Destroying a Democracy to Save it...

Democrats Call for the Disqualification of 

Dozens of Republican Members

written by Jonathan Turley

Below is my column in The Hill on the continued calls to disqualify Republican members of Congress to prevent them from running for reelection. What is maddening is that Democratic groups and commentators are seeking to remove as many as 120 Republicans from the ballots in the name of democracy. It is like burning books in the name of literacy. Yet, on this anniversary of the January 6th riot, members of Congress and Democratic groups want to block voters from reelecting their preferred representatives. Like villages in Vietnam, it appears that some members and activists believe that you have to destroy democracy to save it from itself.

Here is the column:

This year, the Biden administration joined many in the United States in criticizing the mass disqualification of 583 candidates in Iran by the Guardian Council. The Iranian elections (like elections in other countries like China and Venezuela) are democratic only in the most artificial sense: You can freely vote from a pre-selected list of candidates.

Electoral disqualification systems are generally anathema to democratic values, but some in the United States are now toying with the idea for the 2022 or 2024 elections. While more modest than the Iranian model, the Democratic calls for disqualification are just as dangerous. What is most maddening is that this anti-democratic effort is cloaked in democratic doublespeak.

This week, Democratic lawyer Marc Elias predicted that 2022 would bring a renewed interest in disqualifying Republican members from office based on an obscure Civil War-era provision. Elias — the former Hilary Clinton campaign general counsel — is a well-known figure in Washington who has been prominently featured in the ongoing investigation of Special Counsel John Durham. Elias has founded a self-described “pro-democracy” group that challenges Republican voting laws and pledges to “shape our elections and democratic institutions for years to come.”

In the age of rage, nothing says democracy like preventing people from running for office.

Elias and others are suggesting that — rather than defeat Republicans at the polls — Democrats in Congress could disqualify the Republicans for supporting or encouraging the Jan. 6 “insurrection.” Last year, Democratic members called for the disqualification of dozens of Republicans. One, Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-N.J.) demanded the disqualification of the 120 House Republicans — including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy(R-Calif.) — for simply signing a “Friend of the Court brief” (or amicus brief) in support of an election challenge from Texas.

These members and activists have latched upon the long-dormant provision in Section 3 of the 14th Amendment — the “disqualification clause” — which was written after the 39th Congress convened in December 1865 and many members were shocked to see Alexander Stephens, the Confederate vice president, waiting to take a seat with an array of other former Confederate senators and military officers.

Justin Reade of the North Carolina Supreme Court later explained, “[t]he idea [was] that one who had taken an oath to support the Constitution and violated it, ought to be excluded from taking it again.” So, members drafted a provision that declared that “No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.”

By declaring the Jan. 6th riot an “insurrection,” some Democratic members of Congress and liberal activists hope to bar incumbent Republicans from running. Even support for court filings is now being declared an act of rebellion. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) helped fuel this movement — before Jan. 6 even occurred — by declaring that the Republicans supporting election challenges were “subverting the Constitution by their reckless and fruitless assault on our democracy which threatens to seriously erode public trust in our most sacred democratic institutions, and to set back our progress on the urgent challenges ahead.”

Jan. 6 was a national tragedy. I publicly condemned President Trump’s speech that day while it was being given — and I denounced the riot as a “constitutional desecration.” However, it has not been treated legally as an insurrection. Those charged for their role in the attack that day are largely facing trespass and other less serious charges — rather than insurrection or sedition. That’s because this was a riot that was allowed to get out of control by grossly negligent preparations by Capitol Police and congressional officials. While the FBI launched a massive national investigation, it did not find evidence of an insurrection.

With an ominous mid-term election approaching, much of the effort among Democrats on the Hill and in the media has been to keep the enmity alive from Jan. 6. In what seemed almost a hopeful plea, the New York Times recently declared “Every Day is Now Jan. 6.” It made this tragedy sound like the political equivalent of a year-round Christmas store: Every day should involve a renewed gift of reminiscence and rage.

The saddest aspect of this politicization of the Jan. 6 riot is that many of us wanted a full, transparent, and apolitical investigation. House Republicans rejected that idea, but there remain many questions to be answered — which has not happened. Instead, we have an effort to encode the notion of an actual insurrection through mantra-like repetition.

The Constitution fortunately demands more than proof by repetition. In this case, it requires an actual rebellion. The clause Democrats are citing was created in reference to a real Civil War in which over 750,000 people died in combat. The confederacy formed a government, an army, a currency, and carried out diplomatic missions.

Conversely, Jan. 6 was a protest that became a riot.

That is not meant to diminish the legitimate outrage over the day. It was reprehensible — but only a “rebellion” in the most rhetorical sense.

More importantly, even if you adopt a dangerously broad definition of “insurrection” or “rebellion,” members of Congress who supported challenging the electoral votes (as Democrats have done in prior years) were exercising constitutionally protected speech.

Moreover, the Democrats cannot simply use their razor-thin majority to disqualify opponents willy-nilly. Punishments like expulsions take two-thirds votes, and any disqualifications can be challenged in the court.

Indeed, not long after ratification in 1869, Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase ruled in a circuit opinion that the clause was not self-executing. He suggested that allowing Congress to simply bar political opponents from office would be a form of punishment without due process and would likely violate the prohibition on bills of attainder.

As Democrats push to federalize elections and negate the laws in a couple dozen states, figures like Elias are now suggesting that Republicans could also be listed as “rebels” and barred from the ballot. Congress would then control not just how states conduct their elections but even who can appear on such ballots.

The renewed calls for disqualifications may be simply reckless rhetoric timed for the anniversary of the riot. After all, every day would not be Jan. 6 without the requisite rage. However, it is reason — not rage — that we need right now.

A recent poll showed that one in three Americans believes that violence against the government can be justified. It often seems like some want to trigger an actual rebellion by disenfranchising parts of our population. The fact is that there are people who traffic and profit in rage, and we are all the poorer for it.

Why Can’t America Win a War?

The hearts of our leaders are hollow. Who can fault Americans if they will not follow those leaders to war?

by Adam Ellwanger for American Greatness

Looking back on 2021, the collapse of the U.S. military effort in Afghanistan now makes me feel like the target of a 20-year practical joke. 

I never served in the military. I was merely a supporter of the war and an occasional commenter on it. The betrayal I now feel as someone who was completely uninvolved in the war effort—someone who sacrificed nothing—must be miniscule compared to what the rank-and-file men and women who prosecuted the war are experiencing.

I was 23 when 9/11 happened, and I am the son of a Vietnam veteran who served on the Battleship New Jersey. Twenty years later, it’s strange to me that I never even thought about enlisting in the immediate aftermath of al-Qaeda’s attack on America. It’s worth remembering that it was men and women of my generation—Generation X—and some of the older Millennials who were asked to carry the burden of sacrifice for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. I respect everyone who accepted that call and enlisted. 

At the beginning, I supported the war because the cause seemed just and I believed that our government and military valued the lives of young Americans enough that they would be sure to craft a plan for victory that would not risk the deaths of American soldiers for outcomes that were either inconsequential or unattainable. Thus, watching this 20-year affair come to an end—in such botched and catastrophic fashion—also brought with it some personal humiliation because I was so wrong for so long.

I was a precocious adolescent. I remember one brutal Great Lakes winter day when I was about 15. My father was driving us home from his office, and during the six-mile drive, we got into a debate about American involvement in Vietnam. I could tell my dad was getting heated, and I enjoyed that I was getting under his skin. I was in the middle of a monologue about how we lost in Vietnam and how it was good that we did because America never should have been there, anyway. 

Suddenly, my father slammed on the brakes—we were traveling about 55 mph on snowy roads along the banks of the Genesee River. When the car came to a halt and I realized we hadn’t been killed, dad was staring at me. “Get out of the car,” he said. I got out. In 1994, there were no smartphones and no Uber, and as a dumb kid I was perpetually underdressed in winter. This meant I had a long, cold walk home . . . and some time to think about exactly what I had said that had so touched a nerve with my father.

I learned a few things that day. First, I recognized that I didn’t actually know anything about the Vietnam War. Second, I learned that you don’t pointlessly irritate someone you are depending on for a ride. Third, while Vietnam was a total abstraction for me, it wasn’t for my dad. It was over before I was born. But he knew people who had died there. The sacrifices that he and the other men who served made had meant something to them. And in the context of the early 1970s, when my dad’s period of enlistment ended, many vets returned home only to be lectured and mocked by protestors who probably knew even less about what was at stake in Vietnam than I did. My father wasn’t going to listen to any more of that nonsense from a 15-year-old punk.

I was a jerk that day. But I wasn’t entirely wrong. America did lose in Vietnam. The circumstances of our departure from Saigon tells you all you need to know. This doesn’t mean that the veterans of that war fought for nothing. They didn’t. The soldiers’ individual sacrifices meant something. While Vietnam remains a socialist nation today, that country’s economy is increasingly capitalist and there is certainly less poverty than there had been prior to the war. The improvement in the quality of life for the Vietnamese people is to some degree a result of America’s involvement there. Further, even if Vietnam was a military loss for America, it may have been a strategic victory in that it changed the dynamics of the Cold War. 

Nevertheless, the Vietnam War seemed to be the first in a decades-long stretch of American military failure. The pattern is long enough that it can’t be dismissed with a shrug and a consolation of “You win some, you lose some.” Understanding how American military prowess declined is important because it may clarify the dynamics of the broader dysfunction of America’s government and social institutions. 

Our failure can only be understood as the result of a larger moral crisis—one that extends from a lack of confidence among our leaders about the goodness of the nation and our influence across the globe. 

A Brief History of American Military Failures Since 1980

The similarities between what happened in Kabul and what happened in Saigon(even the images of the events look the same!) dramatize the consistent pattern of American defeat, and they invite reflections on the nation’s other military endeavors over the course of my lifetime. 

It isn’t a pretty picture. The humiliation in Lebanon. Legally questionable invasions in Grenada and Panama. The Mogadishu catastrophe. The month-long first Gulf War was a U.S. victory on paper, but the strategic blunder of stopping short of Baghdad and refusing to depose Saddam Hussein ultimately required the later second invasion of Iraq, thus calling the earlier “victory” into question. 

The second war in Iraq was a slow-motion disaster which began with much of the world vociferously opposed to our efforts, moved into a period where we faced defeat at the hands of an ill-equipped but determined insurgency, and resulted in a partial withdrawal that fostered the rise of ISIS and brought on a horrific bloodletting for the Iraqi people. And although some “weapons of mass destruction” were discovered in Iraq, it was not enough to vindicate the exaggerated claims that our government used to justify the war. 

Then there were the missed opportunities for U.S. interests during the “Arab Spring.” And the bombings of Syria which failed to depose Bashar al-Assad. There were Barack Obama’s “red lines” that turned out to be imaginary. And this past summer, humiliation in Kabul, complete with a uniquely craven betrayal not only of the Afghans who provided assistance in our efforts, but also many of our own citizens. To our further embarrassment, all of these military endeavors unfolded in venues of our choosing: an official act of warfare (one publicly approved by the government of an internationally recognized nation) hasn’t occurred on American soil since Pearl Harbor. 

Warfare, Victory, and America’s Crisis of Confidence

So why can’t America win a war? Why can’t the most powerful nation on the planet—one with a larger military budget than any society in world history—achieve a decisive, unequivocal martial victory? Military historians, strategists, and policymakers can catalog the errors and mismanagement that led to these failures better than I ever could. But there is a larger question related to the philosophical cause of our persistent floundering: is it possible that there is a certain worldview that our leaders share which sets them up for failure?

A common complaint about the American style of military engagement is that we fight with one hand behind our backs. The nation seems chronically unwilling to make full use of our martial superiority. There is something to this: as Joe Biden himself has noted in the past, the Taliban had very limited military power. Considering how much of weaponry and hardware we abandoned to them when we left, this is no longer true. But the question lingers: with the immense aerial, tactical, and technological power that we could bring to bear on Afghanistan, how did our conflict there go on for 20 years—only for us to ultimately depart and allow the Taliban to recapture the nation in a little over a week? 

You sometimes hear people argue that America should have turned these places into “glass parking lots”—that we should make no distinction between belligerents and civilians, and that we ought to have less regard for human life. I disagree. But there is also such a thing as too much concern with propriety and “optics” in warfare. When a war unfolds between two nations with a massive power differential, the more powerful nation has an ethical obligation to end the conflict in short order. War is inherently a moral atrocity—and drawing it out unnecessarily multiplies the cruelty inflicted upon the everyday people who suffer the many indignities and brutalities of the conflict. 

Of course, bringing any conflict to an expeditious and decisive conclusion demands a willingness to make use of awesome, lethal force. This seems to be where America fails.

For the last 40 years, all of America’s foreign military operations could be viewed as conflicts of choice—situations where we had an option to avoid conflict. In all of these wars of choice, wars that we initiated because we thought we could win and believed that we would benefit in some way from fighting, we were the stronger nation by a significant margin—whether in terms of economy, military capabilities, population, or technological sophistication. This means it was our obligation to consolidate our victory quickly and unambiguously. We didn’t. 

Elite Relativism and the Decay of Moral Conviction

I propose that the reason for this is that our leadership, and Americans in general, no longer consistently believe in objective categories of good and evil. It’s no coincidence that our military bungling seemed to begin in the 1960s, which was also the period during which relativism and doctrines of tolerance and diversity were ascendant in the universities. 

Relativism and subjectivism assert that moral and value judgments depend on the perspective and context of the people making those assessments. Put differently, these doctrines teach that your beliefs about what is good and evil are not objectively true—instead, your beliefs seem objectively true to you merely because your environment, society, experience, and family life condition you to see them as such. 

This mindset undermines one’s ability to make moral claims at all, which, in turn, compromises the will to act. Relativism demands that its devotees maintain a rigid skepticism regarding moral claims, even where their truth seems to be self-evident. Instead, one must learn to see one’s own moral judgments as mere preferences. 

The corollary of this lesson is obvious: just as no one can be faulted or condemned for their preferences when it comes to their choice of entrée at dinner, we are in no position to condemn any people or societies. They aren’t evil or wrong, and we aren’t right or good—we just have different preferences in terms of politics, ethics, religion, family, money, or morality.

But (as is true so often), even our leaders’ commitment to relativism is half-hearted. Whereas a true relativist must dispense with all universal moral claims or value judgments, our ruling class still insists upon the natural, self-evident superiority of various things and ideas. For example, a big part of the strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan was “winning hearts and minds,” which in practice meant convincing foreigners about the supposedly obvious superiority of liberal democracy. 

So, democracy isn’t simply one preference among others—it is cordoned off from creeping relativism, and thus, remains an inherent good to be pursued at all costs. This leaves our leaders insisting upon a paradox—all cultures are equally valuable and all claims might be true from a particular vantage point. But also, American governance and culture (which these same people routinely denigrate as “systematically-racist” and a hotbed of bigotry) provide the one model of sociopolitical life to which all nations naturally gravitate. Contradictions like this, papered over again and again in the conflicts between the worldview of the ruling class and the stated aims of their foreign policy, are a recipe for failure. No wonder we lose.

The result is that our leaders don’t really believe in our causes—at least not enough to secure victory. But it’s not just them. Almost any use of American military power becomes a matter of bitter internal divisions in our nation. When it comes to winning wars, the people must be unified in their commitment to the cause. As recent history shows, the public is just as conflicted and non-committal about our military adventurism as the ruling class. 

This crisis of confidence—this nagging suspicion that maybe our causes are not worthy—is obvious. Most importantly, it is obvious to our enemies in war. And knowing that our hearts aren’t really in it is an enormous boost to our enemies’ morale, conviction, endurance, and determination. This is how an outfit like the Taliban can defeat a nation that owns the most expansive, sophisticated, and deadly military arsenal on the planet. This is how a tiny nation like Iraq can push the United States to a draw. 

The lesson here, if there is one, is this: military prowess is not enough. Arguably, the sense of moral righteousness—which is the only way that sane men can justify the large-scale exercise of brutal violence inherent to war—is more important. The recent history of American military intervention is a testament to the absence of this conviction in the righteousness of our cause. The hearts of our leaders are hollow. Who can fault Americans if they will not follow those leaders to war? Until we can rediscover a belief in our goodness—until we can rediscover, as a society, a belief in the goodness of goodness itself—we should never fight again. Until then, we don’t deserve to win.

X22, And we Know, and more-Jan 7

 

So, 2 filming legends from way back before any of our times just suddenly 'die of natural causes' a week apart from each other, even though each of them were still healthy...

Anyone getting the 'something's fishy' feeling? While I don't personally know many old actors, this does have me a bit worried of who might be next to just suddenly 'die of natural causes' despite still being healthy.

Here's tonight's news:

Rejecting the ‘DIE Cult’

Why we must never cede language to the Left.

by Thaddeus G. McCotter for American Greatness

In 2001, I served in the Michigan State Senate. One morning our then-governor, John Engler, met with our Republican caucus to promote his idea of consolidating several state entities within a single department by executive order. Characteristic of his transformational tenure, Engler was endeavoring to further streamline the Michigan bureaucracy to provide more efficient and effective services, promote accountability within state government, and save taxpayers’ money. 

When the governor finished his convincing pitch for the Department of History, Arts, and Culture, I raised my hand: “Governor, you know the new department’s acronym will be hack (HAC)?”

In the awkward silence, Engler impassively studied me for a moment then left. The intent stares I received from my senate colleagues told me two things: one, they thought I was a jackanapes; and, two, when the governor got done with me, they wanted to make sure they could identify my body.

Later, the governor was pleased to announce the formation of the new Michigan Department of History, Arts, and Libraries. I do not know if the governor was a science fiction fan, but I do know he possessed the impish wit to christen his new creation with the acronym of the murderous HAL 9000 in “2001: A Space Odyssey.” (Ultimately, on July 14, 2009, in a move akin to Dave Bowman disconnecting HAL, then-Governor Jennifer Granholm eliminated the Department of HAL by disconnecting its constituent parts and housing them elsewhere within state government.)

I was reminded of this acronym incident recently when asked why, when discussing the Left’s cult of “diversity, inclusion, and equity,” I prefer to use the acronym DIE, rather than the regressives’ preferred DEI. 

There are four main reasons.

The first is chronology. As Alexandria Love asks and answers at the Berrett-Koehler Publishers website: “But wait, where did the Equity come from? And has it always been there? In recent years, Diversity and Inclusion initiatives are bolstered by the addition of the concept of ‘Equity.’” Ergo, chronologically, the Left’s promotion of diversity predates inclusion which predates equity—DIE, QED.

The second reason is the Left knows that chronologically and logically “inclusion” should be the second item in their trinity. This is why the Left has deliberately chosen to reorder the acronym from DIE to DEI—“diversity, equity, and inclusion.” Per Love, who reorders the three aims, but then reverts back to a more chronological—and logical—ordering when explaining their relation to each other:

Thus [sic] we arrive at the current incarnation of this essential tool that features equal (and equitable) attention on diversity, equity, and inclusion. A single piece of the puzzle missing would create an incomplete picture. Diversity is the chorus of different voices in the conversation. Inclusion is uplifting, validating, and hearing each and every voice. Equity is the manner in which we amplify voices.

So, why does the Left feel compelled to tweak its cult’s acronym? It would be political death if the Left had to message its noxious cult with the ominous but apt acronym DIE. Instead, the Left which is pimping a new “civil religion” and burning those deemed heretics at the cancel culture stake, demands their cult be referred to with the acronym DEI, which is Latin for . . . “God.”

This leads to the third reason. For those of you who think this is quibbling, consider yourself enlightened. The Left believes it can change human nature. The weaponization of language, be it in the service of “narratives,” redefinitions, or censorship is one the primary tools they use to achieve their ultimate aim of transmogrifying free sovereign citizens into serfs of the state. This is why genocidal Communist China claims it is a “democracy.” As we know, one cannot have an actual democracy without liberty; and, no matter how much you redefine the language, you can’t erase the inhumane reality of the Beijing regime. 

So, we reach the fourth reason: We must never cede language to the Left—especially when they’ve weaponized it against Americans and our free republic. 

After all, seeking to confine our free republic within what they call “our democracy™,” the Left must supplant our foundational principles of “liberty and equality” with theirs of “in diversity, inclusion, and equity.” And, because the Left is bent upon making everything political, we are consequently compelled to defend against their every assault on faith, family, community, and country—the permanent things that unite a free people in the bonds of commodious citizenship. The DIE cult reviles these virtuous, voluntary unions and lusts to redefine, demean, deconstruct, and destroy them. 

Therefore, from the bottom of our liberty-loving hearts with all sincerity and due charity, let us offer the Left this acronym: FU. 

Masks, Vaccines, and Government Lies

The cover-up of information, and the dissembling we’ve seen over the past year on vaccines and masks is serious, not only for health reasons but also for reasons of public trust in institutions.

by Daniel Oliver for American Greatness

Trust in government and government-sponsored edicts is fast declining because is fast declining of federal, state, and local pronouncements on the Chinese flu, vaccines, masks, and lockdowns. The federal government has been as stubborn as an ox against telling the truth—and 2021 was, perhaps appropriately, the year of the ox in China. 

We have a good idea by now that masks are essentially useless. But masks are nevertheless being recommended, and in many cases required, by the feds, the military, and states and cities across the country.

The federal government at first said that masks were not useful, but it turned out that that announcement was for the purpose of limiting public purchases in order to ensure that there would be an adequate supply of masks for healthcare workers—which is to say, the government deliberately deceived the public. Then the feds sang a different tune, that masks were beneficial. Now in many cases—on airplanes, and in public places in many cities—they are required. 

In a Wall Street Journal column, Phillip W. Magness and Peter C. Earle pointed out that in January 2020, Anthony Fauci questioned harsh China lockdowns: “Historically, when you shut things down, it doesn’t have a major effect.”And federal authorities have been wildly inconsistent about what businesses are “essential,” who should get vaccinated and when, and how long sick people should quarantine.

It is reasonable to conclude that the behavior of the government is driven not by science but by politics. Mask mandates have been particularly offensive, especially when the most preachy pols have been photographed not wearing them or fleeing to saner jurisdictions where masks are not required. 

A reader who disagreed with my conclusion in November that masks were not, in fact, beneficial, wrote that he could easily lay his hands on a study that said masks were effective, and shortly afterward forwarded such a study. 

The study has two problems. The first is that it’s old: it was published in January 2021; which leads to the second: it was not based on randomized controlled trials (the gold standard) dealing with the Chinese flu. It even concedes that point, saying early on: “. . . we should not generally expect to be able to find controlled trials, due to logistical and ethical reasons, and should therefore instead seek a wider evidence base.” In other words, the study is just their opinion; it’s not really “science.” 

“Overall,” it says, “direct evidence of the efficacy of mask use is supportive, but inconclusive.” 

And then later on, the study offers this statement, which parents, especially, should read: 

The impact of using masks to control transmission in the workplace has not been well studied. One issue that impacts both school and work usage is that, over a full day’s use, masks may become wet, or dirty. [Ew, yuck!] A study of mask use in health care settings found that ‘respiratory pathogens on the outer surface of the used medical masks may result in self-contamination,’ and noted that ‘the risk is higher with longer duration of mask use (>6h) and with higher rates of clinical contact.’ Further research is needed to clarify these issues. In the meantime, most health bodies recommend replacing dirty or wet masks with clean ones.

Right. So what are parents supposed to do? Send their children to school with five masks and tell them to be sure to change them every two hours? 

People who are seriously interested in the effectiveness of masks should read Jeffrey Anderson’s definitive pieces in City Journal and American Greatness. The key point he makes is that only randomized controlled trials (“RCTs”) are worth considering. It is a fair conclusion, therefore, that masks are not useful because the RCTs that have been conducted don’t prove they are. 

Recently, two members of the COVID-19 advisory board for the Biden-Harris transition team seemed to agree, at least in part. Michael Osterholm and Ezekiel Emanuel wrote in the Washington Post: “masks can be helpful, but only if they are high-quality and used routinely. This means non-fraudulent N95, KN95, or KF94 respirators, all of which have satisfactory filtration efficiency. Cotton or surgical masks are more for show than effective protection, especially against omicron.” 

OK . . . maybe. But even assuming they are correct—and the aforementioned Anderson pieces indicate they are not—how many people actually wear N95 or KN95 masks? At the moment, certainly, there are no government edicts that require N95 or KN95 masks.

How many people do wear N95 or KN95 masks? We don’t know. One survey says that 72 percent of U.S. adults always wear a mask when they go out, but it doesn’t say what kind. You can do your own research: look at the first 20 people you see outside and count those who are wearing N95 or KN95 masks. It will, on a guess, probably be no higher than three, which is only 15 percent of your control group. That suggests that most people are not wearing either the N95 or KN95 masks—and we really don’t have much reason (i.e., RCTs) to think even those are effective. 

Masks mandates are just government overreach—but overreach seems to be standard operating procedure for government these days. 

But there’s more bad news, and it suggests more dissembling by the government. An Indiana life insurance CEO has said that deaths are up 40 percent among working-age people (ages 18 to 64) who are employees of businesses with group life insurance policies.

OneAmerica CEO Scott Davison said the increase in deaths represents “huge, huge numbers.” A key point to remember is that death rates (mortality tables) rarely change at all. Another point is that these deaths are not caused by the Chinese flu: those death rates are actually down. A likely culprit is vaccinations. Why haven’t the feds told us about that? When will we read about that in the mainstream media?

And finally, to start the new year with some critical thinking, see the report from the Canadian Covid Care Alliance which claims that Pfizer’s COVID-19 inoculations cause more illness than they prevent and provides an overview of the Pfizer trial flaws in both design and execution. Did you hear about that from the White House or from Fauci, or read about it in the New York Times or the Washington Post?

The cover-up of this information, and the dissembling we’ve seen over the past year on vaccines and masks is serious, not only for health reasons but also for reasons of public trust in institutions. That trust, a necessity for a functioning democracy, is now fast disappearing—assuming there’s any left.

In China, 2022 is the year of the tiger. Maybe in the United States, it will be the year of truth.

Democrats’ Extremist Policies Keep Losing In Court

The judicial system remains the country’s best hope for restoring national sanity and safeguarding the constitutional rights of every American.

Kiyan Kassam reporting for The Federalist

Today the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in cases challenging President Joe Biden’s controversial Covid-19 vaccine mandates for private employers and some health care workers.

Congressional Republicans recently filed an amicus brief opposing an Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) rule that would compel workplaces with more than 100 employees to mandate the Covid-19 vaccine or require weekly testing. The brief argues the mandate “exceeds the scope of OSHA’s congressionally-defined role” and expresses concern over executive overreach.

The OSHA mandate was reinstated on Dec. 17, after the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals dissolved a stay previously issued by the Fifth Circuit. Three days before enforcement is set to begin, the high court will have an opportunity to deliver yet another legal body blow to the president’s far-left agenda and continued disregard for the Constitution.

Last spring, the Biden administration was repeatedly sued for doling out federal benefits on the basis of race. Plaintiffs in separate cases argued that a provision in Biden’s American Rescue Plan granting priority status for Covid subsidies to minority-owned restaurants was discriminatory and violated the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. Federal judges in Texas and Ohio agreed.

On Aug. 26, the Supreme Court struck down a federal eviction moratorium that had been unilaterally extended by the executive branch without appropriate approval from Congress. The 6-3 ruling was slammed by activists in corporate media, despite the Biden administration admitting weeks earlier that it did not have legal standing to issue a new moratorium.

But it wasn’t just federal courts that served up a dose of reality in 2021. Prosecutors in the trial of Kyle Rittenhouse failed to provide any evidence that the defendant was a white supremacist vigilante. Moreover, the state’s own witnesses repeatedly bolstered Rittenhouse’s claim of self-defense in the fatal shooting of two men in Kenosha. The trial also exposed the lie that Rittenhouse crossed state lines with an AR-15 and that the 17-year-old’s possession of a firearm was illegal under Wisconsin law.

Meanwhile, the trial of Jussie Smollett — who falsely claimed he was attacked in Chicago by two racist, homophobic Trump supporters — crystalized just how pathetic and partisan the left’s embrace of the hate crime hoax was back in 2019. Among the most bizarre pieces of evidence presented at trial: The actor was caught on surveillance video performing a “dry run” of the fake attack beforehand.

Free speech also notched an important victory in Virginia last year. Leesburg Elementary School teacher Tanner Cross had been placed on administrative leave following his objection to two transgender policy proposals during the public comment period of a school board meeting.

“I’m a teacher but I serve God first and I will not affirm that a biological boy can be a girl and vice versa because it’s against my religion,” he explained. Cross sued the Loudoun County School Board, alleging his subsequent suspension amounted to illegal retaliation against his right to free expression.

Judge James E. Plowman granted a temporary injunction reinstating Cross last June, finding Cross was likely to succeed on the merits of his claim at trial. In November, the school board agreed to permanently reinstate Cross. “Just today, the court issued a final order permanently prohibiting the Loudoun County Public School Board from punishing me for freely expressing my views,” he said after the settlement. 

At a time virtually every institution in America seems to have lost its mind — and its backbone — the judicial system remains the country’s best hope for restoring national sanity and safeguarding the constitutional rights of every American.

It Begins: Cambridge Research Paper Pushes 'Authoritarian Power' to Halt 'Climate Change'

Mike Miller reporting for RedState 

First, it was “global warming.” When that didn’t get the job done — it didn’t cover enough weather-related events — they went with the more inclusive “climate change.” And now, “the existential threat of our time.”

Welp, apparently there are still too many “climate deniers” out there, fighting the climate loons climate-conscious folks every step of the way. So what’s the climate-change crowd to do?

According to a recent University of Cambridge research paper, suspend at least part of the U.S. Constitution, implement authoritarian control, and do whatever the hell they want to do. Any questions?

The paper’s author begins with the question, “Is authoritarian power ever legitimate?”

Interesting question, the answer of which in part is also a question: “Held by whom for what purpose(s?” The other part of the answer, as it relates to government, is “No.” And when held by left-wing loons who are hellbent on forcing their policies on society, the answer is an emphatic “Oh hell no.”

Author Ross Mittiga writes:

Is authoritarian power ever legitimate? The contemporary political theory literature — which largely conceptualizes legitimacy in terms of democracy or basic rights —would seem to suggest not. I argue, however, that there exists another, overlooked aspect of legitimacy concerning a government’s ability to ensure safety and security.

Mittiga suggests that while under normal conditions, “maintaining democracy and rights is typically compatible with guaranteeing safety, emergency situations” call for emergency actions.

Conflicts between these two aspects of legitimacy can and often do arise. A salient example of this is the COVID-19 pandemic, during which severe limitations on free movement and association have become legitimate techniques of government.

Climate change poses an even graver threat to public safety. Consequently, I argue, legitimacy may require a similarly authoritarian approach. While unsettling, this suggests the political importance of climate action. [Huh?]

For if we wish to avoid legitimating authoritarian power, we must act to prevent crises from arising that can only be resolved by such means.

Ah, that last sentence. Faux intellectualism. A frequent go-to of the elitist left.

And this:

From the perspective of political legitimacy, ensuring safety and security may, at times, justify relaxing or suspending strict adherence to certain democratic processes or individual rights.

It gets worse. The ridiculous “logic,” I mean.

In times of war, for instance, authoritarian impositions of power, including those that curtail democratic processes or basic rights, are often thought legitimate to the extent they are necessary for protecting citizens and restoring normal conditions.

Likewise, as those who have survived COVID-19 can attest, during a health emergency, severe and enduring limitations of rights to free movement, association, and speech can become legitimate techniques of government, even in robustly liberal-democratic states.

Somewhere in hell, Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, and Joseph Stalin are furiously nodding in approval.

In reality, this guy misses the salient point. In times of war, the strong majority of the populace is generally behind government efforts to defeat the enemy. But, “climate change”?

The ceding of constitutionally-guaranteed individual rights to the totalitarian control of the left for anything? Much less climate change? Yeah, no.

Nonetheless, free-speech rights have to go, as well.

Free-speech rights in many countries have made regulating harmful climate denial and disinformation campaigns virtually impossible. […]

Given this, liberal-democratic governments (and theorists) must confront the bleak possibility that responding to the existential threat of climate change at this late stage may require relaxing or suspending adherence to some of the most widely shared [contingent legitimacy] standards and embracing authoritarian power.

OK, you get where the is guy is coming from and more ominously where he wants to take us. He drones on ad nauseam in his research paper, but we’re going to stop the nonsense now. If you wish to read the entire paper, you can knock yourself out, here.

This left-wing loon and his equally loony research paper should shock no one; it simply “says the quiet part out loud” [hate that overused saying] about the ultimate goal of the left.

As I’ve written in the past, when Democrats don’t win, their first inclination is to cheat. (See: “election fraud.”) When cheating doesn’t work, they attempt to change the rules. (Opposition to voter ID, lax mail-in voting rules, packing the Supreme Court, eliminating the Electoral College, et al.)

And if “all of the above” fails to get the job done? This guy spelled it out clearly: “relaxing or suspending adherence to some of the most widely shared [contingent legitimacy] standards and embracing authoritarian power.”

Two words: Try it.