Search Results for: shapes of things
January 9, 2021 — Scott Johnson
With the Democratic takeover of the executive and legislative branches a few days away, Big Tech has swung into action in a big way to suppress conservative speech. The treatment of President Trump is of course the leading indicator. Here is a compilation of the developing stories as of this morning: • Ebony Bowden, New York Post: “Trump permanently suspended from Twitter account” • Salvador Rodriguez, CNBC: “Trump tweets from
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March 3, 2006 — Scott Johnson
It appears that none of the three network news shows mentioned Justice Ginsburg’s nap during the oral argument of the Texas redistricting case earlier this week. The folks at Fox’s Special Report with Brit Hume noted it and aired the graphic below. Newsbusters asks us to “pretend for a moment that this had happened to a conservative member of the Supreme Court.” I don’t think it takes too much imagination
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January 15, 2023 — Scott Johnson
I have been a fan of the incredible British guitarist Jeff Beck since his work with the Yardbirds. I noted his death at the age of 78 last week. I want to add to the record with a few more glimpses of his work over the years. He had such a long career that I’d like to divide this into at least two parts and return to him next week.
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October 27, 2021 — Scott Johnson
The cultural transformation of the United States proceeds at an astonishing pace. It is assisted by the titans of Big Tech, of course, against whom a president and lowly congressman are powerless. In what should be another installment of my Shapes of things series, Rep. Jim Banks has been suspended by Twitter for allegedly “misgendering [Biden administration] trans health official” Rachel Levine (per the CBS News tweet below). The AP
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May 27, 2021 — Scott Johnson
I have devoted my “Shapes of Things” series to the problem of Big Tech and free speech and have used an avatar of Big Brother to anchor the series (as I do on the home page for this post). Seeking to deepen our view of the problem that the series illustrates, I have chosen to preview Daniel Oliver’s essay “From Big Tech to Big Brother” from the new (Spring) issue
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January 11, 2021 — Paul Mirengoff
In the 1970s, my constitutional law professor, Gerald Gunther, was invited by the West German government to visit that country and to lecture on the American Constitution. Gunther and his family had fled Germany in the 1930s. When he returned home to California, Gunther commended the Germans as hosts and for what they were accomplishing as a society. However, he added that they still didn’t quite understand the importance of
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April 22, 2021 — Scott Johnson
The relationship between the former slave Frederick Douglass and President Abraham Lincoln provides deep insight into both men. Douglass’s recollection of his first meeting with Lincoln — “I shall never forget my first interview with this great man” — is a highlight of the 1892 version of Douglass’s autobiography (The Life and Times of Frederick Douglass). In the Claremont Review of Books celebration of the bicentennial anniversary of Lincoln’s birth
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March 26, 2021 — John Hinderaker
Critical Race Theory, which is just an updated form of racism, is the most destructive force of the 21st century. If you had told me 50 years ago that a half-century hence, there would be a successful social movement, dominating academia, politics and even the business world, holding that the most important thing about a person is his skin color, I wouldn’t have believed it. But that is where we
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February 26, 2021 — Scott Johnson
As in a Stalinist purge, Amazon has silently “disappeared” Ryan Anderson’s book When Harry Became Sally. Amazon tacitly alleges that it acted under revised guidelines prohibiting the sale of “content that we determine is hate speech … or other material we deem inappropriate or offensive,” including content that “promotes the abuse or sexual exploitation of children, contains pornography, glorifies rape or pedophilia, [or] advocates terrorism.” Beyond citing the policy, Amazon
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June 26, 2020 — Scott Johnson
David Blight opens his Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of Frederick Douglass with the unveiling of The Freedmen’s Memorial in Lincoln Park in Washington, D.C., on April 14, 1876. At the heart of Blight’s opening is his account and analysis of Douglass’s Oration in Memory of Abraham Lincoln at the unveiling. In the speech, Blight writes, Douglass “had named the pain and betrayal of ages. Now he entered the celebration….He recognized how
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February 20, 2019 — Paul Mirengoff
I don’t believe we’ve written about Monica Witt, the former U.S. Air Force intelligence specialist accused of espionage for Iran. Witt, who now resides in Iran, out of our reach, is said to have caused significant damage to America. She is suspected, among other things, of revealing the names of double agents run by the United States. Why did Witt become a traitor? Douglas Wise, former deputy director of the
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September 12, 2017 — Steven Hayward
Ta-Nehesi Coates has a new essay out about Trump that is generating a lot of buzz, entitled “The First White President.” Here are a couple of excerpts about what he has to say about Trump: He is preeminently the white man’s President, entirely devoted to the welfare of white men. He is ready and willing at any time during the first year of his administration to deny, postpone, and sacrifice
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January 30, 2017 — Steven Hayward
Courtesy of the good people at Real Peer Review, herewith a dissertation from the University of Utah that you won’t want to miss: “Wow, that bitch is crazy!”: Exploring gendered performances in leisure spaces surrounding reality television by Spencer, Callie Cross, Ph.D., THE UNIVERSITY OF UTAH, 2014, 202 pages Abstract In Reality Bites Back, Jennifer L. Pozner states, “Women are bitches. Women are stupid. Women are incompetent at work and failures at home. Women
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March 16, 2016 — Steven Hayward
If you cast your mind back to 1979 or so, one of the signs that Jimmy Carter was washed up was a long cover story in The Atlantic by James Fallows, who had been one of Carter’s speechwriters, called “The Passionless Presidency.” “[T]here was a mystery to be explained about Jimmy Carter,” Fallows wrote, “the contrast between the promise and popularity of his first months in office and the disappointment
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June 9, 2015 — Scott Johnson
James Scanlan is a Washington attorney specializing in the use of statistics with respect to employment discrimination litigation and compliance. He has forwarded a copy of the letter he has submitted to Minneapolis Mayor Betsy Hodges and Chief of Police Janeé Harteau regarding the recent American Civil Liberties Union Minnesota study of the racial impact of Minneapolis policing practices. I have referred to the ACLU study at several points in
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August 15, 2014 — Scott Johnson
Ammo Grrrll begins the first of a three-part series on her high school reunion. Here is ON THE ROAD, Part One (Eat your heart out, Jack Kerouac): I recently returned to Arizona from a 5,000 mile, 17-day road trip back to Alexandria, Minnesota, for my – Krikey! – 50th high school reunion. My two best friends from high school joined me – Bonnie flying in from Minneapolis to Phoenix (after
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July 22, 2013 — Paul Mirengoff
A Washington Post/ABC News poll finds that 86 percent of African-Americans disapprove of the jury verdict in the George Zimmerman trial. By contrast, 51 percent of whites say they approve of the verdict while just 31 percent disapprove. However, only 30 percent of white Democrats approve of the verdict. Let’s give the African-American community the benefit of the doubt and assume its members didn’t pay much attention to the evidence
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