Joe Biden Cares About ‘Reconnecting Communities.’ Right.

 

Andy McCarthy has an interesting post at National Review today.  I think it’s in poor taste to simply copy and paste an entire post, but in this case, I don’t think Andy will mind:

No further comment necessary. I’ll just quote it:

Highways Have Sliced Through City After City. Can the U.S. Undo the Damage?

The Biden administration is funding projects around the country aimed at reconnecting communities that have been divided by transportation infrastructure.

Ok.  So the Biden Administration is “funding projects around the country.”  I wonder what those projects are, exactly?

They pretend to be concerned with “reconnecting communities that have been divided by transportation infrastructure.”  For some reason, I find it unlikely that that is their true motivation in “funding projects around the country.”  But I’d hate to sound cynical.

We’re trillions of dollars in debt. Our economy, culture, educational system, etc., are all rapidly disintegrating. Our formerly great cities have recently developed problems much, much more serious than the convenient transportation offered by interstates.

What is the Biden administration doing here?  What do they really hope to achieve?  Why does The New York Times consider this important enough to warrant a headline and a news story?

Are there any masochists out there who still have a subscription to The New York Times?  I don’t, so I can’t read the article.  Although somehow I suspect that the purpose of the article is to be sure that I don’t know what’s going on, rather than telling me what is going on.  But I’d hate to sound cynical.

We could cut our federal budget in half tomorrow and the lives of Americans would improve. There is so much stuff like this.

But I’m curious – does anybody know what the true motivations and goals are here?  I just can’t believe they care about reconnecting communities.  But I’d hate to sound cynical.

Does anybody have any insight on this?

Thanks.

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  1. Stad Coolidge
    Stad
    @Stad

    Al Sparks (View Comment):
    It’s a copyright violation.

    What about fair use?

    • #31
  2. David C. Broussard Coolidge
    David C. Broussard
    @Dbroussa

    Mad Gerald (View Comment):
    Maybe they haven’t thought this through

    The next time they do will be the first time. 

    • #32
  3. Jim George Member
    Jim George
    @JimGeorge

    Randy Weivoda (View Comment):

    Dr. Bastiat (View Comment):

    Al Sparks (View Comment):
    It’s more than poor taste. It’s a copyright violation. National Review pays Andy to write copy for them, and they in turn try to monetize it. That helps them stay in business.

    Fair enough.

    The only reason I did that was that Andy copied his entire post from somewhere else as well, adding only two sentences of his own:

    No further comment necessary. I’ll just quote it:

    If that is considered to be plagiarizing Andy’s thoughts, then surely it is a minor infraction.

    Although I don’t know for sure, of course. I’m not a lawyer.

    Sorry if I goofed up. I meant no offense.

    This bit of minor copying and pasting isn’t a problem. There have been times when someone has posted a much longer article in full, and a moderator or editor has edited it down. If someone wants to write a post about an article they read elsewhere, you can copy a couple paragraphs, mention where it came from with a link to the full article, then add your commentary.

    Speaking as one who has run afoul of the offense of (purely unintentional) copyright violation I just have to say that I find the first post making this allegation against Dr. Bastiat to be a classic case of making a mountain out of a molehill. Such a shame the person making the charge had to jump the gun without making even a cursory review of the few words in McCarthy’s tiny entry. My two cents, for what it’s worth.

    • #33
  4. Jim George Member
    Jim George
    @JimGeorge

    Jim George (View Comment):

    Randy Weivoda (View Comment):

    Dr. Bastiat (View Comment):

    Al Sparks (View Comment):
    It’s more than poor taste. It’s a copyright violation. National Review pays Andy to write copy for them, and they in turn try to monetize it. That helps them stay in business.

    Fair enough.

    The only reason I did that was that Andy copied his entire post from somewhere else as well, adding only two sentences of his own:

    No further comment necessary. I’ll just quote it:

    If that is considered to be plagiarizing Andy’s thoughts, then surely it is a minor infraction.

    Although I don’t know for sure, of course. I’m not a lawyer.

    Sorry if I goofed up. I meant no offense.

    This bit of minor copying and pasting isn’t a problem. There have been times when someone has posted a much longer article in full, and a moderator or editor has edited it down. If someone wants to write a post about an article they read elsewhere, you can copy a couple paragraphs, mention where it came from with a link to the full article, then add your commentary.

    Speaking as one who has run afoul of the offense of (purely unintentional) copyright violation I just have to say that I find the first post making this allegation against Dr. Bastiat to be a classic case of making a mountain out of a molehill. Such a shame the person making the charge had to jump the gun without making even a cursory review of the few words in McCarthy’s tiny entry. My two cents, for what it’s worth.

    The post to which I refer can be found at https://ricochet.com/1438080/impeach-remove-bar-from-office-2/, and my (purely unintentional) offense, as explained in a very cordial and much appreciated note from the Editor in Chief, was quoting at such length from an article by Roger Kimball, an essayist and classical scholar I admire as much as anyone writing today with the possible exception of Victor Davis Hanson. As a result, the article, which I thought in my entirely unegotistical way, would have considerable value to some, was not promoted to the Main Page. I have tried to be much more careful with quoted material since then. Lessons learned. 

    • #34
  5. Macho Grande' Coolidge
    Macho Grande'
    @ChrisCampion

    Took a quick screenshot of the first few paragraphs, before the subscription piece kicked in.  Apparently our infrastructure is now racist.  No mention that, regardless of the demographic mix, if you’re going to build a highway that runs through or around a city, someone is going to get displaced.  Ask anyone living in Boston for the past 30 years.

    This is just money, and it’ll be used to support local politicians who receive federal grants for highway relocation.  Slush fund.  Graft.  Grift.  Payola.

    Whatever.  But it’s straight outta the Commie/Democrat playbook.  Take federal spending, and use it to buy votes.

     

     

    • #35
  6. Macho Grande' Coolidge
    Macho Grande'
    @ChrisCampion

    DrewInWisconsin, Oaf (View Comment):

    Dr. Bastiat: But I’m curious – does anybody know what the true motivations and goals are here? I just can’t believe they care about reconnecting communities. But I’d hate to sound cynical.

    It’s about destroying suburbs, about which The Lightbringer is quoted as saying “I loathe the suburbs.”

    The proggies see suburbs as “white” enclaves that purposefully separate themselves from the glorious multicultural urban areas by using “transportation infrastructure” as a separation mechanism. (Read: highways. Or in Buttigieg-speak “racist highways.”)

    So what they’re trying to do is mingle and recombine suburbs and urban areas — that is, get their footsoldiers out into the suburbs more easily so the suburbs can enjoy urban blight, urban crime rates, drugs, homeless encampments, and all the other dysfunction that comes with urban areas. Destroy the suburbs and turn them into urban areas. That’s the goal. It was certainly on the list of Obama’s pet projects. I guess he ran out of time to implement it so now Joe Biden’s puppet masters (who may be Obama’s goons anyway) are going to continue in the Lightbringer’s quest.

    Related: How Obama Is Robbing The Suburbs To Pay For The Cities

     

    Back in Hawaii after his Indonesian interlude, Obama came to see his grandparents as strangers.  The realization dawned as they drove him along a sprawl-filled highway.  Obama then threw in his lot with an African-American mentor named Frank Marshall Davis, who lived in a ramshackle pocket of the city called the “Waikiki Jungle” where his home was a gathering place for young leftists and nonconformists.  Rejecting assimilation into America’s middle-class, Davis hit on socialist politics and identification with the urban poor as the way to establish his racial credentials.

    In other words, Barry hung out with losers who were looking for somebody else to fund their lifestyle, a lifestyle that sounds a lot like leeching.

    • #36
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