I’m devoting this space to journalist Matt Taibbi, “China guarantees free speech, unless it undermines “the interests of the state.” …In Russia jails are filling with regime critics…British police routinely conduct speech raids against offenders across the spectrum, Germany boasts about its thought cops on 60 Minutes, and the EU’s vast censorship law, the Digital Services Act, just played a role in helping overturn an election result in Romania. Around the world, from Ukraine to Australia to Israel to India, free expression is in full retreat.

That leaves America, where the First Amendment is the last obstacle to a global movement toward bureaucratization of speech. In last year’s campaign Donald Trump and J.D. Vance rightly ran against the speech excesses of the Democratic Party, with Vance saying views on censorship constituted the “biggest difference” between Trump and Kamala Harris…They seemed to know what they wanted to achieve on this issue.

That operation is now hanging by a thread. Trump is suddenly blowing it on the speech in a big way…reaching into the same emergency-power cookie jar that foreign counterpart-jackasses like Keir Starmer and Olaf Scholz and Thierry Breton have recently raided…Once [Trump] jumps on this bandwagon, we’re all screwed, because there’s nowhere left to run…

Going after people who have the right papers based on a dystopian pre-crime concept, or a vague standard of “hateful” beliefs, is the same thing every other country in the world is already doing.”

“Now is the time for your tears.” Bob Dylan

 Common Sense from Mike Rowe

ABCFam Has Two Mommies

Do any gay people suck? Well, not on television. TV gays might be a little b-i-zitchy in a truly stereotypical manner but generally they're all, to paraphrase Groucho: "wonderful people with big bushy mustaches and a love for their fellow humans that out-Saroyans Saroyan". Never mind that you and I know gay people, like everyone else, run the gamut from mensch to schmuck.

National Review's Jim Geraghty writes re the new ABCFam show The Forsters:

Do these characters have any flaws? Well, [lesbian mom] Altruistic School Principal tends to unilaterally decide to bring foster children to live with them without checking with [lesbian mom] Dedicated Police Officer, which in many marriages would be a sign of serious problems with communication, trust, and mutual decision-making. "Hi, honey, I decided we would become foster parents to a teenager who I found in a juvenile detention center. Hope you're okay with that." But because this is television land, Dedicated Police Officer purses her lips a bit, but then says it's okay after a hug.

Maybe this show will prove me wrong. But I suspect its social mission will require Altruistic School Principal and Dedicated Police Officer to be one-note characters, endlessly wise and caring and patient and understanding. After watching the pilot, where the parents come across so saintly, one can't help but suspect that the writers will be terrified about portraying them with any flaws, either because they'll be afraid they're portraying gay parents negatively, or because they fear their audience will be even momentarily repelled by characters that the entire show's purpose is to get you to love and accept.

Everything that was really wrong about classic sitcoms -- and their era -- won't be changed by dropping non-vanilla characters into poorly written shows. Bill Cosby became America's favorite TV dad by doing good television. Geraghty notes that the Washington Times is up in arms about what constitutes "family" in family entertainment. Geraghty himself seems more properly concerned about what constitutes "entertainment".

If it were me I'd have named the show Leave It Two Beavers and dared them to put it on the air -- but I'm something of a stinker my own self...

Pajama Media's Sequestration Roundup

These came to my inbox and this seemed the best way to redirect them to my FB friends and the few who follow these erratic posts:

The Nuts and Bolts of the Sequestration ‘Meat Axe’ by Bill Straub

Special Ops Poised to Take $1 Billion Hit from Sequestration, CR by Bridget Johnson

Allen West's new Next Generation video on sequestration.
questration Will Hurt National Security
Let Sequestration Happen by Tom Blumer

Let’s Go Sequestering! by Rick Moran
Sequestration Will Hurt National Security

Dare to be healthy

We recognize that Social Security has devolved from a system of pay-in and then reap a return to one where current payers support payees while the securities that supposedly support the trust are mortgaged to the point of uselessness. In essence SSI has become a pyramid scheme and our national demographics are shifting to invert that pyramid.

Rather than learn from this serious issue, ACA was built as a pyramid scheme, i.e. it's dependent on a base of payers who would place few or no demands on the system. The issue Will discusses here is a "loophole" that will allow members of the proposed base to escape the role of payer while payee demands will grow and, perhaps, spike upwards dramatically (flu pandemic, anyone?). Some have argued (even cheered) the idea that this flaw is a deliberate choice to break private insurers and force us to a single-provider system.

In any case, as George Will points out, we're robbing Peter to pay Paul after arming Peter with a riot gun.

Why I use big words -- or do I?

I think I was just accused of sesquipedalianism for using the word "misogyny" instead of "hatred of women". Being given to metacognition (thinking about thinking), I thought about my use of words. Having made my living writing educational and promotional videos -- as well as stage-plays -- I'm very comfortable writing in a way that will reach a broad audience. I'm also pretty certain that I'm plain-spoken in terms of being frank, even blunt. For my own musings, though, I think that I use words appropriate for college-level reading -- a level which, having earned a Ph.d., I'm two stages past.

Let's pause here for an important reminder about academic degrees:

Two farmers were visiting by the pot-belly stove in the local feed store.
"Zeke," says the first. "What do you think them degrees are the kids are getting down at the Ag School?"
"Well, Clem, I've been pondering about that and I reckon I've got it about reckoned out. Now the first one the get is a B.S. -- and you know what that stands for..."
"Oh, yeah." answers Clem with a chuckle. Zeke continued on.
"Well, now the next one is an M.S. and I think that must mean 'More of the Same'."
"That makes sense." Clem said. "But what about that there P-H-D?"
"Well, that's got to be 'Piled Higher and Deeper'."

Now, my own pondering and reckoning has led me to conclude that the words I value using tend to be economical, serviceable, and elegant rather than high-falutin' for their own sake. Misogyny is the economical term for hatred of women. Not so much, perhaps, in its basic form but for its ability to convert readily. "Misogyny" and "hatred of women" are pretty much a straight trade in terms of communication. However, "misogynist" and "hatred of womaner" or "misogynistic" and "hatred of womany" are not. So, if one is going to deal with such a subject, you should (I think) be consistent in using the term that will serve you most often.

Of course, I could just be justifying my own hyper-reflexive loquaciousness, it's hard to say.

Friday was not the day for it...

But here are some comments of the day, mostly on things that seemed out of place to me yesterday.

Scott Ott on other news of that day:

More from Pajamas Media:

Rick Moran on The Coming Regulatory Black Hole.

Bill Whittle on the Fiscal Cliff and the leading lemmings...

And all the Trifectioners on Jim DeMint Leaving the Senate:

Rick Berman at Daily Caller on Michigan and Right-to-Work:

Interestingly, one fact that seems to have been missed by the union sympathizers is that unions including the UAW have tens of thousands of members in right-to-work states. The only difference is that in those jurisdictions, the local unions needs to show value, earn their members’ trust, and be free of apparent corruption (on average, two union staff gets indicted every week).

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/12/13/personal-freedom-wins-in-michigan/#ixzz2F4HeiboR

Erick Erickson of Red State on Friday's shootings.

 

John Lott's research has resulted in a book called More Guns, Less Crime -- read excerpts here.