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Monday, January 11, 2021

Orwell Warned Us.

Today, in the 21st Century, we are reaping the whirlwind of "Everybody should go to college":

34 comments:

  1. "Them" are tRump supporters. btw, George Orwell went to college.

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    1. Orwell sounds like he was describing CNN! "As long as it's on OUR side, we'll show it on TV"...hilarious. Thank GOD FOX shows all sides, with Donna Brazile and other very articulate libs on every single day to balance.. I'm still waiting for more than 2 (at most) Conservative viewpoints on CNN....still waiting........ :-)

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  2. Yup. Trump has Pelosi's and other criminals' laptops along with all the incriminating evidence therein. They were grabbed during the ruckus in the Capitol. No wonder they want him removed from office immediately. It is crystal clear that Democrats committed high treason and sedition against our nation.

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  3. Unless you're facing jail time for material support of a terrorist attack on the US Capitol, you probably have little to worry about.

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    1. TC... and potentially 2nd degree murder charges for participating in an event that caused the death of a Federal agent.

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    2. Except for, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of association, your second amendment rights, equality under the law......

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    3. Give them all a fair trial, escort them straight to the gallows, and sdrop their bodies in the ocean next to Osama Bin Laden.

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    4. Shouldn't you be out protesting for your right to spread Covid-19?

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    5. ...no, I'd prefer to just continue labelling Influenza deaths in the Covid category.

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    6. TC and others... let's separate the group that descended on DC last week into at least three groups. I think, as Silver has posited, that there was a significant group of people who, as some say, "got caught up in the moment." Protesting tourists if you will. There were also probably a few ppl who go to moments like these who are anarchists, dedicated seldom to any cause other than total chaos.

      But then it seems, from people's statements, that there was a dedicated group of people who wanted to delay or stop Congress from acting, because they did not like the outcome that was coming.

      Thinking only about that final group, can anyone tell me how their actions do not rise to a violation of US Code 2384 regarding Seditious Acts? Here's the relevant text...

      If two or more persons in any State or Territory, or in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, conspire to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them, or to oppose by force the authority thereof, or by force to prevent, hinder, or delay the execution of any law of the United States, or by force to seize, take, or possess any property of the United States contrary to the authority thereof, they shall each be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.

      I get that people may not like the laws that govern us. Black people in the 50's and 60's certainly did not like the laws that governed them. But if a citizenry does not like those laws, they can work, as black people who were not even allowed to vote did, through non violent means.

      Violence cannot be the answer in a civilized country. And no, I am not going to accept from people the belief that unfair laws are by definition, "uncivilized or violent" by nature. because that's a philosophical argument conservatives failed to advance through years of pleading from the African American community in the mostly southern states.

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    7. Dave - for me it's a non-starter. Anyone spreading the lie that the election was stolen from Donald Trump is running propaganda for the terrorists that attacked the Capitol. Fuggem.

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    8. The election was stolen from not Trump, but the people who voted for him.

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    9. Ed... and yet for years, decades even, blacks were the majority in areas of the south and never even allowed to vote. The vote was never stolen from them, they weren't even allowed to participate.

      Did they resort to armed insurrection or "incursion"?

      No they did not. The protested peacefully. Why not follow that example? I dare say there were not too many people entering the Capitol building last week that would have supported the rights of black ppl in the 50's and 6o's to use force to get the vote.

      Heck, they objected to their peaceful protests.

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    10. @ Dave:
      " I dare say there were not too many people entering the Capitol building last week that would have supported the rights of black ppl in the 50's and 6o's to use force to get the vote."
      And you would know this, how?
      Sorry Dave, those that opposed civil rights for blacks were overwhelmingly the main stream Democrats of the time regardless of "Progressives" trying to rewrite history. You just can't help yourself, can you.

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    11. Ed, the election wasn't stolen at all. From anybody. Trump's national popularity and approval rating during the last four years has never risen over that of a clogged and broken maggot-infested broken public toilet. In the 2018 mid-terms he lost the House of Representatives. This time he lost both the Senate and the White House. All he had to do is win enough votes to capture enough states' electoral college delegates. Even if you award EC votes in proportion to popular vote totals in each state rather than winner-take-all, Trump would have fallen well short of 270. Trump's EC count is actually inflated a bit higher than it ought to be by the winner-take-all rules that in fact do not accurately reflect the near 50-50 splits in most states. Trump lost, by a lot. This is neither shocking nor unpredictable in a country where nearly 6 out of every 10 voters didn't vote for Trump. Dude lost. Badly. Get over it.

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    12. Warren... I'm not sure I mentioned political parties. I was only talking about the reality of a stolen vote versus the fantasy of a stolen vote.

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    13. Now TC, the notion that the election was stolen from Trump [instead of in actuality, the attempt made by the Trump cult], has become gospel; just like the Biblical gospels....makes some people feel better...but can never be proven as fact doggonit.

      Go easy on them, there are tender sensibilities at stake amongst the snowflakes on the Right.

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    14. CI, just like you I have to live in the real world with these fools that have romanticized seditious terrorism against our government and their cornpone fantasies of civil war, all of them missing the irony of both all the noise they make on social media about being "censored" and the spin by Trump that his docile adherents somehow misunderstood his calls to attack the Capitol. I have to be honest. People who voted for Trump are undeserving of dignity. Ever.

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    15. TC, I don't know what the hell is going on with you but I've had enough. I voted for Trump and I would again, in a heartbeat. I'm not putting up with any more of your sophmoric insults.
      You've turned into the 12" prick in the joke and it isn't funny anymore
      It's tedious and stupid.
      You're not welcome here anymore.

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  4. Plato, "Statesman"

    STRANGER: The rest of the citizens, out of whom, if they have education, something noble may be made, and who are capable of being united by the statesman, the kingly art blends and weaves together; taking on the one hand those whose natures tend rather to courage, which is the stronger element and may be regarded as the warp, and on the other hand those which incline to order and gentleness, and which are represented in the figure as spun thick and soft, after the manner of the woof—these, which are naturally opposed, she seeks to bind and weave together in the following manner:

    YOUNG SOCRATES: In what manner?

    STRANGER: First of all, she takes the eternal element of the soul and binds it with a divine cord, to which it is akin, and then the animal nature, and binds that with human cords.

    YOUNG SOCRATES: I do not understand what you mean.

    STRANGER: The meaning is, that the opinion about the honourable and the just and good and their opposites, which is true and confirmed by reason, is a divine principle, and when implanted in the soul, is implanted, as I maintain, in a nature of heavenly birth.

    YOUNG SOCRATES: Yes; what else should it be?

    STRANGER: Only the Statesman and the good legislator, having the inspiration of the royal muse, can implant this opinion, and he, only in the rightly educated, whom we were just now describing.

    YOUNG SOCRATES: Likely enough.

    STRANGER: But him who cannot, we will not designate by any of the names which are the subject of the present enquiry.

    YOUNG SOCRATES: Very right.

    STRANGER: The courageous soul when attaining this truth becomes civilized, and rendered more capable of partaking of justice; but when not partaking, is inclined to brutality. Is not that true?

    YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly.

    STRANGER: And again, the peaceful and orderly nature, if sharing in these opinions, becomes temperate and wise, as far as this may be in a State, but if not, deservedly obtains the ignominious name of silliness.

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    1. cont.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: Quite true.

      STRANGER: Can we say that such a connexion as this will lastingly unite the evil with one another or with the good, or that any science would seriously think of using a bond of this kind to join such materials?

      YOUNG SOCRATES: Impossible.

      STRANGER: But in those who were originally of a noble nature, and who have been nurtured in noble ways, and in those only, may we not say that union is implanted by law, and that this is the medicine which art prescribes for them, and of all the bonds which unite the dissimilar and contrary parts of virtue is not this, as I was saying, the divinest?

      YOUNG SOCRATES: Very true.

      STRANGER: Where this divine bond exists there is no difficulty in imagining, or when you have imagined, in creating the other bonds, which are human only.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: How is that, and what bonds do you mean?

      STRANGER: Rights of intermarriage, and ties which are formed between States by giving and taking children in marriage, or between individuals by private betrothals and espousals. For most persons form marriage connexions without due regard to what is best for the procreation of children.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: In what way?

      STRANGER: They seek after wealth and power, which in matrimony are objects not worthy even of a serious censure.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: There is no need to consider them at all.

      STRANGER: More reason is there to consider the practice of those who make family their chief aim, and to indicate their error.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: Quite true.

      STRANGER: They act on no true principle at all; they seek their ease and receive with open arms those who are like themselves, and hate those who are unlike them, being too much influenced by feelings of dislike.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: How so?

      STRANGER: The quiet orderly class seek for natures like their own, and as far as they can they marry and give in marriage exclusively in this class, and the courageous do the same; they seek natures like their own, whereas they should both do precisely the opposite.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: How and why is that?

      STRANGER: Because courage, when untempered by the gentler nature during many generations, may at first bloom and strengthen, but at last bursts forth into downright madness.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: Like enough.

      STRANGER: And then, again, the soul which is over-full of modesty and has no element of courage in many successive generations, is apt to grow too indolent, and at last to become utterly paralyzed and useless.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: That, again, is quite likely.

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    2. cont.

      STRANGER: It was of these bonds I said that there would be no difficulty in creating them, if only both classes originally held the same opinion about the honourable and good;—indeed, in this single work, the whole process of royal weaving is comprised—never to allow temperate natures to be separated from the brave, but to weave them together, like the warp and the woof, by common sentiments and honours and reputation, and by the giving of pledges to one another; and out of them forming one smooth and even web, to entrust to them the offices of State.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: How do you mean?

      STRANGER: Where one officer only is needed, you must choose a ruler who has both these qualities—when many, you must mingle some of each, for the temperate ruler is very careful and just and safe, but is wanting in thoroughness and go.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly, that is very true.

      STRANGER: The character of the courageous, on the other hand, falls short of the former in justice and caution, but has the power of action in a remarkable degree, and where either of these two qualities is wanting, there cities cannot altogether prosper either in their public or private life.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: Certainly they cannot.

      STRANGER: This then we declare to be the completion of the web of political action, which is created by a direct intertexture of the brave and temperate natures, whenever the royal science has drawn the two minds into communion with one another by unanimity and friendship, and having perfected the noblest and best of all the webs which political life admits, and enfolding therein all other inhabitants of cities, whether slaves or freemen, binds them in one fabric and governs and presides over them, and, in so far as to be happy is vouchsafed to a city, in no particular fails to secure their happiness.

      YOUNG SOCRATES: Your picture, Stranger, of the king and statesman, no less than of the Sophist, is quite perfect.

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    3. FJ:

      It takes a Duopoly to tango! ;-)

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  5. Everyone who attended the rally and did not even go near the Capitol is at risk....the IRS will be relentless. Just as before.

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  6. Why is it that the Left continues to not only excuse but reward convicted terrorists like Bill Ayers, and Susan Rosenberg?. After all Barrack Obama said that Bill Ayers was his Inspiration, and his Marta. And Rosenberg serves as Vice Chair of the Board of Directors of Thousand Currents, a non-profit foundation that sponsors the fund-raising and currently does administrative work for the Black Lives Matter moment.

    And yet we, law abiding citizens, and Trump supporters, are the ones that are continually looked at as the as “Bad Guys”, and now we are called “Dangerous Domestic Terrorists” by people such as Nancy Pelosi and the King Pins of Social Media. As the lefties, and the Socialist’s of this country such as Kamala Harris Our New Vice President Elect, donates Bail money for those who Destroyed our Cities, Butnt Down Buildings, Stores, and Police cars, Looted the businesses of innocent Americans, Tore down the Statues that represents our History, dragged people out of their cars and beat them up, and at times Murdered them. The Black Lives Matter militants even Burned down a Police Station in Portland Oregon.

    And as the Social Media shuts down Trumps account, taking away His freedom of speech, and the Democrats have the nerve to label the Trump supporters as “Domestic Terrorists.”
    Don’t these people see a problem here. Are they redy to fall in line with these Nazis?

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    1. Nazis? At least the Nazis waited for the Reichstag to be empty before they burned it.

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    2. Orwell: Ignorance is strength- sort of explains why most scientists and educators are Dems..weak bleeding heart commie idiots that make the USA run well.

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  7. Television entertainment has been given over to endless lessons in social justice. The latest episode of S.W.A.T. was a case in point, in which a black officer spent half the program agonizing over the fact that he had spend two decades as a police officer and that, being Black, that meant he had been on the “wrong side” all those years.

    On “The Rookie” a white officer cleans up a playground in a Black neighborhood so that kids will have a place to play, only to be screamed at by a Black guy that the playground was a nighttime hangout for drug users.

    He responds what he will see to it that the park is patrolled, only to be excoriated again, that it will only mean that more Black people are put in jail. He asks what should be done and the guy says, “Stop the drugs from coming into our neighborhood.”

    Right. Nothing is ever our own fault. If people in the neighborhood are not using and buying drugs, then there is no market and the drugs will stop coming. The Black guy screaming at the white cop does not think of that, of course.

    And what color are the drug dealers? Are white guys coming into the neighborhood and forcing Black people to buy drugs that they don’t want? Of course not.

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    1. Catching the footsoldiers running drugs is proven to be ineffective, though. I think it would be more effective to target the higher-ups. I don't care what colour they are, if you're importing large quantities of narcotics you legitimately belong in jail. What people are complaining about is disproportionate sentences for small quantities of drugs used predominantly by black people. Do affluent cocaine-users deserve shorter sentences?

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    2. Way to miss the point, Jez. The guy is blaming the cops for "allowing drugs to come into the neighborhood." If nobody is buying, will drugs continue to come into the neighborhood?

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    3. You have hidden the complexity inside the superficially easy-seeming problem of keeping the entire neighbourhood off drugs. (How many drug users to you think live in your area code? Are you personally responsible for getting them to relinquish?)
      Also, I think you're loading these fictitious characters too much with the burden of representation. The dialog is arranged for dramatic effect, anger/frustration at any of them for failing to see the big picture is misplaced.

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