Category Archives: Culture
Riots in Lancaster
Here we go again. It is quite clear that the circumstances of each shooting is irrelevant to the protesters. The shooting is the catalyst to vent hate.
Police shot dead a 27-year-old man – who was awaiting trial for stabbing and seriously injuring four people – after he charged at an officer brandishing a huge knife over his head.
Officers in Lancaster, Pennsylvania were called to a home at 4.15pm yesterday by Ricardo Munoz’s sister who said he had become aggressive toward their mother and was trying to break into her house.
Body camera footage release by the Lancaster County District Attorney’s Office shows the 27-year-old emerging from the inside of the house as soon as an officer arrived 10 minutes later.
Munoz could be seen charging at the officer while brandishing a knife above his head ‘in clear view’ and ‘in a threatening manner’ before the officer fired at him. He died at the scene.
Yesterday’s shooting sparked protests in the city, with people marching from the scene of the shooting to the Lancaster Police Department while chanting ‘this is what democracy looks like’.
WGAL-TV reported that protesters also smashed in windows of police cars.
Munoz was awaiting criminal trial on four counts of aggravated assault before he was shot dead yesterday. He also had previous charges of stalking, harassment and criminal trespassing.
Expect this to get worse as the roving violent mob travels in to Lancaster like they did in Kenosha.
Posted by Owen at 0744 hours
Markels and Obamas Remain Silent on “Cuties”
Silence is violence, so I’m told.
Viewers have hit out at Netflix employees Meghan Markle, Harry and the Obamas as the two couples stay ‘silent’ on controversial French film Cuties.
Thousands of people have already launched a call to boycott the streaming giant on Thursday over ‘Mignonnes’ – known as ‘Cuties’ in English – angry that its young stars were portrayed in a sexualized way.
The film is directed by French-Senegalese director Maimouna Doucoure, and started streaming September 9. More than 200,000 tweets with the hashtag ‘#CancelNetflix’ became the top trending topic one day later.
[…]
Neither couple has spoken about the controversial movie as of Sunday. And that has sparked criticism online.
Twitter user @AngelaLMorabito said: ‘The Obamas and Prince Harry & Meghan have contracts with Netflix. If they really want to use their influence for good, they’ll tell Netflix to drop “Cuties.”’
@DTCahill added: ‘Silence from @Netflix employees Michelle, Barack, Megan [sic] and Harry on Cuties.’
Posted by Owen at 2314 hours
Farming Has the Highest Favorability Rating of Any Industry
WASHINGTON, D.C. — For the first time in Gallup’s 20 years of tracking Americans’ views of various business and industry sectors, farming and agriculture is the clear leader. The former top-ranking industries — restaurants and computers — remain in the top four, with the grocery industry rounding out the group. Meanwhile, the pharmaceutical industry’s image has improved modestly since last year, and it has yielded the “worst rated” distinction back to the federal government.
Look at the big swing in the Sports industry.
The sports industry now has a negative image, on balance, among Americans as a whole, with 30% viewing it positively and 40% negatively, for a -10 net-positive score. This contrasts with the +20 net positive image it enjoyed in 2019, when 45% viewed it positively and 25% negatively.
[…]
While it’s not clear how much the various challenges and controversies swirling around the industry are each responsible for its slide in popularity, it is notable that sports has lost more support from Republicans and independents than from Democrats. In fact, Democrats’ view of the sports industry has not changed significantly in the past year, while Republicans’ has slipped from a +11 net-positive score in 2019 to a net -35 today, and independents’ from +26 to -10.
This is particularly troublesome for a non-essential industry that relies on people liking it. For example, if people don’t like the farming industry, what do they care? People will still buy food. But if people don’t like sports, they don’t have to spend a dollar on them.
Posted by Owen at 0739 hours
Major Bambi
This is my favorite story of the day.
Donnie Dunagan is a hard-nosed Marine, a highly decorated veteran of the Vietnam War who served for a quarter-century before retiring as a major. First drafted in the ’50s and subsequently promoted 13 times in 21 years — a Corps record at the time, he recalls — Dunagan found the Marines a perfect fit. That is, so long as he could keep a secret.
A dark reminder of the past Dunagan left behind still lurked unspoken: He was Bambi.
As a kid, Dunagan did a brief stint as a child actor, and he was tapped by Walt Disney to be the voice of the lead in the 1942 Bambi, the now-classic animated film about a young deer learning about life in the forest. And not one of his fellow Marines knew.
“No chance!” Dunagan, now 80, tells his wife, Dana, on a recent visit with StoryCorps in San Angelo, Texas. “I never said a word to anybody about Bambi, even to you. When we first met I never said a word about it. Most of the image in people’s minds of Bambi was a little frail deer, not doing very well, sliding around on the ice on his belly.”
Now, imagine the man who was once Bambi as a commander in a Marine Corps boot camp, responsible for hundreds of recruits. Dunagan didn’t want his recruits drawing any connections, mocking him or calling him “Maj. Bambi.” So, he kept his mouth shut.
Posted by Owen at 2027 hours
Xbox Financing Options
If you are financing your game console, you suck at personal finance. You are paying $840 for a $500 piece of technology for purely entertainment purposes. The fact that this option will be so popular is a window into America’s inability and unwillingness to control government spending and debt.
The high-end Xbox Series X will cost $499 while the entry-level Xbox Series S will cost $299. Microsoft will also offer a financing plan that allows customers to pay for either console over 24 months.The Xbox Series S costs $24.99 per month on that plan while the Xbox Series X will cost $34.99 per month.
Microsoft said the financing plans also include access to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate and EA Play, which allows you to download or stream more than 100 games to Xbox or PC. It will also include Microsoft’s new mobile streaming services that lets you stream from the cloud to an Android phone. You’ll have to buy a Game Pass subscription plan separately, which starts at $9.99 per month, if you don’t finance.
Posted by Owen at 0758 hours
Boy Thanks Police
What a sweet story. This kid is everything that’s right with America.
A 7-year-old boy’s letter supporting the Conroe Police Department prompted a visit to his home from the police chief himself.
David Jimenez wanted to show his appreciation to Conroe police officers who show up in his neighborhood to calm conflicts.
“If the police don’t come, what would happen? There would be more problems. When the police come, everything calms down,” David told his mom, Silvia Martinez, and she told The Courier.
Reflecting a second-grader’s earnestness and writing proficiency, the short handwritten letter expressed David’s appreciation to all the work the force does.
[…]
David’s parents moved from Mexico 12 years ago. His father Sergio Jimenez, 43, works at a lumber company in New Waverly and Martinez, 44, is a housekeeper. One of her employers, Patt McCuistion, 68, has been instrumental in David’s upbringing.
Posted by Owen at 0756 hours
Milwaukee County Trending to Possible All Time High in Suicides
The Milwaukee County Medical Examiner says there were three suicides in July, and the number increased to 23 in August. The current trend puts the county on track to surpass last year and quite possibly an all time record, says the Medical Examiner.
Dr. Ben Weston, the Medical Director for Milwaukee County. says the pandemic, social justice reform and more are contributing factors.
“This goes to show that mental heath is a major concern in our county, as with many counties which has been exacerbated by the COVID 19 pandemic” said Weston.
The Medical Examiner says there were 115 suicides in 2019, and so far in 2020, there have been 96. At the current rate, the Medical Examiner says there would be nearly 200 by the end of the year which would surpass the record of 156 in 2017.
Posted by Owen at 0742 hours
ASLSP Changes Chord
A musical composition designed to take well over 600 years to play has gone through its first chord change in seven years.
Entitled “As Slow as Possible” (ASLSP), the composition by the late American composer John Cage is due to be played out over 639 years at the St. Burchardi church in Halberstadt in Germany.Needless to say, no one will hear the piece in its entirety but the project has garnered quite a following, with many masked fans flocking to the church over the weekend to witness the event. For those unable to attend in person, there was a livestream.The performance started in 2001 on an organ specially built for the super slow-paced recital. During that time, there was a pause that lasted for 18 months, while the most recent note change took place in 2013.
Posted by Owen at 2208 hours
Black Boy Suspended For Playing With Nerf Gun in Own Home
So the schools force the kids to learn virtually and then impose ridiculous rules in their homes? Nuts to that.
A 12-year-old boy in Colorado Springs was suspended from school for five days for playing with a toy gun during a virtual art class – an infraction that resulted in Grand Mountain school sending a police officer to the pupil’s home.
The boy’s parents, Curtis Elliott Jr and Dani Elliott, say the police visit terrified them and put their son Isaiah in danger.
“I never thought, ‘You can’t play with a Nerf gun in your own home because somebody may perceive it as a threat and call the police on you,’” Dani Elliott told the Washington Post.
Isaiah Elliot was not charged but he now has an entry on his disciplinary record saying he brought a “facsimile of a firearm to school”, and a record with the El Paso county sheriff’s office. Another boy who was studying at Elliott’s house was also reportedly suspended.
[…]
The Elliotts have decided to pull their son out of school, hoping to find a place at a school adapted to working with students with attention deficit disorder. His mother said she told administrators: “Black children cannot have that sort of thing on their record. You are reducing his chances at success.”
Good for the parents.
Posted by Owen at 2135 hours
Academy Introduces Diversity Standards for Best Picture
So it’s not really about which movie is actually the Best Picture, is it? Perhaps it was once about the art. Perhaps not. Now it most certainly isn’t.
In a historic move, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences on Tuesday laid out sweeping eligibility reforms to the best picture category intended to encourage diversity and equitable representation on screen and off, addressing gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity and disability.
The film academy has established four broad representation categories: on screen; among the crew; at the studio; and in opportunities for training and advancement in other aspects of the film’s development and release. To be considered for best picture, films will have to meet two of the four new standards, the Academy said.
Each standard has detailed subcategories as well. To meet the onscreen representation standard, a film must either have at least one lead character or a significant supporting character be from an underrepresented racial or ethnic group; at least 30% of secondary roles must be from two underrepresented groups; or the main storyline, theme or narrative must be focused on an underrepresented group. According to the academy, underrepresented groups include women, people of color, LGBTQ+ people or people with disabilities.
Posted by Owen at 2131 hours
History is Already Written
History is already written. It happened. History books are merely the effort by people to discover the facts and understand the complex unfolding of the tapestry of human existence.
I am a lifelong consumer of history. I tend to drift through eras and will read multiple books on a subject before moving onto something else. I especially love period books. For example, I have a WWI history book that was written in 1919. It reads like the era it was written in – full of nationalism, bigotry, and ignorance of things that would not be known for many years after the book was written. When reading history, it is always important to remember that whatever you are reading was written by a person. That person has a perspective, a work ethic (or lack thereof), an ax to grind, a purpose for devoting years of their life to the narrative, and is bound by the social and information limitations of their own time and culture. Reading Dodge is very different than Toland who is very different than Tacitus, but they all have their place in telling our human story.
The same is true for the people pushing The 1619 Project. They have a perspective. They also have several of their facts woefully wrong because they are pushing a specific agenda. As long as we understand that, reading their perspective can add to understanding. It is a shame that it takes a Brit to remind Americans of what their history really is and that it is still OK to be proud of our nation’s birth story.
The 1619 Project undoubtedly provides a huge amount of very important information about the history of American slavery and I would encourage people to read it.
But the central tenet of the main author’s belief is historically wrong, incredibly damaging, and it should not be part of any school curriculum.
American kids should not be told that their country’s great War of Independence was waged to maintain slavery.
That’s not why most colonists fought it; they fought it to end British colonial rule and establish the United States of America.
Young Americans should feel proud of that victory, not ashamed, and should be taught that their country began in 1776 with the glorious Declaration of Independence, not in 1619 with the ignominious arrival of slaves to Virginia.
To reframe the dismantling of British rule as a battle to maintain slavery in the way the NYT has done is not just misguided, it’s disgraceful.
Posted by Owen at 0758 hours
BLM Fascists Attempt to Enforce Fealty From Restaurant Patrons
And assault a cyclist. History has often seen the appearance of fascist mobs that terrorize citizens into fealty or silence. It is a well-worn tactic, and it works. Will it work in the U.S.? It will if we let it.
Black Lives Matter protesters screamed in the face of white elderly outdoor diners during protests in Pittsburgh on Saturday, disturbing new video shows.
Cellphone footage shows the crowd taking over the outdoor dining space with one person even approaching the older couple’s table before drinking their beer in front of them; another smashed a glass from a table.
One protester tells the diners: ‘F**k the white people that built the system.’ He adds: ‘F*** 12′; a reference to police. Others eating at the restaurant pick up their belonging and leave after demonstrators call them an ’embarrassment’.
[…]
A second video taken in Pittsburgh over the weekend shows a demonstrator speaking with a megaphone while walking next to a cyclist. It’s unclear what is said, but the demonstrator nudges the cyclist with his megaphone. The cyclist swats the demonstrator in response, but a second protester hits the man from behind.
Posted by Owen at 0900 hours
More Families Homeschooling
Maybe a long-term benefit of so many schools abandoning their duty to educate. More families spending more time together and educating their kids with their values. Stronger families. Smarter, more independent kids. Promising future. Heh.
The effect of the Wuhan virus crisis is obvious in the responses: Parents reported declining participation in every institutional school option, with the exception of “charter school.” Still, the decline of “public school” was the most notable, falling from 83 percent to 76 percent.
Given the fact that this poll measured families, not children, the percentage of home-schoolers among the overall student population could be even higher. Samantha Spitzer, a certified teacher and home-schooling parent, believes this to be the case. Spitzer has been hosting “how to home-school” workshops throughout her local region of West Virginia this August. She’s seen dozens of first-time home-schoolers showing up at each forum.
“I talked to someone at my county school board office,” Spitzer said. “She left on a Friday evening, Aug. 7, and by Monday morning she had 175 notices of intent to home-school on her desk — all from brand-new families.” Based on public school enrollment numbers, Spitzer estimates that in one local county, as many as one-fourth of K-12 children might be homeschooled this year.
Posted by Owen at 2233 hours
UW Grad Faked Being Black
What sort of mental illness drives this behavior?
A professor of African American history at George Washington University, who publicly identified as black, has now admitted she is a white woman from Kansas City and has been lying about her race for years.
Jessica Krug, 38, revealed on Thursday in a bombshell Medium post that she has lied about being black her entire career and admitted to deceiving her friends and colleagues.
She said in the blog post – titled ‘The Truth, and the Anti-Black Violence of My Lies’ -that she is white, Jewish and was raised in Kansas City. ‘For the better part of my adult life, every move I’ve made, every relationship I’ve formed, has been rooted in the napalm toxic soil of lies,’ she wrote.
[…]
Her neighbor in the Bronx, Anna Anderson, told the DailyMail.com that Krug would call her ‘white trash’ and tell Anderson she was ‘gentrifying’ the neighborhood by going running.
[…]
Her biography page on the university website says she also specializes in subjects including Latin America, Africa, imperialism and colonialism.
She has a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, according to the GWU page.
Posted by Owen at 2058 hours
Known Gang Member with Illegal Gun Shot By Police
Good for the police to release the footage quickly to inject some facts into the public debate. But of course, facts don’t matter. We have a violent insurrectionist cabal that is using the shooting of any black person by police as an excuse to protest and riot. Whether or not the shooting was justified is irrelevant to their cause.
Washington D.C. police have released bodycam footage showing the moment officers shot dead an 18-year-old black man after he allegedly brandished a gun during a police chase – sparking further protests across the city.
Deon Kay died on Wednesday after he was shot in the chest by a Metropolitan Police officer identified on Thursday as Alexander Alvarez.
Authorities said Kay was one of two people who fled on Wednesday afternoon when approached by uniformed cops investigating reports of a man with a gun near the 200 block of Orange Street.
Police Chief Peter Newsham said officers had seen a livestream video on social media of a man with a gun and recognized him from ‘previous contacts.’
He said Kay was ‘validated gang member’ from the area and had had multiple brushes with the law in the past.
During the foot pursuit, Kay allegedly pulled out a weapon, prompting the officer to open fire in response, the MPD said.
To make my case:
Following the shooting, the local Black Lives Matter affiliate called for immediate protests outside the MPD’s 7th District headquarters, stating in a tweet, ‘DC police murdered a Black man today.’
Before they knew a single fact, they called it “murder.” Clearly, it was not, but that doesn’t matter to them.
Posted by Owen at 1353 hours
Carol Baskin to be on Dancing with the Stars
I feel like this says everything about our culture at this point in time.
Like all cool cats and kittens, Carole Baskin is going to “Dancing With the Stars.”
The reality TV star who became a pop culture sensation with Netflix’s docuseries “Tiger King” is joining the new crop of celebrity dancers that includes TV and film actress Anne Heche, former NBA star Charles Oakley and Backstreet Boys singer AJ McLean.
The new season premieres on ABC on Sept. 14.
On the Netflix series “Tiger King”, Baskin, who owns a big cat refuge, sought to shut down Joseph Maldonado-Passage’s for-profit breeding of big cats. His nickname is “Joe Exotic” and her signature line is “cool cats and kittens.”
Posted by Owen at 1236 hours
Traveling Anarchists
The stories are being repeated from city to city. And it is noteworthy that we rarely have more than one city going up in flames at the same time. We have a hardcore cadre of anarchists and Marxists who are traveling our nations inciting insurrection.
A BLM protester who was arrested in Washington DC on Saturday night has also been at riots in Portland and Kenosha, police said on Monday, as they revealed they were looking into whether groups were being funded to travel to protest hot-spots.
Jeremy Vajko, 27, a Microsoft engineer, was arrested on Saturday night during violent clashes between police and protesters in the nation’s capital.
The Metropolitan Police Department incident report into his arrest claims he was driving recklessly near the Hay Adams hotel and drove ‘into a crowd of over one hundred individuals’.
[…]
He did not mention Vajko by name, but he and Mayor Muriel Bowsers both said the city was investigating whether or not funded groups traveled to the city to create havoc over the weekend.
Posted by Owen at 2217 hours
RIP, Kenosha
My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. Go pick up a copy. Here’s a taste to incite you… a little ironic that I use the word “incite” when referring to a column about the Kenosha riots.
On the second night, one videographer followed a young man as he yelled for the children to go home because it was going to get bad. Sure enough, as the sun set, protesters turned into rioters as they tore down street lamps, stood on cars to break their windows with bats, smashed store windows, and looted the contents. Then the fires started. Multiple fires were started simultaneously to overwhelm the fire department, who could not enter the area safely anyway to put them out before they spread. I watched as family businesses burned and nearby homes were evacuated.
On the third night, the chaos worsened; multiple law enforcement agencies took a more aggressive posture to quell the riot. I watched from the angle of the rioters as police formed a human wall and used armored vehicles and nonviolent means to clear the streets. The rioters kept up a steady counterassault with rocks, shields, rolling burning dumpsters, bottles, and fire.
It was on that third night that one journalist came upon several armed citizens who were defending a gas station. They had had enough of the riots and were determined to protect life and property from the marauding horde. I watched as rioters confronted
the armed defenders. Words were exchanged. Spittle spewed. Tempers flared. On my way to bed, I commented to my wife that someone was going to die that night. The next morning, we learned that they did.
Watching several hours of immersive coverage of the riots illuminated a few things. First, traditional media is failing us. When I read the stories in traditional outlets the next day or caught the television newscast, it did not reflect what I watched. This was not a “mostly peaceful” protest where a little scuffle broke out. This was a full riot that raged for several nights. There may have been a peaceful protest during the day, but as soon as the sun set, it was anything but peaceful.
Second, many of the same people who were just shouting and taunting during the day were the same people who were smashing and burning in the night. This was not a case where the peaceful protesters went home at sunset and a shift of criminals and malcontents took their place. These were many of the same people. And many of them are ardent anarchists and Marxists who are intent on destabilizing our republic. You can see it in their graffiti and hear it as they shout it. They are not hiding. The shooting incident that precipitated the uprising was merely an excuse to launch a violent uprising.
Posted by Owen at 0559 hours
