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Post By James Fulford on 10/02/2020
Earlier: “Black Lives Matter” Is A BLOOD LIBEL Against White America. Here’s Why The Althea Bernstein case has   been debunked by both local and Federal investigators. Via Instapundit, whose comment is "THE DEMAND FOR RACIAL HATE CRIMES EXCEEDS THE SUPPLY"  this story from the local press:  “There had been questions about the veracity of the woman’s report because, unlike in other crimes that occu...
Post By Paul Kersey on 10/02/2020
Previously: Bureau of Justice Statistics 2018 Survey of Criminal Victimization Shows Blacks Committed 90% of Interracial Violent Felonies Between Blacks and Whites  and from 2015: Jared Taylor: What Donald Trump Should Have Tweeted Yes, USA Today is now fact-checking memes detailing black on white crime, to try and downplay the reality of just how bad black on white crime is in America. Fact chec...
Post By Steve Sailer on 10/02/2020
Earlier: FBI: Blacks Made Up 55.9% of Known Murder Offenders in 2019 According to recently released FBI crime data for 2019, here is an extraordinary statistic: although males were an unsurprising 7.6 times as likely to be murder offenders as females, blacks were 8.2 times as likely to be murder offenders as nonblacks: [Comment at Unz.com]...
Post By Steve Sailer on 10/02/2020
From a Washington Post opinion columnist: Imagine what it will be like to never have to think about Trump again Opinion by Eugene Robinson, ColumnistOct. 1, 2020 at 12:34 p.m. PDT If you are like me and you watched Tuesday’s debate with a voice in your head screaming make it stop, take heart: We have the power to do just that. We can evict President Trump from the territory he has forcibly seized ...
Post By Steve Sailer on 10/02/2020
Monica Lewinsky says her mental health was bad for years after being almost carjacked in 2011 by armed men (race unspecified). The mental toll from predatory crime can be severe, but you aren’t really supposed to bring up your victimization if you are white and the criminals weren’t. For example, the newspapers probably remind us more each year about the Emmett Till case of 1955 than of all the bl...
Post By Steve Sailer on 10/02/2020
Following up my review in Taki’s Magazine of the bestseller Caste by Isabel Wilkerson, I’m reminded that many of the practices of the Hindu caste system sound like our current Social Distancing festishes gone nuts. From Wikipedia’s article on caste in Kerala in southwestern India: The entire Malabar region had strict pollution rules that were considered by the observers to be the most extreme in a...
Article By John Derbyshire on 10/01/2020

Alternate pop-culture worlds    The Derbs' weekly Netflix rentals this month included two not-bad movies — better than our recent average.

Once Upon a Time In Hollywood, reviewed by our Steve Sailer at TakiMag was the better of the two.

I didn't enjoy it as much as Steve did; but then, I don't know anything like as much as Steve does about 1960s California, Hollywood, and movies. I agree with the numerous reviewers who complained about the movie being too long, and I naturally frowned at the disrespect shown to Bruce Lee.

The movie kept my attention, though. I stayed awake all through, which is by no means — by no means — always the case with me and movies. The acting is at a high professional standard, and the plot line was clever.

That plot line left me reflecting that two of the three 2019 movies I have seen had alternate-history plots; and the history being altered in both cases was pop-culture history. The other of the two was Yesterday, which I reported on in my April Diary. Is there a trend forming?

Alternate-history stories are of course nothing new. As I noted in April, I've been reading them for almost as long as I've been reading. For the most part, though, their worlds are ones in which some large historical event turned out differently. The allies losing WW2 has been the most thoroughly worked-over alternate world: The Sound of his Horn by "Sarban," Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle, Robert Harris' Fatherland, … How many have there been?

Other writers have been more adventurous. Robert Silverberg wrote a rather good novel in which the Ottoman Empire took over all of Europe in the 14th century — Shakespeare's plays were written in Turkish — and held it until the 1900s. Kingsley Amis gave us Russian Hide & Seek, in which the USSR has occupied the British Isles. (Inspiring me to a similar but much shorter effort.)

A favorite of mine, although only at short-story length, was Poul Anderson's "Eutopia," which flips through several alternate worlds, although nothing like as many as David Gerrold's novel The Man Who Folded Himself. And then of course there is Harry Turtledove … Yeah, I know, I've read way too much sci-fi.

Placing the historical switch in the realm of pop culture — of pop music in the case of Yesterday, Hollywood in Once Upon a Time — is new to me, although I may just be out of date here. I've been striving to think of similar plot lines.

  • The young Fred Astaire successfully resisted his mother's efforts to train him as a dancer. His physical genius instead found an outlet in martial arts, of which he became a world-famous popularizer. At the climax of the movie an elderly but still-agile Fred (b. 1899) takes on Bruce Lee (b. 1940) … OK, maybe I'm just getting back at Tarantino for the Bruce Lee caricature.

  • Mario Puzo can't get any movie producers interested in making The Godfather as written, so he starts over, pitching it now as a musical …

No, I'm not really getting anywhere with this, am I? If any readers have suggestions, I'll put them in my next email round-up. If any suggestion ends up as a movie, though, I want a cut of the movie rights.

[Permalink]


Mister Jones.     I mentioned having seen two not-bad movies this month. Number Two was Mr. Jones, based on Welsh journalist Gareth Jones' 1933 foray into Stalin's USSR.

Jones' mother, around 1900, had lived in Ukraine as tutor to the grandchildren of Welsh industrial entrepreneur John Hughes, who had founded the iron-working city of Donetsk — actually named Hughesovka until the Revolution. That connection inspired Jones, against all the rules, to go take a look at how Ukraine was faring in 1933. It was, of course, in the throes of a dreadful famine.

It's a story worth telling, and the movie's not badly done. Main negatives: if you don't know the outlines of the story in advance, it's not clear who's who (Mrs Derb didn't, so I had to keep pausing the thing to explain); the scenes of Jones trekking through deserted snow-bound villages could have been cut by half; and the producers were a bit heavy-handed with atmosphere, which, like so many things in life, is best attained if not striven too hard for.

There were some good character sketches, though. Peter Sarsgaard was a fine repulsive Walter Duranty, the New York Times reporter who shilled for Stalin and got a Pulitzer Prize for it (never revoked). It was nice to see a screen portrayal of George Orwell, too, although the mustache doesn't look quite right.

We also get a glimpse of Malcolm Muggeridge, the only movie portrayal of the old gadfly that I know of. It's the merest glimpse, the bittiest of bit parts: no speaking lines, just a background figure in a crowded-party scene, the left one of the two people face-on here. (The other I think is Ralph Barnes.)

Article By Patrick J. Buchanan on 10/01/2020

In their first debate, the president of the United States, challenged by the former vice president, performed poorly—even by his own estimation.

If memory serves, an instant poll showed that the American people, by 47-43, thought Walter Mondale had bested Ronald Reagan in the Louisville debate where the president made such gaffes as citing the high cost of the military's "food and wardrobe."

By week's end, reflecting the press commentary, 80% of the country was of the view that Mondale had crushed Reagan.

Democrats were cheering Mondale as "The Louisville Slugger."

Among Republicans, there was real alarm. Had The Gipper "lost it"?

The president blamed his staff for stuffing him like a pelican with facts that he spent much of the debate trying to regurgitate. This set the scene for the second debate in Kansas City where Henry Trewhitt of the Baltimore Sun put to Reagan the question raised by the first debate:

"Mr. President, I want to raise an issue that I think has been lurking out there for two or three weeks and cast it specifically in national security terms. You already are the oldest president in history. And some of your staff say you were tired after your most recent encounter with Mr. Mondale. I recall yet that President Kennedy had to go for days on end with very little sleep during the Cuban missile crisis. Is there any doubt in your mind that you would be able to function in such circumstances?"

Reagan stepped into the pitch:

"Not at all, Mr. Trewhitt, and I want you to know that also I will not make age an issue of this campaign. I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent's youth, and inexperience."

Came then the kicker. "I might add, Mr. Trewhitt ... that it was Seneca, or was it Cicero ... that said, 'If it was not for the elders correcting the mistakes of the young, there would be no state.'"

Post By Washington Watcher II on 10/01/2020
Previously: Trump Keeps Refugee Promise—Why Are Lankford Nine Whining? The Trump administration announced Wednesday it would reduce America’s refugee intake to the lowest number in history. Just a few minutes before the congressional deadline to announce the refugee caps for the fiscal year 2021, the administration declared it would accept no more than 15,000 refugees. That is a 16.5% decrease over...
Post By Washington Watcher II on 10/01/2020
The media is in an apoplectic frenzy over President Trump’s refusal to condemn the Proud Boys. Journalists call the pro-Trump group violent white supremacists who pose a far greater danger than Antifa. And the worst part of all: Republican politicians agree with the lying press. The media image of the Proud Boys is not based in reality. The Proud Boys, despite their white supremacist reputation, a...
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By John Derbyshire on 10/01/2020

Alternate pop-culture worlds    The Derbs' weekly Netflix rentals this month included two not-bad movies — better than our recent average.

Once Upon a Time In Hollywood, reviewed by our Steve Sailer at TakiMag was the better of the two.

I didn't enjoy it as much as Steve did; but then, I don't know anything like as much as Steve does about 1960s California, Hollywood, and movies. I agree with the numerous reviewers who complained about the movie being too long, and I naturally frowned at the disrespect shown to Bruce Lee.

The movie kept my attention, though. I stayed awake all through, which is by no means — by no means — always the case with me and movies. The acting is at a high professional standard, and the plot line was clever.

That plot line left me reflecting that two of the three 2019 movies I have seen had alternate-history plots; and the history being altered in both cases was pop-culture history. The other of the two was Yesterday, which I reported on in my April Diary. Is there a trend forming?

Alternate-history stories are of course nothing new. As I noted in April, I've been reading them for almost as long as I've been reading. For the most part, though, their worlds are ones in which some large historical event turned out differently. The allies losing WW2 has been the most thoroughly worked-over alternate world: The Sound of his Horn by "Sarban," Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle, Robert Harris' Fatherland, … How many have there been?

Other writers have been more adventurous. Robert Silverberg wrote a rather good novel in which the Ottoman Empire took over all of Europe in the 14th century — Shakespeare's plays were written in Turkish — and held it until the 1900s. Kingsley Amis gave us Russian Hide & Seek, in which the USSR has occupied the British Isles. (Inspiring me to a similar but much shorter effort.)

A favorite of mine, although only at short-story length, was Poul Anderson's "Eutopia," which flips through several alternate worlds, although nothing like as many as David Gerrold's novel The Man Who Folded Himself. And then of course there is Harry Turtledove … Yeah, I know, I've read way too much sci-fi.

Placing the historical switch in the realm of pop culture — of pop music in the case of Yesterday, Hollywood in Once Upon a Time — is new to me, although I may just be out of date here. I've been striving to think of similar plot lines.

  • The young Fred Astaire successfully resisted his mother's efforts to train him as a dancer. His physical genius instead found an outlet in martial arts, of which he became a world-famous popularizer. At the climax of the movie an elderly but still-agile Fred (b. 1899) takes on Bruce Lee (b. 1940) … OK, maybe I'm just getting back at Tarantino for the Bruce Lee caricature.

  • Mario Puzo can't get any movie producers interested in making The Godfather as written, so he starts over, pitching it now as a musical …

No, I'm not really getting anywhere with this, am I? If any readers have suggestions, I'll put them in my next email round-up. If any suggestion ends up as a movie, though, I want a cut of the movie rights.

[Permalink]


Mister Jones.     I mentioned having seen two not-bad movies this month. Number Two was Mr. Jones, based on Welsh journalist Gareth Jones' 1933 foray into Stalin's USSR.

Jones' mother, around 1900, had lived in Ukraine as tutor to the grandchildren of Welsh industrial entrepreneur John Hughes, who had founded the iron-working city of Donetsk — actually named Hughesovka until the Revolution. That connection inspired Jones, against all the rules, to go take a look at how Ukraine was faring in 1933. It was, of course, in the throes of a dreadful famine.

It's a story worth telling, and the movie's not badly done. Main negatives: if you don't know the outlines of the story in advance, it's not clear who's who (Mrs Derb didn't, so I had to keep pausing the thing to explain); the scenes of Jones trekking through deserted snow-bound villages could have been cut by half; and the producers were a bit heavy-handed with atmosphere, which, like so many things in life, is best attained if not striven too hard for.

There were some good character sketches, though. Peter Sarsgaard was a fine repulsive Walter Duranty, the New York Times reporter who shilled for Stalin and got a Pulitzer Prize for it (never revoked). It was nice to see a screen portrayal of George Orwell, too, although the mustache doesn't look quite right.

We also get a glimpse of Malcolm Muggeridge, the only movie portrayal of the old gadfly that I know of. It's the merest glimpse, the bittiest of bit parts: no speaking lines, just a background figure in a crowded-party scene, the left one of the two people face-on here. (The other I think is Ralph Barnes.)

By Patrick J. Buchanan on 10/01/2020

In their first debate, the president of the United States, challenged by the former vice president, performed poorly—even by his own estimation.

If memory serves, an instant poll showed that the American people, by 47-43, thought Walter Mondale had bested Ronald Reagan in the Louisville debate where the president made such gaffes as citing the high cost of the military's "food and wardrobe."

By week's end, reflecting the press commentary, 80% of the country was of the view that Mondale had crushed Reagan.

Democrats were cheering Mondale as "The Louisville Slugger."

Among Republicans, there was real alarm. Had The Gipper "lost it"?

The president blamed his staff for stuffing him like a pelican with facts that he spent much of the debate trying to regurgitate. This set the scene for the second debate in Kansas City where Henry Trewhitt of the Baltimore Sun put to Reagan the question raised by the first debate:

"Mr. President, I want to raise an issue that I think has been lurking out there for two or three weeks and cast it specifically in national security terms. You already are the oldest president in history. And some of your staff say you were tired after your most recent encounter with Mr. Mondale. I recall yet that President Kennedy had to go for days on end with very little sleep during the Cuban missile crisis. Is there any doubt in your mind that you would be able to function in such circumstances?"

Reagan stepped into the pitch:

"Not at all, Mr. Trewhitt, and I want you to know that also I will not make age an issue of this campaign. I am not going to exploit, for political purposes, my opponent's youth, and inexperience."

Came then the kicker. "I might add, Mr. Trewhitt ... that it was Seneca, or was it Cicero ... that said, 'If it was not for the elders correcting the mistakes of the young, there would be no state.'"

By Ann Coulter on 09/30/2020

Earlier By Ann Coulter: Trump Wins "Disavowal" Game, Then Super Tuesday

After four months of looting, arson, window breaking, vandalism, intimidation, physical assaults, stabbings and shootings by Black Lives Matter and antifa, the first thing on the media’s mind is … getting Trump to condemn “white supremacists”!

It would be as if, on the morning after Pearl Harbor, the League of Nations demanded that FDR condemn American aggression in the Pacific.

Why on earth was Trump being badgered by both debate moderator Chris Wallace and Democratic nominee Joe Biden to denounce “white supremacy”? And why wasn’t Biden ever asked to condemn the nonstop violence by antifa that actually has been consuming the country for more than 100 nights now?

Wallace to Trump: “Are you willing tonight to condemn white supremacists and militia groups?”

Trump (perfectly accurately): “Sure. I’m willing to do that. But I would say almost everything I’m seeing is coming from the left wing, not the right wing.”

The media’s position on the murderous BLM and antifa riots has gone from What riots? They’re peaceful protests! to The rioters are white supremacist Trump supporters!

Who thinks white supremacists are a major force in America? There haven’t been any two people in 50 years who’ve gotten together and said, “Aren’t whites way better? Shouldn’t we rule over other people?”

“White supremacy” is a bogus concept invented on college campuses. There are white men who do horrible things, just as there are Asian men and black men who do horrible things. But they don’t represent any kind of kind of organized movement.

You know what’s an organized movement? Antifa—Rose City Antifa, Antifa Seven Hills, Antifa Sacramento, Atlanta “Antifascists” and so on. They’re organized well enough that hundreds, sometimes thousands, of antifa members always know exactly when and where to show up, and what weapons to bring. Then they turn around and celebrate the destruction they’ve wrought (unpunished by Democratic mayors and liberal district attorneys).

 

By Michelle Malkin on 09/30/2020

Earlier by Michelle Malkin: Sunrise Movement—The Riotous Left's Pot-Banging Brats

Last week, while on a business trip in Wisconsin, I learned about an insane ballot harvesting scheme that appears to be tied to a deep-pocketed liberal advocacy group subsidized by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, Google, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and eBay former chairman Pierre Omidyar's Democracy Fund.

Conservative talk radio host and grassroots activist Vicki McKenna blew the whistle after hearing ads played during her daily show on 1310 WIBA.

"Last week on my radio program, we played Biden campaign ads," she told me. "They were all about something called 'Democracy in the Park.' It was an advertisement about how Madison, Wisconsin, would have 200 parks hosting ballot harvesting events." The ads were punctuated by a disclosure that they were "paid for by Joe Biden for President."

On Saturday, Sept. 26, as advertised by the Biden campaign, Madison poll workers turned out across the city to register voters and collect absentee ballots, even though in-person absentee ballot collection is not supposed to start until two weeks before Election Day, according to Wisconsin state election law. Several of McKenna's listeners showed up to photograph the city government workers' activities promoted by the Biden for President campaign. The poll workers stuffed ballots into "red zipper bags with no security whatsoever. The poll workers witnessed people's (blank) ballots, just like you would if you did an in-person absentee ballot, threw them in the red zipper bags, and we don't know what's become of these ballots since," McKenna told me.

By Jason Kessler on 09/29/2020

 

Antifa unloading a U-Haul full of riot supplies, including shields and weapons

Recently, I pointed out that the Antifa groups that attacked the 2017 Unite The Right rally in Charlottesville VA were also key to this summer’s BLM riots. Now arrests during the current Breonna Taylor riots in Louisville KY have proved my point: notably Sean Gerwing Liter and his girlfriend Holly McGlawn-Zoller—who was notoriously caught In a video clip unloading a U-Haul filled with riot supplies [U-Haul Seen Distributing Shields, Potential Weapons to Louisville Rioters Rented to Holly Zoller of Soros-Connected Louisville Bail Project, by Cassandra Fairbanks, Gateway Pundit, September 23, 2020]—were also caught on camera leading the charge in Charlottesville three years ago. Had our rulers done their duty, defended UTR’s civil rights and cracked down on these Communist vigilantes, America would now be a very different country.

Holly McGlawn-Zoller and Sean Gerwing Liter are both co-founders of Louisville Anti-Racist Action, an integral part of the Antifa Torch Network, explicitly known for being “militant” (Louisville Antifa: Inside Two Of The City’s Most Militant Activist Groups, by Danielle Grady, LEO Weekly, February 19, 2020)

Therefore, it is no surprise that Zoller and Liter are involved in the Louisville riots that followed a grand jury indictment against a single police officer over the death of Breonna Taylor. (Violence erupts in Louisville after only 1 cop indicted in Breonna Taylor case, by Noah Goldberg, Leonard Greene and Nancy Dillon, New York Daily News, September 3, 2020)

Video footage shows that Zoller’s riot shields and barricades were used in violent brawls against law enforcement. At the 50 second mark in the video below, a riot shield is being thrown at the head of a Louisville police officer.

Liter was arrested on multiple charges stemming from the recent riots in Louisville. According to Jefferson County court records, he was arraigned on charges of obstructing a highway, disorderly conduct, unlawful assembly, and driving a vehicle with an obstructed windshield.

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