Time at the gym pays off.

The internet is full of people demonstrating Krav Maga and other martial arts techniques in a gym. Seldom is a real-life defensive situation captured so clearly on video.

An off duty Israeli soldier recently came to the aid of a vehicle that was trapped by a mob of protesters. She needed to use her Krav […]

Source:  The Truth About Knives

One of the featured dudes is Cam Newton, whom I for one appreciate mightily for his hanging in there Sunday — among other days, I’m sure — trying to get passes off vs. the Chicago Bears defensive line, which he must have found extremely offensive.

And I like the hat. (It’s all in how you wear it, after all.)

They get some wonderful teachers for our children, do they not?

“On many levels, mathematics itself operates as Whiteness,” [U of IL Prof Rochelle Gutierrez] argues with complete sincerity, according to Campus Reform. “Who gets credit for doing and developing mathematics, who is capable in mathematics, and who is seen as part of the mathematical community is generally viewed as White.”

She is a dear, no doubt.

. . . Sen. Flake?

Justice Robert H. Jackson, 1892-1954

“It is not the function of the government
to keep the citizen from falling into error;
it is the function of the citizen to keep
the government from falling into error.”

Of course, fewer say this sort of thing these days this well, judges or not.

​​
​Robert Royal about European elections of right-wing candidates:​

​
We’re seeing a budding, if still disorganized, reaction in the developed world to the ways that what might be called “authoritarian liberalism” has come to dominate us. Trumpism, of course, is the most obvious example. But even in Europe, the place that seems to have gone the furthest down that illiberal path, something remarkable is underway.​

​Take ​Brexit:

​

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The Brits have only been half-hearted EU members and never entered the monetary union. There’s something in the pragmatic Anglo-American mind that doesn’t sit easy with the kind of irresponsible bureaucracy in Brussels. Lax immigration policies while London has been repeatedly hit by terrorist attacks were the last straw. In a way, Brexit is unfortunate because, as an Italian friend said to me recently, “Without the British we Europeans are mostly just ex-Fascists, ex-Nazis, ex-Communists.”

​The Anglosphere​
​argument comes to mind.​ There’s more, of course:.

​
Much of the resistance in several European countries stems both a potent mix of grievances against the EU and opposition to mass Muslim immigration (and fear of terr

ori

sm). But the deeper cause may just be the perceived slipping away of a common European way of life and a loss of national traditions. German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Pope Francis have pushed very hard for opening borders, promoting assimilation, calming fears. The mainstream European media, like the American MSM, have largely tried to help with that task

​So we have stand-off.​

​
The usual view from Brussels is that the new movements of nationalism/patriotism now in Britain, France, Germany, Holland, Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, the Czech Republ

ic, and some of the Balkan nations is retrograde and undemocratic. By contrast, many in those countries feel it’s Brussels that operates with a high hand against the interests and wishes of various European peoples

​So what? We turn away from the drastic.

​
But nature, wise men know, abhors a vacuum. And if we don’t stand up for what we are and have been, we may rightly wonder whether we will continue to stand at

all. Better if we can learn to do that in an intelligent and sober way – right now – than to put off decisions until only the most radical interventions will work

.

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​

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Method in his madness, says Dilbert creator Douglas Adams.

If you think Mr. Trump’s tweets are nothing but thin-skinned reflex, you’re missing a great show. Historians and trained persuaders will be analyzing his extraordinary Twitter game for hundreds of years, wondering how much of it was based on training and how much was pure instinct.

He knows what he’s doing.

This dame getting a little of her own medicine in re: he, she (bad), they, them, etc. (good).

A University of Pennsylvania teaching assistant is under heavy fire after they [she]tweeted that they [she] would call on ‘white men’ last when doing student participation.

Stephanie McKellop, a Ph.D. student studying marriage and family (using them, they pronouns), has since set their [her] tweets to private but shared that they [the tweets] were trying to encourage classroom participation by minority students.

‘I will always call on my Black women students first. Other POC [persons of color, but you knew that] get second tier priority. [White Women] come next. And, if I have to, white men,’ they said in the tweets on Monday.

I love it (them?).

The fellow has nailed it.

Most reporters and editors are liberal — a now dated Pew Research Center poll found that liberals outnumber conservatives in the media by some 5 to 1, and that comports with my own anecdotal experience at National Public Radio.

When you are liberal, and everyone else around you is as well, it is easy to fall into group think on what stories are important, what sources are legitimate and what the narrative of the day will be.

Newsroom climate matters. And picking stories is at the heart of it. Liberal bias keeps stories alive long after expiration date. Even when accurately and fairly reported — though sometimes coverage itself leans left or falls on its face in that direction. As in choice of sources for reactions, for instance.

By a Pope’s words ye shall know him.

Which in Francis’ case is unsettling, if not scary.

We might call it pastoral run wild. In any case, he is defining presumed eternal truths down.

In which case, like Kansas City, “Oklahoma” version, he’s gone about as far as he can go.

What next?