Officer Friendly, blank you!

Call or call out the police?

Oak Park Chronicles

Having a cop in school:

Dear Oak Park and River Forest,

Another day, another — what? Comings and goings, nothing grand. Clouds on the horizon, last night got stuffy, as July nights do.

Meanwhile, I see that Officer Friendly is on his way to being defunded by at least two school boards. After 21 years. It’s their right, if not their duty, to do so. But let it be known, sure as shootin’ there will be a spike in classroom crime – cheating on tests, copying homework, passing notes, making faces behind teacher’s back, who knows what else? It’s gonna be “Officer Friendly, [blank] you!” time, right out of “West Side Story.”

So it goes. But the casual observer has to wonder. . . .

Wed. Journal of Oak Park and River Forest has it . . .

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Trump to send federal forces to more ‘Democrat’ cities – Reuters

“Democrat” in quotes, get it?

State and local leaders in Oregon, as well as members of Congress, have called for Trump to remove Department of Homeland Security secret police forces from Portland, Oregon, after videos showed unidentified federal personnel rounding up people and whisking them away in black minivans.

“Not only do I believe he is breaking the law, but he is also endangering the lives of Portlanders,” the city’s mayor, Ted Wheeler, tweeted, having previously called the federal presence “political theater” in an election year.

Get the “secret police” too? Not in quotes. Go Reuters.

And what about that mayor? Lives of Portlanders not endangered as matters stand? City up for grabs, and he talks like this. And he is a Democrat, hasn’t just been called one. It’s a matter of public knowledge, though in some quarters that’s not a recommendation.

Byron York’s Daily Memo: The many dangers of voting by mail

Chapter and verse, folks.   About the New York fiasco.

More than three weeks after the New York primaries, election officials have not yet counted an untold number of mail-in absentee ballots, leaving numerous closely watched races unresolved, including two key Democratic congressional contests.

The absentee ballot count — greatly inflated this year after the state expanded the vote-by-mail option because of the coronavirus pandemic — has been painstakingly slow, and hard to track, with no running account of the vote totals available.

In some cases, the tiny number of ballots counted has bordered on the absurd: In the 12th Congressional District, where Representative Carolyn B. Maloney is fighting for her political life against her challenger, Suraj Patel, only 800 of some 65,000 absentee ballots had been tabulated as of Wednesday, according to Mr. Patel, though thousands had been disqualified.

From Byron York via email:

People are right to be worried. When someone tells you that voting by mail is nothing to worry about, be skeptical.

Do I worry? Do I give a bag of beans? You can bet your life I do.  From the incomparable Ink Spots.

What is herd immunity? And how do we get there on COVID-19?

Chicago Newspapers

I’d make the headline something more like this:

Herd immunity: What it is and why it’s a tale told by “idiots” — Three experts on a bad idea

A story in which nobody speaks up for the idea and the reporter produces the simplest of he-said, she-said, leaving us readers mostly in the dark about why the story in the first place.

Simplest as regards the formula, but hard reading — of stuff that would have been best paraphrased by the writer, with key phrases in quotes. It’s his job as middle man and explainer for readers.

Sources are from Northwestern, U. of Chicago (shown at podium next to the mayor), and Johns Hopkins. Usual suspects.

The N.U. man used the “idiots” term in reference to non-specialists who spout off. In answer to a reporter’s question, to be fair.

Thank you, Chi Trib.

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WHY DO MAINSTREAM MEDIA IGNORE CHINA’S GENOCIDE?

 Good question:

Hans Bader, writing on Liberty Unyielding, brings together the evidence that the Chinese Communist Party is systematically oppressing three million people, using torture and concentration camps.

Yet when was the last time the New York Times, Washington Post, ABC, NBC or CBS did any investigative reporting on this horrendous abuse of human rights?

I give up. When?

h/t Mark Tapscott

Axios Allows Its Reporters to Join Protests – The New York Times

Something strange has this way come:

In an unusual move at a news media organization, the head of Axios, a site popular with Beltway insiders, said in a memo that the company would support staff members who take part in public protests, a shift from the stance journalists normally adopt to avoid the appearance of partisanship.

In a companywide email on Monday that was reviewed by The New York Times, Jim VandeHei, the co-founder and chief executive of Axios, said, ???First, let me say we proudly support and encourage you to exercise your rights to free speech, press, and protest. If you???re arrested or meet harm while exercising these rights, Axios will stand behind you and use the Family Fund to cover your bail or assist with medical bills.???

Well. A few times as a reporter, I was commended for not tipping my hand. My proudest moments.

Regulations abound these days, busybodies get busy. . .

Sunday sermons, weekday observations

An English priest was caught violating one reg for the sake of another, and someone ratted on him in The Tablet, a liberal Catholic magazine  . . .

One of the concerns of [secular] Governments and [church] Hierarchies making regulations about public worship during this pandemic is, absolutely rightly, to discourage people from projecting potentially infected particles from their mouths in the direction of congregations. Medical opinion still seems uneasily uncertain about how far such projection might reach and how effective masks really are.

Behold a possible dilemma, projecting in worshipers’ direction by saying mass facing them, for which he apparently did not have permission.

Father has been very careful about this. [So he took] the immensely sensible form of celebrating ad Orientem [facing in the same direction as they, apparently without special church permission].

At a time when, unhappily, there are still some priests who, despite…

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