Archive for the ‘News/opinion’ Category

One note about this ABC Poll about declining Optimism in America

Posted: July 26, 2021 by datechguy in media, News/opinion

Reality: I am going to tear down your safe space, brick by brick I shall smash it with glee.
Cartman: What? Who is that?
Reality: You cannot stop me from getting inside, I am cold and I am hard and my name … is Reality.

South Park Safe Space 2015

What is the most important part of this story and poll can you spot it?

As President Joe Biden completed 100 days in office, the country was optimistic about the coming year, but now, just after hitting the six-month mark, Americans’ optimism about the direction of the country has plummeted nearly 20 points, a new ABC News/Ipsos poll finds.

A majority — 55% — of the public say they are pessimistic about the direction of the country, a marked change from the roughly one-third (36%) that said the same in an ABC News/Ipsos poll published May 2. In the early May survey, Americans were more optimistic than pessimistic by a 28-percentage point margin. Optimism is now under water by 10 points. Looking ahead to the next 12 months, fewer than half — 45% — now report feeling optimistic about the way things are going, a significant drop from about two-thirds (64%) in the May poll.

Give up? Here is the answer:

It comes from ABC in other words the MSM

For the last six months we have seen left in genera (tech, Hollywood etc) and the MSM in particular do all it can to prop up Joe Biden and the Democrats, to insist that they acquired power legitimately, to insist that their rise was the rescue of America and that we were on the dawn of a new glorious Post Trump age in America.

Yet despite both pushing this narrative to the hilt while suppressing (with the help of Twitter, Youtube, Facebook etc) any narrative contrary to this the country their own poll can’t generate the results they want. Cue South Park again:

Everyone: You can’t ruin our lives Reality.
Cartman: Our safe space will keep you out.
Reality: Rat!
Everyone: We can face almost anything.
Cartman: But reality we can do without.

This shows you the the hole the Biden administration has dug. It’s rather astounding that ABC was unable to generate a result to support their narrative. Sir Humphrey would be very disappointed:

Closing thought. If this is the result the MSM in generating that they are reporting publicly how much much worse must it actually be?

Chicago has most of the tools already to fight violent crime without additional federal help

Posted: July 25, 2021 by John Ruberry in crime, culture, media, News/opinion, politics
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By John Ruberry

Another federal crackdown on guns in Chicago is coming. Just like in 2017 when the Chicago Crime Gun Strike Force was created by the federal government. Obviously it didn’t work well–because here we are in 2021 coping with out of control violent crime in America’s third-largest city.

According to Hey Jackass here are Chicago’s recent homicide and shooting totals:

Year       Homicides  Wounded
2021 
(to date)   443        2,023
2020	    456	       1,902
2019	    303	       1,307
2018	    338	       1,433
2017	    425	       1,813
2016	    414	       2,050
2015	    283	       1,358
2014	    243	       1,227

Already as you can see more people have been wounded so far this year than in any year since 2014, with the exception of 2016. And there have been more homicides–the totals comprised by Hey Jackass include other deaths, such as self-defense shootings–than any year except 2020, when there were 456 homicides. We’re already at 443 with a little more than five months left in 2021.

“2020 did have a lot of shootings in it,” Saniie said. “But it’s also important to put this into perspective.”

Here’s your perspective, Saniie: As I wrote earlier in this entry, violence is out of control in Chicago. A few weeks ago I wrote, correctly of course, “Chicago has a street gang problem not a gun problem.” There are ten gang members for every cop in the city. But let’s talk about guns. Chicago has among the strictest gun laws in America. Oh, don’t believe the long-time apologists’ line that guns from out of state are responsibile for this, or previous, violent crime waves. David Harsanyi ripped that pathetic argument to shreds last year in the National Review. And of course those out of state guns don’t fire themselves.

Chicago has plenty of other laws on the books to fight crime. But Kim Foxx is not a forceful prosecutor. The essential website CWB Chicago, unlike the city’s mainstream media outlets, honestly reports on Chicago crime and holds no punches. Since New Year’s Day it has been documenting the people in Chicago “accused of killing, trying to kill, or shooting someone in Chicago this year while awaiting trial for another felony.” Many of those earlier crimes involve guns. So far CWB Chicago has found 30 such individuals.

According to the same site, 32 people “were charged with committing murder, attempted murder, or aggravated battery with a firearm while free on bail for serious felonies in 2020.”

I don’t have any firm numbers on people in Chicago charged with new felonies while on electronic surveillance because I can’t find any. Perhaps the Chicago Sun-Times, which deems itself “the Hardest Working Paper in America,” or the Chicago Tribune, both of which have greater resources than internet stand-alones, can find out how many ankle-bracelet offenders there are if they put forth the effort. Perhaps such work can reverse their long decline in revenue and subscribers. But alas, both newspapers have a narrative to advance. A false one when it comes to crime.

Even though she is a leftist ideologue like Foxx, Chicago’s mayor, Lori Lightfoot, is not politically close with the Cook County state’s attorney. They may even hate each other. But on the issue of crime they are in lockstep. Last week Lightfoot said Chicago “can’t arrest its way” of of its violence crisis.

Perhaps she is right. But Chicago–and Cook County–can jail and imprison its way, at least for now, out of its violent crime outbreak. But that probably won’t happen. Last month Foxx said that she might drop many low-level charges–her office hasn’t said which alleged crimes would be covered–because of a backlog of cases dating to the 2020 lockdown. Crime very well may pay in Chicago. Foxx is a supporter of “affordable bail.” Meanwhile Illinois’ no cash bail law goes into effect in 2023, two months after Gov. JB Pritzker, who signed that bill into law, faces voters. Al Capone and his henchmen picked the wrong ’20s decade to commit crimes, for sure.

Presumably Cook County judges and Foxx’s attorneys are well-rested from an easy 2020. They need to work harder and fulfil their duty to protect the public. Foxx can put on her lawyer hat and pitch in and help out in the courtroom, although if I was a criminal and she was the lead attorney against me I’d be confident of my chances for an acquittal.

While I’m sure federal assistance will help in fighting violent crime in Chicago, many of the tools are already in place for Lightfoot and Foxx to clean up Chicago now.

Only the Chicago Police Department needs to bring back stop-and-frisk searches, allow foot chases again, and reinstate its gang crimes unit, for starters.

John Ruberry regularly blogs from suburban Cook County at Marathon Pundit. And no, I did not vote for Kim Foxx.

Post Christian/Marxist Sore Thumbs in Science, Law, Tribalism, Truth and the Fruits of it All Under the Fedora

Posted: July 25, 2021 by datechguy in catholic, crime, culture, education, elections, News/opinion, politics, under the fedora, Vive L'Empereur
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You don’t really understand the costs of a Post Christian society until it arrives here are a few thoughts on the subject.

The scientific community was once one of the most trusted communities in the country, because it was based on the process of observation, theory experimentation and results, that is truth. This is a Christian basic principle:

You will know the truth and the truth shall set you free.

John 8:32.

But once “science” became all about pleasing the money men or advancing an ideology, truth was not a goal and once that was recognized trust in scientific institutions disappeared.

Haven’t you ever wondered why so many totalitarian counties were behind scientifically or needed to steal secrets from the west? When truth is suborned to fear it’s hard to generate accurate results.

One of the most critical principles of Christianity is equality before God and equality before the law You shall not act dishonestly in rendering judgment. Show neither partiality to the weak nor deference to the mighty, but judge your fellow men justly. Leviticus 19:15 That was a radical idea when God gave this law to Moses and it was of the things that Jesus called out the Pharisees for:

The scribes and the Pharisees have taken their seat on the chair of Moses. Therefore, do and observe all things whatsoever they tell you, but do not follow their example. For they preach but they do not practice. They tie up heavy burdens (hard to carry) and lay them on people’s shoulders, but they will not lift a finger to move them.

Matt 23:2-4

The blatant double standards we have seen from Hunter Biden and his “Art” sales , to official flaunting the lockdown & mask rules they foist on others, to the treatment of rioters who burn cities vs those who sit on desks and take laptops enrages people. Furthermore the unwillingness to allow those who wish to actually enforce the law as written to do so in cities has led to the exodus of police and the turning of parts of those cities into ‘no go” zones.

The idea that an American could not walk safely in an American city is a concept that was so foreign in my youth that the tolerance of such things today completely puzzles me.

One of the basic principles of Judeo-Christian culture is the caring for others as yourself both in the Old Testament:

You shall not go about spreading slander among your kinsmen; nor shall you stand by idly when your neighbor’s life is at stake. I am the LORD.  

Leviticus 19:16

And the New

One of the scribes, when he came forward and heard them disputing and saw how well he had answered them, asked him, “Which is the first of all the commandments?” Jesus replied, “The first is this: ‘Hear, O Israel! The Lord our God is Lord alone! You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this: ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.“

Mark 12:28-31.

However the Marxist left biggest goals have been to divide us. Punish those who protect their neighbor, allow people to rob and steal. The good one one race isn’t the good of another. The law of one race is not the law of another. The damage this has caused is self evident, yet the realization that the reason this has been so easily accomplished has been the withdrawal of Christian principles of society is not. Nothing better illustrates the bankruptcy of a society then when we decided it was licit and even proper to not lift a finger when other is beaten before us.

The audits have been the best example of another Christian Principle that has been completely suborned:

A good tree does not bear rotten fruit, nor does a rotten tree bear good fruit. For every tree is known by its own fruit. For people do not pick figs from thornbushes, nor do they gather grapes from brambles.

Luke 6:43-44

Our friends on the left insist that the last election was on the up and up but then do all they can to suppress not only the audits of these count and ballots, audits that would supposedly verify their claims, but suppress any that might question then online, why because the truth is not valued. Their reaction and the “Cancel Culture they promote” is no different than the reaction of the crowd to St. Stephen, the 1st of the Martyrs who called out his accusers by their own history and they killed him for it:

But they cried out in a loud voice, covered their ears, and rushed upon him together. They threw him out of the city, and began to stone him. The witnesses laid down their cloaks at the feet of a young man named Saul. As they were stoning Stephen, he called out, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.” Then he fell to his knees and cried out in a loud voice, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them”; and when he said this, he fell asleep.

Acts 7:57-60.

They are creating digital Martyrs although we have not yet reached the point where they are killing us, well except for Ashli Babbitt whose name must not be mentioned by media but whose mother got a standing ovation at yesterday’s Trump rally.

I suspect this martyrdom will have the same results on the voting community as the church’s martyrs did on the spread of Christianity.

Finally the most destructive of these things has had it seeds planted for the last several decades, the denial of the value of Fatherhood and of discipline:

Besides this, we have had our earthly fathers to discipline us, and we respected them. Should we not (then) submit all the more to the Father of spirits and live? They disciplined us for a short time as seemed right to them, but he does so for our benefit, in order that we may share his holiness. At the time, all discipline seems a cause not for joy but for pain, yet later it brings the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who are trained by it

Hebrews 12:9-11

And instead we gave trophies to those wo did not achieve, we indulged when we should not have and we refused to say no. We were warned of the fruits of this in scripture as well:

He who spoils his son will have wounds to bandage, and will quake inwardly at every outcry. A colt untamed turns out stubborn; a son left to himself grows up unruly. Pamper your child and he will be a terror for you, indulge him and he will bring you grief. Share not in his frivolity lest you share in his sorrow, when finally your teeth are clenched in remorse. Give him not his own way in his youth, and close not your eyes to his follies.

Sirach 30: 7-11

The result, we are not only at the point where are children are unsure of what they are, afraid of everything, led like sheep but even worse we are actually giving these kids the right to decide on destructive surgery that will scar them forever and going after their parents if they object!

All of this comes from the rejection of God, the idea that there is nothing greater than themselves and what they feel at any given moment. This is ironically but not surprisingly the very 1st temptation of the Devil to mankind:

But the serpent said to the woman: “You certainly will not die! No, God knows well that the moment you eat of it your eyes will be opened and you will be like gods who know what is good and what is bad.”

Genesis 3:4-5

It is the primary lie that those who for years told us not to make the cultural fight to protect their own advancement that got us here. Jesus knew these types implicitly & called them out:

Why do you not understand what I am saying? Because you cannot bear to hear my word. You belong to your father the devil and you willingly carry out your father’s desires. He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in truth, because there is no truth in him. When he tells a lie, he speaks in character, because he is a liar and the father of lies.

John 8:43-44

The saying goes when you don’t believe in God you’ll believe in anything from people being able to change their sex and gender at will to dark magic as a solution to problems

This was the endgame, and it was always the endgame from the very start, but you couldn’t get to this endgame without creating a post Christian society.

Our trip to Georgia, or where Floridians spend their summer vacations

Posted: July 18, 2021 by John Ruberry in baseball, business, economy, News/opinion, politics, Sports
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Blogger at the summit of Black Rock Mountain

By John Ruberry

As you may have noticed I haven’t posted here for a couple of weeks. Mrs. Marathon Pundit were on vacation. And we traveled to, at least if you live in the Chicago area, to an unlikely place, Georgia. 

After MLB’s spineless commissioner, Rob Manfred, pulled the annual All-Star Game out of Atlanta over Georgia’s voting integrity bill, my wife and I decided to “buy-in” to Georgia. 

MLB moved the Midsummer Classic to Denver, the capital of Colorado, even though that state has more more restrictive voting laws than Georgia. The switch cost Atlanta-area businesses millions. Don’t forget Atlanta is a majority-black city–Denver is majority-white. Of the Georgia election bill, Joe Biden said, “This makes Jim Crow look like Jim Eagle.” 

If that comment makes sense to you, or if Manfred’s panicky substitution swap does, then you need to switch off CNN and MSNBC.

Georgia’s new election laws, by the way, are less restrictive than those in Biden’s home state of Delaware.

So on Independence Day Mrs. Marathon Pundit drove south to the Peach State to make up, in a very small way, for the tens-of-millions of dollars shipped off by Manfred to Colorado. There were some diversions. We spent the night of July 4th in Chattanooga, Tennessee, which is just north of the Georgia state line. We did some sighteeing there the next day, including time on Lookout Mountain, where a pivotal battle of the Civil War Siege of Chattanooga occurred in late 1863. But the lion’s share of that day was spent on the site of the Battle of Chickamauga a few miles south in Georgia. The two battles are often presented as one, or part of a campaign, which is why the these two locations comprise the Chickamauga and Chattanooga National Military Park.

Of our Civil War battles only Gettysburg, fought two months earlier in Pennsylvania, had more casualties than Chickamauga. Unlike Gettysburg, Chickamauga was a Confederate victory. After being routed in Georgia the Union army retreated to Chattanooga. The northern commanding general, William Rosecrans, was relieved of his duties and replaced by Ulysses S. Grant. His breaking of the siege set the stage for the army led by his close friend, General William Tecumseh Sherman, to capture the strategic city of Atlanta the next year. Sherman’s March to the Sea, where Union forces split the Confederacy a second time, ended with the capture of Savannah late in 1864. 

We eventually made it to Savannah too. 

Mrs. Marathon Pundit was stupefied by the sprawling expanse of the Chickamauga Battlefield and the hundreds of monuments there. Her hometown of Sece, Latvia, was the site of a World War I battle. With the exception of a German military cemetery, there are no commemorations of that battle there. C’mon Sece, at least erect an historical marker in town about the battle.

We wandered for the next two days in the luscious Blue Ridge Mountains, mostly hiking, in these state parks: Fort Mountain, Black Rock Mountain, Smithgall Woods, Unicoi, and Tallulah Gorge. The latter is where much of the classic but disturbing film Deliverance was filmed. Around the time that movie was shot Karl Wallenda crossed the gorge on a high-wire. In fact, the Great Wallenda accomplished that feat 51 years ago today. Our first night in the mountains we spent in Helen, Georgia. Its buildings are in a Bavarian style and it’s filled with German restaurants. While it only has about 500 residents, Helen is Georgia’s third-most visited town. And I encountered mobs of Floridians there.  

People often wonder where Florida residents go on vacation–after all the Sunshine State is of course one of America’s most popular vacation destinations. In the summer many Floridians head to the slightly cooler climes of Georgia’s Blue Ridge Mountains. Yes, Tropical Storm Elsa, which passed through coastal Georgia after pummelling Florida during our trip, might have chased some people up north, but not all of them. 

I almost forgot–we hiked the Applachian Trail too.

After a couple of days in South Carolina–at Abbeville, Beaufort, and Hunting Island State Park, with a quick return to Georgia for a walking tour of Augusta and lunch with a high school friend in nearby Evans, we spent our last two days in Georgia in historic Savannah, an even better walking city than Augusta. Our own March to the Sea was over. Then it was time to drive home. 

On our way back, the day of the Home Run Derby of the MLB All-Star Game, we planned to visit Stone Mountain Park, site of “the Mount Rushmore of the South,” the largest bas-relief in the world, which is comprised of carvings of Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and Stonewall Jackson. But the weather that day was horrible–heavy rain–so we kept driving, straight through, back to Illinois. Stacey Abrams, the defeated Democratic candidate for Georgia governor in 2018, favors removal of the mountain carvings.

Stone Mountain Park is the most-visited attraction in the Peach State.

Abrams gave tacit support to a boycott of Georgia because of the voting reform bills, but she stealthily edited her USA Today op-ed call for one, but her disingenous act was later exposed. 

Abrams all but said to stay away from Georgia. 

So we visited. And and Mrs. Marathon Pundit and I had a wonderful time.

John Ruberry regularly blogs at Marathon Pundit.

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