The Morning Report - 1/11/21 [J.J. Sefton]

Good morning, kids. Another new week in Year Zero. By the calendar on the wall, we're nine days away from the abyss, although between now and noon on Wednesday the 20th, things might happen that make even the most implausible plot points in overwrought Hollywood political potboilers look tame by comparison. Right now, I feel a bit like fellow Brooklyn native Irving Strobing. Strobing served in the US Army as a radio operator, and nearly 80 years ago, he tapped out the last messages from within the fortress cave on the island of Corregidor in the Philippines.

''I feel sick at my stomach. I am really low down. They are around now smashing rifles. They bring in the wounded every minute. We will be waiting for you guys to help.''

It was help he knew could not come in time to stave off surrender.

''General Wainwright is a right guy and we are willing to go on for him, but shells were dropping all night, faster than hell. Damage terrific. Too much for guys to take. Enemy heavy cross-shelling and bombing. They have got us all around and from the skies.''

As the end grew near, Corporal Strobing, a Thomas Jefferson High School graduate who had spent a year at Brooklyn College before enlisting in 1939 and being assigned to the Philippines, grew nostalgic:

''Corregidor used to be a nice place, but it's haunted now. Withstood a teriffic pounding.''

''The jig is up,'' he said later. ''Every one is bawling like a baby. They are piling dead and wounded in our tunnel. Arm's weak from pounding key, long hours, no rest, short rations, tired.

''I know how a mouse feels. Caught in a trap waiting for guys to come along and finish it up...''

When you read Strobing's words, the metaphors for today just reach out and grab you by the throat. While Strobing and thousands more Americans and Filipinos would endure the savagery of the Bataan Death March and then over three years of unimaginable suffering at the hands of the Japanese, liberation would ultimately come, and at a terrible cost. But in May of 1942, at that time and in that place, the situation and the future were very much in doubt. Just as it is here and now in 2021, in a nation formerly known as the United States of America.

I've been ranting for years about the perfidy of the left. At times I've been accused of exaggerating. On rare occasions I feared -- or hoped? -- that perhaps I was exaggerating. In fact I can now see that these people are worse than I ever imagined. Worse than most of us ever imagined.

Worse, even, than Donald Trump, with all his insight, imagined.

He went into office determined to clean up the swamp. He was tireless. But not tireless enough. No mere mortal could have been tireless enough. Trump had denounced the swamp in apocalyptic terms, but it proved to be even deeper and more extensive than he knew...

...There's no intrinsic magic about America that protects it from becoming Mao's China or Stalin's Russia. Only utopians believe in the perfectibility of man. People are people. And some of the people who are now, or are about to be, in power in the United States would, if accorded enough power, do far more to those of us who falter in loyalty than merely take away our social-media accounts.

Indeed, as scary as the situation may be right now, one thing's for certain: worse is on its way. The Democrats now control both houses of Congress and are about to be handed the executive branch. The totalitarian-minded elements in that party are on the ascent, backed up by Silicon Valley, the legacy media, and much of corporate America. And they're about to party like it's 1793. In Paris.

The sky's the limit. And therein lies our hope, long-term though it may well be. Without doubt, these people will overreach. Their lists will grow so long, their cancelations so widespread, that, as happened with the Reign of Terror, everyone who isn't clinically insane will finally realize that things have gone too far and will, in one way or another, put an end to the madness.

But how far will things have to go before that happens? How long will it take? And how many lives will be destroyed before it's over? These, alas, are the all too sobering questions that have yet to be answered...

When I was a semi-brain dead teenager in the mid 1970s, I shrugged off the warnings of my sacred mother, of blessed memory, a survivor of the literally literal Hitler, in the aftermath of some act of anti-Semitic violence perpetrated somewhere in the world. "Ma, this is 1975! This is America!" to which she replied, "evil never rests." How right she was and to our horror, we are experiencing the worst kind of evil imaginable because it sprang up right here, in the one place we were sure was the figurative Corregidor, the Rock; a supposedly impenetrable, unconquerable bastion of freedom.

Frank Hewlett was the Manila bureau chief for UPI and was the last reporter to leave Corregidor before it fell to the Japs. He penned this epitaph in the form of a limerick, which came to symbolize the defeat.

We're the battling bastards of Bataan;
No mama, no papa, no Uncle Sam.
No aunts, no uncles, no cousins, no nieces,
No pills, no planes, no artillery pieces.
And nobody gives a damn.
Nobody gives a damn.

For now, I'll still be here, tapping out messages to the outside world. We'll see how long I can stay on the air, willingly or otherwise.

CAPITOL HILL BLACK WEDNESDAY PROTEST AFTERMATH

• "I want him to resign. I want him out. He has caused enough damage," Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski.
  Article of Impeachment Against Trump to be Introduced Monday in House
  
• "Why, with only a week left in his term, expend all this hatred on a lame-duck president?"
  Driving Out the Scapegoat
  
• "The group, which conducted war games about potential election outcomes, is staffed and funded extensively by Obama administration alumni."
  The Transition Integrity Project Admitted Outside Actors Would "Turn Protests Violent"
  
• Robert Spencer: "The attentive reader may have noticed that there is nothing there, or in any other part of the speech, calling upon the crowd to storm the Capitol, or to overthrow the government, or to do anything but walk down Pennsylvania Avenue and encourage lawmakers to support the president. The case for the claim that Trump incited the mob rests on the proposition that he didn't have to spell out what he wanted them to do; when he detailed his reasons for believing that the 2020 presidential election was stolen, that was enough to inflame them sufficiently to storm the Capitol."
  Exactly Where and How Did Trump Incite the Mob?
  
• Pam Geller: "There was no revolution. There was a call by the people for election integrity."
  There Was No Revolution
  
• "The comments come as sources begin to suggest that the 42-year-old military veteran's death may have been linked to a medical condition."
  Capitol Officer's Family Says Don't Politicize His Death as Sources Point to" Medical Condition"
  
• "Capitol Police and D.C. police were reportedly overrun as the mob of protesters moved in on the Capitol building." (the ones that didn't escort the Antifa/BLM agents in - jjs)
  Defense Department Says Lack of Planning" to Blame tor Slow Response to Capitol Attack
  
• The Constitution is in shreds but the race card still looks like it's hot off the presses.
  Malig-Nancy Pelosi Makes Capitol Breach About Race: Chose Their "Whiteness Over Democracy"
  
• Well, Democrats were responsible for both, but jeez louise.
  Former Obama Adviser: Capitol Riots a Worse Security Failure Than 9/11
  * * * * *

• Sebastian Gorka: "When you demonize 63 million Americans for four years sooner or later some of them will cross the line."
  The Storming of Congress and the Normalization of Violence
  
• "For our political and media elites, the Capitol riot on Wednesday is the perfect excuse to 'cleanse' the country of Trump supporters."
  Media Outrage Over Capitol Riot Isn't About Defending Democracy, It's About Wielding Power
  
• "Democrats' sudden concern over violence from Trump supporters comes after months of ignoring their own supporters' far worse transgressions."
  Left's Hypocrisy on Full Display After D.C. "Insurrection"
  
• "On Wednesday, Democrats got what they wished for."
  The Capitol: So Much Suspicious Evidence
  
• Evil, sick harridan.
  Malig-Nancy Pelosi Talked to Joint Chiefs Chair About "Preventing an Unstable President From... Ordering a Nuclear Strike"
  
• "They also shut down a bill which would have given rioters longer prison sentences this summer and cracked down on political violence."
  FLASHBACK: Just Months Ago, Democrats Blocked a Resolution Condemning Mob Violence
  
• "But in the final analysis, the Congress can take up an impeachment resolution without going through committee, without doing any of that. We've got the numbers in order to do that and put it up on the floor."
  Mikvah Waters: Trump is "Trying to Create a Civil War" and Must Be Prosecuted
  
• "Everyone understands what happen at Capitol Hill last week was terrible, but when you crack down on your ideological foes after condoning bad behavior from your own side, you lose all credibility."
  Don't Dismiss DC Capitol Rioters as Trump's Chumps
  
• "..."while I mourn the loss of life that occurred, I'm inclined to agree with Mark Steyn that there is some value in such reminders for the political class as we saw last week."
  We Will Not Be Lectured by the Violent, Anti-American, Revolutionary Left

  THE 2020 DEMOCRAT ELECTION HEIST

• "The violent threats come in response to Hawley leading efforts to object to the certification of the Electoral College and mainstream media smearing him as inciting the small amount of violence that occurred at the Capitol."
  Senior NIH Analyst Threatens Sen. Hawley, "Deserves to be Skinned Alive" for Challenging Election Results
  
• "At some point, fraud and uncertainty in one state's election become national problems that affect voters in every state."
  Congress Has Learned Nothing and Left America More Divided
  
• "Patriotism does not demand that we stand down in questioning the integrity of the presidential election, but precisely the opposite."
  Conceding Defeat to Fraud Is Not Patriotic
  
• "My house has a ghost -- the afterimage of someone who moved out, not the specter of a deceased person. In election jargon, a stale voter."
  The Ghost Who Votes
  
• Hawley said in a statement on Thursday: "I will never apologize for giving voice to the millions of Missourians and Americans who have concerns about the integrity of our elections. That's my job, and I will keep doing it."
  In Capitol Riot Aftermath, People Are Contacting Sen. Josh Hawley's High School Demanding It "Condemn" the Alumnus (define the word "people" in this context- jjs)

  ABOVE THE FOLD, BREAKING, NOTEWORTHY

• "Terrifying times lie ahead."
  What Now?
  
• Daniel Greenfield: "The new cold war is here."
  China's Coronavirus Cold War

  CIVIL WAR 2.0: LEFTIST REIGN OF TERROR, WAR ON POLICE, AMERICAN DISSOLUTION

• "In Sacramento, demonstrators rally to 'Reopen California.'"
  Pro-Trump protesters in SoCal's Pacific Beach targeted by AntiFa
  
• A few million like him and we'd have no worries.
  REPORT: Kyle Rittenhouse Spotted at Bar Wearing "Free As Fuck" Shirt, Drinking Beer
  
• "History tells us that leftist revolutionaries follow certain patterns. The 21st Century is no exception."
  Twenty-First Century Rules for Revolutionaries
  
• "Having rioted, looted, and murdered throughout 2020, Democrats are now using January 6 as the excuse for a total political purge."
  Democrats Close In for the Kill, Not Just Trump But All Republicans
  
• "Given the havoc and destruction Democrats brought to America in 2020, their righteous indignation would be funny if weren't so deadly serious."
  Had President Trump Been Reelected, the Nation Would Still be Burning (more accurately, Had the Democrats Failed in Their Coup - jjs)
  
• Robert Spencer: "Yes, it's a woke fascism of the Left, but it's still fascism."
  Fascism Comes to the U.S.
  
• " The Left wants the total annihilation of the president, his legacy, and his supporters, root and branch."
  The Left Tries Another "High-Tech Lynching" of Clarence Thomas and His "Terrorist" Wife After Trump Rally

  POLITICS

• "At many times, I thought he was ready to do it, and many times it was blocked by, I have to assume, the force that we now call the 'deep state.'"
  Giuliani Says Trump Owes It to MAGA Movement to Declassify Everything
  
• "First Dem-controlled gov't in a decade means fights over filibuster, court packing, socialist agenda."
  As Dems Retake Government, Standoff With Party's Left Flank Looms
  
• "Flake, a frequent critic of President Donald Trump, chose not to run for reelection in 2018 and endorsed President-elect Joe Biden over Trump in 2020."
  Maricopa County Republicans Vote to Censure Jeff Flake, Arizona GOP Schedules Cindy McCain Vote
  
• "Was Trump ever really a Republican?"
  The Impending Divorce of Trump and the GOP
  
• "Too many people fail to recognize that when liberal elites sign on to 'systemic racism' and other leftist concoctions they are not endorsing an ideology, they are protecting themselves."
  A Daring Left and a Cowed Center
  
• The message is clear: "challenge us again at your own peril."
  The Ruling Class Beat Trump. Now It's Salting the Earth
  
• Roger Kimball: "Later ages are always surprised by the casual brutality of totalitarian regimes. What they neglect is the unshakeable (though misguided) conviction of virtue that animates the totalitarians."
  The "Virtue" of the New Totalitarians
  
• "It's been a long road to the White House, and she's made all the safe decisions at every turn, with Thursday's speech just the latest detour."
  Your Monthly Reminder That Nikki Haley is a Social-Climbing Political Opportunist
  
• Victor Davis Hanson: "Hang on. It is going to be Mr. Toad's wild scary ride for all of 2021."
  Crazy 2020 Is Dead! Long Live Crazier 2021!

  BIDEN CRIME FAMILY REVELATIONS

• "Apple's top lobbyist is a longtime Biden adviser. Former executives from Twitter and Facebook are also joining the Biden White House."
  Biden Has Ties To 5 Major Tech Companies
  
• "The e-mails, originally reported by Loomered.com, outline an intimate relationship dating back over a decade."
  E-Mails Reveal Facebook Banned Users at Hunter Biden's Request

  CHINESE CORONAVIRUS FICTIONS, FACTS AND AMERICA IMPRISONED

• "Details of over 300 studies, many of which focus on investigating diseases that transfer from animals to humans, are missing from the state-run National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC)."
  COVER UP: Chinese Communist Party Officials Delete Wuhan Lab Data, Erase Chinese COVID Studies
  
• "Meanwhile, China jails citizen-journalist over Wuhan virus reporting during that city's battle with [Chinese] COVID-19."
  Feds Investigate Potential Link Between University of Alabama and Wuhan Institute of Virology
  
• "Vaccination, safety-ism, and the art of the conservative virtue-signal."
  Refusing the Chinese COVID-19 Vaccine.
  
• People who recovered from [Chinese] COVID-19 are likely to have "robust" and "long-lasting" immunity that lasts for years, a new study suggests.
  RIP Big Pharma: Study Shows Chinese COVID Immunity Is Long-Lasting
  
• A total cluster-fuck with thousands suffering and dying because this mobbed-up creep fancies himself the semi-homemade Mussolini.
  New York Hospital Fined for Vaccinating First Responders Without Angel-of-Death Cuomo's Consent
  
• "It's been the biggest crisis in Indiana's history. And we have people standing on the sidelines," Indiana's outgoing Attorney General Curtis Hill said.
  Indiana AG: Governors Completely Ignore That Endless Lockdowns and Mask Mandates Are Unconstitutional

  OFFICIAL DEMOCRAT PARTY-ENDORSED ANTI-SEMITISM, ANTI-CHRISTIANITY

• "And the hysterical hypocrisy is ratcheting up in the last days of the Trump administration."
  Democrat Hypocrisy on Condemning Anti-Semitism Is Becoming Tiresome

  AMNESTY, IMMIGRATION, BORDER SECURITY

• "I will in fact countermand executive orders that the president has in fact initiated that are contrary to what I think is either his authority and/or even if it's his authority, contrary to the interests of the United States on environmental issues and a range of other things."
  Joe Biden's Handlers Vow "Thorough Investigation" into Trump Officials for Border Policy

  FIRST AMENDMENT, CENSORSHIP, FAKE NEWS, MEDIA, BIG BROTHER TECH

• "The effect of this is that there is no longer a free and open social media company or site for any American to get on any longer, because these big companies, Apple, Amazon, Google, they have just destroyed a -- what was likely -- Parler is likely a billion-dollar company. Poof, it's gone. But it's more than just the financial aspect to that. Republicans have no way to communicate."
  Nunes: Parler Ban a "Violation of Antitrust, Civil Rights, the RICO Statute -- There Should Be a Racketeering Investigation"
  
• "Look for alternatives and not give in to the censorship crowd."
  Plug In Your Old Fax Machine
  
• "Twitter is destroying American freedom to enrich itself."
  Twitter is the Enemy of the American People
  
• "No such widespread censorship was cast upon leftist elites who encouraged the repeated outbreak of deadly riots last year."
  Big Tech Oligarchs Collude to Ban Parler From Internet and Phones
  
• "Silicon Valley escalates its reign of terror against patriotic Americans."
  Twitter Unpersons Trump
  
• "The Lords of Silicon Valley make their move."
  The Night of the Tech Long Knives
  
• "What do they have in mind for us? German government is set to enact a new hate speech law which obliges social media companies like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube to hand over user data to Germany's federal police even before any wrongdoing has been established."
  Germany, Which is Proposing a "Hate Speech" Ban, Offers to Help U.S. Fight "Enemies of Liberal Democracy"
  
• "China's tech giant maintained lucrative relationship with popular British magazine."
  Economist Staffers Flock to Huawei
  
• "..."they will be held accountable and not allowed to pretend they were not involved."
  Lincoln Project Creating Database to Prevent Trump Admin Officials From Future Employment
  
• Big Tech did not remove House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's accounts when she called for "uprisings" against the Trump administration. Facebook and Twitter did not target Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez when she claimed that allegedly marginalized groups have "no choice but to riot." These platforms did not act against Kamala Harris when she said the riots "should not" stop.
  The All-Out Assault on Conservative Thought Has Just Begun
  
• "The hypocrisy of left-wing Big Tech companies is astounding."
  Twitter Allows "Hang Mike Pence" to Trend After Banning Trump for "Inciting Violence"
  
• "Straka's sin was encouraging people from the Walk Away campaign to go to the "Save America Rally" on January 6th at the Capitol Ellipse, where President Trump spoke. Walk Away's encouragement that people fight for election fairness in support of President Trump was apparently a bridge too far for the Silicon Valley censors."
  Brandon Straka's "Walk Away" Facebook Group Deleted in Big Tech Purge of Conservative Accounts
  
• "This threat to free speech precedes the Trump presidency; it has been cultivated by the Left for more than a decade, growing in strength year by year."
  Twitter's Totalitarian Path
  
• "For young people today, it's becoming normal to see political leaders in our country deemed 'dangerous' to be ousted from public platforms."
  The Trump Purge Makes Living in America More Like Living in China

  SECOND AMENDMENT

• "I went to the shooting range yesterday."
  Joe's Man-Chin Says People Shouldn't Be "Scared to Death" of Democrats Taking Guns (not if you never let one get close enough- jjs)

  ABORTION

• "Why doesn't Joe's incitement to the violence of abortion generate full-throated condemnations?"
  The Biden-Coddling, Trump-Condemning Bishops

  FOREIGN AFFAIRS, INTERNATIONAL

• "Kim doesn't like to be ignored. If the world doesn't pay attention to him for a few weeks, he'll throw a tantrum and threaten to destroy his enemies."
  Whoa, Fat's! Message for Joe Biden: We Will Bring U.S. "to Its Knees"
  
• "Qatar must make reasonable concessions to secure good relations."
  Despite Trump's Brokered Gulf Detente, Hurdles Remain for Qatar-Israel Deal
  
• "When people who know tyranny first-hand warn us, it would be foolish to ignore them."
  Three Overseas Leaders Who Know How Repression and Tyranny Work Speak Out on Censorship of Trump and Election Skepticism

  DEFENSE, MILITARY, SECURITY AFFAIRS

• "In addition to foiling the Iranian attack, the Space Force Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Enterprise became an official part of the U.S. intelligence community."
  The Space Force Has Proved Its Worth Already
  
• "Universities received $88 million from CCP entities behind cyber attacks and espionage."
  Organizations Linked to Chinese Military Are a Cash Cow for American Colleges

  WE-ALL-SLAM-FOR-I-SLAM

• "ICNA and CAIR's Wilfredo Amr Ruiz team up to spread radical Islam to Hispanics."
  Terror en Espanol

  DOMESTIC AFFAIRS, THE BUREAUCRACY, WASTE, FRAUD, ABUSE

• Sadly, this trend is going to be reversed. Especially when they open the Bureau of Reeducation.
  Number Employed by Government in United States Declined 1,278,000 in 2020
  
• "His administration will undo many of President Trump's business-friendly policies."
  Joe Biden, Re-Regulator

  THE ECONOMY, STUPID

• "While a higher federal minimum wage would boost some workers' earnings, it would do so at the expense of pushing others out of the labor market -- specifically... the "young, inexperienced, disabled, and poorly educated, along with immigrants, inner-city dwellers, those whose skills have grown obsolete, and residents of areas where costs of living are low."
  Biden Chief of Staff Seems to Back $23 Minimum Wage
  
• "The trends for economic freedom in the USA do not look good."
  Feudalism Returns to America?

  CRIME & PUNISHMENT, NON-DOSTOYEVSKY

• "After killing the student in a parking garage, the shooter 'walked into an apartment building a block away, where he shot a 46-year-old security guard who was sitting at the desk and a 77-year-old woman who was getting her mail.'"
  Mass Shooter Leaves 3 Dead, 4 Wounded in Chicago in "Hours-Long" Rampage

  EDUCATION, AND WHAT PASSES FOR IT

• "The secrets of successful schools are hiding in plain sight. The problem is that our Education Establishment refuses to implement those ideas."
  The Sabotage of Public Education
  
• "Education faculty members in the humanities need to consider what they are withholding from their students."
  "Resexualizing Necrophilia": A Look at What Your Kids' College Professors Care About

  ACTUAL SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY

• Our intrepid science reporter bemoans the leviathan: This is modern America. You don't have the real freedom to do what you want. You must sit, twiddling your thumbs, while your betters in Washington decide whether they will allow you to do it."
  Momentus Forced to Delay Its First Mission Due to FAA Bureaucrats

  CULTURE WARS, NATIONAL SUICIDE

• "The next stop on the tyrannical, free speech-destroying warpath of Critical Race Theory."
  Silence Will Be the Next Hate Crime
  
• "Everyone has lied to us."
  To Heal, We Must First Acknowledge Plummeting Public Trust Is Reasonable
  
• "Peter Wood's learned and thoughtful demolition of the 1619 Project."
  Facts Win Out
  
• "Cancel Culture hearkens back to another time where groupthink reigned supreme."
  Inquisitions and Heroes, Then and Now

  HITHER & YON

• "The latest novel from Fight Club author Chuck Palahniuk is another satisfying, if superficial, examination of the intersection of victimhood and dark impulses."
  The Invention of Sound Aims To Make You Scream
  
• "At every pass we have absorbed laws, not of morality, which are liberating, but of etiquette, which is a curb on adventure and genius, and of security and sloth, which deaden the soul."
  Practical Freedom

NOTE: The opinions expressed in some links may or may not reflect my own. I include them because of their relevance to the discussion of a particular issue.

ALSO: The Morning Report is cross-posted at CutJibNewsletter.com if you want to continue the conversation all day.

Follow us on Twitter: @CutJibNews
Follow us on Instagram: @Cutjibnewsletter

We are also on Parler but as of this morning, their server is "down." Surprise surprise.

posted by Open Blogger at 07:03 AM

| Access Comments