The migrant invasion of Europe

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WATCH: The Anti-Migrant Video Going Viral Across Europe. From the text:

‘With Open Gates: The forced collective suicide of European nations’, a slick, hard-hitting film about the European migrant crisis is going viral in Europe, already watched at least half a million times.

Although the 19-minute film may feel like a dispatch from the future, it is cut entirely from recent news reports, police camera footage, and interviews. Kicking off with scenes of a modern car ferry disgorging thousands of illegals into Greece, the film then cuts to dozens of aerial shots of columns of migrants marching north into Europe.

The film then changed to the harrowing testimony of one young Greek woman who was unable to hide her horror and despair at the scale of the migrant crisis sweeping over her home island of Lesbos. Just six miles from the Turkish coast, the island was subjected to migrant riots in September as newcomers turned on their hosts for not moving them to mainland Europe fast enough.

As Breitbart London reported at the time, the tearful woman tells a news crew: “We are in danger, every day, every minute. We need someone to protect us. They come into our houses. I want to go to work, but I can’t. Our children want to go to school, but they can’t. They have stolen our lives!”.

European leaders, and particularly Merkel, have been raised singing The Internationale, and for whom open borders is part of their Marxist ethos. You cannot imagine Europe ever returning to how it was.

Political economy at its finest

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This is A Strategy For Fiscal Conservatives written in Canada but applicable just about anywhere. Let me start with the first two of six and you will get the idea.

#1. Never cut anything

Conservative parties take a lot of grief for being cold-hearted because they have the audacity to attempt a scaleback of government largesse. Too often the media jumps on every small spending cut with all the alarm of a nuclear war breaking out. Even when Harper tried to scale back the rate of increase to healthcare funding, it was played out like a massive cut to services.

This also instills fear among anyone working in a job associated with government funded departments. Riling up the union-class crowd isn’t worth the political capital. As Ryan Rados mentioned in his recent article, slowly cutting and threatening the CBC only leads to more aggressive bias. Why incite it?

By never cutting anything you aren’t putting yourself in the awful position of trying to explain to voters why you’re cutting what you’re cutting. The go-to-phrase with never cutting anything is, ”We haven’t cut anything!” All the leftist hyperbole is destroyed when you can honestly make a statement like that.

#2. Freeze things you actually want to cut

Inflation is your friend. If you want to make cuts, just make freezes instead. Then you can honestly say, “We haven’t cut anything!” and your critics will have to explain inflation to a population that will instantly get bored with trying to understand inflation.

A budget freeze amounts to a 1-2% cut every year that the freeze is in effect. Relatively painless and slowly, but surely, effective.

(Added bonus? Standing in front of a microphone saying, “We haven’t made cuts to anything!”)

You don’t have to do it in a single year. And my own addition is to hack into spending throughout the public service where no one votes conservative and no one else will mind.

From Small Dead Animals.

Justice American style

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That the American justice system is corrupt to its very roots has been obvious to anyone who has followed Mark Steyn’s “trial of the century”. Steyn has just provided an update on where things are.

On the vast placid frozen lake stretching unbroken beyond the horizon that is the Mann vs Steyn case there has been a small development. As our more elderly readers may recall, four years ago, before Barack Obama’s re-election, climate mullah Michael E Mann sued me and various other parties for mocking his global warm-mongering in general and pooh-pooh-ing his “hockey stick” in particular.

That was in the year 2012. Notwithstanding that it’s the most consequential free-speech case in half-a-century (as the ACLU, NBC, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune et al recognized in their amicus brief), in the DC courts it just sits there, with no discovery and no trial date. . . .

This sclerotic court system can’t expedite nuttin’. The case has now been stalled for two years in an interlocutory appeal. If you don’t know what an “interlocutory appeal” is, consider yourself lucky. If you do know, you’ll be thrilled to learn that one of the questions at the heart of this interlocutory appeal is whether, under the relevant DC law, the interlocutory appeal is even interlocutorily appealable at all. Fascinating! Adding to the fun, as I noted in my recent testimony to the US Senate, one of the judges hearing the interlocutory appeal, Vanessa Ruiz, takes up to three years to issue an opinion. . . .

My legal chums at Popehat and the Volokh Conspiracy seem to think that, when I gripe about the dysfunctional DC courts, I’m somehow showing disrespect for the justice system. Au contraire, it’s because of my profound respect for justice that I would like this bizarre perversion thereof to return itself to the community of functioning Common Law jurisdictions. (While we’re at it, this judge in the Trump University case seems all too typical.)

Ah yes, the Trump case. Trump is determined to show every piece of dirty linen that makes the US fit only for the very wealthy and the dirt poor. Middle class and bourgeois is a definite mistake in modern America.
Alberto R. Gonzales: Trump has a right to ask if Judge Gonzalo Curiel is fair.

But there may be other factors to consider in determining whether Trump’s concerns about getting an impartial trial are reasonable. Curiel is, reportedly, a member of a group called La Raza Lawyers of San Diego. Trump’s aides, meanwhile, have indicated that they believe Curiel is a member of the National Council of La Raza, a vocal advocacy organization that has vigorously condemned Trump and his views on immigration. The two groups are unaffiliated, and Curiel is not a member of NCLR. But Trump may be concerned that the lawyers’ association or its members represent or support the other advocacy organization.

Coupled with that question is the fact that in 2014, when he certified the class-action lawsuit against Trump, Curiel appointed the Robbins Geller law firm to represent plaintiffs. Robbins Geller has paid $675,000 in speaking fees since 2009 to Trump’s likely opponent, Hillary Clinton, and to her husband, former president Bill Clinton. Curiel appointed the firm in the case before Trump entered the presidential race, but again, it might not be unreasonable for a defendant in Trump’s position to wonder who Curiel favors in the presidential election.

These circumstances, while not necessarily conclusive, at least raise a legitimate question to be considered. Regardless of the way Trump has gone about raising his concerns over whether he’s getting a fair trial, none of us should dismiss those concerns out of hand without carefully examining how a defendant in his position might perceive them — and we certainly should not dismiss them for partisan political reasons.

And that’s from The Washington Post. Here’s someone more likely to see Trump’s point: Never “dumb” to shine the spotlight on activist judges.

“Lou Dobbs of Fox Business News, in a recent interview with Gingrich, read from a list of ethnic organizations in which Judge Curiel holds membership. All are activist Spanish-heritage groups. Dobbs also pointed out a possible conflict of interest in the case. One of the attorneys in the law firm appointed by Curiel to represent the plaintiffs has contributed money to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 run for President. (American Spectator)

“When Lou Dobbs made the case that Trump could have reason for concern, given the judge’s associations and conflicts of interest, Gingrich brushed him off responding that Trump’s spotlighting of Curiel’s heritage “in a negative way” was “dumb.”

“First, pointing out a judge’s heritage when that heritage probably leads to bias, especially against Trump because of Trump’s commitment to build a wall on the Mexican border, would seem neither negative nor dumb. Second, Trump’s concern that this judge is an activist, as are so many ethnic legal professionals, is not racist. It’s not at all unreasonable to think that Curiel wants to officiate this particular lawsuit, as a strike at Donald Trump, the wall-builder.”

When you remember that the fall guy after Benghazi was a movie producer who was sent to jail for a year, you might think of the American justice system in a far less benign way.

The elites do not even notice what the working class sees at every turn

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This is Victor Davis Hanson explaining why there are people who favour Trump for President (including him): Class, Trump, and the Election.

Donald Trump seems to have offended almost every possible identity group. But the New York billionaire still also seems to appeal to the working classes (in part no doubt precisely because he has offended so many special-interest factions; in part because he was seen in the primaries as an outsider using his own money; in part because he seems a crude man of action who dislikes most of those of whom Middle America is tired). At this point, his best hope in November, to the extent such a hope exists, rests on turning 2016 into a referendum on class and a collective national interest that transcends race and gender — and on emphasizing the sad fact that America works now mostly for an elite, best epitomized by Clinton, Inc.

That’s how it starts. Read the rest.

Malcolm and national security

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This is Greg Sheridan discussing Malcolm’s views on foreign policy.

The other shocking national-security moment for many Liberals came after Attorney-General George Brandis called on Labor to dis­endorse Peta Murphy, its candid­ate for Dunkley, because she had opposed tough anti-terror laws and questioned whether ­al-Qa’ida’s Somali affiliate, al-­Shabab, should be listed as a terror group. Questioned on Brandis’s stance, Turnbull declined to support him.

Sheridan then goes on to discuss the effect on Liberal “insiders” because, I suppose, we outsiders had not come across this:

Even more astonishing to Liberal insiders, Brandis had co-­ordinated his remarks with Liberal campaign headquarters and was encouraged to make the call. Partly because of the PM declining to back his A-G, terrorism has gone unmentioned in the campaign, ­despite terrorism-related arrests.

No Liberal expects Turnbull to channel Tony Abbott on terrorism, much less to overpoliticise ­arrests. But protecting the nation from terrorism is a core function of government and the Coalition has a very good record on this.

Yet Turnbull refuses to make anything of this issue even though the government is marginally ­behind in the polls and confidence of victory depends on the hope of sandbagging enough seats to resist the general swing.

Sheridan continues further along the same line:

Turnbull and his campaign make almost no mention of defence and Australia’s strategic challenges. Yet ­almost all national-security analysts agree the nation’s strategic circumstances are becoming more challenging. There is an obvious, strong case that the coalition is better equipped to handle these ­issues than Labor, but the PM’s ­apparent discomfort with national security, or unwillingness to campaign on it, has left Liberal silent on one of its strongest issues.

I continually hear about how we need stability and given our recent past, how important it is to allow a Prime Minister to get through his full term. For me, a promise to throw Malcolm out within the first six months of the next Parliament would be the only certain way to get my vote.

Jake Tapper asked if he thought it was a conflict of interest

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This is the bit from this story – Sanders hits Clinton Foundation over foreign donations – that has to make you ponder just how corrupt the American media is:

Democratic presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders criticized the Clinton Foundation for accepting donations from foreign governments in an interview aired Sunday, calling it a conflict of interest.

“Do I have a problem when a sitting secretary of State and a foundation run by her husband collects many, many dollars from foreign governments — governments which are dictatorships?

“Yeah, I do have a problem with that. Yeah, I do,” Sanders said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

When host Jake Tapper asked if he thought it was a conflict of interest, Sanders said, “I do.”

Look Jake, you wouldn’t want to jump to any conclusions, would you?

Chapter One: The Vase

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clinton crisis of character

Secret Service agent to release tell-all book about the Clinton White House and the culture that ‘sickened’ him. The main points:

  • Gary Byrne says he was posted outside Bill Clinton’s Oval Office in 1990s
  • Was one of the agents who testified to a grand jury about Monica Lewisnky [sic]
  • Complained about her behavior and ‘out of hours’ access to the West Wing
  • Releasing book so voters understand the ‘real’ Clinton before the election
  • Reports say his expose is causing deep concern in the White House
  • The release of the book comes a month before the Democratic convention
  • Secret Service agents have openly discussed protecting Hillary in the past
  • Investigative journalist Ron Kessler said agents detested Hillary

My guess is that if the book is being published there’s nothing in it that will disturb Hillary. I’ve heard every story before and it has not made any difference. Character may be destiny, but policy sense is what we are looking for in a president, which this discusses not at all. If Obama can get away with his book being written by Bill Ayers, this will make less noise than a tree falling in the forest.

Facts be damned

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trump economic tweet

Obama said the economy is great, thanks to him, and Trump therefore tweeted the above sets of data which the Washington Post then fact checked. The result: WashPost’s Bump ‘Fact-Checks’ Trump’s Retweeted Obama Economy Charts: Facts Win, 9-0.

Readers can rest assured that despite [The Washington Post‘s] pitiful efforts, the chart-containing tweet which Trump retweeted still stands tall. Trump struck out the Obama-supporting side on nine pitches, er, charts. Bump doesn’t even have a clue that this is objectively the case.

The charts in the retweet are based purely on facts. Each clearly indicates in its red-shaded area what has happened during Barack Obama’s presidency, Each shows that the trends presented have gotten worse under Obama.

You would actually think these journalists would prefer to see the economy run well than have a Democrat in the White House. In fact, they just don’t care. They will continue to lie and mislead to protect the Obama legacy, such as it is, and to get Hillary elected in spite of everything. It is all politics all of the time, and facts be damned.

Ignoring the evidence is a specialty of the left

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There are some things, as Orwell famously said, that are some things so stupid only an intellectual could believe them. From an article by Stacy McCain on Stereotypes are Accurate.

“Consensus” among intellectuals is harmful. Beliefs that are widely accepted in academia are never examined skeptically, and contradictory evidence is ignored or suppressed. . . .

One of the books I most often recommend is Thomas Sowell’s The Vision of the Anointed: Self-Congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy, which examines how certain liberal prejudices distort public policy discussions. Chapter Four, “The Irrelevance of Evidence” shows how liberal beliefs are simply immune to facts. For example, no matter how much evidence you produce showing that the breakdown of the family is a major cause of poverty, liberals insist that racism is the main reason for poverty in America, even though it can be shown that family breakdown causes poverty for white people, too.

The willingness of people to accept explanations that confirm their own prejudices produces myths of “settled science” that can endure for decades within the elite intelligentsia. In his book The Quest for Cosmic Justice, Sowell examines the claims made in Vladimir Lenin’s Imperialism. Lenin asserted that the collapse of capitalism (which Marx had claimed was imminent in the mid-1800s) had been delayed because capitalists had found new sources of profit by exploiting the poor in undeveloped countries. It takes Sowell precisely two pages to destroy Lenin’s claim, showing that the “evidence” provided by Lenin was simply false. And yet, despite the demonstrable falsity of Lenin’s core thesis, and despite the subsequent failure of the Soviet economy, anti-capitalist ideas about “imperialism” and “exploitation” continue to be influential among intellectuals and policy makers. This is just one example of how the leftist prejudices in academia have prevented us from learning useful lessons from recent history. In fact, as John Earl Haynes and Harvey Klehr explain in their 2005 book In Denial: Historians, Communism, and Espionage, academics refuse even to admit the most basic truths of Cold War history, i.e., that the Communist Party in the United States was controlled by Moscow as an instrument of Soviet policy, used for espionage and subversion. The idea that “McCarthyism” was essentially paranoid — that there was no domestic threat from Soviet agents and that innocent liberals were wrongfully persecuted in a “witch hunt” — continues to be promoted in American universities, despite the abundant evidence that Joe McCarthy was basically right about the Communist menace. (See Blacklisted by History: The Untold Story of Senator Joe McCarthy and His Fight Against America’s Enemies by M. Stanton Evans.) The world looks much different when you are willing to examine facts that may contradict your own prejudices, but for decades the academic elite in America has ignored evidence that doesn’t conform to the “progressive” worldview.

Or to quote Mark Twain this time, “It ain’t what you don’t know that gets you into trouble. It’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.” There is quite a bit of that around and it will be the death of us.

Does Obama have anything to do with the American election this year?

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trump foreign policy

This is not a particular good article, but the point it makes is a serious one: 3 Reasons We’ve Forgotten Obama in the 2016 Race — and Why We Shouldn’t.

[Let me] illustrate a particular media trend — a blindness to the powerful impact of over seven years of a disastrous presidency. How does Obama get off the hook for all this? Why do we not see the 2016 election for what it rightly is, a referendum on his failed presidency? Here are three key reasons, from the least effective to the most.

The real reason is that virtually the whole of the media support the Democrats and can barely push the keys to say a word of criticism of Obama. This will be the problem from here to November. Whether Trump can withstand what he will need to deal with over the coming months is the question, along with how much help will he get from the RNC along with how much he will ask for. As noted here, The media have reached a turning point in covering Donald Trump. He may not survive it. It’s the Washington Post, so they will do all they can to make sure that he doesn’t withstand it, but we are certainly about to find out.