They’re Aiming at Elon Musk, but You Are the Target
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You know your tech overlord day is not going well when a U.S. circuit court of appeals opinion starts: A Texas statute named House Bill 20 generally prohibits large socialmedia platforms from censoring speech based on the viewpoint of itsspeaker.The platforms urge us to hold that the statute is facially unconstitutional andhence cannot be applied […]
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Local Trump Banner Sparks Outrage
This isn’t your ordinary banner. The huge red and white letters spill over a three-story balcony, obviously visible to locals and visitors to our heavily commuted, two-lane road called Scenic 30-A, in the Florida Panhandle. Scenic 30-A in South Walton, currently the fastest growing County in Florida, hosts extremely rare coastal dune lakes, soft white sandy beaches that line emerald waters, and some of the priciest real estate in the state. I travel this corridor weekly, checking property for my customers. I’ve passed this mega-banner many times.
It started out displaying “Trump 2020.” After the disputed election, it shouted “Trump Won!” This is a conservative part of Florida and no one makes a fuss. It’s not always there. I think the owner displays it when he’s in town. It’s a casual beach town, and now sporting more visitors and new permanent residents than ever before, especially since COVID.
Conservative television and radio host Mark Levin called this letter one of the greatest political scandals of our time. On Monday, many Americans were outraged by Attorney General Merrick Garland’s memorandum in which he called on the FBI to mobilize against parents who were concerned about what their children were being taught in public schools. […]
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Are There Real Alternatives to Twitter and Facebook?
I turned on my laptop this morning to find this on bonginoreport.com, a favorite news aggregator.
When news broke yesterday, following the horrific events at the US Capitol on January 6th, that President Trump was being permanently banned from Twitter and Facebook, I was not surprised. I was surprised it didn’t happen sooner. It was done so for the flimsiest of reasons: that the President violated their “standards” by promoting violence. Of course, they provided no real evidence of that. They simply joined the mob and repeated the notion that Trump fomented – incited – an insurrection at the Capitol.
I started a conversation and got some good push back due to I’m not a strong communicator. Let me please share what I have learned from that experience and hopefully clarify how your speech is abridged by Congress. I proposed that my US Representative, when part of the minority party in Congress, cannot speak […]
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Robby Soave, senior editor at Reason magazine, author of 2019’s Panic Attack: Young Radicals in the Age of Trump, and someone who is (just) over 30, (finally) joins Young Americans to discuss whether the political activism of young people today, especially on campus, is uniquely dangerous and poised to spill out into the culture as a whole. (Also, some LOST references sneak in.)
Conservative Is As Conservative Does
President Trump is the most conservative president of my lifetime, including President Reagan. This is true, as a matter of fact, across all three of the legs of the old conservative coalition stool: economy, national defense, and social conservatism. With an impressive record of promises kept, despite the worst efforts of Democrats and Conservatism Inc., American voters have a real choice in 2020.
President Trump has done more to strengthen NATO, as opposed to papering over other nations’ hiding under our nuclear umbrella and so shifting the burden onto our taxpayers and our cities under ICBM target designations. He has, without a massive military build-up (despite his hyping of our latest purchases), imposed more economic pain on bad actors (Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran) than any president since at least Reagan, and done so to the advantage of American working families. President Trump’s policies have paid off in growing NATO member states spending at least 2 percent of their GDP on their own defense, from two to eight members, outside the United States. This satisfies Americans’ basic sense of fairness, building a reasonable basis for continued commitment to an alliance that is finally showing signs of taking itself seriously. Such a substantial demonstration of commitment also serves notice to Russia and China that NATO is not a paper tiger.
President Trump has similarly pushed the United Nations to really live up to its fine phrases, its written aspirations. Far from abandoning the world or merely patronizing other nations, he has treated them as adults, as sovereign states who are entitled to pursue their interests while we pursue ours. He made that point again in hosting an on-camera meeting of the U.N. Security Council members. Read or watch the remarks and you will see even China engaging in a mutually respectful manner.
The Purge Hits Home
On Sunday I worked at the American Freedom Alliance conference, a day-long event featuring over 20 speakers, including Charlie Kirk, David Horowitz, Brent Bozell, Michael Walsh, Rebecca Friedrichs, Bill Whittle, and others. The hall overflowed with attendees representing UCLA Republicans to pensioners. It was an outstanding day where we discussed culture, free speech, science, academia, history and politics. On Monday the President of AFA and my dear friend Karen Siegemund was summarily fired from her life-long career of teaching math (both college and high school). The reason provided by the private high school? Her “public views” – that was it. Karen never spoke about politics in the classroom nor did her AFA role crossover into teaching.
Today David Horowitz was banned from Twitter. (*At this moment it seems they have reinstated David.) This follows last weeks widely publicized sweeping ban of other conservative voices from social media, including Paul Joseph Watson (the relatively benign host at InfoWars and other platforms). More incendiary personalities were banned from Facebook and Instagram like Laura Loomer, who, while too emotional for some, raises salient points about the double standard of online free speech (why is the terrorist group Hamas allowed on Twitter, but a Jewish conservative like her is banned?) as well as Milo who is sometimes provocative for the sake of being a provocateur.
You may not like or care about these people, and many don’t, but the battle cry from the Right often branded as ‘slippery slope’ – you may not like Alex Jones, but what happens when they come for you? – is happening now. Karen doesn’t have a provocative bone in her body. She’s a patriot who dedicated her life to educating people, whether her math students or attendees at the organization.
Member Post
A couple of years ago, in the midst of the Ferguson crisis, I sent a list of statistics to a young, woke relation of mine. These demonstrated, in plain numbers, the reality that black Americans are far more likely than whites or Asians to be the perpetrators and the victims of crime, especially violent crime. […]
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I just watched this press conference/release from Milo about his free speech week at Berkeley. Depending on the detailed facts, it could be very interesting. If Berkeley really has gone the road of trying to find criminal complaints in order to intimidate their own students due to ideological differences, then that is really bad. To […]
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Is Antifa Winning? Possibly!
As I have discussed, the real goal of the supposed “Anti-Fascists” known as “Antifa” is to stop all speech except their own, by using the word “hate” to describe anyone who disagrees with them. Of course, it is proven that they are the actual fascists by their actions.
A new poll just out appears to show that stopping freedom of speech is exactly what is happening. From the Washington Times:
In this AEI Events Podcast, a panel of academics, hosted by AEI’s Ryan Streeter and Samuel J. Abrams, discusses the experience of conservative professors on campus and the role faculty play in addressing the campus political climate. The panelists touch on a variety of topics, including the prevalence of confirmation bias and the necessity of including all ideas to avoid decline in the quality of research and education, as well as risks of overstating the current campus climate, and they disagree about whether the campus climate will lead to tangible societal change.
The panel features Samuel J. Abrams (AEI), Gerard Alexander (University of Virginia), Eliot Cohen (Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies), James Gimpel (University of Maryland), and Samuel Goldman (The George Washington University). It is moderated by Pete Peterson (Pepperdine School of Public Policy).
To: Laurie L. Patton President, Middlebury College Preview Open
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Yes, You Have Free Speech! (Except on 99.9985% of This Campus.)
…And except if your expression “disturbs the peace and/or comfort of person(s).” And for only about 18 hours during the week. Otherwise … free speech! So it is at one college.
Alliance Defending Freedom sued Georgia Gwinnett College Monday on behalf of Chike Uzuegbunam, a student who sought to politely share his faith on campus. Despite jumping through several unconstitutional hoops in order to get permission to speak, Chike was nonetheless accused of “disorderly conduct.”
In July, college officials stopped Uzuegbunam from talking with fellow students about Christianity and handing out religious literature in a plaza outside the college library. After Uzuegbunam complied, campus officials informed him that GGC policies also prohibited him from speaking privately with students about his faith unless he provides three days advance notice and speaks only in one of the two small speech zones during the two to four hours a day they are open during the week.
If the attack on corporations succeeds, individuals will be next: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/attorneys-exxon-probe_us_56fab959e4b0a372181b113d Preview Open
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