Politicized distribution of hurricane aid money before the 2024 election was no "isolated incident," a Homeland Security follow-up report sadly concludes
But No Kings, blah, blah, blah. Someone on X astutely explained they don’t care about kings, they just want one on their side. Everything they’re complaining about and protesting was already done by the Biden and Obama Admins to greater degrees. That’s why the only people that care are at the protests. The rest of us understand that No Kings is no different than Corey Booker filibustering himself for 25 hours.
You are right, it is so phony. They would (and did) impose the craziest stuff on us without a second thought. I am not a huge fan of the Speaker of the House, but he made a good point today. We would not have a government shut down if Trump was a King. Furthermore, these protests would be shut down. "Maryland Dad" aka Kilmer Abrego Garcia would be gone, not tying up the court system because he is such an awful person, no country wants to take him. I could go on. It is complete nonsense.
The dems are just working their constituents into a frenzy so they will get out and vote. There’s no popular politicians in the bull pen, the BLM/racist narrative is used up and MSM continues to lose influence. Their only salvation is that Trump has pretty much punted on his campaign promises thereby disappointing many of the people who voted for him.
"punted on his campaign promises"? Peace in the Middle East. doing his best with the mess in Ukraine, got the hostages home, rolling back taxes and regs to induce overseas US countries to come back, reducing personnel, waste and fraud in government, removing men in womens' sports, cracking down on criminals the Dems let go, opening up fossil fuel production so gas and electricity prices come down, removing illegals...making a mess of the tariffs yes, but they did achieve a few beneficial trade deals.
You’ve been watching too much Fox. Trump promised mass deportations of the 10 million Biden let in. That’s 2.5 million per year just to get us back to 2020 numbers. The most generous estimates have him at 400k and we are nearly a year in. Russian war was going to be resolved on day 1. Now he’s talking about sending tomahawk missiles to Ukraine and regime change in Venezuela. Elon and DOGE were fired with very little to show. What we got instead was another tax cut and unlimited weapons and money for Israel while running a $1.8 trillion deficit in 2025. Let me know when we’re winning.
"Peace in the Middle East." That's a good one! "Doing his best with the mess in Ukraine." As in rolling out the red carpet and sending a non-employee real estate tycoon to make deals with a murdering, child abducting barbarian making a "mess" with rape and torture. Ending aid to Ukraine but selling arms, tap dancing around sanctions that never come, and deceitfully teasing Tomahoax missiles as he tantrums for a surrender behind closed doors.
Pulling federal grants from universities until they pay big fines for being "antisemitic."
Ordering high-profile masked SWAT style raids to stir up an "insurrection" so he can declare special powers.
And it's only year one.
Trump revealed few of his most aggressive plans and hinted he would get tough with Putin. Voters surprised by these "promises," kept secret during the campaign, are telling polls they don't approve.
Sounds right to me. They need to gin up support to drag the horrible Abigail Spamberger and her little friend over the finish line. Ditto in New Jersey. Not sure how much Trump has punted on just yet but I do feel like we are getting a bit of show on illegal immigration and I really hate the idea that we have HUNDREDs of THOUSANDS of Chinese "students" here. Also, I have no idea what is going with the Epstein stuff, but I am not letting that ruin my day. But yes, I see your point but I am not there yet but I am close.
The Chinese students and postdocs (and many other foreign students) have slowly filled up slots in grad school and in NIH labs since when I was in science since the late '80s. Although their English is often inferior, their backgrounds in STEM fields are generally better. There is a reason that science and innovation has increasingly moved to China; science jobs are jobs most Americans won't do.
When I started grad school, hard science PhD jobs paid the same as physician jobs. Now if they survive, the pay is about a third of average MDs pay. Also few medical students are even allowed to flunk out of med school (lot of debt to pay back), where grad students frequently left both in grad school or in their fields in postdoctoral jobs (I saw data for starting assistant professors having a lower chance of getting government grants-- for survival in academia-- than for college football players becoming professional athletes). Physicians dominate clinical research, and while some are excellent researchers, most are not (probably due to their didactic training); probably contributed to the horrid Covid response in the US.
The old expression "you get what you pay" for has come true for science in the US. While there is an entrepreneurial spirit in science today (also in China) much of it reflects snake oil selling and grantsmanship.
Oh Al, punting is done by all presidents,is it not? Trump is somewhat less of a punter than most. His behavior is hard for many especially older folks and some younger women. Overall, though, to those paying attention, he is above average.
Interestingly, a tiny state, territory and population-wise, a dot on the map, struggling to defend itself and surrounded by enemies that outnumber it many times over, has a permanent and prominent space in your head and is an answer to all world and US problems and ills. I wonder why is that.
Be lucky Israel is even allowing him to be president. He denied the Epstein files and bombed Iran like they ordered him.
AIPAC is still going strong and deciding our elections.
They will continue to do so until they are forced to register as a foreign agent, and if they represent a FOREIGN PRINCIPAL they must register under FARA no matter who funds them.
Let's concentrate on domestic policy. Israel has control of our foreign policy and requires this otherwise they could not continue to exist.
He hasn't punted on his campaign promises at all, the problem - to the extent that there is a problem - is that when you vote for Trump, you get...Trump, the good, the bad, and the sublimely ridiculous. He's like the little girl w/the curl - when he's good, he's very, very good, but when he's bad, he's horrid.
Well he didn’t end the wars on day 1. He bombed Iran and is about ready to start a regime change war in Venezuela. He promised to balance the budget but bailed on Elon and DOGE after a month and is running up a massive deficit. Epstein files remain under lock and key. Deportations are lagging Obama’s numbers by a lot. His cabinet is made up of deep state Zionists. Groceries are still uber expensive. Yet Israel has gotten everything they wanted. Still waiting for the golden age.
I'm seeing no reason why the protests from Saturday should be shut down. You know, freedom of speech, assembly, those reasons. I'm not aware, at least in my state, of any becoming violent. As NickO said, they have as much impact as Booker's filibuster. But that's not a reason to shut them down.
That is my point- a king or dictator would/could shut them down or they would never happen in the first place. We do not have a king or dictator in Donald Trump. I think everyone needs to see this stuff, all of it. Frankly the media is covering for hateful and sick elements amongst these protesters. They are already censoring the message to make it appear more benign than it is. If anything, that is where the fascism exists, only showing/allowing one point of view that is approved by the Democratic Party/DC/NY/LA media/government establishment.
I'd like to send all the NO KINGS attendees to Caracas and see how they fare there. They don't know what a king is, what a tyrant is, what a woman is, what a Nazi is, what a fascist is, but hell, right, don't let that stop you.
Once you've been smacked around by, say, 30 rubber bullets, you might find some utility in staying in Trump's America. Stop complaining about the food with your mouth full.
Good point, a real king would have a minister of justice ending criticism of the king as "hate speech" and a real king would already have declared an insurrection. In gratitude we should buy $Trump coins and offer airplanes like foreigners do. He's not even close to being a king, even though he works his ass off to get more personal power to benefit us, the people who aren't bad.
Rep Claudie Tenney on X posted, "To everyone marching at the “No Kings” protest: You supported Biden’s rule-by-decree presidency. You defended censorship, mandates, and lawless power grabs. You’re not against kings, you’re mad yours lost his crown."
No Kings is entirely populated with TDS worshippers of BHO. I know several. They were perfectly content with King Biden (or his regents) decreeing student loans forgiven, etc…the “movement’s” hypocrisy and blindness is rich.
I noticed that as soon as the Pro-Hamas street violence began to subside after the ceasefire (though not everywhere), the leftwing hurriedly pieced together the ridiculous "No Kings" baloney again. Just to be able to channel the minds and energy they had already captured.
“No Kings” was a marketing term . It’s just the same crowd wanting to end society as we know it . Using the mice words to receuit gullible people who are mad their lives suck and won’t take personal responsibility to make them better .
Living in the state that has Booker as their senator many of us wish he used that time to do something for our state. He been a senator now for almost 2 decades and still hasn’t written one piece of legislation. He’s a joke and we get to thank Chris Christie for him. That RINO was the one who put him into the senate. Booker was nothing but the mayor of Newark. Zero federal experience but Christie felt he couldn’t get a republican through the state congress. He didn’t even try! We haven’t liked Christie since he was governor and how he even got into Trump’s circle for a minute is laughable. He’s a fat drunk who acts like a jester because he has zero skill or likability.
Trump’s ability to break the media/DNC propaganda lockdown is the kind of thing that deserves a thank you from all Americans. Before Trump, Booker would have been given a medal for his heroic act of jack squat.
Hurricanes come and go on the media landscape but the ones in Florida in 2024-- Helene on September 27 followed closely Milton on October 9--devastated Florida.
Both were during election season in 2024. Taking down political signs to ensure FEMA aid would not pass by was likely not on anyone's mind during such horrendous storms.
One person I work with lost her home, moved and a week later lost that residence.
Helene inundated Tampa Bay (where I teach) , breaking storm surge records throughout the area. The hurricane had a high death toll, causing 252 deaths and inflicting an estimated total of $78.7 billion in damage, making it the fifth-costliest Atlantic hurricane on record.
Milton also impacted west coast of Florida, less than two weeks after Hurricane Helene devastated the state's Big Bend region. Milton spawned a deadly tornado outbreak in one of the most intense tropical cyclone-produced outbreaks recorded. Total damages as a result of Milton were estimated to be $34.3 billion , making it the ninth-costliest Atlantic hurricane on record.
Which adds valuable context to the subject: that after such devastation, people would still prioritize partisan loyalty over administering aid uniformly.
THANK YOU for recognizing this. The only continuing media coverage of the impact of these storms is that the roof was torn off Tropicana Field where the Tampa Bay Rays play baseball. But on the ground people are still building back and hoping they get a year off (it's still hurricane season, but so far in 2025 no major storm).
And homeowners in some municipalities are being threatened with $500 per day fines if a house is not torn down by a certain date. How ridiculous is that? It looks like a regular house from the outside. It just isn’t habitable. The city asses actually used the magnitude of Helene as an excuse for why permits were taking so long, but my neighbor can’t use the same storm as an excuse for why her house hasn’t yet been torn down. Um, maybe it’s the backlog of work for local demolition companies??? Or her reluctance to tear down “the evidence” when she’s still wrestling with her flood insurance company?
I can't say with certainty that FEMA's handling of Helene cost Kamala North Carolina, but i'm certain it pushed the state towards Trump. The flooding up in the mountains was a once in a 1000 year event, and the results were catastrophic. Up to 30 plus inches of rain was dumped over a short period of time in western NC and eastern TN, and some towns were entirely wiped out. There were still people living out of tents in the snow when Trump took office, and it was obviously political. Many millions of dollars flowed to Israel and Ukraine while our fellow Americans froze. There was outrage even in Asheville over how things were (not) handled.
What a dumb thing to do to a swing state in an election year.
Let states handle their own disasters assisted with federal grants. They already know their own major risks and are prepared. FEMA has a track record of failure a mile long and reform won’t help.
Exactly. The farther our taxes have to travel to fix a problem, the more the money changers benefit and the people lose out. Keep disaster relief administered locally, where people are trained to handle the problem and the leaders are accountable.
Do recall the now 10 month old Palisade and Altadena fires, and the susequent Fire Aid Concert/relief project. I recall at least
$100mil raised and 75% went to "agencies to assist those in need", ending with no assistance to actual victims.
I see "administration", whether schools, medical industry, governmental departments, as the biggest drains on money and effectiveness of getting the actual job done. Too many chiefs and no one doing the actual work or assisting those in real need, Trump fans or not.
I would be pissed if I was passed over/delayed legitimate help due to a yard sign. My home is not political.
Exhibit A as to why no CA governor should be President. But the CA citizens keep re-electing the same no-accounts. As here in Illinois, blue super majorities are not made to fix problems, just elections.
Exactly. Great example of a large amount of money donated and victims never saw a dime. Prime example of the deep rot in CA politics and administration.
I totally agree That the states should be responsible for the administration of disaster relief. FEMA, if left intact in any form, should be relegated to provision of funds and equipment as called for and under the direct supervision of congress. FEMA, as of now, is just another glaring example of a Federal agency's bureaucratic nonsense running amok due to congress' abdication of responsibility. Congress loves to create "do good" agencies to garner votes, but immediately wash their hands of the ensuing blunders.
Yep, at the risk of digressing a big...viz. the creation of the Department of Education by Jimmy Carter in 1979.
The Wikipedia opening paragraph is inadvertently kinda funny:
"The United States Department of Education is a cabinet-level department of the United States government, originating in 1980. The department began operating on May 4, 1980, having been created after the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare was split into the Department of Education and the Department of Health and Human Services by the Department of Education Organization Act, which President Jimmy Carter signed into law on October 17, 1979. An earlier iteration was formed in 1867 but was quickly demoted to the Office of Education a year later."
So the ancients back in 1867 immediately recognized their folly but we're stuck living with folly from the 1980's some 45 years later.
DoEd is perfect for all the heart-string-tugging cutesie photos of teachers caring for kids. Total goody-two-shoes imagery for the DoEd. Who could argue?
And it's all bs. Just a cash-sucking sinkhole of a racket.
I'd be all for zonking the Department of Education if it might help de-fang the teachers unions. Nothing against teachers -- I taught adult continuing education for a while. I really enjoyed the work and felt like I was helping people connect with the subject and help some get over "math anxiety".
I would actually like to still do do but I've given up after toooooo many run-ins and rejections by (putatively union) "academics" in the Chicago City College system. I just never seemed to be a "fit" back in Chicago, where I'm from, but yet I seemed to do very well when I was teaching in Minnesota while in grad school.
The rise of the education machine inversely parallels the deterioration of American education.
To bring it back to your comment; the DoEd personifies the feel-good sloganeering useful for garnering votes while simultaneously doing favors for entrenched interests (cf. "teachers unions").
I saw a ton of post-Hurricane Katerina T-shirts in New Orleans bearing the message that for them, FEMA stood for "find every Mexican available," as federal policy was first, waive safety regulations, second, keep New Orleanians out of the city, third, put Mexican workers in French Quarter luxury hotels.
Obviously I do not take counsel even of highly particularized bots, and certainly not generic ones, though I have in fact taken my high blood pressure meds for the day.
Or let volunteers, friends, and neighbors help one another, rather than waiting for the government to intervene. What I noticed was FEMA actually PREVENTING volunteer organizations from reaching the scene, and getting into tussles with local law enforcement over who had control. Absolutely unacceptable.
That is exactly what we’re supposed to have! We are sovereign(?) states united in a federation. FEMA is meant to HELP the states solve their own catastrophes with neighboring states pitching in as they can.
FEMA exists because state-by-state efforts proved inadequate. This was apparent in the 1927 Mississippi River floods. Also, the political bias would be much, much worse.
How many Illinois/Chicago schools aren’t teaching their students to read? THAT is racist. All the union all the time. Maybe the teacher can’t read, either.
I well remember it was the early '80s when 'feelings' first became a weapon.
Disrespect my feelings once, it's on you. Disrespect my feelings twice it's on me for not telling you the first time.
It took off and spread and one of the first tabu things to go were off-colored jokes and then any jokes at all.
It morphed into suppression of male voices and the expansion of female dominance because “feelings”. As a female I was left with telling jokes to guys and now I rarely do that because the reactions vary widely depending on the guy’s age.
Another quote from Ms. Andrews' brilliant article illustrates why feminization is a one-way street: "Women can sue their bosses for running a workplace that feels like a fraternity house, but men can’t sue when their workplace feels like a Montessori kindergarten."
It’s not just FEMA — it’s everywhere. Teachers’ unions running schools like campaign offices, speech “monitors” buried in the deep state, judges and DAs turning law into activism, and health administrators pushing trans ideology instead of science. Government work used to mean serving the public; now it looks more like a loyalty program for Democrats and their pet causes. The whole system’s become a jobs-for-friends racket dressed up as good government.
Ummmm… it’s weird that people on this thread think that this is a Democrat-only problem. I’ve been a close follower of American politics for 25 years. Listened to a lot of right-wing talk radio. Read news from the left, right, and middle.
All of the problems with the Democratic Party identified here are real problems, but all of them are also problems of the Republican Party—some more so, some less so.
Both parties are owned by oligarchs, and I genuinely feel bad for anyone who thinks that Trump or any other US president is actually fighting for them.
I think you misread my comment. “The Party” would be a reference to the Soviet Union. Those of any political persuasion who put party over principles are suspect. That said, the rot does appear to currently be deepest on the left. 40 years ago it was the on the right. The tribal allegiance over what is true and just, however inconvenient, is the disease.
I understood your reference and was commenting on this thread as a whole. I disagree with the rot being on “the left.” In terms of actual policy, the current Democratic Party is to the right of Richard Nixon.
As for comparing the Democratic and Republican Parties, I don’t see any light between them in terms of how corrupt and beholden to oligarchs they are. I also don’t see a meaningful difference between worship of the Democratic Party by many liberals and worship of Trump by MAGA folks.
Regarding Trump, every Republican official who was calling him a criminal, a fraud, a liar, and Hitler before and during his first term is now so far up his ass that they can see his tonsils (which is maybe the funniest part of all of this to watch).
But that has little to do with them changing their minds about Trump; it has to do with the fact they once he got elected the first time, the billionaire class saw that he was a viable candidate who was good for their bottom line and started showering him with money. And politicians follow the money.
It’s not bias to say most government workers lean Democrat — it’s just a fact. Studies of the federal civil service from 1997 to 2019 show just over half identify as Democrats, while the share of Republicans dropped from about 32% to 26%. Unionized state workers skew even harder left, with roughly twice as many Democrats as Republicans. Nearly all federal employees are registered to vote, so this isn’t about apathy — it’s about where their politics generally sit. It doesn’t mean every government worker is a Democrat, but pretending the tilt doesn’t exist is ignoring reality.
When I was working in Türkiye following the devastating 2023 earthquake, I spoke to people who told me that the Turkish equivalent of FEMA had denied tents to people who lost their homes because they were known to the locals as being anti-Erdoğan. Isn't it a joy that we're on the same path?
I hadn't heard others mention tribalism to any degree, so glad you did.
Tribalism is a primitive way of thinking that many citizens of the West moved beyond over the past several thousand years. Not that we are perfect because of this, but it certainly helped move humanity along.
The tribalist will actually think and see differently than the non-tribalist. We are talking a hive-mind versus individuals.
However, Judeo-Christianity and the development of individualism has been such a leap forward. That was recent evolution. It is fairly new in the grand scheme of things.
As Anthropologist Levy-Bruhl noted, primitive mankind and human infants think and interpret the world and others differently than we do, because of being in a Participation Mystique. A collective consciousness. A hive-mind. Individuality is a foreign concept in their lives. Until the infant in a developed society matures, at least.
And as we have seen, we can still lose individuality. In fact, this evolutionary regression is what we see in the WOKE across the West. As more collective groups such as Islam push their way to the forefront. Which is bad news for individualism. We go backwards if this takes hold -- back into a primordial soup of the undeveloped hive-mind.
Political persecutions and this story (and being anti-Erdoğan in Türkiye ) is the worst aspect of "team sports". The primitive aspects of our species are still present.
You stated "Tribalism is a primitive way of thinking that many citizens of the West moved beyond over the past several thousand years." - but political parties are just the next iteration of the 'tribe'. Nothing has really changed. Due to population size and nearly every square inch of the planet being owned by someone or some entity, humans that have no desire to involve themselves in tribal politics are essentially forced to. Empires guarantee that.
Judeo-Christianity evolved the West out of general tribalism. I could write a book about that..... These ideas and values developed the individual out of what was once overall tribalism. Or as Jung said, the unconscious began to be made conscious.
We became individuals with our own morality and critical thinking...rather than a hive-mind. Which brought about some massive improvements for Western humanity.
Primitive peoples and human infants think differently than Western mature individuals. There are good points to each perspective, but generally the more mature individual viewpoint is more evolved.
However, once-individuated persons can regress. You see this happening across the West in the leftwing WOKE and the American Democrats. The regression may eventually become severe enough to be considered malignant, as in the crowd who are into assassinations and mass destruction. Authoritarian empires grow from hive-minds, which was why the idea of the individual was so important in both Judeo-Christianity and in the American Experiment.
Tribalism, or collective consciousness, can (and eventually will) take down your individual morality as well as your individual critical thinking. Poof! All gone.
Especially if the author of your group narrative is a Cluster-B personality....which happens fairly often (they like authority).
Remember seeing once-normal folk turn into zombies during COVID-mania? You were witnessing mind-capture of the individual. They traded their own selves for the herd.....because they believed all of those "here be safety" lies.
I think we are in agreement, but in slightly different perspectives. I think the filmmakers of the movie "The Matrix", certainly in the sequels, tried to grapple with this in a film narrative fashion. I felt it made some sense to relate this topic to the movie "The Matrix" because of the clear parallels in conflict between the one and the many. It's a deep topic that deserves far more time and exploration than can be shared here, but fun food for thought nonetheless.
I just think population size IS a factor with what we are seeing in recent times. Hive mind/ Mass formation is a danger to free-thinking people everywhere. It's the dystopia we were always warned about coming true.
It’s ironic how the woke “globalists” have turned out to be the world’s biggest control freak tribalists as they seek to restrict or override all other tribes (aside from their Covid capers there is a huge emphasis on breaking down the basic “family unit” tribe and replacing it with their “benevolent, all-knowing” state ). Their brand of elitism and intolerance is/will be most oppressive if they become successful in their push to secure “global” reach & control (aka world domination?). The scope of WHO and UN pronouncements are right up there in arrogance with that centuries old papal degree that split ownership of the Americas between Spain & Portugal. (A side note: the UN also has a committee for “Peaceful Uses of Outer space”. Sigh. Just a bit beyond the usual regional planning scope, hey?) it’s become the battle of the billionaires.
The US is like Venezuela for voting, Brazil for Dem candidate selection, Russia for Dem spying on Republicans, and the EU/UK for silencing wrong think. It is first in the head of state telling citizens they were murdering people for not getting the jab.
But it's 'both sides', Matt, don't you get it? There isn't one side censoring and abusing every lever of govt to suppress and punish their political enemies - don't you know that!!!!
Be clear, most Dem/Leftists would have no problem with FEMA doing this if asked their opinion in private.
And they wonder why the Right is so pugilistic now that it's in power? So many incidents of this sort across govt that were utterly unfair and un-American. It strikes at our very core. I'm sick of treating the Dem/Left like they just disagree with us politically - nope, they hate us want to see us dead.
This is merely revealing where we are at, which more Americans need to know. I've known it for some time, not happily, cuz I did my reading on the Left long ago. In fact, it was Bloom's The closing of the American Mind that woke me up 30 years ago to how the rot was advancing in the academy, quite intentionally.
This is right up there with Jimmy Kimmel and others recommending that unvaccinated patients presenting at emergency rooms should be allowed to die. "Agree with us or we'll skip your house, deny you aid relief, leave you to die in the waiting room, shoot you in the head, shoot you in the throat." And Republicans are the ones described as cold, uncaring, hateful, and inhumane. Sounds like projection to me.
Just a quick comment (I haven't read through all of this yet): the hand on Biden's arm in the first image of this article is a perfect example of a picture being worth more than a thousand words.
There are so many ways to interpret it too. Could be Biden being held up, held back, or directed. I can't tell if that is Jill, but I suspect that is a staffer tasked with ensuring Joe doesn't embarrass himself. Years (decades even), too late of course.
It's one thing to become aware of this kind of perfidy. It's quite another to move from seeing it in the rear-view mirror, to pre-empting it in the future.
While I don't know you or beliefs personally, those "real leftists" would include the hammer and sickle waving antifa crew who do things like beat up Andy Ngo, would it not?
Jill Stein calls Trump a fascist, presumably Greens are the third party you're referring to?
Sorry, but I've seen no more desire to reach across the aisle coming from "real leftists" than I have from Democrats, GOP Republicans, MAGA Republicans, neo-Nazis, or anyone else.
I'd like to share this interesting article I recently read exploring the origins of these bizarre and confounding "wokeness" policies infesting our public and private institutions. You don't have to agree with it, but I believe at the very least it's thought provoking.
"Everything you think of as “wokeness” is simply an epiphenomenon of demographic feminization...
"...Female group dynamics favor consensus and cooperation. Men order each other around, but women can only suggest and persuade. Any criticism or negative sentiment, if it absolutely must be expressed, needs to be buried in layers of compliments. The outcome of a discussion is less important than the fact that a discussion was held and everyone participated in it. The most important sex difference in group dynamics is attitude to conflict. In short, men wage conflict openly while women covertly undermine or ostracize their enemies."
most females deal with fantasy (saying things work)
It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies and nosers-out of unorthodoxy.
As a woman who does not fit the above feminization description, I can say I've been bashed much of my life for my directness. There's much pressure on females to use consensus and cooperation, and to also undermine and ostracize rather than deal with problems directly. This is not to say women have leanings in that direction, but social pressure makes it much worse than it needs to be.
After hosting family movie night a couple of years ago—the movie was King Richard based on Richard Williams’ coaching of his daughters Serena and Venus—I asked my granddaughter and daughter in law whether they thought Richard Williams was right in pushing his daughters as he did in the movie. To my amazement neither one of them could answer the question. I subsequently decided they didn’t have the time to decide what other people thought, before answering the question. When my son returned to the room, I asked him the same question. He said “absolutely, he did what was right” and wondered out loud why I would ask such a silly question.
Social conditioning has paralyzed some women’s ability to think.
From my experience with you, I would say that you are weak on authentic thinking on this topic. That what you mistake for thought is just regurgitation of the feminist ideology, which no one in the West could escape having shoved down their throat these past 60 years.
You say in your bio that you are "fiercely independent". Though I find you holding on with all your might to one of the biggest acts of conformity of the post-war generations -- spouting predictable feminism, with contempt for anyone who does not accept this worn and wearisome ideology.
Feminists in my experience are worse than proselytizing religious fundamentalists. Given the choice between having a Saturday morning Jehovah's Witness show up at my door, or an arrogant and programmed feminist....guess which one I would choose? At least the JWs are usually polite and do not have big mouths.
I married a French girl and she definitely doesn’t fit that bill. I was shocked at how casually she’d call out my hypocrisy or simply outright disagree with me when we were getting to know each other. That was something I wasn’t used to. I do see some truth to it here… probably something more to do with our social history and/or religious origins?
Thank you for that comment. I do see in our history, specifically our antebellum history in the south, an elevation of female physical helplessness. The Europeans had plantations and slaves far away in foreign lands, but the upper-class south made white, female delicateness a sign of wealth among the labor of slaves. Perhaps female cooperation was elevated as part of this helplessness.
I find that a decent number of women can be found who will not be ringleaders in acts of emotional manipulation and will speak against such behavior abstractly, but when such women are in the midst of a rage mob of other women, they are still much less likely to resist the flow than I am.
I am a woman, But never a feminist I was appalled by it from early in my life, and then the feminists gave me a hard time throughout university.
They do not really want women to succeed, They want women to be their Useful Idiots and become indoctrinated with their ideology. It is about destruction of the West.
I was very happy to be a mother. And an intellectual. And a non-feminist.
Any woman who wants other women to be their useful idiot is not a feminist, no matter what she calls herself. I'm a wife, a mother, a farmer, a feminist. My natural inclinations are in traditionally male fields, and this makes many women and men miserable. They accuse me of all sorts of evil, like "destruction of the west," because God made me mechanically inclined. Interestingly, my daughter is the opposite, a glamour girl and social butterfly, and many misogynists are shocked out of their puny brains when they meet her. I supported the daughter I love because I would never smash down her inclinations the way I've been treated. Signed, a feminist.
Many men are quite capable of forming their version of a "female mob," sticking together to ruin a woman. I refer to it as Wolf Packing. Those males so inclined, when in a disagreement or employment competition with a woman, will play the "she's trying to ruin all men" game and get others to join him. I've been in that rodeo many times, and I've also been helped by the lone, independent-minded male who doesn't see women as the enemy, sees the game and steps in to break up the wolf pack.
I remember learning in my Logic 101 class over sixty years ago that situational ethics were to be avoided. I did an AI search on situational ethics this morning and you would think, based on the result, the that situational ethics is now the preferred methodology because its achieve results that are are based on “love” and “feelings”.—.reason, logic and consistent results be damned. Unfortunately I blame my own fair sex for such absurdity.
It's an interesting essay, and I agree with a lot of it. But there's a huge blank spot that went unaddressed. One of the most strongly forbidden things in the realm of feminization is violence. Violence is treated with absolute abhorrence and condemnation, and the use of violence brings all of the opposing resources at their disposal to bear. And yet, for the community of men, it is the threat of violence that is the most important deterrent to bad behavior. The potential threat of violence is what is most effective as a deterrent for antisocial or criminal behaviors getting established in the community. Feminization removes this deterrent from the reach of men, thus placing them at an even greater disadvantage when it comes to the active management of society, or of organizations. And it can be argued that the removal of this threat does not improve society at all, rather it leaves society vulnerable, and it places actual violence, the willingness to use violence, in the hands of the criminals and antisocial types.
I agree that violence wasn't discussed in the article but disagree that violence suppression is a virtue of "Feminization." Once "the hive" concludes it is being attacked (or just ignored), an informal green light is issued for unwarranted censorship, unlawful property destruction, physical and verbal abuse, doxing, targeted job terminations, debanking, and "peaceful" protests that often produce casualties and leave regions in ruin. Also, Feminization has widened the definition of violence to include one's feelings, fears, and comfort levels-- unless, of course, it's committed against straight, white males.
Yes but this speaks to my point: Try any of these things with an American male 50 years ago, and he would punch you in the chops, and if able to, maybe give you a good thrashing. This is a distinctly unpleasant experience - and the threat of it, the possibility that it might happen, together with the understanding that it's justified as a response against unwarranted aggression, is what used to keep people from doing it. The threat of violence keeps people a bit more considerate. You notice that these phenomenon are all relatively modern developments in society? 150 years ago, in much the old West, if somebody did you this way, you could just shoot'em.
Things have changed somewhat over the last century, but I believe this abhorrence of violence is a result of boomer and older woman being socialized to reject using violence to defend themselves. I can remember the societal message that firearms are for males and "appropriate" females shouldn't handle guns. In 1970 I was 10-yrs-old in 5th grade and law enforcement came to speak to our school about safety. The girls and boys were separated by sex on each side of the auditorium instead of the usual by grade. The LEO started by talking to the girls and telling us if someone grabbed us to not fight back or we could get hurt worse. We were told to just do what he said until he let us go. He then turned to the boys and told them if they were grabbed to kick, scream and fight back. In other words, girls were being told using violence to defend themselves was out of their reach and inappropriate for girls. I was already a feminist at that tender age but that just reinforced my uncooperative attitude. Unfortunately, many females of my generation complied rather than face hostility for acting "unfeminine" and that has now come full circle.
Women use the passive-aggressive tactic frequently, if they are the type who want to save their self-image while at the same time kicking someone in the teeth.
But No Kings, blah, blah, blah. Someone on X astutely explained they don’t care about kings, they just want one on their side. Everything they’re complaining about and protesting was already done by the Biden and Obama Admins to greater degrees. That’s why the only people that care are at the protests. The rest of us understand that No Kings is no different than Corey Booker filibustering himself for 25 hours.
You are right, it is so phony. They would (and did) impose the craziest stuff on us without a second thought. I am not a huge fan of the Speaker of the House, but he made a good point today. We would not have a government shut down if Trump was a King. Furthermore, these protests would be shut down. "Maryland Dad" aka Kilmer Abrego Garcia would be gone, not tying up the court system because he is such an awful person, no country wants to take him. I could go on. It is complete nonsense.
The dems are just working their constituents into a frenzy so they will get out and vote. There’s no popular politicians in the bull pen, the BLM/racist narrative is used up and MSM continues to lose influence. Their only salvation is that Trump has pretty much punted on his campaign promises thereby disappointing many of the people who voted for him.
"punted on his campaign promises"? Peace in the Middle East. doing his best with the mess in Ukraine, got the hostages home, rolling back taxes and regs to induce overseas US countries to come back, reducing personnel, waste and fraud in government, removing men in womens' sports, cracking down on criminals the Dems let go, opening up fossil fuel production so gas and electricity prices come down, removing illegals...making a mess of the tariffs yes, but they did achieve a few beneficial trade deals.
Dude Trump and his administration is rocking it. Is it perfect? No but all of it is in the right direction.
The Dems are jealous that they couldn't get any of those things done, and they're freaking out that people like you might notice.
You’ve been watching too much Fox. Trump promised mass deportations of the 10 million Biden let in. That’s 2.5 million per year just to get us back to 2020 numbers. The most generous estimates have him at 400k and we are nearly a year in. Russian war was going to be resolved on day 1. Now he’s talking about sending tomahawk missiles to Ukraine and regime change in Venezuela. Elon and DOGE were fired with very little to show. What we got instead was another tax cut and unlimited weapons and money for Israel while running a $1.8 trillion deficit in 2025. Let me know when we’re winning.
Not to mention the Treasury is on track to net $300B in tariff payments.
No Epstein files because Epstein ran a child rape ring against Americans for Israel.
Bombed Iran, also for Israel.
Release the files and no more wars were core campaign platforms.
He can't, his hands are tied. He'd get assassinated like Charlie Kirk the moment he tried anything.
Be thankful Israel even allows him to be president.
"Peace in the Middle East." That's a good one! "Doing his best with the mess in Ukraine." As in rolling out the red carpet and sending a non-employee real estate tycoon to make deals with a murdering, child abducting barbarian making a "mess" with rape and torture. Ending aid to Ukraine but selling arms, tap dancing around sanctions that never come, and deceitfully teasing Tomahoax missiles as he tantrums for a surrender behind closed doors.
Pulling federal grants from universities until they pay big fines for being "antisemitic."
Ordering high-profile masked SWAT style raids to stir up an "insurrection" so he can declare special powers.
And it's only year one.
Trump revealed few of his most aggressive plans and hinted he would get tough with Putin. Voters surprised by these "promises," kept secret during the campaign, are telling polls they don't approve.
The good news? Only three more Liberation Days.
Sounds right to me. They need to gin up support to drag the horrible Abigail Spamberger and her little friend over the finish line. Ditto in New Jersey. Not sure how much Trump has punted on just yet but I do feel like we are getting a bit of show on illegal immigration and I really hate the idea that we have HUNDREDs of THOUSANDS of Chinese "students" here. Also, I have no idea what is going with the Epstein stuff, but I am not letting that ruin my day. But yes, I see your point but I am not there yet but I am close.
The Chinese students and postdocs (and many other foreign students) have slowly filled up slots in grad school and in NIH labs since when I was in science since the late '80s. Although their English is often inferior, their backgrounds in STEM fields are generally better. There is a reason that science and innovation has increasingly moved to China; science jobs are jobs most Americans won't do.
When I started grad school, hard science PhD jobs paid the same as physician jobs. Now if they survive, the pay is about a third of average MDs pay. Also few medical students are even allowed to flunk out of med school (lot of debt to pay back), where grad students frequently left both in grad school or in their fields in postdoctoral jobs (I saw data for starting assistant professors having a lower chance of getting government grants-- for survival in academia-- than for college football players becoming professional athletes). Physicians dominate clinical research, and while some are excellent researchers, most are not (probably due to their didactic training); probably contributed to the horrid Covid response in the US.
The old expression "you get what you pay" for has come true for science in the US. While there is an entrepreneurial spirit in science today (also in China) much of it reflects snake oil selling and grantsmanship.
Oh Al, punting is done by all presidents,is it not? Trump is somewhat less of a punter than most. His behavior is hard for many especially older folks and some younger women. Overall, though, to those paying attention, he is above average.
Interestingly, a tiny state, territory and population-wise, a dot on the map, struggling to defend itself and surrounded by enemies that outnumber it many times over, has a permanent and prominent space in your head and is an answer to all world and US problems and ills. I wonder why is that.
Be lucky Israel is even allowing him to be president. He denied the Epstein files and bombed Iran like they ordered him.
AIPAC is still going strong and deciding our elections.
They will continue to do so until they are forced to register as a foreign agent, and if they represent a FOREIGN PRINCIPAL they must register under FARA no matter who funds them.
Let's concentrate on domestic policy. Israel has control of our foreign policy and requires this otherwise they could not continue to exist.
And Israel has a right to exist!
He hasn't punted on his campaign promises at all, the problem - to the extent that there is a problem - is that when you vote for Trump, you get...Trump, the good, the bad, and the sublimely ridiculous. He's like the little girl w/the curl - when he's good, he's very, very good, but when he's bad, he's horrid.
Trump has punted on his campaign promises? He’s only been president for 9 months?
Well he didn’t end the wars on day 1. He bombed Iran and is about ready to start a regime change war in Venezuela. He promised to balance the budget but bailed on Elon and DOGE after a month and is running up a massive deficit. Epstein files remain under lock and key. Deportations are lagging Obama’s numbers by a lot. His cabinet is made up of deep state Zionists. Groceries are still uber expensive. Yet Israel has gotten everything they wanted. Still waiting for the golden age.
I'm seeing no reason why the protests from Saturday should be shut down. You know, freedom of speech, assembly, those reasons. I'm not aware, at least in my state, of any becoming violent. As NickO said, they have as much impact as Booker's filibuster. But that's not a reason to shut them down.
That is my point- a king or dictator would/could shut them down or they would never happen in the first place. We do not have a king or dictator in Donald Trump. I think everyone needs to see this stuff, all of it. Frankly the media is covering for hateful and sick elements amongst these protesters. They are already censoring the message to make it appear more benign than it is. If anything, that is where the fascism exists, only showing/allowing one point of view that is approved by the Democratic Party/DC/NY/LA media/government establishment.
Ok, my bad for misunderstanding.
I'd like to send all the NO KINGS attendees to Caracas and see how they fare there. They don't know what a king is, what a tyrant is, what a woman is, what a Nazi is, what a fascist is, but hell, right, don't let that stop you.
Once you've been smacked around by, say, 30 rubber bullets, you might find some utility in staying in Trump's America. Stop complaining about the food with your mouth full.
Good point, a real king would have a minister of justice ending criticism of the king as "hate speech" and a real king would already have declared an insurrection. In gratitude we should buy $Trump coins and offer airplanes like foreigners do. He's not even close to being a king, even though he works his ass off to get more personal power to benefit us, the people who aren't bad.
Calm down, buddy. It's a bunch of Karen's in cities that you despise holding signs you disagree with. It's not the march of the brownshirts.
Meanwhile, British King Charles is one of the lead Globalists and supporter of WEF "cooperative ventures". Treasonous.
Rep Claudie Tenney on X posted, "To everyone marching at the “No Kings” protest: You supported Biden’s rule-by-decree presidency. You defended censorship, mandates, and lawless power grabs. You’re not against kings, you’re mad yours lost his crown."
No Kings is entirely populated with TDS worshippers of BHO. I know several. They were perfectly content with King Biden (or his regents) decreeing student loans forgiven, etc…the “movement’s” hypocrisy and blindness is rich.
"Corey Booker filibustering himself for 25 hours"
Phrasing!
I noticed that as soon as the Pro-Hamas street violence began to subside after the ceasefire (though not everywhere), the leftwing hurriedly pieced together the ridiculous "No Kings" baloney again. Just to be able to channel the minds and energy they had already captured.
One would think, but many don’t.
“No Kings” was a marketing term . It’s just the same crowd wanting to end society as we know it . Using the mice words to receuit gullible people who are mad their lives suck and won’t take personal responsibility to make them better .
Living in the state that has Booker as their senator many of us wish he used that time to do something for our state. He been a senator now for almost 2 decades and still hasn’t written one piece of legislation. He’s a joke and we get to thank Chris Christie for him. That RINO was the one who put him into the senate. Booker was nothing but the mayor of Newark. Zero federal experience but Christie felt he couldn’t get a republican through the state congress. He didn’t even try! We haven’t liked Christie since he was governor and how he even got into Trump’s circle for a minute is laughable. He’s a fat drunk who acts like a jester because he has zero skill or likability.
Trump’s ability to break the media/DNC propaganda lockdown is the kind of thing that deserves a thank you from all Americans. Before Trump, Booker would have been given a medal for his heroic act of jack squat.
How DARE you make fun of "Spartacus"!
/s
Hurricanes come and go on the media landscape but the ones in Florida in 2024-- Helene on September 27 followed closely Milton on October 9--devastated Florida.
Both were during election season in 2024. Taking down political signs to ensure FEMA aid would not pass by was likely not on anyone's mind during such horrendous storms.
One person I work with lost her home, moved and a week later lost that residence.
Helene inundated Tampa Bay (where I teach) , breaking storm surge records throughout the area. The hurricane had a high death toll, causing 252 deaths and inflicting an estimated total of $78.7 billion in damage, making it the fifth-costliest Atlantic hurricane on record.
Milton also impacted west coast of Florida, less than two weeks after Hurricane Helene devastated the state's Big Bend region. Milton spawned a deadly tornado outbreak in one of the most intense tropical cyclone-produced outbreaks recorded. Total damages as a result of Milton were estimated to be $34.3 billion , making it the ninth-costliest Atlantic hurricane on record.
Which adds valuable context to the subject: that after such devastation, people would still prioritize partisan loyalty over administering aid uniformly.
THANK YOU for recognizing this. The only continuing media coverage of the impact of these storms is that the roof was torn off Tropicana Field where the Tampa Bay Rays play baseball. But on the ground people are still building back and hoping they get a year off (it's still hurricane season, but so far in 2025 no major storm).
And homeowners in some municipalities are being threatened with $500 per day fines if a house is not torn down by a certain date. How ridiculous is that? It looks like a regular house from the outside. It just isn’t habitable. The city asses actually used the magnitude of Helene as an excuse for why permits were taking so long, but my neighbor can’t use the same storm as an excuse for why her house hasn’t yet been torn down. Um, maybe it’s the backlog of work for local demolition companies??? Or her reluctance to tear down “the evidence” when she’s still wrestling with her flood insurance company?
I know how hard it has been and it's never covered in any news.
I can't say with certainty that FEMA's handling of Helene cost Kamala North Carolina, but i'm certain it pushed the state towards Trump. The flooding up in the mountains was a once in a 1000 year event, and the results were catastrophic. Up to 30 plus inches of rain was dumped over a short period of time in western NC and eastern TN, and some towns were entirely wiped out. There were still people living out of tents in the snow when Trump took office, and it was obviously political. Many millions of dollars flowed to Israel and Ukraine while our fellow Americans froze. There was outrage even in Asheville over how things were (not) handled.
What a dumb thing to do to a swing state in an election year.
Yes, media outside of the cone of these terrible storms hardly think of those suffering and Helene was worse for NC than FL.
These are the government services that make a difference if some small attention could be given to actual people rather than focus on the president.
Anyone surprised? Anyone? Bueller?
Shut FEMA down!
Let states handle their own disasters assisted with federal grants. They already know their own major risks and are prepared. FEMA has a track record of failure a mile long and reform won’t help.
Exactly. The farther our taxes have to travel to fix a problem, the more the money changers benefit and the people lose out. Keep disaster relief administered locally, where people are trained to handle the problem and the leaders are accountable.
Do recall the now 10 month old Palisade and Altadena fires, and the susequent Fire Aid Concert/relief project. I recall at least
$100mil raised and 75% went to "agencies to assist those in need", ending with no assistance to actual victims.
I see "administration", whether schools, medical industry, governmental departments, as the biggest drains on money and effectiveness of getting the actual job done. Too many chiefs and no one doing the actual work or assisting those in real need, Trump fans or not.
I would be pissed if I was passed over/delayed legitimate help due to a yard sign. My home is not political.
sorry I digressed..
Bureaucratic institutions exist to serve themselves and with beyond few their original stated objective. As per Pournell's Law...
Exhibit A as to why no CA governor should be President. But the CA citizens keep re-electing the same no-accounts. As here in Illinois, blue super majorities are not made to fix problems, just elections.
Exactly. Great example of a large amount of money donated and victims never saw a dime. Prime example of the deep rot in CA politics and administration.
Oh contraire -- you were on point!
I totally agree That the states should be responsible for the administration of disaster relief. FEMA, if left intact in any form, should be relegated to provision of funds and equipment as called for and under the direct supervision of congress. FEMA, as of now, is just another glaring example of a Federal agency's bureaucratic nonsense running amok due to congress' abdication of responsibility. Congress loves to create "do good" agencies to garner votes, but immediately wash their hands of the ensuing blunders.
Yep, at the risk of digressing a big...viz. the creation of the Department of Education by Jimmy Carter in 1979.
The Wikipedia opening paragraph is inadvertently kinda funny:
"The United States Department of Education is a cabinet-level department of the United States government, originating in 1980. The department began operating on May 4, 1980, having been created after the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare was split into the Department of Education and the Department of Health and Human Services by the Department of Education Organization Act, which President Jimmy Carter signed into law on October 17, 1979. An earlier iteration was formed in 1867 but was quickly demoted to the Office of Education a year later."
So the ancients back in 1867 immediately recognized their folly but we're stuck living with folly from the 1980's some 45 years later.
DoEd is perfect for all the heart-string-tugging cutesie photos of teachers caring for kids. Total goody-two-shoes imagery for the DoEd. Who could argue?
And it's all bs. Just a cash-sucking sinkhole of a racket.
I'd be all for zonking the Department of Education if it might help de-fang the teachers unions. Nothing against teachers -- I taught adult continuing education for a while. I really enjoyed the work and felt like I was helping people connect with the subject and help some get over "math anxiety".
I would actually like to still do do but I've given up after toooooo many run-ins and rejections by (putatively union) "academics" in the Chicago City College system. I just never seemed to be a "fit" back in Chicago, where I'm from, but yet I seemed to do very well when I was teaching in Minnesota while in grad school.
The rise of the education machine inversely parallels the deterioration of American education.
To bring it back to your comment; the DoEd personifies the feel-good sloganeering useful for garnering votes while simultaneously doing favors for entrenched interests (cf. "teachers unions").
I saw a ton of post-Hurricane Katerina T-shirts in New Orleans bearing the message that for them, FEMA stood for "find every Mexican available," as federal policy was first, waive safety regulations, second, keep New Orleanians out of the city, third, put Mexican workers in French Quarter luxury hotels.
Wasn't ol' Dubya a caution?
Obviously I do not take counsel even of highly particularized bots, and certainly not generic ones, though I have in fact taken my high blood pressure meds for the day.
Take your meds, fella.
It's amazing we haven't seen your idea expressed more widely. FEMA sucking didn't start or stop with Heckuva Job Brownie.
Or let volunteers, friends, and neighbors help one another, rather than waiting for the government to intervene. What I noticed was FEMA actually PREVENTING volunteer organizations from reaching the scene, and getting into tussles with local law enforcement over who had control. Absolutely unacceptable.
I seem to recall in NC, they actually confiscated supplies that the communities and private individuals had brought to be distributed.
Wonder what happened to all of that stuff...
That is just one of many questions that should be answered.
That is exactly what we’re supposed to have! We are sovereign(?) states united in a federation. FEMA is meant to HELP the states solve their own catastrophes with neighboring states pitching in as they can.
FEMA exists because state-by-state efforts proved inadequate. This was apparent in the 1927 Mississippi River floods. Also, the political bias would be much, much worse.
Inadequate I can deal with. FEMA has been both inadequate and downright hostile.
And no Illinois governor should be President for the same reason. Pritzker is a joke. $1.4 million playing cards in Vegas? Stay tuned.
How many Illinois/Chicago schools aren’t teaching their students to read? THAT is racist. All the union all the time. Maybe the teacher can’t read, either.
I well remember it was the early '80s when 'feelings' first became a weapon.
Disrespect my feelings once, it's on you. Disrespect my feelings twice it's on me for not telling you the first time.
It took off and spread and one of the first tabu things to go were off-colored jokes and then any jokes at all.
It morphed into suppression of male voices and the expansion of female dominance because “feelings”. As a female I was left with telling jokes to guys and now I rarely do that because the reactions vary widely depending on the guy’s age.
Another quote from Ms. Andrews' brilliant article illustrates why feminization is a one-way street: "Women can sue their bosses for running a workplace that feels like a fraternity house, but men can’t sue when their workplace feels like a Montessori kindergarten."
I’ve never heard anything about this! Where did this come from?
Probably in higher ed where all the loony stuff comes from just like safe spaces is another step to silence others.
It was just call 'dis me' as in dis me once you bad, dis me twice me bad for not scolding you the first time you hurt my feelings.
https://www.compactmag.com/article/the-great-feminization/
The Great Feminization
Helen Andrews
Helen AndrewsOctober 16, 2025
Just read it half an hour ago. Spot on.
It’s not just FEMA — it’s everywhere. Teachers’ unions running schools like campaign offices, speech “monitors” buried in the deep state, judges and DAs turning law into activism, and health administrators pushing trans ideology instead of science. Government work used to mean serving the public; now it looks more like a loyalty program for Democrats and their pet causes. The whole system’s become a jobs-for-friends racket dressed up as good government.
Allegiance to the Party. Sounds awfully communist, doesn't it?
Ummmm… it’s weird that people on this thread think that this is a Democrat-only problem. I’ve been a close follower of American politics for 25 years. Listened to a lot of right-wing talk radio. Read news from the left, right, and middle.
All of the problems with the Democratic Party identified here are real problems, but all of them are also problems of the Republican Party—some more so, some less so.
Both parties are owned by oligarchs, and I genuinely feel bad for anyone who thinks that Trump or any other US president is actually fighting for them.
I think you misread my comment. “The Party” would be a reference to the Soviet Union. Those of any political persuasion who put party over principles are suspect. That said, the rot does appear to currently be deepest on the left. 40 years ago it was the on the right. The tribal allegiance over what is true and just, however inconvenient, is the disease.
I understood your reference and was commenting on this thread as a whole. I disagree with the rot being on “the left.” In terms of actual policy, the current Democratic Party is to the right of Richard Nixon.
As for comparing the Democratic and Republican Parties, I don’t see any light between them in terms of how corrupt and beholden to oligarchs they are. I also don’t see a meaningful difference between worship of the Democratic Party by many liberals and worship of Trump by MAGA folks.
Regarding Trump, every Republican official who was calling him a criminal, a fraud, a liar, and Hitler before and during his first term is now so far up his ass that they can see his tonsils (which is maybe the funniest part of all of this to watch).
But that has little to do with them changing their minds about Trump; it has to do with the fact they once he got elected the first time, the billionaire class saw that he was a viable candidate who was good for their bottom line and started showering him with money. And politicians follow the money.
I wouldn’t disagree. But the Obama and Biden administration weaponized it to an extreme degree.
It’s not bias to say most government workers lean Democrat — it’s just a fact. Studies of the federal civil service from 1997 to 2019 show just over half identify as Democrats, while the share of Republicans dropped from about 32% to 26%. Unionized state workers skew even harder left, with roughly twice as many Democrats as Republicans. Nearly all federal employees are registered to vote, so this isn’t about apathy — it’s about where their politics generally sit. It doesn’t mean every government worker is a Democrat, but pretending the tilt doesn’t exist is ignoring reality.
The Long March Through the Institutions…
Thank you!!
When I was working in Türkiye following the devastating 2023 earthquake, I spoke to people who told me that the Turkish equivalent of FEMA had denied tents to people who lost their homes because they were known to the locals as being anti-Erdoğan. Isn't it a joy that we're on the same path?
Late stage human civilization. Tribalism on a grand 8.2B person scale. Yeah, it was inevitable.
I hadn't heard others mention tribalism to any degree, so glad you did.
Tribalism is a primitive way of thinking that many citizens of the West moved beyond over the past several thousand years. Not that we are perfect because of this, but it certainly helped move humanity along.
The tribalist will actually think and see differently than the non-tribalist. We are talking a hive-mind versus individuals.
Unfortunately evolution may be the reason we’re tribal. The vast majority of human existence is before civilization.
Yes, most human existence was pre-civilization.
However, Judeo-Christianity and the development of individualism has been such a leap forward. That was recent evolution. It is fairly new in the grand scheme of things.
As Anthropologist Levy-Bruhl noted, primitive mankind and human infants think and interpret the world and others differently than we do, because of being in a Participation Mystique. A collective consciousness. A hive-mind. Individuality is a foreign concept in their lives. Until the infant in a developed society matures, at least.
And as we have seen, we can still lose individuality. In fact, this evolutionary regression is what we see in the WOKE across the West. As more collective groups such as Islam push their way to the forefront. Which is bad news for individualism. We go backwards if this takes hold -- back into a primordial soup of the undeveloped hive-mind.
Tribalism helped us survive for eons, but it has its dark side.
Political persecutions and this story (and being anti-Erdoğan in Türkiye ) is the worst aspect of "team sports". The primitive aspects of our species are still present.
You stated "Tribalism is a primitive way of thinking that many citizens of the West moved beyond over the past several thousand years." - but political parties are just the next iteration of the 'tribe'. Nothing has really changed. Due to population size and nearly every square inch of the planet being owned by someone or some entity, humans that have no desire to involve themselves in tribal politics are essentially forced to. Empires guarantee that.
Judeo-Christianity evolved the West out of general tribalism. I could write a book about that..... These ideas and values developed the individual out of what was once overall tribalism. Or as Jung said, the unconscious began to be made conscious.
We became individuals with our own morality and critical thinking...rather than a hive-mind. Which brought about some massive improvements for Western humanity.
Primitive peoples and human infants think differently than Western mature individuals. There are good points to each perspective, but generally the more mature individual viewpoint is more evolved.
However, once-individuated persons can regress. You see this happening across the West in the leftwing WOKE and the American Democrats. The regression may eventually become severe enough to be considered malignant, as in the crowd who are into assassinations and mass destruction. Authoritarian empires grow from hive-minds, which was why the idea of the individual was so important in both Judeo-Christianity and in the American Experiment.
Tribalism, or collective consciousness, can (and eventually will) take down your individual morality as well as your individual critical thinking. Poof! All gone.
Especially if the author of your group narrative is a Cluster-B personality....which happens fairly often (they like authority).
Remember seeing once-normal folk turn into zombies during COVID-mania? You were witnessing mind-capture of the individual. They traded their own selves for the herd.....because they believed all of those "here be safety" lies.
I think we are in agreement, but in slightly different perspectives. I think the filmmakers of the movie "The Matrix", certainly in the sequels, tried to grapple with this in a film narrative fashion. I felt it made some sense to relate this topic to the movie "The Matrix" because of the clear parallels in conflict between the one and the many. It's a deep topic that deserves far more time and exploration than can be shared here, but fun food for thought nonetheless.
I just think population size IS a factor with what we are seeing in recent times. Hive mind/ Mass formation is a danger to free-thinking people everywhere. It's the dystopia we were always warned about coming true.
It’s ironic how the woke “globalists” have turned out to be the world’s biggest control freak tribalists as they seek to restrict or override all other tribes (aside from their Covid capers there is a huge emphasis on breaking down the basic “family unit” tribe and replacing it with their “benevolent, all-knowing” state ). Their brand of elitism and intolerance is/will be most oppressive if they become successful in their push to secure “global” reach & control (aka world domination?). The scope of WHO and UN pronouncements are right up there in arrogance with that centuries old papal degree that split ownership of the Americas between Spain & Portugal. (A side note: the UN also has a committee for “Peaceful Uses of Outer space”. Sigh. Just a bit beyond the usual regional planning scope, hey?) it’s become the battle of the billionaires.
"Late stage" or return to the norm? Same as it ever was....
The US is like Venezuela for voting, Brazil for Dem candidate selection, Russia for Dem spying on Republicans, and the EU/UK for silencing wrong think. It is first in the head of state telling citizens they were murdering people for not getting the jab.
But it's 'both sides', Matt, don't you get it? There isn't one side censoring and abusing every lever of govt to suppress and punish their political enemies - don't you know that!!!!
Be clear, most Dem/Leftists would have no problem with FEMA doing this if asked their opinion in private.
And they wonder why the Right is so pugilistic now that it's in power? So many incidents of this sort across govt that were utterly unfair and un-American. It strikes at our very core. I'm sick of treating the Dem/Left like they just disagree with us politically - nope, they hate us want to see us dead.
Act accordingly, folks...
They have no problem replying yes to the question did Charlie deserve to die?
This is merely revealing where we are at, which more Americans need to know. I've known it for some time, not happily, cuz I did my reading on the Left long ago. In fact, it was Bloom's The closing of the American Mind that woke me up 30 years ago to how the rot was advancing in the academy, quite intentionally.
After Jay Jones texts wishing death on his political opponent AND HIS KIDS surfaced, Democrat approval of him INCREASED ONLY 12%!!!
And the Dems didn’t force him to resign!
Sad to say, but we are declining into barbarity. Again
This is right up there with Jimmy Kimmel and others recommending that unvaccinated patients presenting at emergency rooms should be allowed to die. "Agree with us or we'll skip your house, deny you aid relief, leave you to die in the waiting room, shoot you in the head, shoot you in the throat." And Republicans are the ones described as cold, uncaring, hateful, and inhumane. Sounds like projection to me.
It's much worse than projection. It's hate and disgusting democrats behaving like rabid animals. The democrats are going to regret this behavior.
Committee of Public Safety…
Just a quick comment (I haven't read through all of this yet): the hand on Biden's arm in the first image of this article is a perfect example of a picture being worth more than a thousand words.
Well-spotted!
There are so many ways to interpret it too. Could be Biden being held up, held back, or directed. I can't tell if that is Jill, but I suspect that is a staffer tasked with ensuring Joe doesn't embarrass himself. Years (decades even), too late of course.
"If it’s known that disaster relief can be politicized and nobody fixes the problem, imagine how mad people will be one or two cycles from now.”
No need to worry. The fact that it was a Democrat administration doing this means that no one besides Racket News subscribers will ever hear about it.
Let alone care that it was.
Actually, probably in favor of it. You know, the Deplorables Reduction Act.
It's one thing to become aware of this kind of perfidy. It's quite another to move from seeing it in the rear-view mirror, to pre-empting it in the future.
Where is the punishment?
Hope you’re feeling better, Matt 🤕
Leftists have always personified the hate that they claim to so bravely stand against.
Leftists project. They always, only, ever project.
It would nice if we leftists, most of us 3rd party voters, didn't always get roped in with the liberal sheep.
While I don't know you or beliefs personally, those "real leftists" would include the hammer and sickle waving antifa crew who do things like beat up Andy Ngo, would it not?
Jill Stein calls Trump a fascist, presumably Greens are the third party you're referring to?
Sorry, but I've seen no more desire to reach across the aisle coming from "real leftists" than I have from Democrats, GOP Republicans, MAGA Republicans, neo-Nazis, or anyone else.
I am in a SM exchange with a US expat in Australia who is using the phrase “Trump attacks his own citizens”
The guy I know personally was on my show where he talked about the army locking him in a hotel when he flew home. COVID era.
He’s like the reporters claiming to only be a crime victim in DC once or twice complaining about a ramp up in enforcement.
I'd like to share this interesting article I recently read exploring the origins of these bizarre and confounding "wokeness" policies infesting our public and private institutions. You don't have to agree with it, but I believe at the very least it's thought provoking.
"Everything you think of as “wokeness” is simply an epiphenomenon of demographic feminization...
"...Female group dynamics favor consensus and cooperation. Men order each other around, but women can only suggest and persuade. Any criticism or negative sentiment, if it absolutely must be expressed, needs to be buried in layers of compliments. The outcome of a discussion is less important than the fact that a discussion was held and everyone participated in it. The most important sex difference in group dynamics is attitude to conflict. In short, men wage conflict openly while women covertly undermine or ostracize their enemies."
The Great Feminization | Compact
https://www.compactmag.com/article/the-great-feminization/
most males deal with reality (making things work)
most females deal with fantasy (saying things work)
It was always the women, and above all the young ones, who were the most bigoted adherents of the Party, the swallowers of slogans, the amateur spies and nosers-out of unorthodoxy.
Orwell
It's the women (esp white) who refused to come across to the Trump side in 2024.
As a woman who does not fit the above feminization description, I can say I've been bashed much of my life for my directness. There's much pressure on females to use consensus and cooperation, and to also undermine and ostracize rather than deal with problems directly. This is not to say women have leanings in that direction, but social pressure makes it much worse than it needs to be.
After hosting family movie night a couple of years ago—the movie was King Richard based on Richard Williams’ coaching of his daughters Serena and Venus—I asked my granddaughter and daughter in law whether they thought Richard Williams was right in pushing his daughters as he did in the movie. To my amazement neither one of them could answer the question. I subsequently decided they didn’t have the time to decide what other people thought, before answering the question. When my son returned to the room, I asked him the same question. He said “absolutely, he did what was right” and wondered out loud why I would ask such a silly question.
Social conditioning has paralyzed some women’s ability to think.
Yes, and I think too much!
From my experience with you, I would say that you are weak on authentic thinking on this topic. That what you mistake for thought is just regurgitation of the feminist ideology, which no one in the West could escape having shoved down their throat these past 60 years.
You say in your bio that you are "fiercely independent". Though I find you holding on with all your might to one of the biggest acts of conformity of the post-war generations -- spouting predictable feminism, with contempt for anyone who does not accept this worn and wearisome ideology.
Feminists in my experience are worse than proselytizing religious fundamentalists. Given the choice between having a Saturday morning Jehovah's Witness show up at my door, or an arrogant and programmed feminist....guess which one I would choose? At least the JWs are usually polite and do not have big mouths.
I married a French girl and she definitely doesn’t fit that bill. I was shocked at how casually she’d call out my hypocrisy or simply outright disagree with me when we were getting to know each other. That was something I wasn’t used to. I do see some truth to it here… probably something more to do with our social history and/or religious origins?
Thank you for that comment. I do see in our history, specifically our antebellum history in the south, an elevation of female physical helplessness. The Europeans had plantations and slaves far away in foreign lands, but the upper-class south made white, female delicateness a sign of wealth among the labor of slaves. Perhaps female cooperation was elevated as part of this helplessness.
I find that a decent number of women can be found who will not be ringleaders in acts of emotional manipulation and will speak against such behavior abstractly, but when such women are in the midst of a rage mob of other women, they are still much less likely to resist the flow than I am.
I am a woman, But never a feminist I was appalled by it from early in my life, and then the feminists gave me a hard time throughout university.
They do not really want women to succeed, They want women to be their Useful Idiots and become indoctrinated with their ideology. It is about destruction of the West.
I was very happy to be a mother. And an intellectual. And a non-feminist.
Any woman who wants other women to be their useful idiot is not a feminist, no matter what she calls herself. I'm a wife, a mother, a farmer, a feminist. My natural inclinations are in traditionally male fields, and this makes many women and men miserable. They accuse me of all sorts of evil, like "destruction of the west," because God made me mechanically inclined. Interestingly, my daughter is the opposite, a glamour girl and social butterfly, and many misogynists are shocked out of their puny brains when they meet her. I supported the daughter I love because I would never smash down her inclinations the way I've been treated. Signed, a feminist.
Many men are quite capable of forming their version of a "female mob," sticking together to ruin a woman. I refer to it as Wolf Packing. Those males so inclined, when in a disagreement or employment competition with a woman, will play the "she's trying to ruin all men" game and get others to join him. I've been in that rodeo many times, and I've also been helped by the lone, independent-minded male who doesn't see women as the enemy, sees the game and steps in to break up the wolf pack.
What the actual F?
I remember learning in my Logic 101 class over sixty years ago that situational ethics were to be avoided. I did an AI search on situational ethics this morning and you would think, based on the result, the that situational ethics is now the preferred methodology because its achieve results that are are based on “love” and “feelings”.—.reason, logic and consistent results be damned. Unfortunately I blame my own fair sex for such absurdity.
Consequentialism - the doctrine that nothing is right or wrong per se; all that matters is whether it generates good or bad results.
Consequentialism is the left-wing approach, whereas the Right prefers actual principles, such as "don't lie" and "don't murder".
One of the many flaws in consequentialism is that "who decides what the greater good is" is never answered well.
“Greater good” is in the eye of the beholder.
I read that a couple days ago and thought it was spot-on.
It's an interesting essay, and I agree with a lot of it. But there's a huge blank spot that went unaddressed. One of the most strongly forbidden things in the realm of feminization is violence. Violence is treated with absolute abhorrence and condemnation, and the use of violence brings all of the opposing resources at their disposal to bear. And yet, for the community of men, it is the threat of violence that is the most important deterrent to bad behavior. The potential threat of violence is what is most effective as a deterrent for antisocial or criminal behaviors getting established in the community. Feminization removes this deterrent from the reach of men, thus placing them at an even greater disadvantage when it comes to the active management of society, or of organizations. And it can be argued that the removal of this threat does not improve society at all, rather it leaves society vulnerable, and it places actual violence, the willingness to use violence, in the hands of the criminals and antisocial types.
Feminization doesn't prohibit violence. It goads others into violence on its behalf.
Which is exactly what the Left does.
A google-able example is the White Feather movement.
I agree that violence wasn't discussed in the article but disagree that violence suppression is a virtue of "Feminization." Once "the hive" concludes it is being attacked (or just ignored), an informal green light is issued for unwarranted censorship, unlawful property destruction, physical and verbal abuse, doxing, targeted job terminations, debanking, and "peaceful" protests that often produce casualties and leave regions in ruin. Also, Feminization has widened the definition of violence to include one's feelings, fears, and comfort levels-- unless, of course, it's committed against straight, white males.
Yes but this speaks to my point: Try any of these things with an American male 50 years ago, and he would punch you in the chops, and if able to, maybe give you a good thrashing. This is a distinctly unpleasant experience - and the threat of it, the possibility that it might happen, together with the understanding that it's justified as a response against unwarranted aggression, is what used to keep people from doing it. The threat of violence keeps people a bit more considerate. You notice that these phenomenon are all relatively modern developments in society? 150 years ago, in much the old West, if somebody did you this way, you could just shoot'em.
Agree. Also challenging, threatening, or attacking someone in person requires more guts than when you do it anonymously online.
Things have changed somewhat over the last century, but I believe this abhorrence of violence is a result of boomer and older woman being socialized to reject using violence to defend themselves. I can remember the societal message that firearms are for males and "appropriate" females shouldn't handle guns. In 1970 I was 10-yrs-old in 5th grade and law enforcement came to speak to our school about safety. The girls and boys were separated by sex on each side of the auditorium instead of the usual by grade. The LEO started by talking to the girls and telling us if someone grabbed us to not fight back or we could get hurt worse. We were told to just do what he said until he let us go. He then turned to the boys and told them if they were grabbed to kick, scream and fight back. In other words, girls were being told using violence to defend themselves was out of their reach and inappropriate for girls. I was already a feminist at that tender age but that just reinforced my uncooperative attitude. Unfortunately, many females of my generation complied rather than face hostility for acting "unfeminine" and that has now come full circle.
Women use the passive-aggressive tactic frequently, if they are the type who want to save their self-image while at the same time kicking someone in the teeth.
Of course the Biden crime family collected political information on hurricane victims. Why would anyone be surprised by this?
"People hate the government enough as it is."
Not enough to change it, at any rate.