Short Take: True Threat Or FAFO?

Put aside whether a resolution by the Bakersfield City Council is consequential or performative crap. It’s obviously the latter, as it serves no meaningful purpose other than to reflect its acquiescence to the demands of the woke. But to 28-year-old Riddhi Patel, it mattered no matter how silly it may be. It mattered a lot.

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When Education No Longer Matters

When public schools shut their doors and went online for Covid, there was a fairly strong argument that it was a waste of time. While some teachers extolled the virtue of their online teaching and the dedication of their highly motivated students, the harsh reality was that education took a beating and students obtained little benefit. To be fair, it was understandable, even if teachers denied it. As Upton Sinclair noted, “‘It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”

But Covid is over. Schools are open. The only thing missing is the students. Continue reading →

Seaton: Sheriff Roy and the Outrage Tornado

Sheriff Roy Templeton had a headache. The assembled group of adults before him hadn’t stopped yelling since he stepped into Principal Doreen Jessup’s office at Nick Saban Intermediate School and asked “What’s the problem?”

When the school called about a row involving some parents and teachers, Mud Lick’s head law enforcement officer decided he’d handle the incident personally. Roy Junior started at Saban Middle in the fall and Sheriff Roy thought getting a little positive face time with the principal of his son’s new school would be advantageous. Continue reading →

When Fines Shock The Conscience

Her situation was sympathetic, and perhaps good neighbors would either have been more helpful or, at least, less antagonistic. But then, many homeowners know how that one house down the block falls into disrepair and brings down the neighborhood. Much as you can feel empathetic toward the troubles that one person is facing, you can also understand why others who maintain their property, both for the sake of appearances and property values, expect their neighbors to do the same.

Sandy Martinez was that one person whose neglect of her property brought down the neighborhood. Why her neighbors didn’t lend a hand is unknown. Maybe there was a feeling of animosity between them. Maybe they were just selfish neighbors, concerned only for their own property. Maybe Martinez was just a problem neighbor and the others had enough of her problems becoming their problems. But when the fines for her neglect reached $165,000, things went too far. Continue reading →

Must Hecklers Be Tolerated For The “Health of Free Speech”? (Update)

In a post that infuriated the progressive left, Jonathan Chait argued that the illiberal authoritarian left whose latest performance is the disruption of President Biden’s events are not engaged in the legitimate exercise of free speech, but its antithesis.

The twist, of course, is that the mobs shutting down the opposition to Trump are not Trump supporters, or at least not right-wing Trump supporters. Pro-Palestinian activists have set out to disrupt Democratic Party officials from speaking and raising funds to defeat Trump.

A New York Times story recently drew some attention to the political problem this creates for Democrats. Indeed, some of the protesters are trying to defeat Biden (ergo, to elect Trump) to teach the Democrats a lesson, and others are merely trying to force the Democrats to move left before the election.

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Tuesday Talk*: Where Do You Stand on Student Debt Forgiveness?

It’s back, not that it’s ever really been gone. But this time, it’s back, bigly.

On Monday, President Joe Biden announced a second attempt at federal student loan forgiveness. The new plan, which is estimated to affect over 30 million borrowers when combined with earlier efforts, aims to enact widespread loan cancelation primarily by expanding existing forgiveness programs and targeting borrowers with high balances due to accumulating interest.

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Should Justice Sotomayor Take One For The Team?

“Don’t RBG us, Sonia,” has become a rallying cry for those who fear that Justice Sonia Sotomayor might give Trump yet another seat on the Supreme Court. Some pundits have been quite open about it, citing her diabetes to offset that fact that Justice Sotomayor is a mere babe at 69 years, compared at least to the presidential candidate at 81.

Others, like 78-year-old Senator Richard Blumenthal, are trying to soft-pedal their push.

“I’m very respectful of Justice Sotomayor. I have great admiration for her. But I think she really has to weigh the competing factors,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn. “We should learn a lesson. And it’s not like there’s any mystery here about what the lesson should be. The old saying — graveyards are full of indispensable people, ourselves in this body included.” Continue reading →

Who “Owns” A Child?

Would it be wrong for a judge to remove a child from the custody of his parent if, due to a parent’s religious belief, the child was denied a life saving drug or surgery? Few would question the judge’s decision as to what was in the best interest of the child. Certainly, a child’s death or disability isn’t a good thing, no matter how passionately the parent believes that god will save their offspring.

But is gender transitioning in the same category as, say, diabetes? The question is not whether it is or isn’t, but who gets to decide whether it is or not. In H.S. v. Dep’t of Children & Families, the Florida Fourth District Court of Appeals decided that the decision belonged to the parent, not a judge, who was at minimum sympathetic to, and accommodating of, the child’s desires. Continue reading →

Can Old Houses Be “Racist”?

Casa de SJ will soon celebrate its centennial. Built as a Georgian Colonial country house in 1927 by architects Polemus and Coffin, its first resident was Hoffman Nickerson, who was not only dear friends with H.L. Mencken, but an advocate for an American landed gentry. He would not, in today’s parlance, be considered “woke.” Indeed, his attitude toward the poor and downtrodden would like be roundly condemned. Does that make Casa de SJ a racist house?

The two-and-a-half storey 9,000-square foot house in the Yonge and St. Clair area, was built in 1906 for Stapleton Pitt Caldecott, a former Toronto Board of Trade president who was opposed to immigration, a University of Toronto historian says. Continue reading →