Here is a Current Events Write-Up for today. There will be four
categories of articles in this post. First, there will be right-wing
articles. I have had to watch CNN and MSNBC in the lunchroom at work
this week, and I have gotten tired of the one-sided anti-Trump rhetoric.
I have had an appetite for reasonable right-wing analysis of current
events. Second, there will be a specific category of right-wing article:
ones critiquing the FX/Hulu Mrs. America hatchet-job about the
late Phyllis Schlafly. Third, there will be one left-wing article.
Fourth, there will be articles I have been sitting on for a while but
have not yet posted because the sites are controversial. Still, the
articles make some valuable points. Not all of these articles are
strictly about “current events,” for some are more historical.
Right-Wing Articles
Federalist: “Why Trump Is Right Not To Cede Power Over The Lockdowns,” by David Marcus.
“So why at this juncture would Trump concede that he has no authority
over the lockdowns? Does he get any advantage from it? Do we even know
that it’s true? This is completely uncharted territory. Who knows how
interstate commerce plays into a state-by-state national lockdown? Trump
can force companies to switch to making medical supplies, but he can’t
tell dentists or restaurants to open? Are we sure? Do we have any basis
upon which to know with certainty?
“It is entirely appropriate for the Trump administration to want some
leverage here. The president has been clear day after day and week
after week that he prefers the heavy lifting to be done by governors
closest to the situation, with his help from Washington. But that is not
inconsistent with maintaining a position that the executive branch has
some cards to play. That it is not some powerless dispassionate
observer.”
American Thinker: “Yes, Trump Can Open America,” by Frank Friday.
“Trump is also right on his authority to override the various
governors and their public health orders. Under the Supremacy clause,
federal law beats state laws, and boy, is the Defense Production Act a
law. By the terms of 50 USC 55, Sect. 4533, there is a general power to
‘create, maintain, protect, expand, or restore domestic industrial base
capabilities essential for the national defense…’ and by which ‘…the
President may make provision — for the development of production
capabilities.'”
Daily Caller: “Cuomo: ‘We Don’t Need Any Additional Ventilators,” by Mary Margaret Olohan.
I didn’t care for Governor Cuomo’s grandstanding.
Daily Signal: “The Left Is Calling for Mail-In Voting. Here’s Why It’s a Bad Idea.”
I live in a state that uses mail-in voting rather than polling sites,
and I like that system. It bypasses the problem of people not being
able to go to the polls because they have to work on Election Day. It
also may be apropos amidst the Corona-virus pandemic, when people cannot
gather at polling locations in large numbers. Still, this interview
raises thoughtful considerations against the idea. First, there is the
question of where the ballots will end up. Are some of them going to
dead voters? Can voters be more easily intimidated outside of the voting
booth? If political organizations can mail people’s ballots for them,
is that not a conflict-of-interest, since they can dispense with ballots
that do not fit their agenda? Second, the article argues that absentee
ballots can address the problem of people needing to vote from home due
to the Corona-virus. The article also discusses how a mail-in system
could work well, provided there are safeguards. And it critiques early
voting, since, were the results to be leaked, that could impact party
strategy, the options before the voters, and how voters will vote.
Reason: “WHO Cares?”, by Brian Doherty.
This is actually a libertarian article and is from 2002, but it is
relevant to the President’s recent call for the U.S. to defund WHO.
According to this article, WHO initially had a decent track record in
eradicating diseases, but it has shifted its focus towards First World
concerns, socio-political engineering, and reinforcing its plush
bureaucracy. It is also rife with cronyism.
Right-Wing Mrs. America Articles
Federalist: “Elites Hate Phyllis Schlafly Because She Defeated Them From Home With Six Kids In Tow,” by Colleen Holcomb.
“‘Mrs. America’ portrays Schlafly as the consummate victim,
persecuted by her own conservative ideology and even by God, as she
desperately inquires of her priest why God ‘put this fire in her’ to
fight a political battle — as if it were wrong to do so. They show her
belittled by the chauvinist men in the conservative movement, and
oppressed, scolded, and even raped by her own husband.
“The characterization is intentionally false and would be laughable
if it weren’t so patently offensive. Schlafly biographer Don Critchlow —
who, in addition to interviewing Schlafly, her family, and associates,
had full access to her archives, financial records, correspondence, and
family letters — called the series’ depiction of Schlafly’s marriage,
‘So inaccurate, it’s absolutely shocking.’
“Producers never bothered to ask family members or any of the
hundreds of living people who actually knew Schlafly about her real
experiences, her true character, and her marriage. Instead of risking
pushback by depicting any of Schlafly’s supporters who are still alive,
producers went the cowardly route, choosing to create fictional
characters bearing the names of only deceased ERA opponents.”
Federalist: “Phyllis Schlafly’s Daughter On Why ‘Mrs. America’ Gets Her Mother Wrong,” by Emily Jashinsky.
“Here’s one example of how that does a disservice to viewers. I asked
Cori what it was like to see Blanchett play her mother in the trailers.
‘She has the hair, and the makeup, and the costuming correct,’ Cori
said. ‘What she misses is the warmth in my mother’s eyes.’
“‘She plays her as a cold, calculating, power-hungry woman. My mother
led a volunteer group of women, and I don’t think she could lead
volunteer women unless she was warm and inspiring. And she was. She was
encouraging, she got women to do things, and you can’t do it if you bark
and order it around. You do it by building up leadership. And that’s
what she did. She said, ‘Nobody is born a leader, leaders are made.’ And
she made it her mission to make a multitude of leaders.'”
Left-Wing Article
The Nation: “No, Italy Is Not the Case Against Medicare for All,” by Vale Disamistade.
Subtitle: “The Americanization of Italian health care plays a part in
the country’s disastrous coronavirus outbreak.” But the article also
tries to argue that Italy’s response was more effective than is commonly
thought.
Articles from Controversial Sites
National Justice: “Yes Rabbi, the Impossible Burger is a Conspiracy Against White Working People,” by Erik Striker.
“There is only an issue when technocratic ghouls begin pushing
austerity through the back door by suggesting turning meat and dairy
products into sin-taxxed luxury items in the name of fighting climate
change.
“This is no conspiracy theory, it is documented in depth by Elaine Graham-Leigh in her 2015 book, A Diet of Austerity. Graham-Leigh,
not a Nazi but a Marxist, meticulously documents why billionaires and
neo-liberal think-tanks they fund would much rather place the blame for
environmental degradation on ordinary people who have to drive to work
and enjoy the simple pleasure of a hamburger instead of big business.
“Critics, in other words, believe the world’s robber barons are
pouring billions into climate change think-tanks with the long-term goal
of extracting more wealth upwards by lowering our living standards even
further. The green figleaf is their cover.”
American Renaissance: “Brown v. Board: The Real Story,” by Jared Taylor.
Taylor talks about the back-door political machinations behind the
decision, and the misleading usage of the “dolls” study. Particularly
interesting is this:
“Today, even some of those who cheered the loudest for Brown
have second thoughts. Derrick Bell is a black lawyer and former Harvard
Law School professor. During the 1960s, he worked for the NAACP, trying
to short circuit the legislative process, arguing dozens of school cases
before dozens of judges. By 1976, he had concluded that integration was
a false goal and that blacks should have instead petitioned for the
‘equal’ in the ‘separate but equal,’ established in 1896 in Plessy v. Ferguson.
‘Civil rights lawyers were misguided in requiring racial balance of
each school’s student population as a measure of compliance and the
guarantee of effective schooling,’ he wrote. ‘In short, while the
rhetoric of integration promised much, court orders to ensure that black
youngsters received the education they needed to progress would have
achieved much more.’ This year, the 50th anniversary of Brown,
Prof. Bell put the case even more bluntly. ‘From the standpoint of
education,” he says, “we would have been better served had the court in Brown rejected the petitioners’ arguments to overrule Plessy v. Ferguson.'”
Mintpress: “How a Hidden Parliamentary Session Revealed Trump’s True Motives in Iraq,” by Whitney Webb.
Essentially: the Trump Administration promises to help Iraq rebuild
its infrastructure in exchange for Iraq giving up 50 percent of its oil
exports then fails to help adequately, Iraq receives a better offer from
China, and the Trump Administration threatens to engineer an uprising
against the Iraqi government.
Revolutionary Left Radio: “A Coup in Venezuela: Imperialism, Fascism, and Class War.”
A Marxist defends Marduro against the usual American talking-points.