Matt Orfalea’s Military-Industrial Complex Non-Disclosure Mashup

Matt Taibbi, quoting Jeff Cohen of FAIR:

"If you’re listening to CNN, CBS, or PBS, and they introduce someone as a ‘former’ something, they’re lying to you,” he says. “What’s more relevant to the news consumer, that someone was an Undersecretary of Defense eight years ago, or that the same person is a highly paid lobbyist now? It’s obviously the second, but almost never revealed.”

And now, here is Matt Orfalea's Military-Industrial Complex Non-Disclosure Mashup:

Continue ReadingMatt Orfalea’s Military-Industrial Complex Non-Disclosure Mashup

John McWhorter Continues to Fight a Two-Front Culture War

Below I'm posting an excerpt from John McWhorter's recent NYT essay: "The Right Likes Book Bans. That Fuels the Left’s Cancel Culture."

BTW, I "identify" as a person who assumes he will be politically homeless for the rest of his life. Clowns to the left of me, Jokers to the right . . .

These cancellations [instigated by those on the political right] are part of a larger project, seeking to muzzle opinions antithetical to the woke quest to eternally contest power differentials and endlessly expand the definition of white supremacy. People on the right are duly appalled by this mind-set. But they miss that their book bans are just as tinny, just as local to petty concerns of our moment and just as, well, unjust. And by revving up its own cancel culture, the anti-woke right is providing the woke left with bulletin-board material: The left, when called on its excesses, can just point to the right’s school-board crusades to justify its own inquisitional zeal. Don’t ban “Bad and Boujee”? How about: Don’t ban “The Bluest Eye”! I’ve encountered endless renditions of this argument in the wake of my book, “Woke Racism.”

The conflict-shy left-of-center onlooker, alarmed by — but unprepared to confront — wokeism on his or her own “side,” winds up finding a certain comfort in what the right is doing. If right-wing zealots are as out-of-bounds as left-wing zealots, they’re able to classify hyper-wokeism as but one symptom of a pox on both ideological houses — a larger, equal-opportunity puritanism. This, in seeming rather hopelessly general, and a matter of a national mood rather than a particular fault of a woke agenda, evinces less desire to face it down. It seems too protean to productively oppose, and all you can do is shake your head and move on.

So here’s a question for right-wing book banners: Do you honestly think the world without your book bans would be a terrible place?

Because if you don’t, and if what you’re really doing is a combination of virtue signaling, panning for gratifying retweets and ginning up wedge issues to help win elections, then you are mirroring what the hard left has been overdosing on since two springs ago. You’re distracting focus from the way the left continues to shred our cultural fabric. There is no better way to sponsor recreational woke puritanism than by fostering a right-wing version of the same.

Continue ReadingJohn McWhorter Continues to Fight a Two-Front Culture War

Aaron Mate: There are Two Forms of Censorship

Aaron Mate asks why our news media doesn't not feature voices advocating for a negotiated peace that also acknowledges the historical U.S. involvement that led to the current situation. He states that there are two types of censorship. In Russia you will find the traditional version. Here in the U.S. we have a much more sophisticated version.

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Hmmm. Why Don’t Smart Good-Hearted People Want to Run for Political Office?

One of our biggest challenges, I believe. I know a lot of smart people, none of who are willing to run for high office. None of them are willing to step into the financial cesspool of politics and none of them want to put their families at risk of harm. This article features the thoughts of For the political scientist Brian Klaas.

"[P]ower-hungry people are, by definition, more likely to seek power. Whether running for national office or applying to manage the local homeowners’ association, those who get off on the idea of controlling others naturally put themselves forward, while most people look at the stress, scrutiny and public pressure, and politely decline.

“Our modern society has made it extremely unattractive to normal, decent human beings to end up in positions of power,” Klaas said, noting that he himself gave up any childhood fantasy of becoming US president as soon as he realised how dirty American politics is. “I don’t think I’m alone in that. I think there’s lots of people who think: I could make the world a little better, but the cost might be enormous to me.” For that reason, Klaas believes, the pool of prospective leaders is already skewed towards those who should be kept well away from power. “I conducted 500 interviews with some of the worst people around – and they weren’t normal,” he recalled. “There are quirks about them, there’s something wrong with some of them, but they’re all very, very good at getting into power. And that’s not an accident."

Continue ReadingHmmm. Why Don’t Smart Good-Hearted People Want to Run for Political Office?