nazis required all Jews to carry special stamped ID cards for travel within the country. A prelude to the yellow Star of David badges, these stamped cards were instrumental in identifying Jews for deportation to death camps in Poland.

Author Raul Hilberg summarizes the impact that such a system had on the Jews:

The whole identification system, with its personal documents, specially assigned names, and conspicuous tagging in public, was a powerful weapon in the hands of the police. First, the system was an auxiliary device that facilitated the enforcement of residence and movement restrictions. Second, it was an independent control measure in that it enabled the police to pick up any Jew, anywhere, anytime. Third, and perhaps most important, identification had a paralyzing effect on its victims.

In South Africa during apartheid, pass books were used to regulate the movement of black citizens and segregate the population. The Pass Laws Act of 1952 stipulated where, when and for how long a black African could remain in certain areas. Any government employee could strike out entries, which cancelled the permission to remain in an area. A pass book that did not have a valid entry resulted in the arrest and imprisonment of the bearer.

Identity cards played a crucial role in the genocide of the Tutsis in the central African country of Rwanda. The assault, carried out by extremist Hutu militia groups, lasted around 100 days and resulted in close to a million deaths. While the ID cards were not a precondition to the genocide, they were a facilitating factor. Once the genocide began, the production of an identity card with the designation “Tutsi” spelled a death sentence at any roadblock.

Identity cards have also helped oppressive regimes carry out eliminationist policies such as mass expulsion, forced relocation and group denationalization.

Through the use of identity cards, Ethiopian authorities were able to identify people with Eritrean affiliation during the mass expulsion of 1998. The Vietnamese government was able to locate ethnic Chinese more easily during their 1978-79 expulsion. The USSR used identity cards to force the relocation of ethnic Koreans (1937), Volga Germans (1941), Kamyks and Karachai (1943), Crimean Tartars, Meshkhetian Turks, Chechens, Ingush and Balkars (1944) and ethnic Greeks (1949). And ethnic Vietnamese were identified for group denationalization through identity cards in Cambodia in 1993, as were the Kurds in Syria in 1962.

And in the United States, post-9/11, more than 750 Muslim men were rounded up on the basis of their religion and ethnicity and detained for up to eight months. Their experiences echo those of 120,000 Japanese-Americans who were similarly detained 75 years ago following the attack on Pearl Harbor.

Despite a belated apology and monetary issuance by the U.S. government, the U.S. Supreme Court has yet to declare such a practice illegal. Moreover, laws such as the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) empower the government to arrest and detain indefinitely anyone they “suspect” of being an enemy of the state.

So you see, you may be innocent of wrongdoing now, but when the standard for innocence is set by the government, no one is safe.

Everyone is a suspect.

And anyone can be a criminal when it’s the government determining what is a crime.

It’s no longer a matter of if, but when.

Remember, the police state does not discriminate.

At some point, it will not matter whether your skin is black or yellow or brown or white. It will not matter whether you’re an immigrant or a citizen. It will not matter whether you’re rich or poor. It won’t even matter whether you’ve been properly medicated, vaccinated or indoctrinated.

Government jails will hold you just as easily whether you’ve obeyed every law or broken a dozen. Government bullets will kill you just as easily whether you’re complying with a police officer’s order or questioning his tactics. And whether or not you’ve done anything wrong, government agents will treat you like a suspect simply because they have been trained to view and treat everyone like potential criminals.

Eventually, as I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, when the police state has turned that final screw and slammed that final door, all that will matter is whether some government agent chooses to single you out for special treatment.

 

[marsh]

Zerohedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

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Buchanan Blasts America's 'Great Leap Forward' Into Socialism

TUESDAY, AUG 03, 2021 - 06:25 PM
Authored by Pat Buchanan,

Just seven weeks into his presidency, Joe Biden signed a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill. Among the largest spending bills in history, it was passed without the vote of a single Republican.

The plan sent direct payments of up to $1,400 to most Americans, extended a $300 per week unemployment insurance boost until Sept. 6 and expanded the child tax credit for a year. It also put $350 billion into state, local and tribal relief.

This weekend, a bipartisan group of senators crafted a $1 trillion measure to repair and expand the nation’s roads, bridges, ports, airports and broadband. Last week, this trillion-dollar infrastructure plan got a green light from 17 Republican senators, including Sen. Mitch McConnell.


Boasted Biden:

“The Bipartisan Infrastructure Deal is the largest infrastructure bill in a century. It will grow the economy, create good-paying jobs, and set America on a path to win the future.”

Up next is a $3.5 trillion measure to remake America, which is also to be enacted without GOP support via a process called “reconciliation,” which enables the Senate to pass measures with a simple majority.

This $3.5 trillion measure would expand social and environmental programs, extend the reach of education and health care, tax the rich and take on the challenge of the century — climate change.

Among programs funded are universal prekindergarten for all 3- and 4-year-olds, two years of free community college, clean energy mandates for utilities and lower prescription drug prices. Medicare benefits would be expanded and amnesty extended to millions of illegal migrants.

All that is needed for its enactment into law is a Democrat majority in Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s House, the votes of the 50 Democratic senators and the signature of Biden.

After effecting passage of his $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package, if Biden gets the $1 trillion infrastructure proposal and the $3.5 trillion package, he will have enlarged federal spending by $6 trillion.

This would constitute the greatest leap forward toward socialism of any American president, with Biden’s only rivals being previous record-holders Franklin D. Roosevelt during the 1930s’ New Deal and Lyndon B. Johnson’s Great Society in the 1960s.

If Biden succeeds in getting it all, this would not only be a quantum leap toward European-style socialism. It would cross a divide for America, from which history teaches us there is no return.

“A billion here, a billion there, and pretty soon you’re talking real money,” said Sen. Everett Dirksen in the 1960s, when he was leading a badly outmanned Republican minority in the Senate after the Barry Goldwater defeat.

Today, we talk not about billions but about trillions, and that $6 trillion in spending Biden is reaching for translates into more than six thousand billion dollars.

As of today, however, neither the infrastructure bill nor the $3.5 trillion omnibus bill is a done deal, with the former looking more probable than the latter. But if both are passed, they would create new records and new realities for the U.S. government.

The federal debt would exceed the U.S. economy for the first time since World War II. The deficits for this year and last, roughly $3 trillion in each year, already exceed any past deficits since World War II

Passage of the $3.5 trillion omnibus bill would constitute a quantum leap in the number of Americans dependent on the federal government for the necessities of life.

It would increase America’s ratio of tax consumers to taxpayers.
It would be tantamount to an admission of belief that the real engine of economic growth in America, the truly indispensable provider upon whom an ever-expanding share of the population of the nation depend for food, rent, health care, education and cash income, is the government of the United States, not the American free market system.

As for the Republican Party, the conservative party of lower taxes, balanced budgets and free market solutions to social problems, the fiscal debate will be over in a way it has never been before.

Passage of that $3.5 trillion omnibus bill would represent the triumph of Great Society liberalism over Reaganite conservatism.

In his first inaugural address, President Ronald Reagan declared that government is not the solution to our problems. Government is the problem.

In his State of the Union address in 1996, President Bill Clinton seemed to concede the triumph of Reaganism over liberalism and socialism:

“We know big government does not have all the answers. We know there’s not a program for every problem. We have worked to give the American people a smaller, less bureaucratic government in Washington. And we have to give the American people one that lives within its means.

“The era of big government is over.”

In 2021, Biden and his party are saying: Clinton was wrong to concede Reaganism its victory. When there is a big crisis in the country, FDR was right: Big government is the solution.

If the terrain looks unfamiliar, that is because we are crossing a new continental divide. We are entering Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez country.

 

[Housecarl]

Posted for fair use.....

Coming soon: America’s own social credit system

The same issue with government censorship exists with corporate censorship: If there is a line, who draws it?

thehill.com

Coming soon: America's own social credit system

BY KRISTIN TATE, OPINION CONTRIBUTOR — 08/03/21 09:00 AM EDT 2,164Comments
THE VIEWS EXPRESSED BY CONTRIBUTORS ARE THEIR OWN AND NOT THE VIEW OF THE HILL

Video

The new domestic “War on Terror,” kicked off by the riot on Jan. 6, has prompted several web giants to unveil predecessors to what effectively could become a soft social credit system by the end of this decade. Relying on an indirect hand from D.C., our social betters in corporate America will attempt to force the most profound changes our society has seen during the internet era.

China’s social credit system is a combination of government and business surveillance that gives citizens a “score” that can restrict the ability of individuals to take actions — such as purchasing plane tickets, acquiring property or taking loans — because of behaviors. Given the position of several major American companies, a similar system may be coming here sooner than you think.

• Senate report finds major cybersecurity shortcomings among federal...
• Sunisa Lee says distractions from social media contributed to bronze...

Last week, PayPal announced a partnership with the left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center to “investigate” the role of “white supremacists” and propagators of “anti-government” rhetoric, subjective labels that potentially could impact a large number of groups or people using their service. PayPal says the collected information will be shared with other financial firms and politicians. Facebook is taking similar measures, recently introducing messages that ask users to snitch on their potentially “extremist” friends, which considering the platform’s bias seems mainly to target the political right. At the same time, Facebook and Microsoft are working with several other web giants and the United Nations on a database to block potential extremist content.

The actions of these major companies may seem logical in an internet riddled with scams and crime. After all, nobody will defend far-right militias or white supremacist groups using these platforms for their odious goals. However, the same issue with government censorship exists with corporate censorship: If there is a line, who draws it? Will the distinction between mundane politics and extremism be a “I’ll know it when I see it” scenario, as former Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart described obscenity? If so, will there be individuals able to unilaterally remove people’s effective ability to use the internet? Could a Facebook employee equate Ben Shapiro with David Duke, and remove his account?

The implications of these crackdown efforts will be significantly more broad than just prohibiting Donald Trump from tweeting at 3 a.m. Young people cannot effectively function in society if blocked from using Facebook, Twitter, Gmail, Uber, Amazon, PayPal, Venmo and other financial transaction systems. Some banking platforms already have announced a ban on certain legal purchases, such as firearms. The growth of such restrictions, which will only accelerate with support from (usually) left-wing politicians, could create a system in which individuals who do not hold certain political views could be blocked from polite society and left unable to make a living.

The potential scope of the soft social credit system under construction is enormous. The same companies that can track your activities and give you corporate rewards for compliant behavior could utilize their powers to block transactions, add surcharges or restrict your use of products. At what point does free speech — be it against biological males playing in girls’ sports, questioning vaccine side effects, or advocating for gun rights — make someone a target in this new system? When does your debit card get canceled over old tweets, your home loan denied for homeschooling your kids, or your eBay account invalidated because a friend flagged you for posting a Gadsden flag?

Federal fingerprints aren’t directly on recent actions — yet. The creation of a “Digital Dollar” would put an exclamation point on a new social credit score. Working in conjunction with major tech companies, citizens not convicted of a crime could lose their ability to transact any business. In time, decentralized forms of money, such as cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, may be the main means for dissidents to operate — as long as the federal government doesn’t move to squash them. If the Fed and members of Congress are skeptical of crypto now, its use by political undesirables could lead to a furtive effort to severely restrict or ban these currencies.

Until and unless there is an organized pushback, our future could track with those of increasingly illiberal societies. Just last week, the British government announced its own version of a health social credit system. China’s system was announced only seven years ago. Considering the growth of algorithms and dependence on tech giants, the ability to track, censor and eventually punish ordinary citizens will be mindboggling by 2030. America’s descent into a 21st century Gilded Age directed by tech titans isn’t an inevitability. However, do you know anyone who would take a 5 percent Amazon coupon in exchange for a “call to action”? Or someone who would replace their Facebook profile picture to avoid being locked out?

Peer pressure, trendy movements, and the ability to comply with the new system with the click of a mouse combine all of the worst elements of dopamine-chasing Americans. As it grows in breadth and power, what may be most surprising about our new social credit system won’t be collective fear of it, but rather how quickly most people will fall in line.

Kristin Tate is a libertarian writer and an analyst for Young Americans for Liberty. She is an author whose latest book is “How Do I Tax Thee? A Field Guide to the Great American Rip-Off.” Follow her on Twitter @KristinBTate.

 

[marsh]

$8 billion for ‘anti-racism training’…

White Fragility Robin DiAngelo is thrilled by the $8 billion being spent to indoctrinate She hates herself for being White…

citizenfreepress.com

$8 billion for [corporate] ‘anti-racism training’…
Posted by Kane on August 4, 2021 3:13 am

View: https://youtu.be/kwHdDHIviQo
1:02 min

White Fragility Robin DiAngelo is thrilled by the $8 billion being spent to indoctrinate

 

[marsh]

Trump-appointed appeals court judge slams critical race theory in discrimination case

U.S. Circuit Judge James C. Ho criticized critical race theory last week in a concurrence he wrote that challenged the validity of

independentchronicle.com

Trump-appointed appeals court judge slams critical race theory in discrimination case

Thomas McDonald - August 3, 2021

U.S. Circuit Judge James C. Ho criticized critical race theory last week in a concurrence he wrote that challenged the validity of disparate impact theory as a legal basis to claim racial bias.

Disparate impact theory is a judicial theory that allows legal challenges to government policies that on their face appear to be non-discriminatory but have disproportionately negative effects on certain groups and communities.

"Congress enacted Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to prohibit intentional racial discrimination — not to restrict neutral policies untainted by racial intent that happen to lead to racially disproportionate outcomes," Judge Ho wrote.

"There's a big difference between prohibiting racial discrimination and endorsing disparate impact theory," he continued. "It's the difference between securing equality of opportunity regardless of race and guaranteeing equality of outcome based on race."

"It's the difference between color blindness and critical race theory," he added.

The case involved Manning Rollerson, a black property owner in Freeport, Texas, who claimed the city used discriminatory tactics to purchase land from a historically black neighborhood for a port expansion project. Ho's concurrence accompanied a majority opinion that reinstated one part of that property owner's suit.

Rollerson said the strategy used by Port Freeport to complete a harbor improvement project, which it's working on with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, violated civil rights law.

Under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, discrimination in federally funded programs or activities is prohibited.

He said if people suing under Title VI can use disparate impact theory to back up their claims, Congress should be responsible for cementing that in law.

"It's said that the road to hell is paved with good intentions...That's why we have laws on the books, like Title VI, that simply forbid the 'sordid business' of 'divvying us up by race' no matter what our intentions," Judge Ho said.

 

[marsh]

Make No Mistake. You Are Living Under the Perfect Censorship.

We who have lived in communist countries recognize the signs: American freedom of speech and thought are hanging on by a ...

humanevents.com

YOU ARE LIVING UNDER THE PERFECT CENSORSHIP.
We who have lived in communist countries recognize the signs: American freedom of speech and thought are hanging on by a thread.

By Armando Simón | July 29, 2021

In 1991, Mario Vargas Llosa, Nobel laureate from Perú, caused a firestorm on Mexican television by calling Mexico the “perfect dictatorship, a phrase that has since become iconic. He pointed out that the one-party rule in Mexico had become entrenched: the Institutional Revolutionary Party (Partido Revolucionario Institucional in Spanish, or PRI) held uninterrupted power in the country for 71 years, even though the name of the presidents changed every five years (whereupon they were automatically amnestied by their successor for any criminal activity). Criticism—up to a point—was permitted, even encouraged, to maintain the illusion of Mexico being democratic. Opposition parties were allowed, but they often found that the means for an effective election campaign was controlled by the ruling party. As Vargas Llosa explained, a special kind of political rhetoric had been created to justify Mexico’s political system by recruiting intellectuals who were too willing to prostitute themselves. In short, it was a deviation from the traditional style of brutal military dictatorship, but it was a dictatorship nonetheless.

View: https://youtu.be/kPsVVWg-E38
7:43 min

Vargas Llosa’s interview had an impact. Vicente Fox, running on the National Action Party (PAN) ticket, was elected president in 2000, followed by Felipe Calderón (also PAN) in 2006. In 2012, PRI returned to power with the election of Enrique Peña Nieto, but lost it again in 2018 with the election of Andrés Manuel López Obrador (of the center-left progressive populist party, Movimiento Regeneración Nacional). By pointing out what everyone knew, Vargas Llosa had effectively altered Mexican politics.

Criticism—up to a point—was permitted, even encouraged, to maintain the illusion of Mexico being democratic.

With reflection, it is evident that the template for a “perfect dictatorship” has also been applied in other countries such as Turkey, Venezuela, and Russia: either the same leader—Erdogan, Maduro, Putin—gets “re-elected” while opposition candidates are hamstrung. Alternatively, as in the case of Iran, clones of the same kind of leader cycle through the office. Though these regimes are a deviation from the traditional style of brutal military dictatorship (where power is seized by force), they are dictatorships nonetheless: despite the performance of periodic elections, power is nevertheless held by a single leader or group with little or no tolerance for political pluralism or independent media.

Upon further reflection, it is also clear that many western (ironically, democratic) countries now face a similar condition—not necessarily in terms of their elections, but in terms of other freedoms that democratic electorates have grown accustomed to. Western democracies are now under perfect censorship. This process has been going on for many years, and is on the verge of being perfected in the United States.

MAN WITH BULLHORN.

THE DANGEROUS TREND TOWARD PERFECT CENSORSHIP
“Perfect censorship” has already been perfected and is in full operation in many of our western counterparts: the United Kingdom, Canada, Germany, France, and Sweden—all countries where freedom of speech has vanished. Gone. In those countries, anyone who makes jokes will at best be fined and, at worst, jailed.

When these views are combined with the power of left-leaning institutions, censorship isn’t far behind.

In Great Britain, through section 58 of the Terrorism Act 2000, people can now be sent to prison for 15 years just for viewing “far-right propaganda,” which is a vague and undefined phrase (much like Germans and Dutch were jailed for listening to the BBC during WWII, and Russians and Hungarians could be sent to the gulag for listening to Voice of America). In 2019, journalist Caroline Farrow, a devout Catholic, was threatened with prison for “misgendering” a transgender person, accused of violating the UK’s Malicious Communications Act.

Jokes, meanwhile, are practically illegal in Scotland (actually, in all of the UK), as Mark Meechan, known online as “Count Dankula,” found out when he tried to irritate his girlfriend by teaching her pug dog the Hitler salute. When he posted the prank online, it was deemed not only offensive, but threatening, as if people were going to be converted to National Socialism because of a pug doing a Hitler salute. He was taken to court and fined. (Meechan subsequently praised America’s First Amendment after Britain’s Prince Harry called it “bonkers.”)

Meanwhile, police are on the lookout for a “loud man” who talked of his “dislike of Muslims” on a train from York to Leeds—a heinous hate crime, according to British Transport Police.

Then, there is climate change. Those who deny global warming should be murdered, according to at least one British actor—but murdered humanely, he insisted. One actor’s opinion doesn’t rise to the level of censorship, of course, but when these views are combined with the power of left-leaning institutions, censorship isn’t far behind. Climate activists have lobbied social media platforms in the UK to designate speech critical of the “climate change” narrative as misinformation, even going as far as to call for the de-platforming and demonetization of these views. The mainstream media, meanwhile, has fallen in line: in February, the Press Gazette’s Charlotte Tobitt declared that the UK press has “moved from denial to acceptance and now action on climate change.”

In Europe, Books critical of Muslims, like Hege Storhaug’s Islam: Europe Invaded, America Warned, and Sabaditsch-Wolff’s The Truth is No Defense, are being attacked, along with their authors. For all intents and purposes, criticizing any aspect of Islam is officially verboten in many European countries (but attacking Christianity is permitted). The European Court of Human Rights has ruled that the Islamic religion should not be criticized in any way, even when simply pointing out historical facts regarding the religion’s central figure, the Prophet Mohammed.

I could continue, but you get the picture. In short, Europeans (and Canadians) may have democracy, but, paradoxically, they do not have freedom of speech.

They have been told, and they have accepted, that such restrictions are for their own good and so certain select groups won’t feel offended. In fact, the majority of the citizens of those countries are even unaware that they are living under a regime of censorship—that is how effective it has been.

It is a dangerous trend, one that is making its way to the United States.

MAN WITH BULLHORN.


Part 1 of 3

 

[marsh]

Part 2 of 2

THE FIRST AMENDMENT HANGS ON BY A THREAD
Just as the ”perfect dictatorship” deviates from the traditional violence of a military coup, the “perfect censorship” deviates from more traditional styles of state censorship in that it is not instituted by the government. Instead, it is a kind of control that has been slowly, subtly, and systematically imposed over the years by ideologically driven fanatics who, almost without notice, have established a wide presence within institutions, and who instinctively gravitate towards positions of power within those institutions, no matter how seemingly insignificant (like student governments in universities). They have a hive mind: they think alike, they speak alike, they act alike, they feel alike. It is as if they were NPCs.

Whether one wants to admit it or not, the fact of the matter is that American censorship is being carried out not by libertarians or conservatives, but by liberals. The very same people that so fiercely advocated free speech decades ago are now equally fiercely advocating censorship.

The very same people that so fiercely advocated free speech decades ago are now equally fiercely advocating censorship.

In order to present an illusion of tolerance, American editors will occasionally hire a “conservative” who is anything but a conservative. Occasionally, they will even hire a real conservative as long as he/she hates Trump. However, when one of these token conservatives steps out of line for expressing views that are anathema, he/she finds themselves instantly out on the street (as happened to Kevin Williamson in 2018 with The Atlantic, when the editors realized that Williamson was much more conservative than they had anticipated, having once posted on Twitter that women who have abortions should be hung).

Another instance is Bret Stephens, formerly of Wall Street Journal, now working on borrowed time at The New York Pravda—sorry, The New York Times. He was brought over to the Dark Side immediately after the 2016 election simply because of his intense hatred for Donald Trump, and he has pleased his new masters by occasionally writing pieces like the one where he defended Sarah Jeong, despite her unapologetic anti-white racism. (However, deviation from the party line sends leftists into a hysterical frenzy, as Stephens has learned on a number of occasions.)

The United States has one advantage that the supposedly democratic countries of Europe and Canada do not have: the First Amendment of the US Constitution—the highest legal authority of the United States—which forbids any governmental body or bureaucrat from usurping the free speech rights of its citizens. This is not to say that there are no politicians who would love to strip us of those rights. Or try to, rather. And as expected, they all happen to be from the Democratic Party.

During a 2018 CNN interview, California Democratic Representative Ted Lieu declared that he “would love to be able to regulate the content of speech,” while the former Chair of the Democratic National Committee and presidential candidate Howard Dean declared in a Tweet that “Hate speech is not protected by the first amendment.” David Chipman, President Joe Biden’s pick to lead the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, recently showed his contempt for not one, but two fundamental American rights, saying that those who use “hate speech” on the internet should not have the right to bear arms.

Most of the 2020 Democratic primary candidates advocated “regulating” “hate speech” and “white nationalism” speech. As early as 1974, then-Senator Joe Biden had bragged that politicians could take away the First Amendment while, during the Democratic presidential debate, Kamala Harris called on Twitter to delete President Trump’s account. Sen. Bernie Sanders, the socialist Senator from Vermont, wants to control all facets of journalism, which is not surprising since there isn’t a communist regime that he doesn’t like. In 2019, Sanders published an op-ed for Columbia Journalism Review to share his vision for a government-managed Fourth Estate: “We need to rebuild and protect a diverse and truly independent press so that real journalists can do the critical jobs that they love, and that a functioning democracy requires,” he writes.

Glenbrook South’s chapter of Turning Point USA was canceled by orders of Democratic politicians because the group put up a poster criticizing China’s Communist Party.

The enthusiasm that leftist leaders have for censorship is trickling down to the local level as well. It speaks volumes that this year Glenbrook South’s chapter of Turning Point USA was canceled by orders of Democratic politicians because the group put up a poster criticizing China’s Communist Party. That tells you everything there is to know about the future of free speech in a Democrat-controlled world. It’s a little scary to think what all these individuals would do if it wasn’t for the First Amendment. It’s likely one of the reasons that Democrats are desperate to pack the Supreme Court with totalitarian-minded “progressives.”

After eliminating “hate speech,” they would then outlaw the Republican Party (even though it is mostly composed of eunuchs), something that they have openly advocated.

Nor is it just politicians. American universities are teeming with sophists who have argued in favor of censorship; so have journalists. (The irony being that these two groups have been strong opponents of censorship). Just look at the catalog of acts of censorship in schools found in The College Fix, Campus Reform, and Samizdat 2020. It is fascinating reading the intellectual gymnastics undertaken by the intellectual left to justify censorship.

The First Amendment protects Americans from censorship by the government, but has no say in preventing censorship by private institutions, such as social media (YouTube, Google, Pinterest, Twitter, Facebook), newspapers (e.g., New York Times, The Boston Globe, Washington Post), and network news (CBS, ABC, CNN, MSNBC, NBC). In the past four years, I have personally collected hundreds of instances of censorship by these entities, ranging from outright deliberate falsehoods (“fake news”) to news blackouts to removal and demonetizing internet channels. After I finished writing this essay, President Biden called on Facebook to censor “misinformation” on its site, even more aggressively than it already does, just like YouTube. Since the politics of the Democratic Party and Silicon Valley are congruent, Facebook and its peers will no doubt comply.

We may have the First Amendment, but free speech in America is hanging by a thread.

FREE SPEECH GRAFFITI.

 

[marsh]

Part 3 of 3

WE, THE MODERN-DAY CASSANDRAS
It is not just censorship that is worrisome. And here we truly come to the crux of the problem. Present-day censorship is a manifestation of totalitarianism. Only someone who is very obtuse will fail to recognize that we are in the midst of a totalitarian movement.

I come from Cuba, and I have Russian and Ukrainian friends; what is happening in the United States has a disturbing familiarity.

In schools and universities, ideological indoctrination and rigid conformity are taking place. Everything has become politicized, from television to businesses to advertisements to the military. People are afraid to speak their minds. Comedy is under attack (and isn’t it interesting that the Soviet Union never had comedy? In my research, I have never come across any comedy in Soviet films or television.

There was never any comedy in Communist countries, which I guess is why circus clowns were so popular in the Soviet Union). The Radicalization Awareness Network recently published a report attacking humor, as it is applied to dogma, to political parties, to governmental policies, or any of an assortment of leftist sacred cows. It makes recommendations on how to eliminate humor.

Meanwhile, resistance to censorship is minimal and ineffective.

I come from Cuba, and I have Russian and Ukrainian friends; what is happening in the United States has a disturbing familiarity. We are experiencing déjà vu. We who have lived in communist countries—Vietnamese, Poles, Ukrainians, Russians, Cubans, Chinese, Romanians, Czechoslovakians—recognize all the signs. We have seen it before. We are frantically sounding the alarm to an unresponsive citizenry—the barbarians are inside the gates—but we are dismissed as alarmists, as engaging in “hyperbole.” We are modern-day Cassandras, who are disturbing the tranquility of the readers.

In the words of Pastor Artur Pawlowski, “We were warning Americans and Canadians—Westerners—about what is coming. We could smell it for many years. People were laughing at us. ‘Oh, you’re just making this stuff up. You’re blowing this out of proportion. You conspiracy theorist.’ However, it’s here.”

I wonder if Winston Churchill felt the same way.

 

[marsh]

The People vs. Critical Race Theory

There won’t be a second chance to take back hijacked American schools.

americanmind.org

The People vs. Critical Race Theory
Zachary Rogers

There won’t be a second chance to take back hijacked American schools.

With a speed that has astonished ordinary Americans, a vocal minority of “critical race theorists” has blitzed K-12 education with sweeping changes of law and policy. The New York Times’ 1619 Project has been the tip of the spear of their movement to put anti-American narratives of race and power at the heart of American curricula.

Even at the very highest levels of prestige, the examples now are legion. At the Dalton School in New York City, faculty signed a letter with a long list of recommendations, including: yearly anti-racist training for employees, an expanded diversity bureaucracy with at least 12 positions, and employee anti-racism statements. Prestigious exam schools predicated upon admitting excellent students and outstanding staff have been pushed to abandon entrance tests in the name of equity (not to be confused with equality).

Not to be outdone, the Illinois Board of Education recently amended a rule to establish “culturally responsive” teaching standards. The regulations require educators to recognize that there is no one “‘correct’ way of doing or understanding something”; to acknowledge that “systems of oppression…in our society…create and reinforce inequities”; and to “work actively against” those systems in order to “understand how the system of inequity has impacted them as an educator.” The amendment mandates that teachers adopt a narrow political ideology that includes a view of American history, society, and law that most citizens reject. The prioritization of this agenda comes at a time when many students are not even in the classroom.

Majority Report
The spirit that moved the Illinois Department of Education saturates social media and is omnipresent on elite college campuses. But there is also good news.

Despite what the media and the academy would have you believe, the American people think that free speech, equal opportunity under the law, and the principles of the founding should still govern the day-to-day lives of citizens. A recent survey of 800 Illinois residents sponsored by the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA) strongly suggests that efforts to politicize public education do not align with the values of the majority of citizens. Rather than imposing a partisan agenda through rules and regulations from an agency, citizens should have an informed debate about public school curricula and teaching standards.

To judge from Illinoisans’ assessment of their K-12 schools, the conversation is overdue. Forty-eight percent of respondents think that schools are doing a “worse than good” job (6 percent answered “excellent”). To improve that number, schools would be well served by focusing on preparing students for lifelong success rather than imposing policies and advocating a socio-political position that is at best controversial.

They should also recommit to teaching civic literacy. ACTA’s survey found that the push to implement new curricula aligned with the NYT’s 1619 Project is disfavored by many in the state, however popular it may be with elites and activists. Presented with two views, nearly half (48 percent) of respondents chose “K-12 schools should focus on teaching students about American founding principles and the documents that established the first free and democratic country in the world” as closest to their own, compared to 38 percent who would prefer that K-12 schools “teach children to understand that America is founded on slavery and remains systemically racist today.” Large majorities of Republicans (78 percent) and Independents (69 percent) favor “teaching students about American founding principles,” along with one-quarter of Democrats. What this indicates is that a sizable number of people in a very blue state do not think schools should prioritize the main thesis of the 1619 Project. Instead, they want students to understand the fundamentals of American history and the principles of American government.

Critical race theory and action civics are also unpopular with the people of Illinois. A majority of respondents indicated that students should receive a fair and balanced education when it comes to United States history. Question 21 on the survey presented respondents with three statements: a) “K-12 teachers should work to expose students to a variety of perspectives about the country’s founding and history, and to equip them to think critically about its successes and failures”; b) “K-12 teachers should embrace progressive viewpoints and perspectives when teaching U.S. history, to encourage students to advocate for social justice causes”; or c) “Unsure.” Out of these three options, 62 percent chose a), 23 percent picked b), and 15 percent were unsure. Illinoisans want teachers to focus on the facts and principles of American history so that children know the nation’s story, understand the propositions of our government, and can evaluate the struggle to live up to these ideals.

Nor do respondents desire to see the K-12 system prioritize social justice ahead of the basic knowledge and skills that students need for professional success.

When presented with two options—“Teacher preparation programs in Illinois should focus on making teachers better equipped to help students develop core skills and competencies” and “Teacher preparation programs in Illinois should prioritize teaching progressive viewpoints and social justice advocacy”—57 percent chose the first option. As it turns out, people care about preparing students with the knowledge they need to succeed in a competitive workforce and within their communities.

The viewpoints of activists are also at odds with those of most Illinoisans on issues of free speech, equality, and meritocracy:

• Fifty-nine percent of survey respondents opposed “Efforts to prevent speakers from expressing opinions that some members of the [college] campus find offensive.” Only 20 percent supported suppressing free speech.
• Half of respondents (50 percent), when given two options, chose “Fighting racism means making sure that everyone regardless of race has the same opportunities and equal protection under the law—but it’s not the government’s role to mandate equal outcomes for everyone.” Forty percent chose equality of outcomes instead of equality of opportunity.
• More than eight in 10 (84 percent) agreed that men and women should be treated equally based on merit.

What the People Want
Americans want to attain success based on their achievements, receive equal justice under equal laws, and to be judged on their own merit. What they do not want is to see civics and history education distorted into a partisan exercise, meritocracy eliminated, or free speech obstructed. Practical steps parents and legislators can work toward include:

• Legislation mandating the study of specific primary historical documents as well as curricular transparency—so that parents know what their children are learning in public schools.
• Well-designed professional development programs focused on improving content knowledge among civics and history teachers, to ensure rigorous instruction in the classroom.
• Reforms to teacher certification standards that make it possible for schools to hire teachers with a strong background or content knowledge of the subject instead of a standard teaching diploma.
• New processes to ensure the adoption of balanced and academically rigorous curricula at the local, district, and state levels.
• The development of rigorous assessment instruments that measure content mastery and civic literacy among students and/or that require teachers to have mastery of their instruction specialty.

Problems and Solutions
Activists used the rule-making process in Illinois to enact radical changes in K-12 education because they knew that Illinoisans would not otherwise consent to it.

This imposition of radical policies and curricular changes by administrative fiat instead of the consent and deliberation of citizens is occurring in every state. It should be stopped. If the Department of Education refuses to withdraw the rule, the people of Illinois might consider electing new lawmakers to represent them, in the spirit of 1776.

 

[marsh]

'If We Have to Appeal to Keep This Going For a Month at Least' - Biden Admits Eviction Moratorium Unconstitutional, Banks on Case Getting Tied Up in Court (VIDEO)

www.thegatewaypundit.com

‘If We Have to Appeal to Keep This Going For a Month at Least’ – Biden Admits Eviction Moratorium Unconstitutional, Banks on Case Getting Tied Up in Court (VIDEO)

By Cristina Laila
Published August 5, 2021 at 4:54pm

Joe Biden on Thursday spoke to reporters after driving an electric Jeep Wrangler around the South Lawn of the White House.

Biden admitted the CDC’s decision to unilaterally extend the eviction moratorium for 60 days was likely unconstitutional.

Even worse, Biden said the quiet part out loud and admitted the point of extending the moratorium was to get the case caught up in the courts to buy time.

“I can’t guarantee you the court won’t rule that we don’t have that authority but at least we’ll have the ability to, if we have to appeal, to keep this going for a month-at least. I hope longer and in the process, by that time we’ll get a lot of…”

VIDEO:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1423381284286607361

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1423381284286607361
.16 min

The CDC on Tuesday announced a new 60-day moratorium on evictions.

CDC Director Rochelle Walensky acted independently and signed the order on Tuesday.

‘This moratorium is the right thing to do to keep people in their homes and out of congregate settings where COVID-19 spreads,’ Walensky said. ‘Such mass evictions and the attendant public health consequences would be very difficult to reverse.’

“This order will expire on October 3, 2021 and applies in United States counties experiencing substantial and high levels of community transmission levels of SARS-CoV-2,” according to a statement, which adds that the moratorium “allows additional time for rent relief to reach renters and to further increase vaccination rates.”

There are steep criminal penalties for landlords who break this order signed by Walensky.

– Potential $100,000 fine and 1 year in jail if eviction doesn’t result in death
– Up to $250,000 fine and 1 year in jail if evicted person dies
Joe Biden knowingly violated the Constitution and admitted he is banking on the case getting caught up in the courts to push through his agenda.

 

[marsh]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PytRsvWfuYQ
13:52 min

Far left’s LONGTERM plan to demonize white conservatives EXPOSED

Aug 5, 2021


Glenn Beck

Glenn explains how it’s been the far left’s plan ‘for a very long time’ to slowly but surely use race to demonize all conservatives. In fact, Glenn thinks, it started as far back as September 11th, 2001. Now white supremacists have been equated to all white people, and all white people have been equated to conservatives. They’ve created “two Americas,” Glenn says, and they’re destroying the culture, history, and values of the nation we once loved...

 

[marsh]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v4LwwRfmkl4
32:23 min

Landlords Sue Biden For Illegal Eviction Moratorium, Fauci Says Third COVID Shot Rushed For Approval

Aug 5, 2021


Tim Pool

Landlords Sue Biden For Illegal Eviction Moratorium, Fauci Says Third COVID Shot Rushed For Approval. The Supreme Court had already ruled the moratorium illegal and Biden even acknowledged it was.

 

[marsh]

Federal appeals judge: Implementing critical race theory would violate civil rights law

Judge James Ho warns agency regulators not to apply trendy legal theories to the Civil Rights Act.

justthenews.com

Federal appeals judge: Implementing critical race theory would violate civil rights law

Judge James Ho warns agency regulators not to apply trendy legal theories to the Civil Rights Act.

Updated: August 5, 2021 - 6:10pm

Critical race theory flies in the face of the federal Civil Rights Act by presuming that racial disparities are the result of racial discrimination, a federal appeals court judge wrote in a concurrence.

A black property owner alleged that a Texas navigation district committed racial discrimination by threatening to condemn properties and conspiring with city officials to keep property values low in his neighborhood, so it could acquire them for a channel improvement project. The East End of Freeport was created as a "Negro reservation" and remains majority-minority, though Hispanics heavily outnumber blacks.

The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected Manning Rollerson's racial discrimination claim because he didn't allege "facts supporting the contention that racial discrimination played some supporting role in the Port’s decision-making," which has a "legitimate motivation" in the need to acquire land around the Velasco Terminal.

Judge James Ho, nominated by President Trump, joined most of the opinion but wrote separately to express his concerns about "unelected agency officials usurping Congress’s authority when it comes to disparate impact theory," which lies behind Rollerson's lawsuit.

Title VI of the Civil Rights Act targets "intentional" racial discrimination, not "neutral policies untainted by racial intent that happen to lead to racially disproportionate outcomes," Ho wrote.

"There’s a big difference between prohibiting racial discrimination and endorsing disparate impact theory. ... It’s the difference between securing equality of opportunity regardless of race and guaranteeing equality of outcome based on race. It’s the difference between color blindness and critical race theory."

Ho contrasted Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech, which seeks a nation where children "will not be judged by the color of their
skin," with the book "How to Be an Anti-Racist" by critical race theorist Ibram Kendi, which deems racist "any measure that produces or sustains racial inequity between racial groups."

Disparate impact theory requires looking at race to suss out racial imbalance, but the Supreme Court has held that racial balancing is "patently unconstitutional," Ho continued.

It also requires "a legal presumption that evidence of racial imbalance is evidence of racial discrimination," which runs headlong into the "bedrock" principle of innocent until proven guilty. The result is often racial discrimination in the service of balancing, he said.

"My point is simply this: If disparate impact theory is going to be incorporated into federal law, it should be done by Congress—not agency regulators," Ho concluded. "Citizens are understandably skeptical when government officials claim that they’re just here to help—but then declare that up is down, left is right, race consciousness is good, and race neutrality is bad."

Cornell law professor William Jacobson flagged the concurrence in a Monday blog post, calling Ho "a likely Supreme Court nominee when Republicans regain the White House."

Jacobson told Just the News it was the first mention of critical race theory or Kendi by name in a court opinion that he had seen. "Judge Ho’s views are constitutionally correct as well as correct under existing anti-discrimination law," he wrote in an email. "It is only a matter of time before the court system is forced to confront racism in the name of so-called 'antiracism.'"

 

[marsh]

Apple Reveals Plans to Spy on Everyone's iPhones - Here's How to Check for Spy Software

www.thegatewaypundit.com

Apple Reveals Plans to Spy on Everyone’s iPhones – Here’s How to Check for Spy Software

By Richard Abelson
Published August 6, 2021 at 9:19am

Tim Cook © Apple

Apple Computer has unveiled plans to scan iPhones in the USA, AP reports, ostensibly under the guise of searching for for child pornography. The Electronic Frontier Foundation called Apple’s giving up privacy protections “a shocking about-face for users who have relied on the company’s leadership in privacy and security.”

Apple Computer was once celebrated among security and civil liberty watchdogs alike, for refusing the FBI access to the San Bernadino jihadi terrorists’ iPhone communications, who killed 14 and injured 22 others.

In 2020, President Donald Trump slammed Apple over refusing access to password-protected iPhones used by the shooter in the 2019 attack on a Navy base in Pensacola, Florida.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has said that “Apple is opening the door to broader abuses”:

“It’s impossible to build a client-side scanning system that can only be used for sexually explicit images sent or received by children. As a consequence, even a well-intentioned effort to build such a system will break key promises of the messenger’s encryption itself and open the door to broader abuses […] That’s not a slippery slope; that’s a fully built system just waiting for external pressure to make the slightest change.”

The Center for Democracy and Technology has said that it is “deeply concerned that Apple’s changes in fact create new risks to children and all users, and mark a significant departure from long-held privacy and security protocols”:

NSA Whistleblower Edward Snowden recently revealed how Pegasus spy software from Israeli company NSO can infilitrate our iPhones:



For the skilled user, here is a step-by-step instruction for checking whether your phone has been compromised by Pegasus spy software.

 

[marsh]

LA High School Teacher Hangs ‘F*** the Police’ Poster in Classroom | National Review

Over the last year, teachers and administrators nationwide have weaponized K-12 education by injecting progressive politics into classrooms.

www.nationalreview.com

CRT Roundup: Fairfax County Schools Sent Second Graders Video Vilifying Cops: ‘I Feel Safe When There Are No Police’

By NR STAFF
August 5, 2021 3:05 PM

Parents and community members attend a Loudoun County School Board meeting which included a discussion about Critical Race Theory, in Ashburn, Va., June 22, 2021. (Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters)​

Over the last year, teachers and administrators nationwide have weaponized K-12 education, injecting progressive politics into classrooms, and indoctrinating students with novel social justice dogma, including theories that call for racialized curriculums and reverse discrimination to achieve racial equity.

Mainstream media outlets and left-wing commentators have accused conservatives of demonizing critical race theory, and turning an obscure academic theory into a rightwing “bogeyman.” But there sure are a lot of examples of it turning up in schools across the country, from big city Democratic strongholds to suburban districts in red America. The following are summaries of just a small number of the fights that have erupted in the last year.

Fairfax County Schools Sent Second Graders a Video Vilifying Police: ‘I Feel Safe When There Are No Police’

Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS) sent second-graders a “summer learning guide” in July which included a Youtube video titled “Woke Kindergarten” that vilified the police.

​

Centered around the importance of “feeling safe,” the video, which was obtained by Parents Defending Education, presents a slideshow of photos featuring groups of young African Americans, some of whom are holding Black Lives Matter signs.

“We deserve to feel safe in our homes… I feel safe when there are no police. And it’s no one’s job to tell me how I feel. But it’s everyone’s job to make sure that people who are being treated unfairly……feel safe too,” a narrator says.

The “suggested texts” section of the summer learning guide also recommends students listen to “Good Trouble by Ki,” which instructs students on the merits of civil disobedience.

The narrator of another video, intended for seven-year-olds, tells students, “sometimes it’s good to get into trouble.” The video also presents a sequence of photos depicting social justice demonstrations, some from the modern day and some taken during the Civil Rights movement of the mid-twentieth century.

In a reference to Representative John Lewis’ 2020 speech in Selma, Alabama commemorating Bloody Sunday, the video adds, “John Lewis was a freedom fighter who got in a lot of good trouble.”

“Get in good trouble, necessary trouble, and redeem the soul of America,” Lewis declared at the 2020 event.

Over the last year, the Fairfax school system has become a notorious hotbed for many of the progressive developments taking root in public K-12 education across the country. Teachers have been instructed to use students preferred pronouns and an aggressive form of diversity, equity, and inclusion curricula has taken hold. Teachers in the district have also resisted efforts to return to in-person learning.

On the radicalized curriculum front, prominent journalist Asra Nomani criticized the district’s decision to change a rule guiding how contentious topics are discussed in the classroom.

The district leaders announced they would be “revising the existing Controversial Issues Policy and developing a new Anti-Racism, Anti-Bias Education Curriculum Policy.”

Nomani told National Review that she believes the curriculum revision is laying the foundation for progressive activists to impose “anti-racist” indoctrination and critical race theory on students.

Teachers’ Union Sues Rhode Island Mother for Over-Requesting Public Records on CRT in School District

Nicole Solas, a mother of a kindergartner in South Kingston, R.I., was sued by a powerful teachers’ union earlier this week after she requested documents surrounding the teaching of Critical Race Theory and related concepts at her daughter’s public school.

After hearing reports that teachers refused to address students as “boys” and “girls,” Solas grew concerned that progressive indoctrination was infiltrating her child’s classroom.

​

Denied both a tour of the elementary school and an un-redacted copy of its curriculum, Solas identified an avenue to inquire directly about the district’s social justice agenda without incurring the exorbitant cost many parents confront just to gain access to information about their children’s schooling.

In July, The Goldwater Institute filed a public records request on Solas behalf, resulting in her receiving a $74,000 bill to fulfill it, according to The Goldwater Institute.

To avoid paying thousands of dollars, Solas submitted over 160 specific public records requests, narrowing the scope to six months and requesting digital rather than hard copies, to investigate the school district’s plans to introduce critical race theory and other equity and inclusion initiatives, GoLocalProv reported.

Among the records Solas requested were documents pertaining to the influence of the AFL-CIO and NEA unions and teacher discipline and performance, as well as emails sent by various district administrators over the last six months, according to the lawsuit.

​

To justify the legality of filing so many records requests at once, Solas cited a provision in the state Access to Public Records Act (APRA) law, which holds that “[M]ultiple requests from any person or entity to the same public body within a thirty (30) day time period shall be considered one request,” according to her own account.

But the local branch of the National Education Association, the largest teachers’ union in the country, sued Solas alleging that she unfairly inundated the district with solicitations for documents, some of which are obscure items that do not constitute public records.

The lawsuit’s declaratory judgement reads, “The APRA system is not an alternative to the civil discovery process and is not to be used for abusive purposes or a fishing expedition – it was not intended to ’empower the press and the public with carte blanche to demand all records held by public agencies.”

(This article is impossible to format. Please read the rest on their website.)

 

[marsh]

Rhode Island Teachers Union Sues Mom Over CRT Public Records Request

www.thegatewaypundit.com

Rhode Island Teachers Union Sues Mom Over CRT Public Records Request

By Julian Conradson
Published August 6, 2021 at 4:40pm

The National Education Association (NEA) filed a lawsuit and a temporary restraining order against a Rhode Island mom for requesting information regarding the CRT propaganda that her child is being taught in school.

Nicole Solas filed an official request with the district for a copy of her daughter’s public school curriculum and other materials under the state’s Access to Public Records Act, but was instead presented with the ridiculous lawsuit.

After she was served papers yesterday, she blasted the National Education Association for hiding the requested information and said that they are “bullying moms” in the process.



The union said they filed the court actions because some of the records Solas requested include documents like emails that display “personal information” which would violate their members privacy – something that can EASILY be redacted.

In a statement to Fox news Jennifer Azevedo, the deputy director of the Marxist Union, sounded like they believe their members are above the law and that the lawsuit was filed in hopes the court would determine that their rights to teach your kids whatever they want are more important than transparency.

“We are asking the Court to conduct a balancing test to determine whether our members’ privacy rights outweigh the public interest.”

‘We believe they do, and those records should either not be disclosed or should be redacted accordingly,” Azevedo said.

In other words they are looking to set the precedent that you have no right to educate your own children.

Fox news detailed the National Education Association’s ridiculous lawsuit:
NEARI’s verified complaint, which was filed Monday, states: “Given the circumstances of the requests, it is likely that any teachers who are identifiable and have engaged in discussions about things like critical race theory will then be the subject of teacher harassment by national conservative groups opposed to critical race theory.”

Cornell law professor William Jacobson argued that “[t]his lawsuit makes little sense on its face. The unions purport to be protecting their members non-public documents and information, but the public records law only applies to “public records” as defined under the statute.”

The filing from Monday, however, seeks for the court to examine certain categories of documents which are “potentially public records” under the Access to Public Records Act.

It adds that if records aren’t determined to constitute a “clearly unwarranted invasion of privacy,” they should be disclosed with redactions of personally identifiable information or “information which may lead to the identity of such teachers.”

The “National conservative groups” are to blame for the unions lack of transparency – yeah, give me a break.

Parents have every right, especially if their child is enrolled in a public school and as a taxpaying citizens, to review and have access to what is being taught to their kids.

Why are these radicals fighting so hard to keep parents in the dark?

One thing is for sure, they wouldn’t file a restraining order against a concerned mother if they had nothing to hide.

 

[marsh]

Teen Vogue Urges Gen Z to Mobilize, Build ‘Socialist Future’

Teen Vogue urged its young readers to “mobilize toward building a socialist future” and “shift the tide in favor of socialism."

www.breitbart.com

Teen Vogue Urges Gen Z to Mobilize, Build ‘Socialist Future’: ‘No Future Under Capitalism’

AMY OSBORNE/AFP/Getty
JOSHUA KLEIN6 Aug 2021499

Teen Vogue urged its young readers in a recent online publication to “mobilize toward building a socialist future” and “shift the tide in favor of socialism,” describing it as “the only system that will guarantee us a livable planet and life unburdened from economic exploitation, crushing debt, and racial castes,” while claiming, “there is no future for us under capitalism.”

The op-ed, titled “The Democratic Socialists of America Can Mobilize Gen Z’ers Like Me,” was penned by Calla Walsh, a 17-year-old political organizer from Massachusetts and one of the youngest delegates to this week’s Democratic Socialists of America’s (DSA) national convention.

Noting that some of the “defining life experiences” affecting one’s political consciousness occur during adolescence, Walsh described herself as “a 17-year-old socialist” who attributes a “fascist presidential administration, pandemic, economic collapse, and a historic uprising for Black lives” to having shaped her generation’s worldview.

“These defining events and movements have caused Gen Z to become more disillusioned with capitalism and the white-supremacist, bourgeois state than older generations,” she wrote.

Walsh then urged members of her generation “to mobilize toward building a socialist future,” noting that Gen Z is “especially open to ideological radicalization.”

Having watched capitalism “fail time and again” and having “experienced two of the country’s worst recessions,” Walsh described her personal experience of “risking [her] life” to work during the pandemic.

“When I regained employment after Massachusetts reopened, I witnessed capitalism’s lack of regard for human life firsthand,” she wrote. “Going to work meant risking my life to perform labor because the ruling class had decided that dead frontline workers were just the collateral damage of their profit-motivated reopening.”

Walsh described being motivated to join the DSA while working at a restaurant that closed due to the coronavirus in November, as well as due to prior experiences while “climate organizing.”

“My belief in socialism was strengthened during my time as a frontline worker, but it originated earlier, when I first became engaged in politics through climate organizing,” she wrote.

“I recognized capitalism as the root cause of the climate crisis and realized that the environmental justice for which I was fighting posed a threat to capitalism’s very existence as a system of profit and exploitation,” she added.

Walsh claimed, “Looking at the world through the lens of class conflict and historical materialism has made everything I had never been able to explain make sense.”

“What continues to mystify me is how anyone my age can still have complete faith in capitalism, a system that is driving our planet to literal inhabitability,” she added.

The “climate crisis,” too, necessitates “Gen Z’s commitment to socialism,” according to Walsh, who then quoted the DSA:

As DSA’s Ecosocialist Working Group explains, “The liberation of people and the planet are necessarily intertwined and dependent on the dismantling of our exploitative capitalist production process and the remaking of society to serve the needs of people and planet, not profit.”

“Human survival will depend on revolution,” she added, warning that “‘survival mode’ under late-stage capitalism” means enduring “the endless exploitation of the Earth’s natural resources”:

We will have to survive floods, heat waves, forest fires, and air pollution; watch our homes sink under water; the collapse of food supply chains; and power grids that give out. The working class will suffer while the rich will be able to move to higher elevations and build safeguarded homes.

Walsh then claimed that organizing will be driven “by an impulse to save the human race.”

Generation Z has already demonstrated its ability to “organize and mobilize,” Walsh stated, citing “young Black activists who led Black Lives Matter protests, and young allies who participated and made it likely the biggest movement in U.S. history.”

In addition, young voters have begun turning out in record numbers, according to Walsh, and are responsible for propelling Joe Biden to victory in key swing states.

Their “digital fluency” provides them with “a unique platform to organize, disseminate information, and share our beliefs,” with social media exposing them to “new ideas that antagonize our current belief systems, induce change, and push us toward ideological clarity,” Walsh stated.

Walsh also claimed that “the struggles to end white supremacy and capitalism are intertwined,” citing Black Lives Matter’s (BLM) “focus on dismantling racial capitalism.”

“Centering Black liberation in our movement for socialism is a moral imperative that will also allow us to engage young people who were politically radicalized by Black Lives Matter and counter the neoliberal co-optation of racial justice organizing,” she added.

Walsh called on her generation — “whose souls have not yet been crushed by capitalism” — to utilize their tools and “shift the tide in favor of socialism,” which she described as “the only system that will guarantee us a livable planet and life unburdened from economic exploitation, crushing debt, and racial castes.”

She then said, “We are counting on millennials, Gen Z, even Boomers to guide us into the socialist movement so we can work together to empower the working class.”

Walsh concluded her op-ed by urging the socialist movement to invest in educating and mobilizing her generation and by urging her generation to join the DSA.

“I urge the socialist movement to meaningfully invest in youth activation and the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity we have to mobilize Gen Z. And I urge my peers to join their local DSA or YDSA chapter and start organizing,” she wrote, adding, “The future belongs to young people, but there is no future for us under capitalism.”

In response, Young Democratic Socialists of America (YDSA) called on the youth to join the socialist movement, stating, “It’s clearer with every passing day that young people need an alternative to capitalism. But only a mass movement will get us there.”

In November, Teen Vogue columnist Kandist Mallett blasted America while calling for a range of radical motions and criticizing any notion of unity.

In the essay, titled “There’s No Such Thing As a United America,” Mallett wrote that the U.S. is rooted in “divisiveness,” was founded “through the genocide of Indigenous peoples,” and flourished “through the enslavement of Africans.”

“At its core, America’s values are white supremacy and capitalism,” she wrote. “That is true no matter who has been in office.”

In June, an Axios and Momentive poll found that a majority of young adults, aged 18-24, in the United States have a positive view of socialism.

Socialism has specifically been gaining ground among millionaire entertainment industry elites as Hollywood’s brand of corporate leftism has proven to be insufficiently radical for a growing number of showbiz professionals, as reported by Breitbart News last month.

A study published in July showed that socialism appeared to have gained a strong foothold with the younger generations of Britons, with over two-thirds of Millennials and Generation Z in the U.K. preferring to live under a socialist economic system than the free market system currently enjoyed in Britain.

 

[marsh]

Chinese Regime Has Stolen Enough Data to Compile 'Dossier' on All Americans: Former Official

A former U.S. national security official warned that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is stealing data to compile ...

www.theepochtimes.com

Chinese Regime Has Stolen Enough Data to Compile ‘Dossier’ on All Americans: Former Official
By Jack Phillips

August 6, 2021 Updated: August 6, 2021

A former U.S. national security official warned that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is stealing data to compile a “dossier” on every American adult and may use coercive means to influence private citizens and political leaders.

During a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing this week, former Trump deputy national security adviser Matthew Pottinger said the CCP has stolen Americans’ sensitive data via illicit methods, including cyber theft and hacking.

“Assembling dossiers on people has always been a feature of Leninist regimes, but Beijing’s penetration of digital networks worldwide, including using 5G networks … has really taken this to a new level,” Pottinger said, referring to former Soviet dictator Vladimir Lenin.

With the information the CCP has obtained, he said, it “now compiles dossiers on millions of foreign citizens around the world, using the material that it gathers to influence, target, intimidate, reward, blackmail, flatter, humiliate, and ultimately divide and conquer.”

Going a step further, Pottinger sounded the alarm that “Beijing’s stolen sensitive data is sufficient to build a dossier on every single American adult and on many of our children too, who are fair game under Beijing’s rules of political warfare.”


Deputy National Security Advisor Matthew Pottinger arrives for a Medal of Honor ceremony for Sergeant Major Thomas P. Payne, United States Army, for conspicuous gallantry in the East Room of the White House in Washington, on Sept. 11, 2020. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

For years, the CCP has engaged in campaigns to steal U.S. intellectual property and technology secrets in a bid to militarily and geopolitically gain an advantage over the West.

The regime has also carried out significant hacks against private entities, including last month’s alleged cyberattack against Microsoft—which the United States and its allies blamed on the Chinese Ministry of State Security. In addition, four Chinese nationals were charged by the Department of Justice over a number of separate cyber intrusions that targeted corporate and research secrets.

During the hearing, the former director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, William Evanina, said that the CCP is using a “whole of country approach” to “leverage, infiltrate, influence, and steal from every corner of U.S. success.”

“It is estimated that 80 percent of American adults have had all of their personal data stolen by the CCP, and the other 20 percent most of their personal data,” he said.

Furthermore, he said that the Chinese regime poses an “existential threat” to the United States and is employing “complex, pernicious, strategic, and aggressive” tactics to accomplish its goals.

William Evanina, nominee to be director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, testifies during a hearing held by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence in Washington, on May 15, 2018. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)

The Chinese regime is even working to illegally obtain data to create artificial intelligence, research, and development programs to bolster its military and economic goals.

After the recent cyberattacks, Biden administration officials offered sharp criticism against Beijing’s state-sponsored hacks, including intellectual property theft. But the critical words were not accompanied by any punitive actions including diplomatic expulsions or sanctions against the regime.

Separately, Pottinger also warned about the CCP’s so-called “United Front” efforts to spread propaganda and influence decision-makers around the world and within the United States.

“The CCP’s 95 million members are all required to participate in the system, which has many different branches. The United Front Work Department alone, which is just one branch, has three times as many cadres as the U.S. State Department has foreign service officers,” he noted.

 

[marsh]

100 Years of Authoritarian Dreams of Control Have Been Realized

Government elite wannabes have been craving power for over a century, and they're progressing; and destroying our middle-class in the meantime.

thebluestateconservative.com

100 Years of Authoritarian Dreams of Control Have Been Realized

• Madame Defarge
• August 7, 2021

The ultimate control of our world has devolved into the hands of an oligarchy with great influence. Their status in international society is determined by three factors: wealth, expertise, and slavish social conformity therein. Being included in the elite circle bestows personal recognition of one’s importance to society and is relentlessly pursued by those who are emotionally bereft.

Wealth is the first factor and self-explanatory in one sense, but it is quite ephemeral in others. Wealthy people will not hand their money to individuals less financially endowed. Consequently, there is not any advantage personally to their presence at your table. Their money does, however, create a level of social respectability and the ability to bask in reflected status attracts many of the self-appointed political type oligarchs who lust to attend convocations in hope of recognition and indirect fame.

Next, professional expertise is an entree which is an area that has experienced exponential growth in the past generation. One of the few differences between ourselves and the ancients is not in the development of character or expertise, but rather in the proliferation of unneeded educational niches and institutions which have created a vast number of nooks and crannies in which the insignificant can attempt to install themselves as persons of consequence.

Insecurity concerning wealth or knowledge leads to a complex order of prominence among the oligarchy and those striving for acceptance. The major question becomes what social action will allow advancement and recognition from this ruling group? The screaming-from-rooftops ploy has devolved into the keyboard commando set, desperate for a momentary spotlight.

If you do not conform to one of these groups’ mantras, you must be deplorable and therefore insignificant. Make no mistake, the word deplorable is certainly how the socially ostracized commoner is viewed. We the insignificant are to be controlled by the rulers’ political police and then otherwise ignored completely.

This situation is quite important as our society has rapidly regressed into the haves and have-nots. Historically the haves possessed only great wealth. The development in recent generations has been that the haves now include those of great scientific knowledge or talents in an appreciated area. This has created a bit of instability in the financial castle but has finally been allowed.

As always, being ruled requires two things. One is someone to rule and the other is someone to bend the knee to receive crumbs from the table. History has never seen such a rapid growth in monetary dominance and power by a ruling class. The changes in our society are immense. Their goal over the past 50 years is the absorption of the middle-class’ wealth and power.

The middle class is dissolving into the serf class. There has been no war or even a natural disaster to accelerate the process. There is only a hugely successful propaganda campaign used to assimilate assets. The business model used for a rapid consolidation of retail commerce was stumbled upon by a simple boy who could write code and had the timing to ride to the top of the financial chart.

The vast amount of wealth created in retail trade supported millions of families and municipal governments across the country before the great financial vacuum was cranked up. These families were a bedrock of the independent society.

Amazon used the model of Sears and Roebuck to take advantage of the time constraints placed upon the working lives of many Americans. The old folks will remember the Sears catalog. Virtually any item could be ordered by phone or mail from a catalog and delivered to your home. A catalog for those young people who are confused by the term is a printed book picturing items and prices available for purchase.

The major difference today is the use of a credit card for the purchase. Your information is stored to send advertising updates on items of interest. The government, of course, has access to your purchase histories in case you are a terrorist or say mean things about a politician from Kenya. This reality allows the money in circulation to be concentrated, regulated, and controlled to benefit the WEF and the U.S. government.

The banks/politicians are quite pleased with the results of the flu scam. Half of the country is terrified to the point of wearing a mask. A large percentage of these people use online shopping to avoid the flu. The rest use big box stores that were somehow exempt from lockdowns. The problem is that out of every $100 spent in the big box only $43 stays in the community. $70 stays if you use a local small store.

The corporate elite now have more money to pay their politician/employees to stack the deck further in their favor. The cycle continues into the glories of having your own charitable foundation. This scam is incredibly well organized after 100 years of fine tuning.

The foundation can be non-taxable while still paying salaries to its’ principles. It can also provide money to political causes and research grants to universities and individuals. These researchers are lifted socially into the cocktail circuit much to their delight while expanding their niche.

Obviously, a quiet question as to the findings desired from the grantee results in an appropriate result. This in turn leads to more grants and a groundswell of noise in support of project global warming, project flu bug or anything else from which the grantee may profit. Finally, there is a way out of financial purgatory for the professoriate which also includes the extra benefit of social standing. What could be better?

We now have reached the stage of having the oligarchy control the government as well as the educational system while sucking their middle-class rivals financially dry. It will be interesting to see how long it will take to drive the society totally into the oblivion.

 

[marsh]

"Restore Liberty" Group Started Out West and Grows As Americans Realize the Constitution Grants Limited Authority to the Federal Government

www.thegatewaypundit.com

“Restore Liberty” Group Started Out West and Grows As Americans Realize the Constitution Grants Limited Authority to the Federal Government

By Joe Hoft
Published August 7, 2021 at 2:05pm

Americans across the country are tired of the takeover of individual rights by the radical communists who will do anything for power. One group is promoting a better understanding of our rights and the federal government’s limited authority as a remedy.

A couple of men in Montana met (John Sheets, a lover of American history, met Darin Gaub, a well-known leader in the Montana conservative movement) and put together the Restore Liberty organization.

Together, they wrote a document called the Declaration of Constitutional Consent and founded the organization called Restore Liberty (HOME ). The declaration they created does not serve to replace any founding document, but instead outlines the original intent of the founders when they wrote those documents: to call to light the strictly limited authority of the federal government, and to enumerate many of the abundant violations of the compact that is the Constitution. Finally, it declares that because the limited authority that is held within central government is solely derived from the consent of the people within the sovereign states, any act of the federal government outside of that consent is illegal, and compliance will not be given.

This is not a novel idea. In fact, it was dusted off from Thomas Jefferson’s and James Madison’s own declarations in the same vein, as well as the debates over the ratification of the Constitution. It was repeated by many of the key figures of the founding generation.

For example, Alexander Hamilton (himself a big fan of a powerful central government) said in Federalist 78, “…there is no position which depends on clearer principles, than that every act of a delegated authority contrary to the tenor of the commission under which it is exercised, is void. No legislative act, therefore, contrary to the constitution, can be valid. To deny this, would be to affirm that the deputy is greater than the principal; that the servant is above his master; that the representatives of the people are superior to the people themselves; that men, acting by virtue of powers, may do not only what their powers do not authorize, but what they forbid.”

In other words, anything the federal government does outside of the powers given to it is invalid and void. It’s up to the citizens and the states to declare them void, though, and to act as if they are indeed void. That concept and promise was the foundation for convincing the delegations from the various colonies to ratify the Constitution. It’s the same principle that gave us the Tenth Amendment as an additional reassurance that all powers not delegated to the government of the United States are reserved to the individual states and the people.
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Restore Liberty is a non-profit 501(c)(4) organization committed to educating and advocating for the re-adoption of that principle. And advocacy means to engage with local and state leaders to encourage them to endorse the principle and take actions toward that end, when warranted. Restore Liberty has begun collecting signatures on the Declaration of Constitutional consent at their website (and would like people to physically mail the declaration to politicians around the country), have set up state-level leadership in over twenty states, and are actively engaging numerous state legislatures, governors, and influential figures in those states. They are also hosting classes on the original intent of the Constitution and working with key data analysts to identify election integrity issues.

It should be clear to conservatives everywhere that there is no fixing Washington or our dismal direction as a country by simply replacing the bums in Washington with other bums. A careful screening and selection of constitutional conservatives committed to action at the grassroots level is what is needed. As Jefferson avowed, states are “the true barriers of our liberty in the country.” Restore Liberty aims to change the entire culture and thought on how to save liberty in this country, using a very old and proven concept to do it.

Americans know they don’t want communism. Restore Liberty is providing some leadership in efforts to keep America free.

 

[marsh]

Biden's Unprecedented Attack on the Constitution

Joe Biden certainly isn't the first president to violate his oath of office, but he might be the first in memory to openly brag about doing it.

townhall.com

Biden's Unprecedented Attack on the Constitution

David Harsanyi
|Posted: Aug 06, 2021 12:01 AM

The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Townhall.com.

Source: AP Photo/Matt Slocum

Joe Biden certainly isn't the first president to violate his oath of office, but he might be the first in memory to openly brag about doing it. As Biden announced a new "eviction moratorium," he informed Americans that the "bulk of constitutional scholars" would say the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention eviction moratorium is "not likely to pass constitutional muster."

Not likely? It already failed. In June, Justice Brett Kavanaugh agreed with the majority Supreme Court that the CDC "exceeded its existing statutory authority," even though he allowed the order to sunset. The president admitted as much, noting that the new moratorium is meant to give the administration time to act on "rental assistance" before the court again shuts it down. What stops Biden from stalling and trying a third time? A 10th time? Biden admitted to the media that he would be circumventing the courts, the law and his oath of office, in which he promised, to the best of his ability, to "preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States," not to infringe on the property rights of Americans to placate crackpot socialists in his party.

When asked today about the discrepancy, White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki promised, "This is also going to be a temporary solution." Because, as Article 2, Section 5, apparently states, the executive can make laws irrespective of Supreme Court rulings, as long as he also crosses his heart and promises it's only going to be temporary. When pushed further on the matter, Psaki could not recall the moment when Biden was convinced there was solid legal ground to move forward. Probably because no such moment exists.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was far more honest, noting that this was "a huge victory for the power of direct action and not taking no for an answer." Not taking no for an answer -- in this case, not taking no for an answer from the Supreme Court -- is lawlessness. The process -- the sacred norms that Democrats pretended to care about over the past five years -- is irrelevant to engaging in "direct action" within government. It's been clear from their efforts to delegitimize the Supreme Court to their effort to undermine faith in federalism and countermajoritarian institutions.

None of this is to even speak of the tremendous abuse of power inherent in the underlying eviction moratorium itself. Biden's new 19-page order includes draconian penalties, fines and potential jail time for violating a concocted "law."

Forget that it's terrible public policy; it is also, as I noted when it was first issued by the Trump administration, state-sanctioned theft. At best, such an "emergency" infringement should be left to state and local municipalities. Does anyone really believe that the Founders would approve of the CDC -- an incompetent agency tasked with dealing with infectious diseases -- retroactively ripping up millions of legal contracts and unilaterally suspending the property rights of 90% of landlords? If it can do that, what can't it do?

Some have argued that former President Donald Trump's reappropriation of funding for a southern wall or former President Barack Obama's power grab on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program paved the way for this kind of executive abuse. But neither the wall nor DACA policies had yet been adjudicated by higher courts when they were put into play. Obama had, on numerous occasions, admitted that he had no constitutional authority to enact amnesty for millions of Americans by fiat. In 2010, he said, "I am not king. I can't do these things just by myself." The next year, he again acknowledged that, as president, he was not empowered to "just bypass Congress and change the law myself. ... That's not how a democracy works." Obama, of course, didn't believe in any such limitations, and he went ahead with DACA anyway. Yet not even he enacted the executive action after the Supreme Court ruled it unconstitutional.

That is unique.

You can imagine what the future looks like once we've normalized the idea that presidents can regurgitate unconstitutional executive actions as long as the polling is positive. One of the often repeated -- and legitimate -- concerns regarding Trump was that he would simply ignore the will of the Court. That is exactly what Biden is doing right now. Writers at major outlets such as The Washington Post and CNN are already celebrating this lawbreaking as a moral good. Democrats will dutifully defend the president, talk about the purported benefits of the moratorium and ignore the unconstitutional manner in which it is implemented. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, an alleged leader of the legislative branch of the American government, pressured Biden to ignore Congress and the courts. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer celebrated the decision. And it is highly unlikely that a single Democrat will stand up and speak up for the rule of law.

 

[marsh]

Disney's 'Grown-ish' show for teens promotes BLM narrative of 'racist-a** cops,' says 'white people are inherently bad'

The Disney-owned cable channel Freeform TV, which was formerly ABC Family, is promoting Black Lives Matter narratives on one of their television shows aimed at high school-aged children. The TV series "Grown-ish," which is the spin-off of the ABC sitcom "Black-ish," featured dialogue talking...

www.theblaze.com

Disney's 'Grown-ish' show for teens promotes BLM narrative of 'racist-a** cops,' says 'white people are inherently bad'
PAUL SACCA
August 07, 2021

The Disney-owned cable channel Freeform TV, which was formerly ABC Family, is promoting Black Lives Matter narratives on one of their television shows aimed at high school-aged children. The TV series "Grown-ish," which is the spin-off of the ABC sitcom "Black-ish," featured dialogue talking about "racist-a** cops" and how "white people are inherently bad."

The "Grown-ish" episode titled "Boy with a Gun" that aired on Aug. 4 shows a black man being shot by police in Virginia. The plot was influenced by the Feb. 2020 murder of Ahmaud Arbery, according to "Grown-ish" writer and co-producer Des Moran.

The shooting death becomes a rallying call for social justice from the main characters of the TV show, who attend a fictional college called "Cal U."

According to the MRC, one of the characters says, "Do you not even watch the news? Uh, have you not heard about the racist-a** cops who murdered another man in Virginia?"

During a party scene, a black male character is asked about his dedication to "support the justice of an innocent black man," to which he says he doesn't want to "ruin people's mood by talking about some poor black kid who got killed by the cops." The character is then called a "bad black person" for not committing to social justice.

While talking about what it means to be a "bad black person," the question is asked if they talk about other things than sports and the weather. A woke student reportedly responds, "Only if it's about how college athletes are notoriously undervalued and exploited, or how hurricanes statistically target black neighborhoods."

During the show marketed to teens, one of the characters says for black people, "Any place is the wrong place. At any time, every damn day."

During a conversation in the episode, one of the characters says, "White people are inherently bad."

• Jazz: "Why are we having this discussion about bad black people and arguing with each other, when we all know white people aren't sitting around discussing whether or not they're a good white person?"
• Aaron: "That's 'cause white people are inherently bad."
• Doug (to a white character): "Why would you, when the system was designed to work for you and against me? I mean, there's no point in me trying to change something that they would never allow me to fix."
• Doug: "…this college degree, a high-paying job, a seat at the front of the bus, our freedom, bro — it doesn't matter if we still have these targets on our backs."

When a second black teen is shot by police, a character proclaims, "It's time to push back."

https://cdn.mrctv.org/videos/56841/56841-480p.mp4 2:22 min

https://cdn.mrctv.org/videos/56846/56846-480p.mp4 1:44 min

https://cdn.mrctv.org/videos/56850/56850-480p.mp4 1:28 min

"Grown-ish" will have two episodes devoted to the BLM narrative of racist police.

The next episode will be focused on the BLM protests ignited by the shootings.

Jenifer Rice-Genzuk Henry, executive producer on "Grown-ish," said Freeform and ABC Studios were "nothing but supportive and trusting" of the Black Lives Matter episode, and "Got behind me when I was like, 'I want to burn a police car.'"

Variety gives a preview of the upcoming episode:

As the storyline continues on Aug. 12, the group of friends continue to debate their roles in the protest movement and how far some want to go. Doug, Kieala, Aaron (Trevor Jackson) and Luca (Luka Sabbat) hit the streets of Los Angeles to fight for racial justice and equality, despite the curfew enacted by the city. But while the real-life protests were marked by rubber bullets, police batons and tear gas, there was a real question about just how much of that brutalization to show on "Grown-ish." The writers wanted things to be realistic, but how much could they get away with?

View: https://youtu.be/xkOTbnuLmhg
.16 min

 

[marsh]

Senators Launch Effort to Expand Federal Bench by 77 Judges

Sens. Todd Young (R-IN) and Chris Coons (D-DE) introduced a bill last month that would expand the federal judiciary by 77 judges.

www.breitbart.com

Senators Launch Effort to Expand Federal Bench by 77 Judges
228

NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP via Getty Images
JOEL B. POLLAK8 Aug 2021296

Sens. Todd Young (R-IN) and Chris Coons (D-DE) introduced a bill last month that would expand the federal judiciary by 77 judges, starting in 2025, after the current presidential term.

Democrats have been expressing a wish to expand the number of Supreme Court justices, so that President Joe Biden can appoint four new justices to override the current 6-3 majority of Republican appointees. Some have advocated a milder approach, expanding the lower courts first.

The new bill, called the Judicial Understaffing Delays Getting Emergencies Solved (JUDGES) Act, says that “The Judicial Conference of the United States requested the creation of 77 new district judges in its 2021 report,” and that “As of March 31, 2021, there were 696,789 pending cases, averaging 803 filings per judgeship.”

The Coons-Young legislation provides for 39 new judgeships to be created after Jan. 21, 2025, and 38 new judgeships after Jan. 21, 2029.

Last year, during the presidential campaign, Biden dodged the question of whether he would endorse Democrats’ calls to pack the Supreme Court, finally announcing that he would appoint a commission of “scholars” to consider the issue. But Democrats jumped the gun, unveiling legislation in both the House and the Senate in April to expand the number of Supreme Court justices from nine to thirteen.

The federal judiciary expanded by 30 percent under President Jimmy Carter, who filled the resultant vacancies with liberal-minded justices. A smaller expansion took place in 1990, under President George H.W. Bush.

Left-wing judicial activists are describing judicial expansion as an urgent priority.

 

[marsh]

Zerohedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

When Confidence In Our Institutions Collapses

Authored by Charles Lipson via RealClearPolitics.com,

Sometimes, stories that appear unrelated share common foundations and have cumulative effects, far more serious than any one does individually.

Highlighting these common features tells us something profound about our society and its troubles.


That’s the case with four stories over the past few days.

The first two involve police.

One concerns a New York City gang member who attacked multiple officers and shot one of them. The suspect had more than 25 prior arrests for guns, drug offenses, and other crimes. He was known to be part of a gang affiliated with the “Bloods.” Yet Jerome Roman was roaming the streets, gun in hand, out on bail. It is a story repeated dozens of times each week across the country.

The second story involves the inability of Portland, Ore., to recruit police to fight the city’s stunning murder epidemic. For some reason, Portland just can’t find people willing to join the special unit designed to stop the killings.

The next two stories involve a subject that seems far removed from violent crime: COVID masks.

One is a news report with photographs of Washington, D.C., Mayor Muriel Bowser celebrating maskless at an indoor party just hours after she had imposed a comprehensive mask mandate on her city, prohibiting exactly her kind of behavior. This was just the latest in a spate of “rules are for thee, not me” actions by Democratic mayors and governors. One of them, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, is facing a recall effort. The rest continue along their merry way.

Finally, the ubiquitous Dr. Anthony Fauci, our nation’s top official for infectious diseases, told ABC News this past weekend that wearing masks should not be an individual choice. That statement goes beyond saying masks are desirable, based on public health data. It portends a new round of mandates. President Biden also indicated new, stricter rules are coming.

Is there any connection among these stories about police, murder, hypocrisy, and public health advice? Yes, and it is a connection that illuminates our country’s deepest problems.

The problem we face, beyond the specifics about crime, COVID, duplicity, and social division, is a palpable breakdown in public order at the same time the public has lost confidence in our government officials and the institutions they lead. The two meta-problems—the breakdown of order and erosion of public confidence—are deeply intertwined because we count on our leaders and institutions to give us reliable information, provide a stable environment (so each of us can go about our lives), and abide by the same rules we all do. Those are foundational elements of a peaceful, liberal, democratic society. Their attrition imperils that society and its governance.

Citizens are all too aware of the collapse of law and order in cities and on America’s southern border. They are aware, too, that the current administration and the mayors of most big cities are unwilling to speak honestly about the problems. They know that Vice President Kamala Harris’ exclusive focus on the “root causes” of migration from Central America is really a way of evading the painful question: Why won’t the Biden administration stop the unprecedented surge of illegal immigration or even speak candidly about it?

The danger and dishonesty come after decades of eroding trust in public officials and the institutions they lead. Polls in the early 1960s showed over 70% of the public believed public officials were telling the truth. Those numbers have declined steadily to less than 20%. Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon got that ball rolling downhill, but it hasn’t stopped. The mistrust goes beyond public officials to include news media, social media, universities, corporations, unions, churches, and even civic organizations such as the Boy Scouts.

The public put aside those doubts, at least temporarily, when the COVID pandemic struck in February and March 2020. Almost everyone was willing to follow mask mandates and business closures. They were willing to let small children skip in-person learning and use their computers. But after more than a year of self-confinement and school closures, the public’s patience has run out.

So has the public’s confidence that health officials know what they are doing and are telling us the truth. This mistrust grew when people discovered the initial guidance not to wear masks was a deliberate lie. At the time, Fauci and his colleagues actually believed masks would help, but they feared that saying so would lead to a run on masks, leaving none for medical professionals. Instead of trusting the public and retailers like Amazon and Walgreen’s, they lied. In June 2020, Fauci explained his reasons: “We were concerned the public health community, and many people were saying this, were concerned that it was at a time when personal protective equipment, including the N95 masks and the surgical masks, were in very short supply. And we wanted to make sure that the people, namely, the health care workers, who were brave enough to put themselves in harm’s way, to take care of people who you know were infected with the coronavirus and the danger of them getting infected."

However benign Fauci’s goal, the longer-term effects were pernicious. They were bound to be once the public discovered the deception. How could anyone trust his future statements at face value? He is paying that cost personally now that he is trying to reassure the public that he had nothing to do with funding the Wuhan virology lab’s gain-of-function research.

Donald Trump’s attacks on the integrity of the 2020 election were even more corrosive of public trust. He has continued those attacks without providing independently verified evidence of widespread fraud. Recently, we learned that while he was still in office Trump crossed another bright line when he pressured the Justice Department to endorse his claims. “Just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen,” he told Acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen, who refused his demand.

While it is perfectly appropriate to demand election integrity and review the vote count, it is deeply destructive to continue claiming the election was stolen without proof. It is even worse for a sitting president to do so. Among Trump’s most avid supporters, those claims undermine Biden’s legitimacy as president.

For everyone else, Trump’s charges undermine his own claim that he knows the boundaries of constitutional behavior and tries to stay within them.

Smashing through those boundaries is exactly what House and Senate Democrats proposed when they suggested packing the Supreme Court, adding new states to the union (to give them a durable Senate majority), and eliminating the Senate’s filibuster rule. All are permissible within the Constitution’s formal rules, but all breach long-standing conventions that protect minority rights.

The public’s growing mistrust of senior officials, elected and appointed, overlaps with widespread doubts that those officials must follow the same rules as the rest of us. This common standard, and public confidence in it, is foundational to our constitutional democracy. Politicians, billionaires, and celebrities may be able to hire the best lawyers, but they are not supposed to be above the law itself.

That confidence depends on neutral procedures. When O.J. Simpson was found not guilty of double murder, there was widespread disbelief, but the public still accepted the jury’s decision. Even if the decision was misguided, the process made it legitimate. Contrast that acceptance with the FBI and Department of Justice whitewashing Hillary Clinton’s reckless mishandling of classified data. No fair-minded person believed the investigation and charging decision was even-handed. Ordinary folks have languished in jail for far less serious violations, such as a submariner whose photographs inadvertently included classified equipment.

Nobody else got the FBI director to write an exoneration before the central figure was even interviewed. Director James Comey then compounded his blunder by announcing he would not charge her (a decision that should have been made only by the Department of Justice) and, later, by holding a press conference that detailed Clinton’s wrongdoing without charging her, a flat violation not only of FBI standards but of centuries of precedent. It may have cost her the election.

Beyond those egregious violations, the FBI’s very different investigations of Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are why the public no longer believes the nation’s top law enforcement agency is politically neutral or even competent. Its leaders seem ready to kneecap their enemies and cover up their own agents’ wrongdoing.

During the Comey years, when these spying-and-leaking scandals emerged, most conservative commentators defended the rectitude of ordinary agents—the “99 percent who do a great job.” That defense is seldom heard these days.

After all, lots of “great agents” must have known about their bosses’ misdeeds, yet none blew the whistle. They were just ordinary bureaucrats, protecting their pensions and promotions.

The key point here is that these problems - and they are serious - occur amid a long-term decline of trust in all our institutions, public and private.

That problem goes well beyond the FBI’s bias, the hypocrisy by Muriel Bowser or Gavin Newsom, or the public mistrust in Anthony Fauci’s pronouncements and the CDC’s guidance. It goes beyond Trump’s dangerous game in questioning the election, and beyond surging crime and illegal immigration. Serious as those problems are, an even larger problem encompasses them: threats to our country’s stability are accumulating when the public no longer has confidence in the institutions meant to cope with them.

 

[marsh]

Blake Masters: Big Tech Is an 'Extension of the Surveillance State'

Blake Masters, the tech leader running in the Republican senate primary in Arizona, blasted Apple for abandoning its previously robust commitment to user privacy with its announcement that it will scan users' photo libraries for illegal imagery.

www.breitbart.com

Blake Masters: Big Tech Is an ‘Extension of the Surveillance State’
1

Thiel Fellowship
ALLUM BOKHARI9 Aug 202121

Blake Masters, the tech leader running in the Republican senate primary in Arizona, blasted Apple for abandoning its previously robust commitment to user privacy with its announcement that it will scan users’ photo libraries for illegal imagery.

The candidate, who previously worked for conservative tech entrepreneur and early Trump supporter Peter Thiel, said users need a “new set of legal protections” to protect them from being “constantly spied on and exploited.”

Masters previously condemned PayPal for its plan to share Americans’ financial transaction data with the far-left Anti Defamation League, calling it an “obvious pretext to suppress any dissent.”

“Big Tech now operates as an extension of a surveillance state that indiscriminately violates your privacy,” said Masters.


“What the government can’t do directly, it just tells Apple to do. But that violates the First and Fourth Amendments all the same. This is what modern tyranny looks like.”

Data collection is not integral to Apple’s business model as it is for its competitor Google, and the company previously enjoyed a fairly unblemished record for upholding user privacy.

The company chose to water down that commitment with its announcement that it would proactively scan iPhone and iPad photos, purportedly to root out child abuse.

Apple’s announcement came just two weeks after PayPal announced it would share data with law enforcement as part of an effort to combat the “far right,” and an “anti-terrorism” consortium of other tech giants including Facebook, Google, and Microsoft, announced it would shift its monitoring focus from Islamic extremism to “white supremacists” and “far right militias.”

“Conservatives need to wake up: these companies use the same playbook every time. First, they introduce ‘necessary protections’ to take on a real problem — something awful like child abuse, which no one in his right mind would defend,” said Masters in a press release.

“They then put in place processes that allow them to secretly review your private information and correspondence. If they see something they don’t like, they’ll report you to law enforcement.”

“Before long, they’ll be scanning your phone for ‘extremism’ or ‘hateful content,’ and everybody who opposes our new oligarchy will be a target.”

“Enough is enough. Your data on your devices should belong to you. We need a new set of legal protections that protect users from being constantly spied on and exploited by massive technology companies… even when the Biden Administration claims it’s ‘for your own good.'”

 

[marsh]

Christians take over the streets of leftist Seattle…

The 21st Great Awakening has resurrected against the hateful woke There is a revival in Portland too…

citizenfreepress.com

Christians take over the streets of leftist Seattle…
Posted by Kane on August 9, 2021 4:14 pm

View: https://youtu.be/FxFjvVr2gJg
1:08 min

The 21st Great Awakening has resurrected against the hateful woke

There is a revival in Portland too…

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1424558491423830021

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1424558491423830021
2:19 min

 

[marsh]

Conservative College Student Docked Grade, Told 'White People Cannot Experience Racism' - Todd Starnes

A teaching assistant docked a conservative student's grade, telling her "white people cannot experience racism."

www.toddstarnes.com

Conservative College Student Docked Grade, Told ‘White People Cannot Experience Racism’

Aug 9, 2021

Biden Declares War on Private Property Ownership

Video on website 02:45 min

A teaching assistant at Virginia Tech University docked a conservative student’s grade in a Nations and Nationalities class, telling her “white people cannot experience racism,” Campus Reform reports.

Alyssa Jones, a VTU campus ambassador for The Leadership Institute and president of her school’s Turning Point USA chapter, chose to write about “the New Black Panther Party” after students in the class were told to write a paper on a hate group from the Southern Poverty Law Center’s list of hate groups and analyze how that group justifies its worldview.

The SPLC, a discredited left-wing political activist organization, writes that the Black Panthers “encouraged violence against Whites, Jews and law enforcement officers.”

Jones emailed Sabrina Harris, the graduate teaching assistant for the class, to ask why she received a low grade. Harris told her it was her view on racism when it comes to white people.

“To begin, we discuss in lecture that racism is a systemic issue rooted power structures which have historically oppressed non-white peoples, as a result, white people cannot experience racism,” Harris wrote in the email obtained by Campus Reform.

The conservative student immediately reached out to her professor, Edward Weisband: “Ms. Harris says that blacks cannot be racist against whites, and therefore lowered my grade due to the viewpoint discrepancy.”

The professor told her he would take another look and reevaluate her grade.
“I agree with you, as I understand your position, persons identified as ‘white’ certainly can be subjected to racism,” Weisband wrote.


Enterprise podcasting made simple with Omny Studio 11:54 min

 

[marsh]

'We Didn't Back Down': Christians Respond to Portland Antifa Attack With Massive Worship Rally

One day after a shocking and disturbing attack on a Christian prayer event in Portland, Oregon, Christians rallied in that very location for a massive gathering to sing and worship God.

www1.cbn.com

USFAITHWIRE
Displaying 30+ Stories
'We Didn't Back Down': Christians Respond to Portland Antifa Attack With Massive Worship Rally

08-09-2021
Dan Andros

Image: Sean Feucht/YouTube screenshot​

One day after a shocking and disturbing attack on a Christian prayer event in Portland, Oregon, Christians rallied in that very location for a massive gathering to sing and worship God.

Sean Feucht, best known for his work as a volunteer worship leader at Bethel Church, led the large gathering and even claimed one member of Antifa who came to disrupt, ended up getting saved.


“Members of Antifa showed up in Portland last night to threaten, harass, bully and intimidate us,” he wrote on social media today. “A mom and her baby were tear-gassed. Antifa stood 10 feet from me as we lifted our voices in praise, but we didn’t back down.

We kept worshipping and God moved powerfully!”

As it turns out, that worship ended up ringing true for at least one self-professed Antifa member, who gave his life to Christ.

“One member of Antifa who came to disrupt our service was SAVED giving his life to Jesus! It’s a time for a BOLD & BELIEVING church!” Feucht joyfully wrote. “God has not given us a Spirit of fear but of POWER & GRACE! The Church is on the move and the gates of hell will not prevail against it!”

MORE ON THIS STORY IN OUR PODCAST TODAY:

The 4&3 Podcast 30:58 min

Feucht wrote emphatically of the need to continue to proclaim the Gospel, arguing that “people are scared, addicted, lonely, suicidal and hopeless – AND WE HAVE THE HOPE OF THE WORLD INSIDE OF US!!”

“THIS IS WHY WE CAN’T BACK DOWN” he wrote in all caps.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1424593773250551808

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1424593773250551808
1:00 min

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1424565635573456905

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1424565635573456905
.18 min


“So many were saved, healed, delivered and freed tonight!” he added, while warning not to listen to “the trolls” who criticize. “Don’t let ANYTHING hold YOU BACK from sharing the love of JESUS in this season! IT IS REVIVAL SEASON!” Feucht proclaimed.

All of this happened as Antifa threw needles, pills, drugs and more at the crowd. They also allegedly attacked Christians as they were exiting the event, according to frequent Antifa reporter Andy Ngô.



Feucht posted a recap of their response rally that drew hundreds, possibly over a thousand Christians to sing and praise God.

View: https://youtu.be/yc_k9R-cr_8
6:42 min

WHO DID ANTIFA ATTACK?
Shocking video from over the weekend showed Antifa members assaulting a group of Christians, including children, who were gathering in Portland, Oregon Saturday for a scheduled prayer event.

The Post Millennial reports that Canadian Pastor Artur Pawlowski organized the event last month, giving antifa plenty of time to organize their attack.

Journalist Andy Ngo shared video of the large group carrying shields and weapons as they yelled profanity at the worshippers.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1424171542729080838

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1424171542729080838
1:41 min

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1424172330629009412

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1424172330629009412
.45 min

The Christians can be heard praying as the Antifa members became more aggressive and violent.

Here’s a clip of one brave young boy who was attacked by these thugs.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1424576366658400256

View: https://twitter.com/i/status/1424576366658400256
.26 min

A woman attending the event described the group as “ruthless.”

“Antifa just rolled in like an angry mob, started throwing flash bombs at everybody, macing everybody … rotten eggs,” she said. “They threw a flash bomb into a group of kids that were out there from four months old to like 10.”



WARNING: Language and violence can be seen in this extended video of the incident.

View: https://youtu.be/ArGFD1AcaRo
12:05 min

Another attendee helped Pastor Pawlowski, who was sprayed in the face with mace.
“Walked up to ask them to stop throwing things at the children,” the man explained. “There’s kids down there, I mean they’re toddlers and they sprayed me too.”

Pastor Pawlowski, who leads the Fortress of Adullam Church in Calgary, Canada, gained attention earlier this year for reportedly violating public health restrictions on in-person worship gatherings and chasing police out of his church property with shouts of “Nazi!” at them.

View: https://youtu.be/ziWXH7T15zw
2:20 min

Antifa members also destroyed a sound system and other music equipment by throwing it into the Willamette River.

“Where is your god now?” can be heard amongst the chaos.

According to The Post Millennial, the Portland Police Department did not intervene during the incident and would not interact with either group.

 

[marsh]

Zerohedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

Gaslighting: The Psychology Of Shaping Another's Reality

TUESDAY, AUG 10, 2021 - 10:45 PM
Authored by Cynthia Chung via The Saker Blog,

“But I don’t want to go among mad people,” Alice remarked.
“Oh, you can’t help that,” said the Cat: “we’re all mad here. I’m mad. You’re mad.”
“How do you know I’m mad?” said Alice.
“You must be,” said the Cat, “or you wouldn’t have come here.”
– Lewis Carroll’s “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland”

We are living in a world where the degree of disinformation and outright lying has reached such a state of affairs that, possibly for the first time ever, we see the majority of the western world starting to question their own and surrounding level of sanity. The increasing frenzied distrust in everything “authoritative” mixed with the desperate incredulity that “everybody couldn’t possibly be in on it!” is slowly rocking many back and forth into a tighter and tighter straight jacket. “Question everything” has become the new motto, but are we capable of answering those questions?

Presently the answer is a resounding no.

The social behaviourist sick joke of having made everyone obsessed with toilet paper of all things during the start of what was believed to be a time of crisis, is an example of how much control they have over that red button labelled “commence initiation of level 4 mass panic”.

And can the people be blamed? After all, if we are being lied to, how can we possibly rally together and point the finger at the root of this tyranny, aren’t we at the point where it is everywhere?

As Goebbels infamously stated,

“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State [under fascism].”

And here we find ourselves today, at the brink of fascism. However, we have to first agree to forfeit our civil rights as a collective before fascism can completely dominate. That is, the big lie can only succeed if the majority fails to call it out, for if the majority were to recognise it for what it is, it would truly hold no power.



The Battle for Your Mind

“Politicians, Priests, and psychiatrists often face the same problem: how to find the most rapid and permanent means of changing a man’s belief…The problem of the doctor and his nervously ill patient, and that of the religious leader who sets out to gain and hold new converts, has now become the problem of whole groups of nations, who wish not only to confirm certain political beliefs within their boundaries, but to proselytize the outside world.”
– William Sargant “Battle of the Mind”

It had been commonly thought in the past, and not without basis, that tyranny could only exist on the condition that the people were kept illiterate and ignorant of their oppression. To recognise that one was “oppressed” meant they must first have an idea of what was “freedom”, and if one were allowed the “privilege” to learn how to read, this discovery was inevitable.

If education of the masses could turn the majority of a population literate, it was thought that the higher ideas, the sort of “dangerous ideas” that Mustapha Mond for instance expresses in “The Brave New World”, would quickly organise the masses and revolution against their “controllers” would be inevitable. In other words, knowledge is freedom, and you cannot enslave those who learn how to “think”.

However, it hasn’t exactly played out that way has it?

The greater majority of us are free to read whatever we wish to, in terms of the once “forbidden books”, such as those listed by The Index Librorum Prohibitorum.

We can read any of the writings that were banned in “The Brave New World”, notably the works of Shakespeare which were named as absolutely dangerous forms of “knowledge”.

We are now very much free to “educate” ourselves on the very “ideas” that were recognised by tyrants of the past as the “antidote” to a life of slavery. And yet, today, the majority choose not to…

It is recognised, albeit superficially, that who controls the past, controls the present and thereby the future. George Orwell’s book “1984”, hammers this as the essential feature that allows the Big Brother apparatus to maintain absolute control over fear, perception and loyalty to the Party cause, and yet despite its popularity, there still remains a lack of interest in actually informing oneself about the past.

What does it matter anyway, if the past is controlled and rewritten to suit the present? As the Big Brother interrogator O’Brien states to Winston, “We, the Party, control all records, and we control all memories. Then we control the past, do we not? [And thus, are free to rewrite it as we choose…]”

Of course, we are not in the same situation as Winston…we are much better off.

We can study and learn about the “past” if we so desire, unfortunately, it is a choice that many take for granted.

In fact, many are probably not fully aware that presently there is a battle waging for who will “control the past” in a manner that is closely resembling a form of “memory wipe”.
* * *
William Sargant was a British psychiatrist and, one could say, effectively the Father of “mind control” in the West, with connections to British Intelligence and the Tavistock Institute, which would influence the CIA and American military via the program MK Ultra. Sargant was also an advisor for Ewen Cameron’s LSD “blank slate” work at McGill University, funded by the CIA.

Sargant accounts for his reason in studying and using forms of “mind control” on his patients, which were primarily British soldiers that were sent back from the battlefield during WWII with various forms of “psychosis”, as the only way to rehabilitate extreme forms of PTSD.

The other reason, was because the Soviets had apparently become “experts” in the field, and out of a need for national security, the British would thus in turn have to become experts as well…as a matter of self-defence of course.

The work of Ivan Pavlov, a Russian physiologist, had succeeded in producing some disturbingly interesting insights into four primary forms of nervous systems in dogs, that were combinations of inhibitory and excitatory temperaments; “strong excitatory”, “balanced”, “passive” and “calm imperturbable”. Pavlov found that depending on the category of nervous system temperament the dog had, this in turn would dictate the form of “conditioning” that would work best to “reprogram behaviour”. The relevance to “human conditioning” was not lost on anyone.

It was feared in the West, that such techniques would not only be used against their soldiers to invoke free-flowing uninhibited confessions to the enemy but that these soldiers could be sent back to their home countries, as zombified assassins and spies that could be set off with a simple code word. At least, these were the thriller stories and movies that were pumped into the population. How horrific indeed! That the enemy could apparently enter what was thought the only sacred ground to be our own…our very “minds”!

However, for those who were actually leading the field in mind control research, such as William Sargant, it was understood that this was not exactly how mind control worked.

For one thing, the issue of “free will” was getting in the way.

No matter the length or degree of electro-shock, insulin “therapy”, tranquilizer cocktails, induced comas, sleep deprivation, starvation etc induced, it was discovered that if the subject had a “strong conviction” and “strong belief” in something, this could not be simply erased, it could not be written over with any arbitrary thing. Rather, the subject would have to have the illusion that their “conditioning” was in fact a “choice”. This was an extremely challenging task, and long term conversions (months to years) were rare.

However, Sargant saw an opening. It was understood that one could not create a new individual from scratch, however, with the right conditioning that was meant to lead to a physical breakdown using abnormal stress (effectively a reboot of the nervous system), one could increase the “suggestibility” markedly in their subjects.

Sargant wrote in his “Battle of the Mind”: “Pavlov’s clinical descriptions of the ‘experimental neuroses’ which he could induce in dogs proved, in fact, to have a close correspondence with those war-neuroses which we were investigating at the time.”

In addition, Sargant found that a falsely implanted memory could help induce abnormal stress leading to emotional exhaustion and physical breakdown to invoke “suggestibility”. That is, one didn’t even need to have a “real stress” but an “imagined stress” would work just as effectively.

Sargant goes on to state in his book:

“It is not surprising that the ordinary person, in general, is much more easily indoctrinated than the abnormal…A person is considered ‘ordinary’ or ‘normal’ by the community simply because he accepts most of its social standards and behavioural patterns; which means, in fact, that he is susceptible to suggestion and has been persuaded to go with the majority on most ordinary or extraordinary occasions.”

Sargant then goes over the phenomenon of the London Blitz, which was an eight month period of heavy bombing of London during WWII. During this period, in order to cope and stay “sane”, people rapidly became accustomed to the idea that their neighbours could be and were buried alive in bombed houses around them. The thought was “If I can’t do anything about it what use is it that I trouble myself over it?” The best “coping” was thus found to be those who accepted the new “environment” and just focused on “surviving”, and did not try to resist it.

Sargant remarks that it is this “adaptability” to a changing environment which is part of the “survival” instinct and is very strong in the “healthy” and “normal” individual who can learn to cope and thus continues to be “functional” despite an ever changing environment.

It was thus our deeply programmed “survival instinct” that was found to be the key to the suggestibility of our minds. That the best “survivors” made for the best “brain-washing” in a sense.

Sargant quotes Hecker’s work, who was studying the dancing mania phenomenon that occurred during the Black Death, where Hecker observed that heightened suggestibility had the capability to cause a person to “embrace with equal force, reason and folly, good and evil, diminish the praise of virtue as well as the criminality of vice.”

And that such a state of mind was likened to the first efforts of the infant mind “this instinct of imitation when it exists in its highest degree, is also united a loss of all power over the will, which occurs as soon as the impression on the senses has become firmly established, producing a condition like that of small animals when they are fascinated by the look of a serpent.”

I wonder if Sargant imagined himself the serpent…

Part 1 of 2

 

[marsh]

Part 2 of 2

Sargant does finally admit: “This does not mean that all persons can be genuinely indoctrinated by such means. Some will give only temporary submission to the demands made on them, and fight again when strength of body and mind returns. Others are saved by the supervention of madness. Or the will to resist may give way, but not the intellect itself.”

But he comforts himself as a response to this stubborn resistance that “As mentioned in a previous context, the stake, the gallows, the firing squad, the prison, or the madhouse, are usually available for the failures.”

How to Resist the Deconstruction of Your Mind

“He whom the gods wish to destroy, they first of all drive mad.”
– Henry Wadsworth Longfellow “The Masque of Pandora”

For those who have not seen the 1944 psychological thriller “Gaslight” directed by George Cukor, I would highly recommend you do so since there is an invaluable lesson contained within, that is especially applicable to what I suspect many of us are experiencing nowadays.

View: https://youtu.be/BICqcEvzhVw
2:22 min

The story starts with a 14 year old Paula (played by Ingrid Bergman) who is being taken to Italy after her Aunt Alice Alquist, a famous opera singer and caretaker of Paula, is found murdered in her home in London. Paula is the one who found the body, and horror stricken is never her old self again. Her Aunt was the only family Paula had left in her life. The decision is made to send her away from London to Italy to continue her studies to become a world-renowned opera singer like her Aunt Alice.

Years go by, Paula lives a very sheltered life and a heavy somberness is always present within her, she can never seem to feel any kind of happiness. During her singing studies she meets a mysterious man (her piano accompanist during her lessons) and falls deeply in love with him. However, she knows hardly anything about the man named Gregory.

Paula agrees to marry Gregory after a two week romance and is quickly convinced to move back into her Aunt’s house in London that was left abandoned all these years. As soon as she enters the house, the haunting of the night of the murder revisits her and she is consumed with panic and fear.

Gregory tries to calm her and talks about the house needing just a little bit of air and sun, and then Paula comes across a letter written to her Aunt from a Sergis Bauer which confirms that he was in contact with Alice just a few days before her murder. At this finding, Gregory becomes bizarrely agitated and grabs the letter from Paula. He quickly tries to justify his anger blaming the letter for upsetting her. Gregory then decides to lock all of her Aunt’s belongings in the attic, to apparently spare Paula any further anguish.

It is at this point that Gregory starts to change his behaviour dramatically. Always under the pretext for “Paula’s sake”, everything that is considered “upsetting” to Paula must be removed from her presence. And thus quickly the house is turned into a form of prison. Paula is told it is for her best not to leave the house unaccompanied, not to have visitors and that self-isolation is the best remedy for her “anxieties” which are getting worst. Paula is never strictly forbidden at the beginning but rather is told that she should obey these restrictions for her own good.

Before a walk, he gives as a gift a beautiful heirloom brooch that belonged to his mother. Because the pin needs replacing, he instructs Paula to keep it in her handbag, and then says rather out of context, “Don’t forget where you put it now Paula, I don’t want you losing it.” Paula remarks thinking the warning absurd, “Of course I won’t forget!” When they return from their walk, Gregory asks for the brooch, Paula searches in her handbag but it is not there.

It continues on like this, with Gregory giving warnings and reminders, seemingly to help Paula with her “forgetfulness” and “anxieties”. Paula starts to question her own judgement and sanity as these events become more and more frequent.

She has no one else to talk to but Gregory, who is the only witness to these apparent mishaps. It gets to a point where completely nonsensical behaviour is being attributed to Paula by Gregory. A painting is found missing on the wall one night. Gregory talks to Paula like she is a 5 year child and asks her to put it back.

Paula insists she does not know who took it down. After her persistent passionate insistence that it was not her, she walks up the stairs almost like she were in a dream state and pulls the painting from behind a statue. Gregory asks why she lied, but Paula insists that she only thought to look there because that is where it was found the last two times this occurred.

For weeks now, Paula thinks she has been seeing things, the gas lights of the house dimming for no reason, she also hears footsteps above her bedroom. No one else seems to take notice. Paula is also told by Gregory that he found out that her mother, who passed away when she was very young, had actually gone insane and died in an asylum.

Despite Paula being reduced to a condition of an ongoing stupor, she decides one night to make a stand and regain control over her life. Paula is invited, by one of her Aunt Alice’s close friends Lady Dalroy, to attend a high society evening with musical performances. Recall that Paula’s life gravitated around music before her encounter with Gregory. Music was her life. Paula gets magnificently dressed up for the evening and on her way out tells Gregory that she is going to this event. Gregory tries to convince her that she is not well enough to attend such a social gathering, when Paula calmly insists that she is going and that this woman was a dear friend of her Aunt, Gregory answers that he refuses to accompany her (in those days that was a big deal). Paula accepts this and walks with a solid dignity, undeterred towards the horse carriage. In a very telling scene, Gregory is left momentarily by himself and panic stricken, his eyes bulging he snaps his cigar case shut and runs after Paula. He laughingly calls to her, “Paula, you did not think I was serious? I had no idea that this party meant so much to you. Wait, I will get ready.” As he is getting ready in front of the mirror, a devilish smirk appears.

Paula and Gregory show up to Lady Dalroy’s house late, the pianist is in the middle of the 1st movement of Beethoven’s Piano Sonata #8 in C minor. They quickly are escorted to two empty seats. Paula is immediately immersed in the piece, and Gregory can see his control is slipping. After only a few minutes, he goes to look at his pocket watch but it is not in his pocket. He whispers into Paula’s ear, “My watch is missing”. Immediately, Paula looks like she is going to be sick. Gregory takes her handbag and Paula looks in horror as he pulls out his pocket watch, insinuating that Paula had put it there. She immediately starts losing control and has a very public emotional breakdown. Gregory takes her away, as he remarks to Lady Dalroy that this is why he didn’t want Paula coming in the first place.

When they arrive home, Paula has by now completely succumbed to the thought that she is indeed completely insane. Gregory says that it would be best if they go away somewhere for an indefinite period of time. We later find out that Gregory is intending on committing her to an asylum. Paula agrees to leave London with Gregory and leaves her fate entirely in his hands.

In the case of Paula it is clear. She has been suspecting that Gregory has something to do with her “situation” but he has very artfully created an environment where Paula herself doubts whether this is a matter of unfathomable villainy or whether she is indeed going mad.

It is rather because she is not mad that she doubts herself, because there is seemingly no reason for why Gregory would put so much time and energy into making it look like she were mad, or at least so it first appears. But what if the purpose to her believing in her madness was simply a matter of who is in control?

Paula almost succeeds in gaining the upper-hand in this power-struggle, the evening she decided to go out on her own no matter what Gregory insisted was in her best interest. If she would have held her ground at Lady Dalroy’s house and simply replied, “I have no idea why your stupid watch ended up in my handbag and I could care less. Now stop interrupting this performance, you are making a scene!” Gregory’s spell would have been broken as simple as that. If he were to complain to others about the situation, they would also respond, “Who cares man, why are you so obsessed about your damn watch?”

We find ourselves today in a very similar situation to Paula. And the voice of Gregory is represented by the narrative of false news and the apocalyptic social behaviourist programming in our forms of entertainment. The things most people voluntarily subject themselves to on a daily, if not hourly, basis.

Socially conditioning them, like a pack of salivating Pavlovian dogs, to think it is just a matter of time before the world ends and with a ring of their master’s bell…be at each other’s throats.

Paula ends up being saved in the end by a man named Joseph Cotten (a detective), who took notice and quickly discerned that something was amiss. In the end Gregory is arrested. It is revealed that Gregory is in fact Sergis Bauer.

That he killed Alice Alquist and that he has returned to the scene of the crime after all these years in search for the famous jewels of the opera singer. The jewels were in fact rather worthless from the standpoint that they were too famous to be sold, however, Gregory never intended on selling these jewels but rather had become obsessed with the desire to merely possess them.
That is, it is Gregory who has been entirely mad all this time.

A Gregory is absolutely dangerous. He would have been the end of Paula if nothing had intervened. However, the power that Gregory held was conditional to the degree that Paula allowed it to control her. Paula’s extreme deconstruction was thus entirely dependent on her choice to let the voice of Gregory in. That is, a Gregory is only dangerous if we allow ourselves to sleep walk into the nightmare he has constructed for us.

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone,
“it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”
“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master – – that’s all.”
– Lewis Carroll’s “Through the Looking Glass”

 

[marsh]

Senate passed Cotton amendment to ban federal dollars from funding Critical Race Theory in schools

All Senate Democrats, aside from Joe Manchin, voted to keep CRT in schools

justthenews.com

Senate passed Cotton amendment to ban federal dollars from funding Critical Race Theory in schools

All Senate Democrats, aside from Joe Manchin, voted to keep CRT in schools

Updated: August 11, 2021 - 10:10am

The Senate has approved an amendment to the $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation bill that will ban the use of federal funds from being used to teach Critical Race Theory in schools.

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., introduced the "Stop CRT Act" in an effort to prevent tax dollars from being used to teach the controversial set of ideas in public school classrooms.

"They want to teach our children that America is not a good nation but a racist nation. Those teachings are wrong and our tax dollars should not support them," Cotton said ahead of the vote. "My amendment will ensure that federal funds aren’t used to indoctrinate children as young as pre-K to hate America."

All Senate Democrats voted against the ban, aside from West Virginia moderate Joe Manchin, who gave the GOP the vote it needed to successfully pass the amendment during series of votes late Tuesday and early Wednesday.

"Our future depends on the next generation of kids loving America and loving each other as fellow citizens, no matter their race," said Cotton.

The passage occurred overnight during the chamber's 15-hour "vote-a-rama" that ultimately saw the Senate pass the $3.5 trillion budget package.

 

[marsh]

Zerohedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero

www.zerohedge.com

Canceling The Constitution: Biden Hailed For Violating Rule Of Law To Extend Eviction Moratorium

WEDNESDAY, AUG 11, 2021 - 12:16 PM
Authored by Jonathan Turley,

Below is my column in the Hill on the extension of the eviction moratorium — a move that his White House Counsel and most legal experts told him was unconstitutional. However, according to the Washington Post, Speaker Nancy Pelosi encouraged Biden to call Harvard Professor Laurence Tribe who reportedly advised hm that he had the authority. I have had many (and sharp) disagreements with Tribe over the years (including profane and personal attacks) but there is usually some good-faith underlying disagreement in controversies like impeachment. This is not such a case. I fail to see the credible basis for telling a President that the CDC can use the same authority that five justices just declared it did not have.



Here is the column:

During the 2020 presidential campaign, then-candidate Joe Biden told voters that the choice between him and Donald Trump was between the lawful and the lawless. He called for voters to support “the rule of law, our Constitution,” a choice repeated mantralike by the media to “end Trump’s assault on the rule of law.” Now, six months into his presidency, Biden is openly flouting the Constitution with a knowingly invalid extension of the eviction moratorium — and some law professors and advocates on the left are cheering him for it.

A few weeks ago, the Supreme Court ruled on the authority of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to impose a nationwide moratorium on the eviction of renters during the pandemic. Some of us criticized the CDC order as unconstitutional. The reason is the breathtaking authority claimed by the CDC under a federal law that gives it the power to “make and enforce such regulations as in [its] judgment are necessary to prevent the introduction, transmission, or spread of communicable diseases.”

I have long been a critic of such unchecked and undefined authority in pandemics. This, however, is a particularly chilling example. It would give the CDC authority over huge swaths of our economy to avoid even the possibility of the “introduction” or spread of a disease. It means that a Constitution designed to prevent tyranny and authoritarianism becomes largely irrelevant if you put on a white lab coat. After all, the law was designed to control disease, not democracy, as a public health priority.

In its 5-4 decision in Alabama Association of Realtors v. Department of Health and Human Services, the Supreme Court kept the CDC moratorium in place but left no question that a majority of justices ultimately view the CDC order as unconstitutional. On the minority side of the vote, Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett wanted to suspend the eviction moratorium as unconstitutional. Yet the CDC’s original order was about to expire anyway, so — in a somewhat baffling concurrence — Justice Brett Kavanaugh supplied the fifth vote in favor of the CDC to allow the law to simply expire and thereby enable an “additional and more orderly distribution of the congressionally appropriated rental assistance.” Thus, Kavanaugh voted with the majority in this case — but also indicated that he agreed with his conservative colleagues on the larger point that the CDC never had the authority to issue the nationwide eviction moratorium in the first place without a congressional act.

Biden acknowledged the obvious — that any new order to extend the moratorium would be unconstitutional.

Indeed, he admitted that legal experts overwhelmingly told him so:

“The bulk of the constitutional scholarship says that it’s not likely to pass constitutional muster.”

Yet he added that he was able to find “several key scholars who think that it may and it’s worth the effort.”

The fact that most scholars relied upon by the Biden White House said the move would be unconstitutional is itself remarkable. Given the makeup of most law faculties, Democrats in Congress usually can expect hundreds of supportive academics to sign letters and attest to their legal positions.

The question then arose as to who would offer Biden constitutional cover when virtually every other liberal professor declined to do so — and the “several key scholars” were guessed by some of us to be a single figure: Harvard law professor Laurence Tribe. After his own White House counsel agreed that the move would be unconstitutional, Biden reportedly told his chief of staff, Ron Klain, to call Tribe, who has been consistently there for Democrats, from supporting court packing to declaring Trump a terrorist to attacking Republicans and those with conflicting views.

Tribe and I have long disagreed on constitutional questions, but the partisanship was often laced with some plausibility. The advice in this instance is incredible for its sheer mendacity. The court clearly stated that the CDC lacks this authority, but Tribe reportedly assured Biden that this technically would be a new order, even though it is based on the same unconstitutional claim. It is like being given a parole for stealing a BMW and then immediately stealing a Lexus because it is a different car. The problem was the act, not the make of the car.

What is particularly alarming was Biden’s reason for why it may be “worth the effort” — that “at a minimum, by the time it gets litigated, it will probably give some additional time while we’re getting that $45 billion out to people.” In other words, with appeals, the Biden administration could rush out money before the courts could shut it down.

Biden was hailed for his extraconstitutional commitment to social justice. One liberal commentator declared that “with one small action, Biden reveals himself as a better leader than Trump.” That “small action” was violating the Constitution — the document he swore to uphold, “so help me God,” at his inaugural.

Nevertheless, gutting the rule of law is somehow now seen as “a sign of leadership in action.”

Biden is not a first-time offender. When he was vice president, the Obama administration green-lighted the expenditure of billions under ObamaCare despite lacking congressional approval. I represented the House of Representatives as lead counsel in successfully challenging that clearly unconstitutional act, but the administration was never required to get the money back. With the cover offered by Tribe in this instance, Biden apparently hopes to repeat the same tactic to bar evictions while evading the Constitution.

When confronted on his unconstitutional strategy, Biden repeatedly reminded reporters that a pandemic is raging. Yet, just months ago, Biden declared his election would amount to the triumph of the “rule of law” and would show that “the flame of democracy” cannot be extinguished, “not even [with] a pandemic or an abuse of power.”

So, Biden is now blowing out that flame while attempting to excite political demands for extraconstitutional action. It will come at a great cost for the country and his own legacy. The oath that he took on Jan. 20 did not include an exception for political convenience. Indeed, it is often inconvenient to uphold the Constitution — but the alternative is a type of self-eviction on the basis of one’s oath of office.

 

[marsh]

FBI Seizes Entire Bank Account of Conservative Talk Show Host After He Attended a Trump Rally - DailyVeracity

During a viral new documentary released on Tuesday, Conservative Talk Show host Nicholas J Fuentes discussed the legal…

www.dailyveracity.com

FBI Seizes Entire Bank Account of Conservative Talk Show Host After He Attended a Trump Rally

byDaily Veracity Staff
August 11, 2021

During a viral new documentary released on Tuesday, Conservative Talk Show host Nicholas J Fuentes discussed the legal repercussions he has faced after he simply attended former President Trump’s speech on January 6th.

Fuentes never entered the capitol building and remained approximately 200 yards away from the nearest entrance. The 23-year-old talk show host says he went to the capitol building following Trump’s speech because the former President said he would also be giving a speech outside the front of the building.

“Currently the FBI is pursuing an investigation against me for my involvement at the capitol, I had done nothing wrong at the capitol, I committed no crime, I went there for the Trump rally at the Elipse which is just outside the White House,” Fuentes said during the documentary.

“I walked to the capitol with hundreds of thousands of other people for a civil first amendment protected demonstration. I didn’t participate in any violence or illegal criminal activity. So on the one hand I knew I had done nothing wrong but on the other hand, I knew that in this new country that we have, that doesn’t necessarily protect you from law enforcement.”

In the film, Fuentes noted that days later he noticed his credit card was declined for a subscription he signed up for. After checking his bank account, he found that his balance went from almost half a million dollars the day before, to zero dollars.

“I went through my transaction history and I saw a legal order that subtracted my entire bank balance,” Fuentes said. “Both my credit cards and my entire checking account were frozen.”

Fuentes said that what made this so crushing is that the Department of Justice and the FBI are immovable.

“Because of the war on terror, because of the Patriot Act, because of how the federal government operates, they really can do whatever they want to whoever they want, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Fuentes was also recently banned from flying on U.S. airlines by the United States Government, put on the official no-fly list, and permanently banned from Twitter following his attendance at the Trump speech on January 6th.

Fuentes was on his way to a press conference where he was intending to address political censorship online, only to find out that he had been censored by the U.S. government and banned from flying there.

Fuentes speculates that the mass action taken against him is due to his large effective reach, gigantic audience size, his ability to turn out hundreds of people at a moment’s notice, and his vocal support of former President Trump.

Fuentes suggests that he is a true ‘threat to the system’ because of this.

Operation Choke Point was a 2013 initiative of the United States Department of Justice that led to the investigation of banks in the United States and the business they did with firearm dealers, and other companies the government claimed to be at ‘high risk for fraud and money laundering.’

The operation soon extended to dozens of conservative and tea party groups.
In 2013 the IRS admitted it applied extra scrutiny to conservative groups applying for nonprofit status. Lois Lerner, then the head of the Exempt Organizations unit responsible, became the public face of the scandal, though many other IRS officials were involved as well.

In 2018. The Trump administration, after years of litigation, settled a lawsuit with a group called ‘True the Vote’ which was investigated and raided by the FBI and IRS on multiple occasions amid the mass targeting.

Today, American dissidents and conservatives say they are experiencing Operation Chokepoint ‘on steroids.’

Unlike in 2012, the U.S. Government now mostly relies on private industry to silence its critics. Many of these companies, which are ideologically aligned with the American regime, now have more power than the federal government can ever dream of.

In a recent opinion piece for The Hill, Kristen Tate outlined how America’s version of China’s social credit system is already here, and how it is becoming worse than China’s as time progresses.

“Last week, PayPal announced a partnership with the left-wing Southern Poverty Law Center to “investigate” the role of “white supremacists” and propagators of “anti-government” rhetoric, subjective labels that potentially could impact a large number of groups or people using their service. PayPal says the collected information will be shared with other financial firms and politicians. Facebook is taking similar measures, recently introducing messages that ask users to snitch on their potentially “extremist” friends, which considering the platform’s bias seems mainly to target the political right. At the same time, Facebook and Microsoft are working with several other web giants and the United Nations on a database to block potential extremist content.”

“When does your debit card get canceled over old tweets, your home loan denied for homeschooling your kids, or your eBay account invalidated because a friend flagged you for posting a Gadsden flag?”

This is already happening to a large degree to American citizens like Fuentes, Andrew Torba, Vincent James, Alex Jones, and thousands of others who are having their bank accounts banned, credit cards frozen, and are banned from nearly every social media platform, payment processor, and ridesharing app.

America’s new social credit system has just now begun to affect those who refuse the COVID vaccine.

Soon, many Americans will not be able to enter bars, restaurants, or supermarkets because they are unvaccinated. Many also won’t be able to travel, go to school, go to work, financially transact, and maybe even access streaming services without having to show or upload their vaccine certificates first.

Perhaps the most terrifying part is that millions of Americans are simply falling in line with this new status quo.

 

[marsh]

Marxism With American Characteristics

Commentary Despite modern technology, there is no better way to send a message to the world than from ...

www.theepochtimes.com

A statue of Karl Marx is seen in a file photo. (wal_172619/Pixabay)

Marxism With American
Characteristics

David Flint
CONTRIBUTOR

August 10, 2021 Updated: August 11, 2021

Despite modern technology, there is no better way to send a message to the world than from a well-written and timely book.

Mark Levin has demonstrated the truth of this in his latest book, American Marxism, which can rally the nation back to American exceptionalism—a belief that once not only united her people but also united the free world for the last 80 years behind the United States.

Levin, a former chief of staff to U.S. President Ronald Reagan’s Attorney General Edwin Meese, is currently a leading conservative broadcaster who has become part of a central counterbalance to the legacy media organisations and social media companies that are increasingly steering journalism away from the principles of honesty, accuracy, and truthfulness.

Levin is also the author of a highly influential political library, with each one of his seven books enjoying the accolade of being a New York Times bestseller.

The essential theme in American Marxism is that the eternal and self-evident truth within the Declaration of Independence is that all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, namely Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.

Levine’s great ability as an author is that while he maintains intellectual integrity, his style is such that he remains accessible to all.
Conservative talk-show host Mark Levin speaks during the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) 2016 at National Harbor in Oxon Hill, Md., March 4, 2016. (Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images)

His singular achievement here is to make sense of the apparently unrelated, never-ending and increasingly bizarre dogmas that have poured out of the United States and spread across the world in recent years. Successfully piercing the camouflage of separateness carefully erected around each movement and demonstrating all can be traced back to one common source, what Winston Churchill described as the bacillus or bacteria of Marxism.

Thus Levin establishes the existence of Marxism with American characteristics.

Being a consummate media practitioner, Levin declares at the very opening of the book that this new form of Marxism constitutes a counter-revolution devouring American society, culture and threatening the destruction of the nation itself. A nation made exceptional, as Reagan asserted, less as a place and more as an idea, an idea “deep in the souls of Man.”

Karl Marx believed that it was inevitable that the exploited proletariat (lower classes) would overthrow the capitalist class and introduce a communist utopia in which the state would wither away. But as Levin says, Marx was wrong about almost everything.

The fact is that Lenin did not come to power in a proletarian uprising but in a narrowly won Bolshevik coup.

Nor did Mao rise to be the ruler of China because of a proletarian revolution; without industrialisation, the proletariat was, in fact, far too small.
A woman walks past a statue of the late Chinese Communist Party leader Mao Zedong in Beijing, China, on Oct. 9, 2007. (Guang Niu/Getty Images)

In the meantime, the workers in the United States and other English-speaking countries were just not interested. They were far too conservative and increasingly economically successful—and in the case of the U.S., too religious and had too much faith in the exceptionalism of their country.

So while clinging to the essence of Marxism, Marx’s acolytes sought instead to obey American Marxism’s fundamental instruction: “Philosophers have hitherto only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it.”

Herbert Marcuse, a German-born Marxist philosopher, appointed to some of America’s leading universities, used the very freedom those positions gave him to become the father of the Critical Theory Ideology from which the racial, gender and other critical movements have sprung.

All seek the destruction of American society through a clash of increasing and never-ending classes or groups of oppressed races, genders, or other societal divisions against their oppressors.

The nation’s humanities faculties are now crammed with activist Marxists delivering graduates indoctrinated in Critical Theory and now working in education, media, administration, legal, and executive positions in big business and politics.

They are thus fulfilling Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci’s answer to the unlikeliness of a proletarian revolution, the long march through the nation’s institutions.

The essence of Marxism, dialectical materialism, declares that all ideas, beliefs, and institutions anywhere, including America, are the product of the oppressors’ tools and, therefore, must be rejected and removed—violently if need be.

When it comes to race, the wise and gentle words of Martin Luther King, that he looked to a day when people will “not be judged by the colour of their skin, but by the content of their character,” are now anathema.

In indoctrinating the nation’s youth, the Marxists have introduced what George Orwell predicted in 1984, a language limiting everyone’s range of thought, Newspeak.

A mural depicting British novelist George Orwell with the quote “Freedom is the right to tell people what they do not want to hear” in Belgrade, Serbia, on May 8, 2018. (Oliver Bunic/AFP via Getty Images)

Hence “sex” has been replaced by “gender” to create the myth that sex is only a matter of choice.

These new decrees constantly come from Marxists instructing all on what they may say and how they may describe a wide range of events and relationships.

Unfortunately, too many now roll over for these decrees. At the same time, religion has been under attack by activist judges and removed from public education.

The widespread acceptance of Marxist propaganda can be explained by the fact that people are inherently programmed to believe. In words attributed to English writer G.K. Chesterton, “When man stops believing in God, it is not that he believes in nothing. He will believe in anything.”

This brings me to Levin’s courage in denouncing the dogmatic approach and promotion of man-made global warming, which is advantaging Beijing in its quest to dominate the West.

In a chapter named “Climate Change” Fanaticism, Levin sees this as part of the degrowth movement, the aim of which writer Ayn Rand long ago denounced as the “destruction of the remnants of capitalism in today’s mixed economy and the establishment of a global dictatorship.”

Levin endorses the opinion of Ian Plimer, emeritus professor of earth sciences and mining geology, that climate change catastrophism is the “biggest scientific fraud that has ever occurred,” as well as that of scientist Robert Carter that no expert on the planet can tell you with credible probability “whether the climate … will be warmer or cooler.”

This book is important not only to the U.S. but to the rest of the free world, which is becoming as infected by the bacillus of American Marxism as it has been by the CCP (Chinese Communist Party) virus, that people now willingly argue could have been manufactured in a laboratory in Wuhan.

Views expressed in this article are the opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.

 

[marsh]

Biden’s IRS Is A Partisan Weapon In The War On Religious Freedom

We aren’t even a full year into Biden’s administration and the IRS is already returning to the Obama era's politically discriminatory practices.

thefederalist.com

Biden’s IRS Is A Partisan Weapon In The War On Religious Freedom

AUGUST 11, 2021 By Timothy Head
The U.S. First Amendment protects every American citizen’s right to express his opinions, teach his religious beliefs, and worship God without interference by the federal government. Under the First Amendment, freedom of religion is a constitutional guarantee.

But Joe Biden’s Internal Revenue Service is having a hard time getting that message.

Recently, in a glaring display of partisan prejudice, IRS Exempt Organizations Director Stephen Martin denied tax-exempt status to the Texas-based nonprofit Christians Engaged. According to the IRS, this nonprofit, which strives to educate Christians in prayer and civic engagement, was participating in “prohibited political campaign intervention” by promoting Biblical values.

After some top-notch legal work by First Liberty and some aggressive advocacy by conservatives in Congress such as Rep. Chip Roy, Sen. Ted Cruz, and Sen. Mike Lee, the IRS has since reversed its decision.

But some bells can’t be unrung, and the partisan politics at play behind closed doors at the IRS can’t be unseen. Christians Engaged knew whom to contact to bring the fight to the IRS. What about the hundreds of smaller Christian nonprofits that might be victims of the same partisanship?

We know this isn’t the first time the IRS has been weaponized by leftists and Democrats to politicize our freedom of speech. Who can forget how Obama’s IRS under Lois Lerner systematically targeted conservative organizations for unfair additional scrutiny?

Of course, Lerner eventually apologized for her agency’s systematic discrimination against conservatives. But words are just words. Years later, it’s clear that Democrats haven’t learned their lesson. We aren’t even a full year into Biden’s administration and the IRS is already returning to the same anti-conservative and discriminatory practices from the Obama era.

The problem is that leftists and Democrats don’t share or even understand the values of the majority of Americans. Religion matters in America, and faith is a part of our culture and a force that shapes and guides the political beliefs of millions of Americans. Faith is not a partisan political weapon; it’s a core part of the American way of life.

This is what leftists don’t get. To far too many on the left, faith is just something Republicans talk about on the campaign trail. In his original letter denying tax-exempt status to Christians Engaged, Martin went so far as to say that “ible teachings are typically affiliated with the [Republican] party and candidates.”

That would certainly be news to the ancient Israelites and apostles who wrote the Bible. But the IRS director’s words don’t only express simple ignorance; they showcase leftists’ willingness to relegate the core religious beliefs of millions of Americans to a partisan niche.

But here’s the thing: the Bible wasn’t written by Republicans or Democrats, and it wasn’t given to us by God to tell us for whom to vote. The Bible is the foundation of the Christian faith, which is for anyone and everyone. The Bible should not be turned into a political punching bag for the left.

Never before in the history of America has professing the Christian faith been understood as a form of partisan political campaigning. It’s obviously excellent news that the IRS has reversed its original determination. But the battle for religious freedom in America is far from over.

Our Constitution was designed to protect us from government tyranny, and the IRS has no right to target and discriminate against Christian nonprofits like this.

Our fundamental religious freedom should never be weaponized by partisan politics.

 

[marsh]

Update — Black principal brings back school segregation to Atlanta…

This is the mother who filed suit with the U.S. Dept of Education Background info here… Different Video — Local Atlanta TV news report has an update f…

citizenfreepress.com

Update — Black principal brings back school segregation to Atlanta…
Posted by Kane on August 11, 2021 6:02 pm

View: https://youtu.be/aN-H3-8RrSg
1:59 min
This is the mother who filed suit with the U.S. Dept of Education

Different Video — Local Atlanta TV news report has an update from this afternoon

View: https://youtu.be/aTTLT2RGCsU
2:50 min

 

[marsh]

Top Republicans demand answers from FBI for 'quasi-investigation' of conservative women's group

Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley's office says FBI director Christopher Wray is more than a week behind deadline for responding.

justthenews.com

Top Republicans demand answers from FBI for 'quasi-investigation' of conservative women's group

Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley's office says FBI director Christopher Wray is more than a week behind deadline for responding.

Updated: August 11, 2021 - 11:00pm

The FBI used a bureaucratic workaround to investigate a women's group with a socially conservative agenda, despite having no "particular factual predication" for wrongdoing, according to a document disclosed under the Freedom of Information Act.

The revelation outraged top Republicans on the House and Senate Judiciary committees, who are demanding an explanation from FBI Director Christopher Wray.

The July 2016 review of Concerned Women for America (CWA) for the "possibility of fraudulent activity" was based on its two-star rating (out of four) by Charity Navigator, which evaluates nonprofits for their financial health and transparency, according to the FBI "charity assessment."

The redacted FBI form emphasizes that CWA, whose leader was a public supporter of then-candidate Donald Trump, "underperforms most charities in its Cause" by Charity Navigator's standards. It's also listed among "non-disclosure charities" by the BBB Wise Giving Alliance, meaning it didn't consent to evaluation by that charity watchdog.

The FBI reviewer cited redacted "red flags of fraudulent activity" by CWA but concluded it did not merit a full investigation.

"This document raises serious questions about the FBI's targeting of domestic civil society organizations on the basis of a third-party opinion, and not any credible allegation of a crime," House Judiciary ranking member Jim Jordan of Ohio wrote to Wray Wednesday.

"The federal government wields immense surveillance ability and Congress, especially this committee, has an obligation to ensure that it is used properly and in accordance with all laws and regulations," Senate Judiciary ranking member Chuck Grassley of Iowa wrote to Wray July 20.

Both lawmakers pointed to the "intelligence" aspect disclosed on the assessment. While the "embezzlement" aspect is marked unclassified, the intelligence aspect is additionally marked "for official use only." The acronym FOUO is crossed out on the document.

Grassley's letter requested a response by Aug. 3, which his office has yet to receive, spokesperson Taylor Foy told Just the News. The Justice Department did not answer a query Wednesday about its response to the lawmakers.

The FBI turned over the redacted CWA assessment last month in response to a lawsuit by the libertarian Cato Institute this spring seeking information on its use of assessments.

Then-Attorney General Michael Mukasey created this "bureaucratic exercise in legerdemain" in 2008 in the name of preventing terrorism, according to Cato Senior Fellow Patrick Eddington, a former CIA analyst. All that's needed to launch an assessment is an "authorized purpose."

Agents have "broad powers" to engage in "fishing expeditions" of people and groups for First Amendment activities "without having hard evidence that someone has or is about to commit an actual federal crime," he wrote.

The CWA assessment — the result of "an FBI agent looking to meet a quota" — should spur Congress to ban such "quasi‐investigations" and find out how many other domestic organizations were subject to spurious FBI reviews, Eddington wrote in an Orange County Register op-ed.

Penny Nance, CWA president and CEO, said she believed her "personal support for Donald Trump for President was the only reason for this investigation."

The group, which "protects and promotes Biblical values and Constitutional principles," has always supported law enforcement and intelligence agencies but now feels betrayed by them, she said.

"The Biden Administration must work to reestablish the American people's trust in our top law enforcement agencies which is at an all-time low," Nance said.

"We call on Congress to clamp down on the out-of-control intelligence community."

In his letter Wednesday, Rep. Jordan said the CWA assessment calls into question the FBI director's recent testimony. Wray told the House Judiciary Committee that his agency uses "proper predication" to launch investigations and avoids "First Amendment groups" or their members.

Jordan asked Wray for an unredacted copy of the CWA assessment and a staff briefing on its history, as well as unredacted copies of all charity assessments and an "accounting" of all assessments since January 2016.

Grassley made similar requests in his letter, which invoked the FBI's Crossfire Hurricane investigation of Trump-connected individuals and botched probe of convicted sex offender and former USA Gymnastics team doctor Larry Nassar.

These investigations show it has "repeatedly failed in its mission and abused its authority."

Charity Navigator told Just the News its ratings are "unbiased and objective," based on public data including Internal Revenue Service filings and "news reports from credible news agencies."

While it's "honored that governmental agencies are referencing our data," Chief Relationship Officer Kevin Scally encouraged the feds to "also consider additional data points when assessing if an investigation is warranted."

Eddington, the Cato scholar, told Just the News the group has appealed the FBI's "withholdings" from the CWA request to the Justice Department's Office of Information Policy.

He emphasized the FBI has historically targeted groups on the political left "by orders of magnitude" more than those on the right. While the "pattern is holding steady" from the information Cato has collected thus far, the FBI holds "literally millions of historical records" that could complicate that pattern if revealed.

 

[marsh]

Sorry, my big F/U. Articles were posted in wrong category. They have been removed to elections.

 

[marsh]

Sorry, my big F/U. Articles were posted in wrong category. They have been removed to elections.