Read it.

There’s a pleasure in the downfall of sages, gurus, and moralists that is, unfortunately, part of the makeup of Man. Those whom we delight to place on a pedestal we delight equally to pull down. When a stern reader of lessons to humanity is found egregiously to have broken the very lessons that he has read the rest of us, we feel a sense of relief. He is just like us after all; we therefore need to feel a little less ashamed of our own conduct.

I doubt, then, that anyone who read of the current scandal concerning the research into human dishonesty by Dan Ariely of Duke University will not have taken some slightly shamefaced pleasure in it. Some of his research into dishonesty has proved to be dishonest: what, in fact, one might call meta-dishonest.

Read it.

Apparently the Religion of Peace still has a few bugs to work out.

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Apparently point out that obesity is a co-morbidity that exacerbates COVID is ‘fat shaming’ and therefore Not Allowed.

Read it.

In North Korea new border security measures have been given a priority previously only accorded to the nuclear and ballistic missile programs. Desperate to seal the 1,400-kilometer Chinese border, the government put more cash, and personnel, into building a wall and electrified fence along the rural portions of the border most frequently used by smugglers. This just drives up the cost of bribes to get across more vulnerable portions of the border.

Read it.

One of the most morally revolting talking points taken up by Democrats in their effort to deflect attention from President Joe Biden’s deadly incompetence in Afghanistan is to minimize the deaths of 13 troops in Kabul, Afghanistan by pointing out that more people are dying from COVID-19 every day.

First of all, if we use the standards that Democrats set during the Trump years, those COVID-19 deaths are also the responsibility of Biden.

It should be said that comparing deaths caused by a faceless worldwide pandemic to the deaths of American troops who were needlessly placed in a perilous situation by an administration that handed security of Kabul to the Taliban is a special brand of cynical partisanship.

Read it.

I know there’s a live argument over the Oxford comma, and whether to use one or two spaces after a period. But these are so 20-teens: did you know that capitalization is—somehow—oppressive?

That’s what we’re told by Dr. Linda Manyguns, I mean, dr. linda manyguns, who is “associate vice president of indigenization and decolonization” at Mount Royal University in Alberta.

Apparently capitalization (except of ‘Indigenous’) is raaaaaaysis. Who knew?

I know what you’re thinking, and I checked: this is not a Monty Python skit.

A legal pillar of environmental justice is now under attack (The Hill) ‘Environmental justice’ isn’t justice but a proglodyte hobby-horse.

The Answer to Climate Change Is Organizing (The New Yorker)

Back to the Caves!

California Coastal Commission Goes Berserk Mandating Future Coastal Sea Level Rise Hype  Still waiting for cheap real estate in Malibu.

Another Trump Organization executive to appear before NY grand jury as prosecutors probe former President’s business

Rogue Congressman on Afghan Mission Claims He’s Heading Home (Daily Beast) Doesn’t he know that his job is to stay in Washington and do what he’s told?

The Trump News Show Is Over and We’re All Healthier For It (Politico) It won’t be over until propaganda outlets like Politico quit talking about it.

‘I Love Him More Than I Hate Ted Cruz’ (Politico) Beto rises from the dead.

Twitter Rolls Out New Anti-Harassment “Safety Mode” To “Reduce Disruptive Interactions”  Good luck with that.

Panicked LA Times Columnist: Newsom Recall Fueled By ‘Anti-Immigrant Nativists’

‘Taliban Would Love Texas Pro-Life Law’: Hollywood UNHINGED

White supremacist praise of the Taliban takeover concerns US officials (CNN) Ah, yes, white supremacists – is there anything they can’t do?

Texas parents accused a Black principal of promoting critical race theory. The district has now suspended him. (Washington Post)

Freedom from “Blackness”

25% Of Bosses Say They’ve Fired Someone For Zoom Meeting Gaffes

Lockdown Under

Joe Rogan Announces He Has COVID

‘I Feel Good’: Joe Rogan Contracts Covid, Bounces Back Within Days Using Drug Cocktail Including Ivermectin

Joe Rogan has covid-19, is taking unproven deworming medicine (Washington Post) Well, I guess he’ll prove it – or not.

Judge orders Ohio hospital to treat Covid patient with ivermectin

AMA Calls On Doctors To Immediately Stop Prescribing Ivermectin For Covid

Friend shares conservative vaccine denier’s last words to her (CNN) Denier!

Oregon school district fires superintendent without reason, after he upheld state’s mask mandate (CNN) Without reason!

WHO Places ‘Mu Variant’ Under Close Scrutiny Over Fears Of Vaccine Resistance

Harvard Epidemiologist Says The Case For COVID Vaccine Passports Was Just Demolished

Surgical masks lower spread among elderly, but cloth masks don’t

Jaguars Use Vaccine Status As Determining Factor In Roster Cuts

Two Top FDA Officials Resign “In Anger” Over “Intensifying Pressure” To Approve Booster & Shots For Kids Under 12

Europe’s CDC Breaks With Biden Admin, Says No Urgent Need For COVID Boosters

Florida Chiropractor Signs Mask Exemptions for More Than 500 Students

A grim warning from Israel: Vaccination blunts, but does not defeat Delta

New Mask For Democratic Politicians Automatically Goes Up When A Camera Is Around

Biden team to use civil rights law as pretext to impose masks at school

ACLU Says The State Forcing People To Take Vaccines Is A Victory For Civil Liberties

Read it.

India, a country whose history, language, religion, and culture are synonymous with its caste system,?divides its?1.4 billion people?into rigid hierarchical groups. The Indian caste system assigns everyone a rung on a socially-constructed ladder. Today, more than?200 million Indians?find themselves on the bottom rung. These people, the Dalits, cruelly referred to as the “untouchables,” are regularly denied access to basic necessities like education and healthcare. Furthermore, social mobility is all but impossible. For the “untouchables,” ridiculed and persecuted, life is a miserable existence.

In the United States, a similar caste system has sprung up. Though it is only a few years rather than millennia old, the American caste system, like the Indian one, rewards some and demonizes others. The American caste system is the product of?intersectionality, a framework that uses race, class, and gender to classify individuals. At the bottom of this shaky ladder you will find whites. More specifically, white men. To be even more specific,?“cisgender” white men.

Read it.

A billionaire Los Angeles real estate mogul with a family history of anti-Semitism is building a multimillion-dollar estate that is blocking access to a beloved wilderness area in Beverly Hills, according to the Daily Mail.

Mohamed Hadid, a Palestinian who made headlines in 2020 for equating the state of Israel with police brutality in the United States, is constructing the largest home ever permitted in Los Angeles County, with an asking price of $250 million. If purchased at that price, the property will be the most expensive residence ever sold in California. The construction of the 80,000-square-foot mansion, which is expected to take two years, has forced the closure of national hiking trails in the Santa Monica Mountains.

When I hear the word ‘Palestinian’ I reach for my revolver.

Freeberg nails it.

The President is senile. Electronic and print media are pretending he isn’t. His communications apparatus is presenting his embarrassing failures as successes. The media is doing little to nothing to correct this.

We have this new industry of “fact checking” that answers to no one and forms questionable conclusions in a bubble and as a monolith. They label things as “misinformation” that are not false, and in some cases, are provably or demonstrably true. We have become numb to this, after years of seeing persons in positions of authority add their signatures to things that are known lies, forced to conclude what people must say in totalitarian dictatorships: “Maybe it’s a lie, but there’s nothing I can do about it, so whatevs.” If any one resource is “caught spreading misinformation,” someone somewhere with power takes steps to disconnect them. There is usually no appeal and we almost never know who exactly is making the necessary judgment call. They cite “community standards” that do not exist in any written, open format that could be cited or referenced. They just suspend/disconnect and that’s that.

Yeah, that pretty much sums it up.

Severian is delightfully dyspeptic today.

One of my usual terms for the Left is “the herd of independent minds.” Just as the Left have convinced themselves that “diversity” means “everyone has different skin tones and sexual fetishes, but is otherwise exactly the same,” so Leftists — the most rigidly conformist people on the planet — are deeply invested in the idea that they are freethinking rebels. Even though they and everyone they know agree 100% on everything, it is central to their identity that they are unique. (Hence all the tattoos and face piercings — sure, to the outside observer, it’s all the same, but look, my ironic hipster tattoo is a slice of pizza, while that Basic Bitch Becky’s is merely a dolphin).

One is tempted to merely write this off as another uninteresting manifestation of the Opposite Rule of Liberalism, and be done with it. If they say they want to “challenge convention,” of course what they really want is “total, lockstep conformity.” But it’s actually a useful chink in their armor.

Read it.

“And I say unto you, Make to yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness; that, when ye fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations.” Luke 16:9.

Don’t think of it as selling out; think of it as buying in.

Read it.

In Africa most of the local Islamic terrorists are affiliated with al Qaeda in addition to a multitude of small ISIL affiliates. Since 2018 there have been two ISIL “provinces” in central Africa. The smaller one is ISGS (Islamic State in Greater Sahara), which showed up in 2018. ISGS is currently active in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger. The other, slightly older and larger, ISIL province was ISWAP, which is actually a faction of the Nigerian Boko Haram Islamic terror group, which saw itself as the “African Taliban” and has been around since 2004. For a few years Boko Haram was, in terms of people killed, more of a problem than any other ISIL group, including the combined ISIL operations in Syria and Iraq.

Steve Sailer.

If you are exposed to the horrific tropical diseases river blindness and lymphatic filariasis, you very much should ingest ivermectin. Ivermectin’s discoverers were awarded the 2015 Medicine Nobel Prize and Merck gives ivermectin away for free in the tropics.

Read it.

In the long run, the Democratic Party doesn’t need any more Democrats in California.

Like I’ve long said, the liberal NIMBYists of Malibu and Beverly Hills get to impose their sentimental immigration policies on the rest of America, while being immune to having volatile Omar Mateen-like Afghans live anywhere near them.

Why Pfizer Thinks Its COVID Vaccine’s Days Could Be Numbered

CDC lacking data on breakthrough COVID-19 infections

Two Senior FDA Officials Quit Over Frustrations With Biden Admin: Report

Ohio judge orders hospital to give ivermectin to covid patient Jeffrey Smith after wife’s lawsuit

How Long Does Immunity To COVID-19 Last? : Goats and Soda (NPR) Not long enough for a ‘real’ vaccine.

Sen. Marshall to Newsmax: Studies Say Masks Don’t Protect Against COVID

China Ramped Up Cyberattacks On Australia After Prime Minister Morrison Asked For Investigation Into Covid

Merck Begins Late-Stage Trial of Experimental COVID-19 Drug

Fourth Case Of Contaminated Moderna Vaccine Reported In Japan  Moderna, of course.

Rogue antibodies involved in almost one-fifth of Covid deaths

Japan finds stainless steel particles in suspended doses of Moderna vaccine

San Diego County Declares COVID Misinformation ‘Public Health Crisis’

Hospital Admissions Due to COVID-19 Down in US for First Time Since June

Office for Civil Rights Sticks Its Nose Unnecessarily Into School Masks Debate

CDC Director Tells The Unvaccinated Not To Travel Over Labor Day Weekend  The unvaccinated tell her to suck on it.

Newlyweds post $240 bill for no shows at their wedding

Contra the Supreme Court’s Diversity Decisions, Black Affirmative Action Admittees Demand Segregated Safe Spaces

Black Women Seeing Guns as Protection From Rising Crime

CRUEL SUMMER: Nets Spend Less Than an Hour on Crime Spike in Dem Cities

Officers, Paramedics Charged in Elijah McClain’s 2019 Death

Apple’s Beats teams up with Shedeur Sanders as its first college athlete ambassador  Because, of course, only black people could possibly be college athletes.

1 Male Killed in North Carolina High School Shooting

House committee investigating insurrection wants Mo Brooks’ phone records

Sidney Powell Storms Off Set When Grilled on Her Election Lies (Daily Beast)

Eric Clapton, Enough Is Enough (The New Yorker)

3 Teachers Now Suing Virginia School System Over Transgender Pronouns

Reinstatement of teacher who objected to pronoun policing is upheld

Gabriel Gipe, pro-Antifa California teacher: ‘I have 180 days to turn them into revolutionaries’

New Physics Experiment Indicates There’s No Objective Reality

Michael Mann: Carbon Shaming Celebrity Climate Hypocrites is a Big Oil Plot

Democrats Warn Millions Of Lives Could Be Saved If Texas Abortion Ban Goes Into Effect  Babylon Bee.

‘I Have 180 Days to Turn Them Into Revolutionaries’: Pro-Antifa Teacher Admits to Indoctrinating Students

CensorTrack With TR: Big Tech SILENCES Congressman, Mourning Mother

Ignoring The Babies, CNN Says Texas Abortion Ban Mainly ‘Affects Low-Income Women’

Lileks.

On the way back to the Cities I thought of some writers who are perfectly empowered to discuss the fate and foibles of the Fargos of America, but would probably twitch in their seat if you drove them around, first out of fear that Red Indians would come whooping over the horizon, and then out of dismay that none of this comported with their preconceptions. There’s the classic movie theater, still open, all the marquee bulbs flashing. There’s where the symphony plays. There’s the museum. There’s the central library. There’s the coffee shop with the rainbow flag. There’s the 30s office building with Moderne lines; there’s the dense housing; there’s the bright new big school, lavishly funded. There’s the big newspaper building. There’s the University. Oh, look, there’s the other University. There’s the historic architecture. Here’s the river. Beyond all this, endless grain and toil.

That’s why there’s always a market, in the Big City, for a book by a Big City denizen (who, more often than not, didn’t grow up in the Big City)  chronicling a down-the-Zambezi-with-gun-and-camera expedition to Flyover Country, marveling at all of the Dirt People and what strange shenanigans they get up to.

Read it.

When I think about Social Security, I think about MacGyver. You know, the 1980s heartthrob who could defuse a bomb with a paperclip. (The show has even been rebooted) Bear with me. Time and time again, MacGyver would wait until the very last second to stave off disaster. With one second left on the clock, he would wiggle a wire, preventing some giant explosion. You know, sort of like how the U.S. treats the Social Security Trust Fund. The last amendments to the program to ensure its solvency were passed in April 1983, three months before its Trust Fund was to run out.

Well, the clock is ticking again. If nothing is done, the Social Security Trustees estimate that by 2034, the Trust Fund will be depleted. When that happens, the program will continue to function, but benefits will be cut by more than 20 percent. This reduction would obviously be a problem for the whopping one quarter of seniors who receive almost all of their income from the program. But it also has implications for an issue that has been gaining attention in the wake of COVID-19 — the racial wealth gap.

Tread it.

Watching the fiasco in Afghanistan unfold was the first time that it crossed my mind that Joe Biden might actually be in charge in the White House. I had presumed that he was a figurehead, and someone was behind the scenes, calling the shots. But the way Afghanistan was handled is classic Joe Biden – he took exactly the same approach back in Vietnam (ignoring our enemies and abandoning our friends), as the Cambodians will tell you. Well, the Cambodians who survived, at least. The Cambodians who survived probably strongly dislike Mr. Biden. Interestingly, those who didn’t survive probably voted for him. Nothing changes one’s perspective like dying, I suppose.

Freeberg nails it.

So, it’s “Please wear masks regardless of your vaccination status.” And apparently everywhere, multiple counties. China Virus stats are up, so our leaders are clamping down hard…on us. Good to know.

We’ve been through this before. A few times. Once again, it’s up to me to point out the obvious…to point out what everybody with a brain knows already, but people with better manners are going to leave unsaid.

What we’re seeing play out here, is a conflict between two ways to look at medicine. There are the very loud people, what I call the “Puppeteers and puppets” people, who perceive it’s the job of the medical authorities to tell us what to do…and our role is to do what they tell us. This seems reasonable, at first, until you ponder the most obvious question: Are they sure? And the clear and obvious answer is, no they’re not, and that’s okay. It’s science, which is supposed to constantly evolve as we learn more things. It’s science about what is still essentially a novel virus.

And then there are the people like me, who understand what’s wrong with that. The puppeteers are not sure, and that’s okay. But the central premise for everything we’re doing, is that they are sure. They’re scientists, after all! Are you a scientist? Am I a scientist? No and no. They outrank us, so let’s pretend they’re sure when they’re not.

So I guess you call us the “No Pretend” people.

Read it.

Paul Krugman needs to learn some geography. Last week, he wrote, “there’s no more room for housing” in California unless they build up. After all, he notes, “San Francisco is on a peninsula, Los Angeles is ringed by mountains.”

Yes, San Francisco is on a peninsula. But, immediately to the south of the city is San Mateo County, which — according to census data — is 68 percent rural open space. South of San Mateo is Santa Clara County, home of San Jose, which is 74 percent rural.

I’ve always thought that San Francisco ought to be a walled city, like Valetta.

Read it.

Reporters like to imagine themselves as the nation’s most powerful defenders of democracy, and on occasion, project themselves as enforcers of political civility. If all that were true, then they might report critically on violent extremists of any ideological stripe, who find their joy in bringing anarchy and disorder. Sadly, some violent extremists are more celebrated than scorned.

On August 25, Reuters investigative journalist Aram Roston profiled Nicole Armbruster, a self-proclaimed “anti-fascist” who is putting her “body on the line” against fascism and racism. They call this “rare insight” into this movement, but instead, it’s just letting a violent radical activist explain herself.

Steve Sailer.

How seriously should whites take the ever-increasing levels of racial hate expressed toward them in outlets such as The New York Times and Washington Post?

Perhaps the fad over the past eight years to express fear and loathing of “whiteness” (i.e., whites) will always be more bark than bite?

After all, most people find themselves angriest not at large-scale abstractions such as a race but with the individuals who get on their nerves.

And other people like to watch spats.

Read it.

After Marine Lance Cpl. Rylee McCollum died last week in Kabul, Afghanistan, two fundraisers were set up for his widow and unborn child.

McCollum, 20, was among 13 U.S. service members killed in a terrorist bombing Thursday at Hamid Karzai International Airport.

A GoFundMe page, ”Rylee McCollum’s Child Education Fund,” set up by the Into the Breach Supply Co., reads that ”this is a fund specifically dedicated to the education and upbringing of Marine Rylee McCollum’s child who is expected for September. His sacrifice at HKIA to protect the lives of those who cannot themselves will not be forgotten.”