Susan Jacoby, The Age of American Unreason

At Amazon, Susan Jacoby, The Age of American Unreason in a Culture of Lies.

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Thomas C. Foster, How to Read Literature Like a Professor

This book's really good, heh.

At Amazon, Thomas C. Foster, How to Read Literature Like a Professor: A Lively and Entertaining Guide to Reading Between the Lines.

Jennifer Delacruz's Sunday Forecast

I know Sunday's half over, but I've missed my Ms. Jennifer blogging. She's so incredible!

At ABC 10 News San Diego:

Lais Ribeiro Sneak Peak (VIDEO)

For Sports Illustrated Swimsuit:

We All Live on Campus Now

From Andrew Sullivan, a.k.a, "RawMuscleGlutes," at New York Magazine:

"The goal of our culture now is not the emancipation of the individual from the group, but the permanent definition of the individual by the group. We used to call this bigotry. Now we call it being woke."https://t.co/iHY9xqjNps via @intelligencer

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) February 9, 2018

Bari Weiss on 'Real Time with Bill Maher' (VIDEO)

She got some attention the other night on Twitter for her appearance on "Real Time." I don't know, she seems so young, heh.

Either way, she's the best writer at the New York Times right now. I'm blown away by the quality of her analysis. Every time.

Watch:

U.S. Budget Deficit Could Balloon to $1 Trillion This Year

I've long ago given up any hope that the political system, regardless of which party's in power, will get a handle on our perpetual budget deficits, and concomitantly, the national debt.

But a projected $1 trillion deficit for this year does seem like some apocalyptic milestone, my god.

At Forbes, "Trump's Federal Budget Deficit: $1 Trillion and Beyond."

And while I'm still in the neocon camp, I'm definitely in favor of winding down the Afghanistan deployment these days. It's just gone on too long. No once can say the U.S. didn't make an effort there, or at least some kind of effort. Perhaps a different strategy, or different historical circumstances (like no Iraq war in 2003), would have made things better.

In any case, I give props to Rand Paul on discussing the budgetary drawbacks of endless wars. A few years ago I would have blown off such talk. But not now. It'll be 17 years this November.

From Face the Nation this morning:

Circling the Drain

I don't think it's a question of if. California's a far-left basket case. A leftist, politically correct bureaucratic nightmare. Even San Francisco is witnessing an exodus of people these days.

This post, from Steven Hayward, at Power Line, has to be read in full at the link. It's amazing. Utterly mind-boggling.

See, "Is California Starting to Circle the Drain?"

Meghan Murphy Fights for Feminism — Feminism for Women

I've been reading Canadian feminist Meghan Murphy quite a bit lately. She's up in Vancouver, and she proudly represents the critical strand of "trans-exclusive" radical feminism, although I doubt she'd use that phrase to describe herself, because "TERF" is an epithet used by radical transgender identity activists to demonize opponents.

In any case, she's good. See her "Open Letter" to the British Columbia New Democratic Party, "Open Letter to the BC NDP regarding the conduct of BC NDP Vice President Morgane Oger":

This letter was sent along to the @bcndp one week ago, and the party has yet to respond. We request that the party condemn the bullying behaviour of Morgane Oger and his efforts to silence women's free speech https://t.co/stm54Ls3zS

— Meghan Murphy (@MeghanEMurphy) February 10, 2018

Over 100 Canadians have signed on to a letter demanding the @bcndp condemn and address the bullying behaviour of its Vice President, Morgane Oger. Canadian politicians should protect feminist speech, not harass women into silence. https://t.co/Eg2o7Czny4 @BCNDPWomen

— Feminist Current (@FeministCurrent) February 10, 2018

Dear Sirs and Madams,

We — the undersigned — are Canadians deeply concerned with recent public statements and behaviour on the part of Morgane Oger, Vice President of the BC NDP.

On January 20th, Women’s Marches took place across North America. Initially fuelled by anger over Donald Trump’s election and boasts of sexual misconduct, this year the #Metoo campaign galvanized women around the world towards solidarity and action. No longer can we deny that women and girls everywhere continue to suffer abuse and harassment in every arena of life, at the hands of men.

In Vancouver, one woman who attended the march carried a sign reading:

“Transwomen are men. Truth is not hate. Don’t believe the hype — trans ideology is misogyny and homophobic. Woman is not a ‘feeling,’ a costume, or a performance of a stereotype. Woman is a biological reality. There is no ethical or moral reason to lie to soothe the male ego.

Do not cis-gender me. Stop the stereotypes. I am neither conforming nor non-conforming. My preferred prefix is neither cis nor trans. I am a female. Resist Orwellian Newspeak.”

After being posted to social media, a photo of the woman holding this sign went viral. She was subjected to numerous threats of violence and death as a result.

Oger shared the image online as well, publicly requesting the identity and address of the woman, stating intention to file a human rights complaint against her. On Facebook, Oger wrote:

“Apparently not everyone at the Vancouver Women’s March was equally enlightened about why trans women are women… A concerned citizen passed this photo on to me. This is hate speech. Anyone know who this person is? I’d like to speak to her.

… That person in the photo is free to have beliefs and to express those beliefs without breaking the law. I feel that she has overstepped. What this person has done is take things to the next step, like publishing it in a newspaper or distributing it in mailouts. I believe that what she has done is prohibited in BC. She is invited to contact me for a chat or email my office at morgane@morganeoger.ca.”

In a comment on the same post, Oger wrote:

“Who is a woman in Canada and British Columbia is not based on their plumbing but on our gender identity. Women are women because we say we are. Attributes usually associated with women are protected for all women, whether they possess them or not, like plumbing or biological function. We have six months for somebody to file a complaint against this woman on the basis of gender identity. But to do this, who she is needs to be known. If somebody knows who she is please email me the information at morgane@morganeoger.ca”

These comments equate to a public threat and defamation, and have led to further harassment of the woman in the photo. Oger has knowingly continued to fuel these threats and this harassment through ongoing, numerous posts on social media. We wonder why the BC NDP has yet to take action on this behaviour? In this case, the statements are particularly disturbing, as they have put an individual woman’s life and livelihood in danger.

Oger has referenced a “team of lawyers” on social media numerous times. One tweet read:

“The Supreme Court of Canada has upheld human rights tribunal rulings about hate speech twice. My legal team is confident that the act of publishing hateful material is the only test in this case and the material on that sign matches the hate test.”

In another, Oger stated:

“There are laws put in place to protect transgender people from transphobia. One such law bans the publishing of hate in public. I expect Canada’s laws to be applied.”

We are curious to know who this “team of lawyers” is and how they are being financed. Either Oger is in a financial position to hire a “team of lawyers” to bully and silence women who cannot afford such a luxury, or the lawyers in reference are the BC NDP’s legal team. Is the BC NDP using its government resources to persecute and harass citizens who disagree with their representatives? Does the BC NDP support Oger’s intention to potentially impoverish a woman by forcing her to hire “a team of lawyers” to defend her right to hold a sign Oger does not like at a women’s protest march?

We are concerned by these tactics and an expressed desire to silence those whose opinions conflict with those held by the Vice President of the BC NDP. We are concerned that many people have refrained from commenting on Oger’s behaviour or addressing it for fear of retribution, in large part due to the way Oger has responded with regard to this particular woman and her sign. Oger is leveraging political power in a deeply troubling way, with intention to intimidate fellow NDP members and constituents into fear and silence.

Politicians should expect that people will disagree with them — that is par for the course. But politicians should be gracious and deferential to their critics when those critics are just members of the public. Potential voters are being insulted, demeaned, bullied, and smeared by a representative of the NDP. This is not how Canadian politicians should handle conflict and disagreement. Instead of engaging in meaningful, principled debate, Oger invites and escalates conflict, is unable to negotiate or reach consensus with a large portion of voters, defames and insults them, targets individuals with relentless harassment and smear campaigns, and advocates that real, material harm be inflicted on them (i.e. loss of job, reputation, criminal charges, financial ruin, etc.). We would ask whether the BC NDP believes that this behaviour is reflective of the Party’s values, and the values of its constituents.

The woman who is being intimidated by Oger was expressing ideas and sentiments that are important and meaningful to her and to many other members of the Canadian public. All Canadians should feel comfortable expressing ideas that are meaningful and important to them, free from intimidation, bullying, and harassment.

“Gender identity” itself remains vaguely defined. It rests on an ideology that claims gender is innate, when in fact gender roles are socially imposed, based on biological sex, as a means to normalize the hierarchy that exists between men and women under patriarchy. Women’s sex-based rights, on the other hand, rest on material reality: we know that women in our society are discriminated against and subjected to male violence on account only of having been born female. We have judgments protecting women from discrimination based on things like pregnancy, miscarriage, abortion, and breastfeeding, on the explicit reasoning that only one sex gives birth and only one sex breastfeeds. The notion that males can actually be female if they “feel” it or if they emulate feminine stereotypes conflicts with women’s sex-based rights as it not only reduces “woman” to something intangible and undefinable, but claims women’s oppression is rooted in “feeling” or personal identity rather than on biological sex. Challenges to the concept of “gender identity” should be not only acceptable but encouraged...

Keep reading.

Worst Flu Season in Almost a Decade (VIDEO)

It's not as bad this year as it was in 2009, apparently, when the 2009 swine flu pandemic, but it's been very bad nevertheless. Yours truly came down with a case a week ago Friday, and it's been 10 days not I've been fighting this. My semester started last week too, which was otherwise fine. I just had to be very medicated. I've be taking over the counter medications, but I stayed in bed all day yesterday, and frankly yesterday and today's the first days I've genuinely felt better. I got the flu shot too, in December, and I haven't come down with the flu for at least two or three years, so I was pretty surprised I got hit. Don't mess around if you're sick. If you have persistent high fever, can't breath, or fluid on the lungs, go to the doctor. Otherwise, get some rest.

At CBS News 2 Los Angeles, "High Schooler In Thousand Oaks Dies of Flu," and at the Los Angeles Times, "Flu deaths reach a high, but outbreak shows signs of easing."

And watch, at PBS News Hour:

Telegenic Warrior

The Old Gray Lady had a big piece on Dana Loesch last weekend, "The National Rifle Association’s Telegenic Warrior":

The National Rifle Association’s Telegenic Warrior https://t.co/aTrCAC3O1w

— NYT Politics (@nytpolitics) January 20, 2018

For as long as Ms. Loesch can remember, the world has been a scary place. She was born Dana Eaton in 1978 in Hematite, Mo., a small community about 40 miles south of St. Louis. Her parents divorced when she was in kindergarten and she has not spoken to her father in more than a decade. Her mother worked three jobs after they moved to nearby Festus, Mo., bringing home bags of granola bars after her shift at a local granola factory. Ms. Loesch said she spent school-day afternoons at home alone or with an aunt.

“Now, you could say it was like a meth ’hood,” Ms. Loesch said of her old neighborhood. “People were fighting. It was kind of crazy. It wasn’t the most stable of childhoods.”

Ms. Loesch mostly found refuge at her grandparents’ home in Annapolis, Mo., a town of about 450 people nestled in the rural Ozarks. Her family voted for Democrats. Her grandfather hunted deer and raccoon. Despite episodes of violence, Ms. Loesch idealized summers in Annapolis in “Flyover Country.” In the book, she recalled her grandfather standing on the porch one night with a shotgun in his hands. Ms. Loesch’s aunt had just arrived; her estranged husband had threatened to kill her.

“Looking back,” Ms. Loesch said, “I think I always wanted to know that I was safe.”

In the late 1990s, Ms. Loesch attended Webster University in suburban St. Louis, studying journalism, but dropped out after she got pregnant. In 2000, she married Chris Loesch, the baby’s father: a musician and son of a preacher who now manages her career. They attend weekly services at the Church of Christ. And on Halloween they give a party that harks back to more pleasant childhood memories. “Halloween was big with her mom,” said Leigh Wambsganns, a friend. Last October Ms. Loesch said she dressed as Wonder Woman.

As a new parent in St. Louis, she blogged about motherhood and began her long-running radio program, “The Dana Show.” She became disillusioned with Democratic politics, though, in the wake of President Clinton’s affair with Monica Lewinsky. She helped found the St. Louis Tea Party, organizing protests and speaking at rallies. And, in 2010, she joined Andrew Breitbart at his website, one of several new voices railing against establishment politics and media bias.

After Mr. Breitbart died in 2012, Ms. Loesch clashed with Steve Bannon, the former Trump ally who had been named executive chair of Breitbart News. She sued to get out of her contract. In 2014, she moved to Dallas to work for The Blaze.

Ms. Loesch’s particular brand of attack proved unpalatable to mainstream audiences. In 2012, CNN, which had hired her as a political commentator, distanced itself from comments she made on her radio show supporting a group of Marines who urinated on dead Taliban soldiers. She claims the reporting of her comments was “disingenuous.” A year later, she was banned from the now defunct “Piers Morgan Live” after getting into a Twitter fight with the host. “I thought we made up,” she said. “But then we started fighting again.”

And, in 2016, Ms. Loesch expressed personal ire at Kayleigh McEnany, now the spokeswoman for the Republican National Committee. Ms. McEnany had chided a friend of Ms. Loesch’s for not supporting Mr. Trump, then a Republican candidate, during a CNN segment. “Babycakes, this was more than just going on television and flashing your pearly whites and your flat chest, red dress, over-sprayed bleach blond hair,” Ms. Loesch told radio listeners.

This time, it seemed, she had gone too far. Ms. McEnany was undergoing treatment for a genetic predisposition to breast cancer. Both Ms. Loesch and Ms. McEnany declined to discuss the matter.

Home on the Range

Ms. Loesch’s performance for the N.R.A. has had more polish. Last April, she was featured in a recruiting ad for the organization called “Violence of Lies.” Scenes of street violence and protests flashed onscreen as Ms. Loesch called for citizens to fight media bias and liberal politicians with the “clenched fist of truth.” (The N.R.A. also released an ad in 2017 aimed at The New York Times, claiming media bias.)

According to Andrew Arulanandam, the N.R.A.’s managing director of public affairs, the message was “inspired” by the chief executive, Wayne LaPierre Jr., whose association donated $30 million in campaign support to Mr. Trump. According to news reports, the N.R.A. may have a connection to the investigation of Russia’s involvement in the election. “Violence of Lies” has been viewed nearly three million times on YouTube alone.

“Dana comes across clearly to our members and gun owners,” Mr. Arulanandam said.

But even some in those groups found the video unnecessarily, even dangerously, incendiary. An online petition was circulated, demanding Facebook remove it. On Twitter, DeRay Mckesson, a Black Lives Matter activist, called the video “an open call to violence to protect white supremacy.” In response, Ms. Loesch challenged him to come on her show and “tell me to my face I’m a racist.” He didn’t, saying Ms. Loesch seeks to use opponents as a foil.

“I don’t believe that she was really talking to me,” he said in an interview. “She was using me to rile up the base.” Last week Ms. Loesch said she had no interest in speaking with Mr. Mckesson.

Ms. Loesch’s boss, Mr. LaPierre, has a history of inflammatory rhetoric at the N.R.A., which has five million members. In 1995, he was forced to apologize after President George H. W. Bush canceled his N.R.A. membership in protest. The N.R.A. had sent out a fund-raising letter calling law enforcement “jackbooted government thugs” who threatened to hurt Americans. “That is what they do,” said Representative Kathleen Rice, a Democrat of New York, who has sparred with Ms. Loesch, also on Twitter. “The N.R.A says their members are under attack.”

Radical Left Attacks the New York Times

I saw this at Memeorandum yesterday, "The Left’s War Against the New York Times."

Interestingly, Memeorandum also curated this throwback piece on Judy Miller at New York Magazine, from over a decade ago, "The Source of the Trouble."

So, there's some good Friday night reading for you.

Emotional Support Hamster Flushed Down the Toilet

Well, perhaps it's better to get a larger animal --- like a peacock --- to avoid traumatic situations like this.

At the Miami Herald, "Bad info from Spirit Air led me to flush pet hamster down airport toilet, student says" (via Memeorandum):

Bad info from Spirit Air led me to flush pet hamster down airport toilet, student says https://t.co/Qw6RF47CQR Via @DavidOvalle305 pic.twitter.com/2PQ4ZmwgHh

— Miami Herald (@MiamiHerald) February 8, 2018

Before Belen Aldecosea flew home from from college to South Florida, she twice called Spirit Airlines to ensure she could bring along a special guest: Pebbles, her pet dwarf hamster. No problem, the airline told her.

But when Aldecosea arrived at the Baltimore airport, Spirit refused to allow the tiny animal on the flight.

With her only friends hours away at campus, Aldecosea was stuck. She says an airline representative suggested flushing Pebbles down an airport toilet, a step that Spirit denies. Panicked and needing to return home promptly to deal with a medical issue, Aldecosea unsuccessfully tried renting a car and agonized for hours before doing the unthinkable.

She flushed Pebbles.

“She was scared. I was scared. It was horrifying trying to put her in the toilet,” Aldecosea said. “I was emotional. I was crying. I sat there for a good 10 minutes crying in the stall.”

Aldecosea, 21, of Miami Beach, is now considering filing a lawsuit against Spirit over the conflicting instructions that wound up pressuring her into making an anguished decision with a pet certified by her doctor as an emotional support animal. She shared her story with the Miami Herald weeks after the story of an emotional support peacock — denied entrance to a United Airlines flight — went viral on the Internet.

This case is much different, said her South Florida attorney, Adam Goodman. “This wasn’t a giant peacock that could pose a danger to other passengers. This was a tiny cute harmless hamster that could fit in the palm of her hand,” he said.

A spokesman for Spirit acknowledged the airline mistakenly told her that Pebbles was allowed. But he denied that a Spirit employee recommended the option of disposing of her pet in an airport restroom.

“To be clear, at no point did any of our agents suggest this guest (or any other for that matter) should flush or otherwise injure an animal,” spokesman Derek Dombrowski said...

More.

Today's Deals

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Dow Closes 20 Points Down as Volatility Remains

At Barron's, "Dow Drops 20 Points on Late Rush for the Exit."

Plus:

Why stocks still have room to rise https://t.co/KScPuZCD66

— Barron's (@barronsonline) February 7, 2018

Alexis Ren Intimates for Sports Illustrated Swimsuit (VIDEO)

She's really fine.

Sharyl Attkisson on Surveillance Abuse and Incurious Journalists (VIDEO)

From Fox News:

Hate Speech Police in Britain

I missed this earlier.

From the typically outstanding Pat Condell:

Katie Hopkins in South Africa (VIDEO)

At the Rebel:



ADDED: "SHOCK: Katie Hopkins detained at South Africa airport," and "Katie Hopkins in South Africa: Is “freedom fighter” Malema “afraid of meeting a little white woman?”