A Different Kind of Love

 

Friends, this week's Newsmaker Show with me and Brian O'Neil ranges across numerous scintillating topics, as always.  One of them is our growing addiction, as a society, to social media and our electronic devices, which is impacting young people especially harshly.  In addition, Brian and I cover the ongoing battle for political supremacy between Israel's Supreme Court and the Netanyahu government, the bigger picture of improved safety in air travel in the wake of the runway collision in Tokyo, Japan, the divided ranks of the Trump alternatives in the GOP, the prospects for a GOP collapse if Trump isn't made the nominee, the nature of Trump's fandom, the question of whether Republican/conservative consternation about election rigging may reduce their tendency to vote, the chances that SCOTUS will intervene in the campaign to remove DJT from the presidential ballot, the state of the polls and the prospects for Republican victory even in traditionally blue states, and the sad fate of Claudine Gay amidst the growing acceptance of mediocrity and even dishonesty in academia.

 

That's right -- there was so much breaking news and urgent analysis this week that he didn't have time for "This Day in History"!  Sometimes, history just has to wait...

https://wlea.net/newsmaker-january-3-2024-nick-waddy/

Let's Have an Honest, Open One-Sided Debate

 

Friends, what do you think -- is it a good idea or a bad idea for children to have their genitals surgically removed?  Seems like a pretty straightforward question, doesn't it?  Although, as the lefties love to remind us, the answer to every question depends on "context".  Well, fair enough.  In that case, let's examine the pros and cons.  That seems like a good place to start.  The problem, however, is that, to the Left, there is no debate about the efficacy or morality of "transitioning" for trans kids.  That's because, if there was a debate, that would imply that there are two sides to the discussion, and, if there were two sides, it's conceivable that someone's decision to say "Sayonara!" to their genitals could be, arguably, wrong.  Well, that's absurd, and it's clearly "anti-trans", so anyone who breathes a word of criticism about the trans ideology must be vilified and vigorously censored!  I mean, what choice do we have, right?  (Incidentally, if you don't believe me about this censorship and whitewashing of the issue, try Googling "trans debate" and see what you come up with!)

As you'll see in these two articles, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine, a Republican, has vetoed legislation that would have banned sex change surgery for minors.  His reason?  It almost never happens, and when it does it's the result of careful, dispassionate, rational deliberation between a troubled youth and the team of psychologists and doctors who only want the best for him/her/it.  In other words, the idea that anyone could be pressured into "transitioning", against their true interests, is simply outlandish.  Well, as article number two reveals, the fact is that it is becoming, in mainstream media, educational, and medical circles, increasingly impossible even to point out the downsides of "transitioning".  Transitioning is always encouraged!  Transitioning is beautiful.  Transitioning is positive.  Transitioning makes the world go 'round.  Those who "transition" and then come to regret their choice, on other hand, simply don't exist, or, if they do, they're poor unfortunates brainwashed and exploited by neo-fascist anti-trans nutjobs.  So, in short, just as it's always super-terrific to become gay, and always a tragedy (and a scientific impossibility) to go straight again, it's irrefutably wonderful to go trans, and as trans as can be, but it's always morally, ideologically, and scientifically heinous to reverse, obstruct, or even criticize the transitioning process.  To put it another way, the science, the medicine, and the political conversation surrounding trans issues have become so loaded and, well, politicized, that rational decision-making, by troubled teens, by parents, by doctors, by scientists, and by politicians, is next to impossible.  In the meantime, Governor DeWine has made his choice, on behalf of Ohio's kids, and, for the time being, therefore, the trans business is booming in the Buckeye State -- like it or not.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/healthcare/dewine-vetoes-bill-limiting-transgender-procedures-for-minors-for-ohio

 

https://www.broadview.news/p/the-weirdness-of-this-washington 

In other news, Israel's Supreme Court has announced its decision to strike down the law curbing its own powers.  Gee, how about that?  Judges think judges should be in charge.  Who saw that coming?  Of course, all the leftists praising this development will naturally feel the same way when the U.S. Supreme Court rules that Donald Trump can run for president and isn't barred by the 14th Amendment's insurrection clause.  Of course, that was a joke.  The Left doesn't have any consistent views about the proper role for the judiciary in "democracy", except insofar as it likes leftist judges and despises, with an unholy passion, conservative ones.  (And note the obnoxiously biased tone of this BBC report.)

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67859177

 

Finally, check out this analysis by our old friend Robert Reich.  He argues that the mainstream media, bv reporting negatively and critically about Joe Biden and the Biden Administration, is effectively helping Trump to win in 2024.  What's more, the media is fueling cynicism, which, because it drags all politicians down into the muck, creates a false equivalency between noble statesmen like Biden and diabolical neo-fascists like Trump.  Well!  Reich has a point.  If Trump wins, it will be partly because the American people are so disgusted with the status quo, and with all our institutions, that they're willing to elevate a rhetorical bomb thrower and (in all likelihood) a convicted felon to the presidency, just to shake things up, since, after all, both parties are corrupt and odious, so why not just oscillate mindlessly between them and hope for the best?  In other words, Reich is arguing that popular skepticism and mass despondency, both actively cultivated by the media, help outsider candidates like Trump win votes...and he's right.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/dec/31/mainstream-media-is-playing-into-trumps-neo-fascist-hands-im-sticking-with-democracy-and-the-guardian

The Best of Times

 

Friends, I wish you health, happiness, glamour, glory, victory, sweet vengeance, and oodles of self-indulgence in 2024!  This coming year will be a wild ride, as we all know, and I'm thankful that I have YOU as my faithful companions as we face the unknown together.  God bless each and every one of you!!!

Reality Bites

 

Friends, you've no doubt heard that another state -- Maine -- has ejected DJT from the Republican presidential primary ballot.  Well, the dastrdly Dems are far from unanimous in this matter, but this development nonetheless raises the stakes and makes it ever more critical that SCOTUS should weigh in and save us from this imperious meddling in the democratic process.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-67842012

 

A good friend of mine (no, not you, the other one) has written an article that sets this effort to purge the 2024 ballot of Donald Trump in its proper context.  For more than a century now, "progressives" have been telling us that the law, the nature of government, and even the U.S. Constitution need to "change with the times".  They've propounded a theory of "legal realism" that posits that, at any given time, the law and the Constitution mean whatever "society" needs them to mean, and who decides that?  Well, the enlightened ones, of course, i.e. progressives!  This is yet another way in which the Left magically conjures the objective out of the subjective, and deifies itself in the process.  All this must be resisted vigorously and seen for what it is: a play for power of breathtaking audacity and limitless scope.

 

https://thespectator.com/topic/keep-trump-off-ballot-colorado-michigan/ 

Speaking of the courts, it looks like Israel's highest court is about to issue a ruling slapping down the Netanyahu government and declaring that it and it alone rules the State of Israel.  Lefists are overjoyed.  Conservatives are more than a little dazed.  First, Hamas hits Israel, and Israel's government, below the belt, and when and how and where it was least expected.  That, apparently, did serious damage to the public's confidence in Prime Minister Netanyahu and his conservative allies.  Now, the high court is poised to finish off Netanyahu and friends, and to remind them how little power they truly have.  Netanyahu could choose to defy the court, of course, and provoke a constitutional crisis -- but would he have the guts for it, especially as his country prosecutes a war against Hamas?  We shall see.

 

https://www.timesofisrael.com/high-court-reasonableness-ruling-may-presage-return-to-tribalism-and-overhaul-fight/ 

 

Finally, kudos to Finland, which is preparing to inaugurate a secure storage facility for spent nuclear fuel.  No one has been eager to house nuclear waste, lo these many decades since the hiccups known as Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima, but the fact is that nuclear energy is among the cleanest sources of power available, and mankind would be foolish to believe that it can overcome its dependence on fossil fuels without making wide use of nuclear energy.  Finland's bold step forward makes nuclear power generation a little easier and more practical, and may even give this troubled industry a long-term future.  Let's hope so.

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20230824-the-descent-to-the-worlds-first-waste-nuclear-fuel-storage-site

The Amiable Dictator

 

Friends, no U.S. president did more to expand the powers and scope of the federal government than Franklin Delano Roosevelt.  His power grab was also especially dangerous in that it effectively ballooned the authority of the presidency itself.  The Supreme Court stood up to FDR, for a while, but it was bullied into submission and, with the retirement of a number of conservative justices, ceased to be a major obstacle to FDR's New Deal policies.  Thankfully, his plan to pack the court was unsuccessful, but that's one of the few victories against Roosevelt's megalomania that conservatives and constitutionalists ever won.  Later, Democratic presidents like LBJ and Barack Obama would build on the questionable achievements of FDR and make the federal government even more instrusive and authoritarian.

This, of course, is just one of the historical themes that Brian O'Neil and I discuss on this week's Newsmaker Show.  We also ponder the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, and the chaos in Eastern Europe in the wake of WWI.

In terms of current events, Brian and I tackle the Colorado Supreme Court's high-handed and ideologically-driven ruling that removed Donald Trump from the presidential primary ballot in that state, and the horrific consequences that could follow if SCOTUS does not rapidly slap down this anti-democratic outrage.  We also discuss the fantasy that Russia could invade Western Europe (or Poland, for that matter), the state of the U.S. defense budget, the biggest stories of 2023, and the future of Harvard President Claudine Gay and the state of (left-wing) academia as an institution.

All that in less than 25 minutes???  I wouldn't believe it myself if I hadn't been integrally involved in taping the show!

https://wlea.net/newsmaker-december-27-2023-dr-nick-waddy/

 

***

 

There's lots of other news today.  For instance, here's a story about a project to help conservatives identify alternatives to putting money in the pockets of woke corporations.  It's easy to say, "No Target for me!" or "Sayonara, Bud Light!", but how do you go about picking new companies to do business with?  This might be part of the solution.

 

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2023/12/27/boycotting-woke-worked-publicsq-shows-what-next/ 

Personally, I was never that impressed by Vivek Ramaswamy, who, in my view, is more smarmy than swamy, but it looks like his upstart campaign is now in a death spiral.  My take is that he was never a serious candidate for president anyway.  A vote for Ramaswamy is, in effect, a vote for Trump, because it keeps the ranks of the Trump alternatives in the GOP divided, which effectively helps Trump win.

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/12/27/vivek-ramaswamys-campaign-stops-all-tv-ad-spending-less-than-a-month-before-iowa-and-new-hampshire.html

 

The Michigan Supreme Court has given Trump a "win", in that it has kept him on the presidential primary ballot, but that doesn't mean necessarily that he would be on the presidential ballot itself in the fall.  Bottom line: there is NO SUBSTITUTE for U.S. Supreme Court intervention in this matter.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/27/politics/michigan-supreme-court-rejects-insurrectionist-ban-case-trump

 

Did you know that the U.S. economy can be summed up in just two words: "All good"!  That's Joe Biden's assessment.  For some reason, the media isn't reporting news about the economy quite that succinctly and simplistically...but no doubt they'll fall in line as we get closer to the main event.

 

https://nypost.com/2023/12/25/news/biden-scolds-media-on-economy-start-reporting-it-the-right-way/ 

Who will control the House of Representatives after the 2024 elections?  The results may well hinge not on public opinion, but on a number of active court cases affecting redistricting.  Aren't we way past redistricting, you say?  Wasn't that completed right after the 2020 census?  Nope.  The Democratic Party philosophy is, as always, that you keep voting, or keep redrawing electoral boundaries, until you get the results you want.

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/redistricting-states-house-congress-control/

 

Many Republicans and Trumpers argue that the criminal charges against Donald Trump have actually helped him and improved his popularity.  Among Republicans, that's certainly true.  The bigger question, though, is, once Trump's trials get underway, and once he's convicted of one or more felonies (which is highly probable, given the judges and the venues involved), how will the public perceive him?  Will his legend grow, or will he pay a political price?  No one knows for sure, but the polls say that being a convicted felon isn't a selling point -- and this, of course, is exactly what the dastardly Dems are banking on.  We can't discount the possibility that their evil machinations will be crowned with success...

 

https://dnyuz.com/2023/12/26/a-trump-conviction-could-cost-him-enough-voters-to-tip-the-election/ 

On the Brink?

 

Friends, as we approach New Year's Eve and the official start of 2024, a lot of people are reflecting on the state of American democracy, Western Civilization, our popular culture, our economy, etc.  So, naturally, am I.  

 

What were the top stories of 2023, according to Yours Truly?  I believe the main development that imperils our freedoms and our way of life is the redoubled efforts by the establishment to restrict and control speech, and to stage-manage the democratic process itself.  Here I'm thinking about the full court press by the powers-that-be against Elon Musk and Twitter, the major federal case that is examining whether the U.S. government can coordinate with social media companies to silence dissent, and the campaign of lawfare against Donald Trump, the likely GOP presidential nominee in 2024, as well as other conservatives -- up to and including the efforts to purge the ballot itself of every candidate except Joe Biden.  All these developments threaten the very foundations of our pluralistic democratic/constitutional system.  They bear watching, to say the very least!  

Another major story that I think many people missed is India's new status as the world's most populous country, combined, as it has been, with major political, social, and especially economic setbacks for Red China.  As Russia and China and arguably the United States falter, countries like India will loom much larger in the future than they do now.

Another theme that has caught the attention of many in 2023 is the rise of artificial intelligence.  Some are excited about these developments, some are terrified, and some are just confused.  All these reactions are understandable.  What's certain, though, is that we're only seeing the very beginnings of A.I.'s transformative impact.

What do YOU think were the most important stories of 2023?  I would love to get your perspective.

https://www.britannica.com/topic/2023-The-Year-in-Review

Toppling the Ivory Tower

 

Friends, as this CNN article points out, the recent stumbles at Ivy League institutions have given Republicans and Trumpers an opening, and needless to say conservatives are making the most of it.  In addition, the esteem in which academia, and "the experts" more broadly, are held has been in terminal decline for a while now.  Be all that as it may, I don't see any sign that the business model of elite higher education, which is as much about leveraging government grants and corporate cash as it is about attracting students and tuition dollars, is seriously under threat.  In fact, the lesson of recent history is that elite institutions are as strong as ever, and as contemptuous of dissent, especially from conservatives, as ever, too.  Academia remains a deeply problematic institution from the perspective of patriots and conservatives, and it would take truly herculean efforts by future Republican legislators, governors, and presidents to wrestle it back into respectability.  Good luck to anyone who's trying, I say!

https://www.cnn.com/2023/12/22/politics/harvard-plagiarism-controversy-republicans-analysis/index.html

 

Here are two able summaries of where we stand vis-a-vis the evidence against the Biden "crime family".  The key, as always, is tying Joe Biden to the clearly unethical, but not necessarily illegal, schemes of his close relations.  We shall see if that can be managed.

 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12886201/republicans-impeachment-joe-biden-evidence-white-house.html 

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2023/12/22/top-5-revelations-from-biden-family-probe-in-2023/

Gröfaz!

 

Friends, this week's Newsmaker Show covers a lot of ground, as per usual, starting with the Boston Tea Party of 1773, cruising through the unraveling of Operation Barbarossa on the Eastern Front in WWII, and arriving, right on schedule, at the present day, and the death throes of American democracy.  What a long, strange trip it's been!

In terms of current events, Brian and I discuss the decline of American "hard power" globally juxtaposed against the incredible popularity of our popular culture abroad; the strange aberations that we're seeing in the polls, vis-a-vis the views of America's youth versus the rest of us; the tired analogies between Trump and Hitler; the electoral fortunes of RFK, Jr.; and the sad fate of Rudy Giuliani, the canary in the coal mine when it comes to progressive "lawfare".

When we get to This Day in History, we hash over Adolf Hitler's decision to take personal command of the German military in late 1941, and to insist that it hold its ground in the face of Soviet counterattacks; the "opening" of the Berlin Wall (to Western visitors) in 1963; and the legacy of the Boston Tea Party, in the light of the Left's strident condemnation of "insurrection".

Boy!  What a diverse set of topics.  Arguably, they've got just one thing in common: you NEED to hear what I have to say on each and every one of them!

https://wlea.net/newsmaker-december-20-2023-dr-nick-waddy/

 

***

 

In other news, you may have heard that the Colorado Supreme Court decided, by a vote of 4 to 3, that DJT is an insurrectionist (bastard), and he therefore cannot appear on the presidential ballot in the Centennial State.  Well!  This is the first time that a state has struck Trump's name off the ballot, based on his (alleged) ineligibility under the the 14th Amendment.  Needless to say, Trump has never been charged with, or convicted of, "insurrection", or indeed any crime related to the events of January 6th, but no matter: the Dems long ago concluded that Trump is automatically guilty of everything, so, that being so, the Colorado Supremes did what they had to do.  One assumes that the Supreme Court of the United States will have something to say about this, and quickly, too, because otherwise the 2024 presidential election could turn into an even greater mess than it already is.

https://thespectator.com/topic/trump-off-the-ballot-colorado-court/

 

https://news.yahoo.com/trump-cases-thrust-supreme-court-194911468.html 

https://twitter.com/ccadelago/status/1737538069505745356

 

Finally, my home state of New York is once again leading the way...to perdition.  Governor Kathy Hochul has signed a bill initiating a process that may lead to slavery reparations.  On what basis?  Reparations for whom?  How much will it cost?  Your guess is as good as mine.  My hope is that this dreadful bill is just virtue signaling, and that even this benighted state wouldn't be foolish enough to go down the reparations rabbit hole.  We shall see.  (Note, as well, the grossly condescending, biased nature of the CBS report, which does not even consider the immense complications in meting out "reparations".  Why would it, though?  Opposition to "racial justice" is simply unthinkable!)

 

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/gov-kathy-hochul-signs-controversial-legislation-to-create-slavery-reparations-commission/ 

Gen Z: Not as Hopeless as We Thought?

 

Friends, there's lots of election-related news today!  For one thing, the New York Times is clutching its pearls because a number of polls, including its own, are showing that young voters are drifting Trumpward.  That's big, big news, because in 2020 and 2022 Republicans lost by wide margins with voters under 30.  Does Trump need to win over Gen Z to reassume the presidency?  Heck, no!  He only needs to narrow his margins of defeat.  It looks like that's very achievable.  This article speculates that the reason for youngsters' disdain for Joe Biden could be the Israel-Hamas war, and Gen Z's sympathies for the Palestinians.  I seriously doubt that, mainly because I don't think Middle Eastern affairs is a top-tier issue in this country (and, if it is now, it won't be if you wait five seconds).

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2023/12/19/nolte-ny-times-poll-shows-trump-leading-biden-with-young-voters/

 

Politico, no friend of Donald Trump, is speculating that, even if DJT is convicted in one or more of his numerous election year trials, it might not significantly change his electoral fortunes.  No kidding!  Nothing that's happened in the last eight years has significantly changed the American people's views on Trump, if we're to be entirely honest with one another.  Either you love him, or you hate him, and "unfolding developments" have little to do with it.

 

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/12/16/why-a-trump-conviction-might-not-save-bidens-reelection-00132125 

Will private funding of election offices and get-out-the-vote efforts turn the tide in 2024, as they almost certainly did in 2020?  That's doubtful, because many states have criminalized what Mark Zuckerberg and his cronies did to help Joe Biden win, i.e. hand out "grants", extremely selectively, to boost turnout in blue areas.  This doesn't mean the danger of election outsourcing has entirely been eliminated, however.

https://thespectator.com/topic/zucked-up-private-election-fundings-new-form/

 

And the Wall Street Journal is asking an obvious question: if many voters don't want Trump or Biden in 2024, then shouldn't this be a banner year for third party candidates...like RFK, Jr.?  It could be, but it's still unlikely he can do anything other than play the role of spoiler.

https://www.wsj.com/politics/elections/voters-want-something-different-is-it-rfk-jr-14f434fe?mod=hp_lead_pos9

 

Leaving the 2024 aside, here's a pretty fair analysis of our fiscal predicament that comes from a leftist media platform -- color me shocked!  I agree with most of the assumptions here, including the key one: we will hit a fiscal wall someday, but no one really knows when...

https://www.vox.com/money/2023/12/18/24001984/us-budget-deficit-2023-debt-tax-revenue-interest-rates

 

Finally, here's an article that, while it paints with a broad brush, still makes a very profound point: U.S. power, measured according to objective economic, political, or military factors, has been declining for a long time.  Presumably, it will continue to do so.  At the same time, our cultural influence is probably at an all-time high.  This is especially true if one is considering global popular culture.  Do we benefit from the fact that the whole world is watching our shows, and wearing our clothes, and listening to our (i.e. Taylor Swift's) music?  You bet we do!  There's money to be made from these cultural exports, and we get the enjoyment of watching decadence infect our rivals almost as severely as it infects us...  On the other hand, the culture that we're exporting is almost uniformly garbage, and both we and our customers know it.  Ergo, this cultural dominance could be short-lived, and there's certainly no guarantee that it will breed respect for America, as a country, and a great danger that it could instill contempt instead.

https://www.ft.com/content/dce07860-f39e-432b-a0f6-1a2124e4e1a3?segmentId=b385c2ad-87ed-d8ff-aaec-0f8435cd42d9

Plenty of Genocide to Go Around?

 

Friends, today I bring you the result of a very interesting Harvard-Harris poll.  Now, as always, the nature of the questions asked can skew the result, and a small sample size (especially for the different age cohorts) means we should take that result with an extra large grain of salt, BUT it appears that different generations of Americans have a wildly different perspective on the Israel-Hamas conflict, and who's committing "genocide" against whom.  Now, I don't have an agenda to push here myself.  Frankly, depending on whether you bombard people with images of Israeli suffering, or Arab suffering, it's pretty easy to build a narrative that favors one side or the other.  It's a complex and long-running conflict, open to many interpretations.  The fact is, though, that young Americans have such a different take on it than their elders that we really have to question how this came to be.  The article blames TikTok...without evidence, of course.  Personally, I think the worldview of youngsters is unlikely to be preprogrammed by Chinese app developers.  It's a rich tapestry, but Hollywood, the K-12 public education system and higher ed, and the mainstream media all must play a part.  What's interesting is that, on this issue, youngsters are way out of step with the American establishment (right?), but on others they fall slavishly in line.  Go figure.  I would also like to point out that a substantial number of Americans, in effect, support the expulsion of Palestinians from Palestine, or Jews from Israel, and in either case that would be ethnic cleansing, at best, and genocide, at worst.  So...maybe we don't object to genocide as much as we thought?

https://nypost.com/2023/12/16/news/majority-of-americans-18-24-think-israel-should-be-ended-and-given-to-hamas/