The primary issue that Donald Trump rode to victory on in the 2016 election was immigration.  It worked against old-school conservatives of the Bush school in the primaries first, who had quietly embraced large-scale immigration as providing cheap labor necessary for our economy. It worked against the Obama Democrats who had chosen to cast off the white working class’s concerns about the issue in favor of importing a whole new underclass whose vote they could purchase for generations as dependent clients of the welfare state.  The real story can never be controlled by those who care for narratives only because of the power they bestow. (No, this is not some paranoid right-wing fantasy — we have not thrown our copy of The Emerging Democratic Majority (“Demography is Destiny!”) down the memory hole just yet. We’re still down for the count.) Among all the issues that immigration raises, perhaps the most important one is assimilation. This is an issue worldwide, where it has, in many places, dwarfed all other issues, at least to many of the native-born who feel that the very core of their purpose as a nation is not shared. They believe that the new immigrants are repaying their welcome with contempt for them and their culture. They see a not-so-concealed agenda to replace the welcoming culture with the immigrants’ culture against the will of the erstwhile welcomers. Assimilation as Moral Necessity Assimilation has been an issue for me as a Jew since we debated it in my high school Sunday School class. It’s been an issue in Jewish life ever since the destruction of King Solomon’s Temple and the forced exile of almost all the Jews to Babylonia. There was a mass exile when the Assyrians conquered the northern Kingdom of Israel, uprooted the 10 tribes who had resided there, and scattered them across the Assyrian lands. That had been Assyria’s way of dealing with conquered nations: Scatter them about so that they lose all cohesion and identity. (READ MORE from Shmuel Klatzkin: The Gollum Possibility at the DNC) More than assimilation, it was a way of wiping out the original identity entirely. It succeeded — those Jews who were exiled are known as the 10 Lost Tribes because, wherever they may be, their identity as part of the people of Israel is lost, at least for the last two-plus millennia. When the remaining Jewish kingdom, Judah, was conquered, the Babylonians exiled them but allowed them to stay together. Among the Jews, there was a divine prophecy that struck a balance between the need of the larger sovereignty to be sovereign and the need of the Jews to maintain their relationship with God. Jeremiah delivered these words to the people in exile in God’s name: Build houses and live in them, plant gardens and eat their fruit. Take wives and beget sons and daughters; and take wives for your sons, and give your daughters to husbands that they may bear sons and daughters.… And seek the welfare of the city to which I have exiled you and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its prosperity, you shall prosper. This does not mean that the people are to lose their identity — Jeremiah will later condemn the exiles in Egypt for doing just that — they are to remain distinct and identifiable, as their faith requires.  What it does mean is that they are commanded by their religion itself to act loyally and positively with the kingdom that is their host. They are to engage in reciprocal altruism, by divine command. God is instructing them not only in what to do but in the why — you will yourself prosper along with the nation to which you devote yourself. Most important is that this is communicated as a divine imperative: God requires this cooperation of you. God is not asking you to make a show of cooperation but to be sincere in it, to the point that you will pray on its behalf.  In the Jewish law tradition, with its millennia-spanning continuity, this principle of recognizing the legitimate authority of a host country is encoded today in the principle of dina demalchuta dina — the law of the kingdom is law. What this means is that laws propagated by any sovereignty are binding on Jews by Jewish law as well as the power of the state. The only exceptions are laws that persecute Jews or that serve no legitimate aim in furthering the commonwealth when the government acts more as a gang of bandits than as a proper sovereignty.  Assimilation Is Not Annihilation  When the Constitution had finally been ratified by all 13 original states, President Washington visited the last ratifying state, Rhode Island, to celebrate. When he was there, he was approached by the Jewish community of Newport to clarify the terms under which Jews would be living in this new country. Washington’s answer, in letter form, set out terms that embrace the idea of Jeremiah’s prophecy, seen from the other side. In the key paragraph, he wrote:  All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship … Happily the Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance requires only that they who live under its protection should demean themselves as good citizens, in giving it on all occasions their effectual support. In other words: We do not require you to change your religion; you are only required to be an effectually supportive citizen, the same as anyone else. And the Jews responded to this declaration and, as Jeremiah foretold, America and its Jews have prospered together. (READ MORE: Will Jews Stay With Feckless Dems in 2024?) Though America has known bigotry and has even seen, briefly, an official expulsion of Jews from certain areas, those have proven to be aberrations from the American trajectory. The greatest threat to American Jews has been the kind of assimilation that had nothing to do with what Jeremiah and Washington outlined. The country has never required assimilation that throws away ancient commitments set by God. But some have thought freedom was to be found by leaving responsibilities behind.  Reject the Nihilism of the Democrat Party As we approach the issue of immigration, we would do well to bear in mind the lessons of Jeremiah and George Washington. It is legitimate to expect of any people coming to live in another land that they are committed to it — that they pray for its welfare and seek their prosperity as part of the prosperity of the country in which they will now live. They must always give their adopted home their effectual support. We must expect this of them, and we need not be ashamed to require it, even as we require it of ourselves. There will be one law for you and the stranger that comes to dwell. A false duality has been presented to us by our dysfunctional political culture: One can either give up one’s former identity or forfeit one’s place as a full citizen in the United States. There is a place for the gifts of identity and history that each immigrant brings, the light of their own journey and story in all the particulars that make it unique, focused, and powerful. The past is not a burden to be thrown off and only thus are we free, contrary to the oft-repeated musings of a would-be philosopher queen. Our country does not rise as a freakish test-tube monster, absent parents. On the contrary: e pluribus unum, our unity is a confluence of many lives and the gifts each one brings. They come here for a reason, and inasmuch as that reason is positive and respectful of our national purpose and sovereignty, each one enriches us. America is a great tree fed by many, many strong roots. All this requires that America not adopt the jahr null nihilism of Kamala Harris’ party, in which the past is severed from our lives, and all we have at any one moment is what we will be told by those who control the story — or think they do. It is people who know where they have been that know where they now need to go. “Freeing” ourselves of the past makes us the slaves of the ruling class’s propagandists and the pawns of their power. The real story can never be controlled by those who care for narratives only because of the power they bestow. As Genesis declares: This is the book of the history of Adam’s kind. The medieval Spanish mystic, Nachmanides, commented that the book here means all of God’s instruction, and it is written in the lives of all of Adam’s descendants. We each have our part of the larger story which is ours to live and tell and will outlive the manufactured, self-serving narratives of those who must destroy history to establish the place they imagine is theirs. We have a culture that is true to the oldest memory of humankind. It is what made this country a place worth coming to, and which forms a part of the story of every true immigrant. When we cure ourselves of our cultural sickness, this affliction of the mind and the spirit that we have no story to tell and no purpose playing out in our national story, then we will welcome gladly those immigrants who bring their gifts and their story with respect and with devotion to a cause they are willing to make their own. It is, first of all, our upholding freedom of conscience that makes us worthy of that respect. For in that, we uphold the ancient condition that nations owe their sovereignty to God in the first place — not to whoever takes the reins of governmental power. This is America at its best, as Washington memorably summarized it in his letter, a place where all our duties align with each citizen’s duty to God.  Long after the deniers of history and the pursuers of unlimited power are gone, may this America, the true America, thrive and prosper, body and soul. The post The Virtues of Immigrant Assimilation appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

The term “Catholic” has, in the present age of identity politics and progressive activism, lost some of its meaning, but the name is still touted as if it is itself a blessing from the Vatican. A group calling itself “Catholics for Choice” advocates one of the most heinous and gruesome of all sins, the slaughter of the innocent unborn. The Catholic heritage is one of virtue, of courage, of longsuffering, and (in a spiritual sense) of conquering the world. Amusingly, Wikipedia notes that the group “is not affiliated with the Catholic Church, as it objects to many of its teachings.” Now, a new group is calling itself “Catholics for Kamala.” How any Catholic can in good conscience claim to support Kamala Harris is a mystery more inscrutable than the Holy Trinity. From her time as a district attorney and later attorney general in California to her tenure in the U.S. Senate, to her catastrophic vice presidency, Harris has accumulated a staggering record of anti-Catholic actions, policies, and rhetoric. Even when not directly, openly criticizing, prosecuting, or persecuting Catholics, Harris opposes everything that the Catholic Church upholds as good, valuable, worthwhile, noble, and even necessary. As if Harris’s extant record were not bad enough, the anti-Catholic animus of her campaign has now been compounded by her choice of running mate: Minnesota Governor Tim Walz. It would indeed be a challenge to find an American politician more blithely and blatantly radical than Harris; but if one were to accept that challenge, Walz would be a good find, a veritable gold mine. (READ MORE from S.A. McCarthy: Learning From the Collapse of Catholic Ireland) Like Harris, Walz vigorously opposes practically every moral and social teaching of the Catholic Church. Abortion, of course, tops the list. As governor, Walz made abortion in Minnesota legal up to the point of birth, allowing fully-formed, completely viable children to be butchered seconds before emerging from the womb. More than that, Walz demanded that doctors abandon babies who survived abortion attempts, leaving them to die of the abortionist’s grievous wounds. He then removed reporting requirements so that no one actually knows how many children have been left to bleed, choke, or suffocate to death on operating tables across the state. His pro-abortion efforts have obviously earned him a 100 percent rating from Planned Parenthood. The Harris-Walz ideological alignment continues: the Minnesota governor is a rabid LGBT activist. While debate continues across the globe on whether children should even be allowed to undergo genital mutilation surgeries and pump themselves full of hormone drugs — all in the name of “gender identity,” of course — Walz has clearly made up his mind on the issue. Last year, Walz went further than most of even the most ardent transgenderism advocates and signed a law that would remove children from their parents and place them in state custody if the parents hesitate to subject their children to the horrors of the gender transition industry. Walz has referred to castration, cutting off penises, and carving up breasts — as well as the psychopathic practice of making fake genitals out of chopped-up forearms — as “healthcare.” He has banned “conversion therapy” in Minnesota and stuffed boys’ school bathrooms with feminine hygiene products, earning the moniker “Tampon Tim.” Perhaps best-known of all, Walz stood by as Black Lives Matter rioters looted, pillaged, defaced, and burned down half of Minneapolis in 2020. Like a pathetic, senile parody of the Roman Emperor Nero, Walz fiddled while the city burned. It was three days before he finally agreed to call the National Guard, but the damage was done, and the BLM hysteria spread across the nation and even across the Western world. During that time, Walz permitted and even encouraged the destruction of a statue of the Catholic hero Christopher Columbus. Unlike Kamala Harris, however, Walz was raised Catholic. He became a Lutheran at the age of 30. Although Walz was, unfortunately, raised in an era in the Church noted for its rather tepid and diluted approach to catechesis, he would have still grown up with the knowledge at least that the Catholic Church frowns upon the slaughter of the unborn. (READ MORE: A Painful Division in the Heart of the Church) Yet he chose to abandon the Catholic Church and now attends a church run by a female pastor, where all employees list their pronouns. The name “Catholic” is not a simple adjective, it is not a means of denoting membership in a club. The Catholic heritage is one of virtue, of courage, of longsuffering, and (in a spiritual sense) of conquering the world. From the beginning, Catholics have boldly suffered for their face, preferring to face the most gruesome of deaths than abandon their God and the Church He established. St. Lawrence was roasted on a spit over an open fire, and so firm was his devotion to the Church that he made light of suffering, famously remarking to his executioners, “You can turn me over now; this side’s done.” When St. Sebastian survived being shot full of arrows, he was brutally clubbed to death. Even more astoundingly, St. Polycarp survived being burned at the stake; when the flames refused to devour him, he was slain with a lance, and his gushing blood extinguished the fire. St. Thomas More was beheaded, St. Edmund Campion was hanged and drawn and quartered, St. Isaac Jogues’s head was split open with a tomahawk, St. Maximilian Kolbe was starved for weeks before being executed by the Nazis. Even many saints who were not slain suffered for the sake of their faith. St. Francis of Assisi would hurl himself into brambles and thornbushes rather than sin against the virtue of chastity. St. Francis de Sales nearly lost his feet to frostbite tramping through the mountains in winter, passing out catechetical books. St. Jean Marie Vianney would sleep only an hour or two per night and ate nothing but boiled potatoes, so consumed was he with the work of saving souls, spending hours daily hearing confessions, preparing his sermons, and physically grappling against Satan. That any would dare to attach the name “Catholic” to such diabolical sects as “Catholics for Choice” or “Catholics for Kamala” is an appalling insult to 2,000 years of saints (both known and unknown) who have lived and died, suffered and sweat, cried and bled for the love of God and His Holy Catholic Church. Those calling themselves Catholics and backing the Harris-Walz ticket would do well to look to Walz himself as a warning: they, too, may find themselves following in his footsteps and leaving the Catholic Church. Of course, if they’re already endorsing abortion and sodomy, then leaving the Church would really just be making their relationship with Hell official. The post The Atrocity Known as ‘Catholics for Kamala’ appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

It has long been a big part of the American Dream to own your own home, whether a single-family bungalow or a condo or a co-op. That has become even more urgent since inflation became the bugaboo of our lives and drove home prices into the stratosphere in many parts of the USA (especially here in California where I am sitting right now). Economics is — or should be — about making yourself as happy as possible within your limited means. But why? Why do we all love property? First of all, we love property because everybody else loves property. It’s a fad, even an obsession, that we should own our own homes. It’s the Hula Hoop of our day. But it’s much more than that. There are authentic reasons based in the arcane system of economics, the dismal science that showers so many good things on those who bother to learn anything about it. Reasons for Homeownership First of all, turn to that perennial: how do homes compare with government bonds? If you bought a government bond, you would get a coupon every month or every quarter or at some other interval. The payments on that bond would be fully taxable at the federal level. When it came time to sell it, if there were a capital gain that income would be fully taxable. In fact, a large portion of the government’s income that year would come from taxing the income on your bonds, either as regular coupons or from capital gains on those same bonds. If you bought a home, the “income” from your home would mostly consist of the enjoyment you derived from living in and occupying that home. It is not considered taxable income under the Internal Revenue Code. However, any gain you and your family enjoyed would be considered “capital gains” income. At some points it would have been taxed at far lower rates than earned income, i.e., income from actual labor. Nowadays, the rate fluctuates quite considerably, but as income tax rates change, the differential between earned income tax rates and capital gains rates has narrowed. Homes as a Hedge Against Inflation Two: Inflation: We all observe that what we might call “hard goods,” brick and mortar and soil, rise rapidly as inflation gnaws at the economy. Radio waves as transmitted by the Internet tend to drop in value and in cost. Investing in the Internet seems to drop in both value and cost as the costs involved in making the content of the Internet fall. A home is a combination of labor and materials that tends to rise in value as inflation roars along. Plus — and this is important — it tends to create value as time passes, even as high tech tends to fall. Plus, as environmentalists make building a home ever more difficult, the value of a home rises just as the value of a medical degree rises as ever more restrictions are placed on that MD. Three — and this is highly subjective — many years ago, I had the great pleasure of having a lengthy conversation with America’s greatest economist, Milton Friedman. Dr. Friedman was asked by me what the single best investment would be as far as he was concerned. “Whatever you enjoy the most,” answered the great man. “If new shirts from Brooks Brothers make you happy, buy them and wear them. If a date with a girl in your class makes you salivate, ask her out and don’t pay attention to the cost.” (I do not pretend that these are exact quotations from Friedman. They were part of a lengthy conversation, much of which would now be considered not just politically incorrect but sinfully incorrect, most of it coming from Ben Stein.) In times of painful inflation, Friedman noted that some of the sting could be taken out of the equation by the simple expedient of making yourself happy. This certainly has been my experience as well. Economics is — or should be — about making yourself as happy as possible within your limited means. It has always made sense to me. (This file is licensed under the Creative CommonsAttribution-Share Alike 4.0 International license.) (http://reason.com/blog/2012/07/31/vid-happy-100th-birthday-to-milton-fried) READ MORE from Ben Stein: Squatters in Northern Malibu Indispensable Lessons From My Life The Mrs. Nixon I Have Always Loved The post Inflation, Houses, and You appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

Older and more mature now, in matters of the heart I have come to the same conclusion as Dave Barry, who said “never again will I underestimate the persuasive power of a woman with legal training and big tits.” If love is the spice of life, flirting is the syrup, or better yet, the Caesar salad dressing, or roast chicken breasts, or grilled sea bass with wedge potatoes. Maybe my doctor is right, there are two things I shouldn’t do when I’m hungry: go to the supermarket and write. Be that as it may, in summer we move from our natural habitat. And just as the swallow mates with the swallow wherever nature calls, no matter how far from its nest it may be, men are stunned by the exotic beauty of girls from other latitudes, and do whatever it takes to pick them up. Okay, flirting and mating are not synonyms, or at least, they shouldn’t be. For some strange reason, men, upon observing young ladies on vacation abroad, assume that they’re dying to party, drink, and flirt. The obstacles men encounter in that critical moment of love are threefold: language, cultural differences, and the six-foot-four dude on the girl’s arm. Flirting In French In French “I love you” is Je t’aime, but it’s too soon for you to say that to a French woman. Besides, like all Gallicisms, it sounds like you’re going to be leading a float at Gay Pride. But if you love a French girl you should speak to her in French, so you can try tu es la plus belle des fleurs des champs (you are the prettiest of the flowers of the field). Tell her and either she runs away, or she smiles; and, if a Frenchwoman smiles at you, French love knows no bounds. Look at Macron, he married his grandmother. Flirting In German Almost all German is just like your own language, but shouting, dropping consonants as if you were clearing your throat, gesticulating like Hitler, and accentuating vowels as if you had just consumed the cannibal drug. The bad thing about German women is that, if they have to choose between saving a kitten’s life or yours, you’re dead. Flirting in Albanian If for some strange circumstance you need to pick up an Albanian woman, tell her Te dua. I don’t know what the hell it means, but if it’s something bad I’m sure her husband will explain it to you with the help of one of those Kalashnikovs that every good Albanian keeps in the attic. Flirting on the Highway The ultimate place to flirt when language is an insurmountable barrier is the car. From your car you can just look at her and smile, and that — I think — is a universal language. If you’re going to do it alone, check first that the girl you want to pick up is in her own car and not driving a police van. It’s happened to me. Spoiler: they’re sick to death of the “hey, officer, could you handcuff me?” joke. Flirting in Italian I love Italian women, but they are not as easy to conquer as you might think. Among other things because I’m told that one of their favorite compliments is sei una ragazza di acqua e sapone, which means “you are a girl of water and soap.” Careful. Say this only if she’s Italian, and I mean very Italian (it’s not enough for her to look like Laura Pausini). If she’s German, for example, she’ll think you’re telling her she smells bad, and if a German girl slaps you, you could end up flying around the world and be back to square one in a matter of seconds. And then she’ll slap you again. Flirting in a Pub The universal pub language is dancing. Try not to speak that language if you are not sure you master it. If she seems up for it and she is Latin American, buy her a drink. But be careful, if she is European, especially if she is Nordic, as she could be one of those half-crazed feminists who think that a man buying them a drink is micromachismo. They bark, but they drink the drink. If you’re not sure of the girl’s country of origin, don’t leave your drink alone, you might get roofied and next thing you know you’ve woken up chained to a bed, surrounded by tattooed gang members with butterfly knives, in some clandestine basement on the outskirts of town, hidden under a marijuana plantation. Flirting in Spanish From Spain If you want to flirt in my native language with a Spanish woman say eres preciosa (you are beautiful). It won’t work, but they usually find it funny when you try to speak their language while tripping on the R’s. Maybe she’ll fall in love with you out of pity. Every little bit helps. Spanish girls kiss with real passion, but only with foreigners, so I speak from hearsay. My country is strange. The girls are very pretty, but the ones under 40 listen to shitty music and move their asses way too much when they dance. Flirting in Thai Thai women are very beautiful. If you want to tell her that you love them try pronouncing C̄hạn rạk khuṇ. My advice is don’t say it in the plural when you’re with several of them or you’ll be taken for a sex tourist. And, by the way, before you propose, check that the frying pan has no handle. I have been told by my informants that over there gender is not fluid, but gaseous. Flirting in Swahili You need to speak Swahili if you’re going to pick up girls in Somalia, Congo, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, and places like that. They’re not the best places in the world to fall in love, but if you can’t help yourself, walk up to a girl and say Bia tafadhali. This means you want a beer and it’s going to be cheaper than saying “I love you” to a random girl in a part of the world where most guys have a lot of wives, little patience, and are usually armed with military weaponry imported by the government with the clever blessing of the UN, and subsequently passed on to the black market, no pun intended. READ MORE from Itxu Diaz: Social Democratic Dictatorship: European Commission Threatens Musk for Interviewing Trump Hobbies for Boring Days Around the House Woke? Nope. Back to Sleep. The post Flirting With a Foreigner appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

Every Western fan has a favorite John Wayne film. Some titles immediately come to the fore: Red River, where Wayne first revealed his versatility as an actor; John Ford’s Cavalry Trilogy; and most obviously The Searchers, often regarded as the greatest Western ever made. I would also add his last film, The Shootist, which was worthy of an Academy Award in my opinion as Wayne (who himself was dying) played one the West’s last great lawman dying of cancer. The domestic scenes with the Quaker family, where a quizzical Wayne watches and comes to enjoy their peaceful lifestyle, are charming. As a long time John Wayne fan, I hold these films in high regard, but I have a soft spot for one that is often passed over in discussions of Wayne’s films: The Angel and the Badman, made in 1947 just as his career would enter its greatest phase.  The film was the first occasion that Wayne served as producer and was the work of one of Wayne’s best friends, James Edward Grant, who would write many of Wayne’s films, including Hondo, Island in the Sky, The Alamo, and one of Wayne’s personal favorites, The Sands of Iwo Jima. Grant was a hard drinking, former newspaperman who had a way of writing dialogue that Wayne felt suited his image. He is listed as the director of Angel and the Badman, though Bruce Cabot, one of the many of Wayne’s Hollywood buddies who played the villain, claims that Wayne directed much of the film.  The story is a simple one. Wayne is a wounded gunman named Quirt Evans, who arrives unconscious at the farm of a Quaker family, is taken in, and nursed back to health by the family. In the process, he falls in love with the daughter, played by Gail Russell in one of her best roles. The scenes between Wayne and Russell hold the film together. Russell’s performance mixes a quiet beauty and a sense of humor as she schools an unbelieving Wayne in her faith in non-violence. The theme of salvation runs through the film as Wayne in the end rejects violence for her. Wayne had a soft spot for Russell, who would struggle with alcoholism her whole life. His wife would claim that they had an affair, but that was just divorce talk. In reality, Wayne felt sorry for her and believed that she was shy and all she needed was for “someone to show her kindness.” She had cost Wayne and Republic Pictures $125,000 for her services, and Wayne threw in some extra money for her. Unfortunately, no one could help her drinking, and she died of alcoholism in 1961 at just 36 years of age. There are a couple of scenes in the film that are worthy of the best John Ford-John Wayne work. Wayne becomes domesticated, even helping in the kitchen and around the farm. As Wayne recovers, he discovers that a nearby miserly farmer controls the water needed for the farmers in the valley. He rides to confront the farmer, played with wonderful grouchiness by character actor Paul Hurst. The farmer is belligerent, until Quirt Evans reveals his name to the farmer. A frightened Hurst immediately opens the sluices. He meets Russell’s family and is softened by their kindness to him. The farmer’s wife cures a boil on his neck and gives him fresh baked goods. Like Wayne, the hardened Hurst is won over by the family’s Quaker kindness. In one of the key scenes in the film, the men who wounded Wayne, led by Cabot, arrive at the farm to confront him. The still weak Wayne takes out his gun only to discover the family had removed all the bullets. He sits in a chair, holding the empty gun, and bluffs Cabot and his gang.  Angel and the Badman is also notable for the legendary Western actor Harry Carey making one of his last appearances in a film. Carey was one of the few Hollywood types who Wayne himself hero-worshipped (John Ford was the other). Wayne copied Carey’s Western dress as well as his laconic low-keyed acting style. The sick Carey — he would die shortly after the film premiered — plays a marshal who is after Wayne. In one scene, he warns Russell that Wayne is no good and is beyond redemption, but she says her love will save him. (READ MORE: The Star Trek Election III: Men vs. Women) In the climactic final scene in the film, Carey kills Cabot and his cohorts, saving Wayne from doing so and going back on his oath to Russell that he wouldn’t resort to violence again. Wayne and Russell ride off together, with Carey smiling and waving his hat.  Wayne would pay homage to Carey in many of his Westerns, particularly the last scene of The Searchers, where, framed against on open door, he looks back on Olive Carey, Harry’s real-life wife, who plays a key role in the film, and holds his arms in the unique way that her husband did in many of his films. When they shot that scene, Olive Carey said she just cried. Not a lot happens in the plot line of Angel and the Badman other than the developing relationship between Wayne and Russell. The domestic scenes with the Quaker family, where a quizzical Wayne watches and comes to enjoy their peaceful lifestyle, are charming. At a picnic, Wayne is given a new Bible by the Quakers in thanks for securing the water for their farms. One of his friends rides up and tells him about an opportunity to rustle a herd of cattle. Wayne is tempted, but seeing Russell being wooed by a young Quaker lad, he turns his back on the scheme. He has been redeemed. (READ MORE: We’ll Never Have Paris) Angel and the Badman was one of Republic Pictures’ big successes in 1947. It made $4 million at the box office, the equivalent of $50 million today. It is one of the rare films where Wayne, a well know Hollywood conservative, played something like a peace convert, eschewing violence. He accepted the Quaker way of life. But in the end, it is The Duke at his best. John P. Rossi is Professor Emeritus of History at LaSalle University in Philadelphia. The post A Little-Known Film Is a John Wayne Gem appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

Sports pages used to be sane alternatives to the insanity of the news pages. No more. Normal Americanos have just gotten their heads around the fact that two guys, or at least non-women, fought for the gold medal in women’s boxing in the most woke Olympics in history, when we see, to our displeasure, that the odious Colin Kaepernick is weaseling his way back into public discussion. Plus, Colin now would have a hell of a time getting an NFL helmet around his magnificent Afro, which has grown larger than some of the closer planets. He’s still flogging the tired idea that he has a future as an NFL quarterback. If the current Colin Kaepernick is NFL quarterback material, I’m the next Archbishop of Canterbury. Before we move on, let’s linger just a bit on IOC head Thomas Bach’s declaration that chromosomes no longer determine sex. Who knew? Bach must have gotten his MD degree from Woke U. This nutso announcement should retire the gold in the freestyle leftist bloviation competition. Chromosomes — no matter what the trans-obsessives insist — and the resulting hormones and muscle mass do separate the boys from the girls. In a combat sport like boxing, if biology isn’t destiny, it’s way the hell ahead of whatever’s in second place. And one is entitled to wonder what those original  Greek Olympians, who competed nude in various hairy-chested sports, think of this abomination, and of such new Olympic “sports” as break dancing and skate boarding. What’s next? Crocheting? But I digress … Back to Colin. A new Alice in Wonderland wrinkle in the sorry Kaepernick saga was added this week when we learned (be seated for this one) that Jim Harbaugh, the Los Angeles chargers’ new head coach, has offered Colin a spot on his coaching staff. I’m not making this up, and I’m not quoting from The Babylon Bee. Funny, Harbaugh doesn’t look stupid. And I doubt he’s conferred with Chargers ownership before launching this fool’s errand. Kaepernick on the payroll, on the field or on the sidelines, would surely lead to ticket sales Hell. Harbaugh didn’t specify what Kaepernick’s coaching duties would be. Perhaps he could instruct chargers players on different kneeling positions they could assume during the playing of the national anthem and tell them where to buy the best pig socks. Harbaugh has won both a college championship and a Super Bowl, His Super Bowl win coming in 2013 with the San Francisco Forty-Niners with Kaepernick as his quarterback. Perhaps he’s allowing sentiment to cloud his judgment. But most sports outlets tell us Kaepernick insists he wants to play again. Of course Kaepernick doesn’t deserve another shot as a player in the NFL. Not just for his delusional politics and his anti-American antics, though these are the main charges and specifications against him and would be enough. Also while the helmets weren’t leather when Colin took his last snap in the NFL, his career is fast fading into the distant past. We’re talking serious ring rust here. Colin is 36, an awkward age for an NFL player. Not every QB can be Tom Brady. And Colin certainly sure as hell wasn’t. Kaepernick Wants a Whipping Boy But for all the sound and fury, I don’t believe for a second that Colin really wants to play football again. He just wants the NFL as a whipping boy and as an excuse for his racialist rants, as well as a way to stay in the public eye, ear, nose, and throat. I’m sure he’s grasped that it’s far more lucrative and less dangerous endorsing the products of woke corporations than getting the stem-winding crap knocked out of him on the football field on Sundays. He’s been out of the game long enough to have forgotten the soul-freezing feeling of a 320-pound lineman with one big eye in the middle of his forehead breathing like a landfill bearing down on him with malicious intent. Plus, Colin now would have a hell of a time getting an NFL helmet around his magnificent Afro, which has grown larger than some of the closer planets. I’m well struck in years now, but my health is good. So perhaps I’ll live long enough to see Colin Kaepernick where he deserves to be, washed up as just another tarry shingle on the beach of old and forgotten news. READ MORE from Larry Thornberry: RIP Mike Marshall Flags Unlimited — Zebras on Steroids? The post Will Wearisome Kaepernick Ever Leave? appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

For years, policymakers and regulators have created a hostile regulatory environment for America’s tech sector. This “techlash” has usually manifested in the form of various proposals targeting these companies’ core products. This includes services like social media, app stores, or online commerce. However, these regulatory efforts have been largely unsuccessful, and now the misguided anti-tech crowd seems to have pivoted toward attacking data centers. Data centers are part of  the vital infrastructure behind consumer-facing services, and they now find themselves in the crosshairs. By weaponizing permitting and zoning laws, emissions and electricity regulations, and tax hikes, policymakers aim to sabotage operations altogether. Policymakers should not fall prey to the anti-tech rhetoric disguised as environmental and energy concerns. As Americans continue to lead increasingly digital lives and artificial intelligence (AI) development continues to soar, computing power has become a precious resource. This has spurred a need for companies to set up data centers in various regions of the country. These have become necessary infrastructure for the modern digital economy. State governments across the country were initially enthusiastic about the prospect of hosting data centers within their borders. These facilities often translated into multi-million-dollar land and construction investments and increases in property tax revenues. Some states were perhaps too enthusiastic, offering myriad tax credits and utility rate discounts in what could be considered state-level industrial policy efforts.  More Energy for Data Centers Unsurprisingly, data centers’ resource-intensive operation requires a significant amount of energy to run properly. This has given anti-tech politicians the perfect excuse to put forward hostile regulations, as the country struggles with a strained energy grid. Under the guise of protecting the energy grid or limiting emissions, local and state governments have enacted regulations that limit companies’ ability to build new data centers.  By constraining fuel choices for backup generators, or raising fees for their basic infrastructure, governments have put the squeeze on America’s tech sector. For example, Arizona, Illinois, and Arkansas passed laws that either suspended data center development or restricted where they can be built. Prince William County in Virginia recently passed a tax hike of 70 percent on their computer equipment.  While a strained electric grid in an increasingly digital economy is a cause for concern, a lot of claims about data centers tend to be hyperbolic or ignorant. Data centers have an economic incentive to lower their energy consumption as much as possible, as energy costs are one of their main operational costs. Not for nothing, most of the data center operators sign lengthy power-purchase agreements to lock-in energy rates to constrain these costs. Not only do they push for a lower rate, but they aim to use energy more efficiently, investing millions of dollars into research and development to optimize their energy consumption. In addition, data centers are a perfect example of an economy of scale producing greater efficiency. It is undoubtedly more energy efficient for hospitals, offices, manufacturers, and other data-intensive industries to contract with data centers versus each running their own server farms. Some companies have even gone so far as developing self-powered centers. In some cases, these facilities have gone from being energy consumers to being energy providers, sending off excess energy back to the grid. Ultimately, in an economy that increasingly relies on digital commerce — and will likely become more dependent on AI — purposefully limiting the country’s computing power would be a strategical blunder. While some politically motivated actors feel compelled to attack the tech industry’s operation by crippling its operating capacity, it will be consumers who will face the costs of diminished computing power. It could also harm the provision of basic government services. If emergency lines like the 911 line are embracing AI to optimize their operations, undermining data center capacity would be an ill-advised policy.  This all goes without mentioning the security tradeoffs of penalizing data center development and storage in the United States. Government’s should avoid unintentionally incentivizing data centers that serve Americans to move overseas. Policymakers should not fall prey to the anti-tech rhetoric disguised as environmental and energy concerns that surrounds these data center bills. Instead of stifling the United States’ computing capacity, policymakers should find ways to maximize its energy production and aid these data centers in becoming more energy efficient. Prioritizing permitting reform, for example, can help them develop the necessary infrastructure to offset their energy consumption in a cost-efficient and timely manner. Juan Londoño is a senior policy analyst at the Taxpayers Protection Alliance.  READ MORE: Harris Can Avoid Reporters But Not Economics America Needs a Rational Energy Policy The post Don’t Regulate Data Centers Out of Existence appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

from Liberty Sentinel: TRUTH LIVES on at https://sgtreport.tv/

"Grandpa, what's a Psyop?" pic.twitter.com/8GzZ13a2Vw — Keri Smith ?Deprogrammed (@RealKeriSmith) August 17, 2024

by Mac Slavo, SHTF Plan: The Israel-Gaza war has reached a bloody new milestone. Over 40,000 Palestinians have been killed since Israel launched an incursion and war on Hamas following the group’s October 7th attack on the Jewish state’s civilians. The health ministry in the enclave said Thursday, that this is yet another dark milestone in […]