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PHOTON COURIER
 
Monday, October 31, 2016  
IS HILLARY CLINTON DIRECTLY RESPONSIBLE FOR THE EXECUTION OF SHARAM AMIRI?

Sharam Amiri, an Iranian nuclear scientist, was executed by the regime on August 3 after being convicted of providing secret information to the Americans. Sharam Amiri was also discussed in emails that were found on Hillary Clinton’s unsecured server.
Did Clinton’s negligence lead to Amiri’s execution? Possibly not: the regime was suspicious of him for other reasons, and we don’t know for certain that the Clintonmail bathroom server was hacked by the Iranians. But discussing a foreign intelligence contact on a system that is not certified for classified information can easily lead to the deaths of American agents and other individuals, whether or not it happened in this specific case..
There is no excuse for Vox’s flippant attitude in referring to this matter as “Trump’s fake controversy.” If you take several passengers for a high-speed drive in your car while knowing that the brakes are bad, then you are doing a terrible thing, even if that particular ride does not end in disaster. If you feed someone a regular diet of poisons, and he is killed by someone else before the poisons have a chance to act, that does not let you off the hook. Clinton’s extreme irresponsibility may have led to Amiri’s execution or it may not; it may have led to the execution or murder of others of whom we were unaware. This case provides one more piece of evidence about Hillary’s utter lack of concern about the lives and well-being of actual, particular human beings.
cross-posted at Chicago Boyz, where comments are open

3:13 PM

Wednesday, October 26, 2016  
THE RAGE OF THE HILLARYITE BULLIES

I’ve been trying to figure out what common trait binds Clinton supporters together. As far as I can tell, the most unifying characteristic is a willingness to bully in all its forms.
If you have a Trump sign in your lawn, they will steal it.
If you have a Trump bumper sticker, they will deface your car.
if you speak of Trump at work you could get fired.
On social media, almost every message I get from a Clinton supporter is a bullying type of message. They insult. They try to shame. They label. And obviously they threaten my livelihood.
Only one presidential candidate has wielded the sledgehammer of government against personal enemies.
The spirit of totalitarianism is very strong among today’s Left, and you can expect that a Hillary Clinton presidency would unleash and encourage a broad spectrum of attacks against those who do not toe the line.
cross-posted at Chicago Boyz, where comments are open

8:41 AM

Monday, October 24, 2016  
THE TOTAL BUREAUCRATIZATION OF HIRING AND PROMOTION

It seems that one of the next campaigns of the ‘Social Justice Warriors’ will be the elimination of management discretion in hiring:
The next battlefield after high tech is discretion in hiring–which the activists believe must be limited to force employers to hire any candidate “qualified” for a job as soon as they apply. Only a few radicals are proposing this kind of blind hiring now, but continuing successes in getting firms to bow to their diversity demands will result in a list of new demands. We have already seen Seattle pass an ordinance requiring landlords to rent apartments to the first applicant who qualifies. And similar movements in hiring–supposedly to prevent discrimination by eliminating management choice of who to employ–are coming soon.
The SJWs will certainly get around to insisting that promotions, as well as initial hiring, be handled in the same way.
You can be certain that a Hillary Clinton presidency would be far more favorable to this sort of thing that would a Donald Trump presidency.
If your aspiration is to be a robot, with your every action in life controlled by highly-detailed top-down rules, then you should by all means work fervently for a Clinton presidency.
cross-posted at Chicago Boyz, where comments are open

7:38 AM

Wednesday, October 19, 2016  
READ AND CONSIDER BEFORE VOTING

Regulators retaliate against Tea Party activist for his free speech–and get away with it.  People’s political views are being attacked by threatening their employment; there is more and more of this.
Various people in Silicon Valley and elsewhere are advocating a boycott of businesses in which Peter Thiel is involved because of his $1.25MM donation to the Trump campaign. Ellen Pao of ‘Project Include,’ a group which says it focuses on improving tech-industry opportunities for women and minorities, has already cut ties with the Y Combinator (startup incubator) because Thiel is a part-time partner there.  Not very helpful to the people you are claiming to want to provide opportunities for, I’d say, Ms Pao.
Video has been released in which Democratic operatives admit to inciting violence at Trump rallies.  According to this, one of the major players is Robert Creamer, co-founder of something called Democracy Partners. Creamer is the husband of Illinois Democratic Rep. Jan Schakowsky. He also has a guilty plea for financial fraud on his record, and has visited the White House 342 times since 2009.
Mary Grabar writes about her personal experience with the IRS persecution of conservatives.
At least 20 cars belonging to attendees at a Trump rally were vandalized in Bangor, Maine.  There was also a recent fire-bombing of Republican office in North Carolina.
It’s not new news, but consider the continuing flood of heresy accusations–which can have serious consequences for the accused party’s career—on college campuses.
Obama has denounced what he calls the ‘Wild West’ media landscape and called for a ‘curating function’ on information distribution.  (‘obviously not censorship,’ he adds.)  See Mark Steyn’s response.
The Obama administration has called for ‘local intervention teams’ to ‘prevent the spread of violent ideologies.’  As Mary Grabarsays:  “ou can bet your sweet bippy that these “local intervention teams” will be guided by Madame President and that the focus will be on the “violent ideology” of tea partiers and Trumpeters.”
A Hillary Clinton presidency would mean the ceaseless tightening of the coils of the anti-free-speech python.  Expect free expression outside of a defined (and ever-narrowing) box to be threatened by further politicization of regulatory agencies, threats against individuals’  employment, use of major media corporations (including blogging platforms) as part of the ‘extended government’–and direct mob action against dissident organizations and individual dissidents. Not to mention the continuation and reinforcement of anti-free-speech behavior and extreme political indoctrination in America’s institutions of higher education.
cross-posted at Chicago Boyz, where comments are open


8:40 AM

Monday, October 17, 2016  
THE CUBAN MISSILE CRISIS, AS VIEWED FROM A SOVIET LAUNCH FACILITY (rerun)

This month marks the 54th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis, which brought the world dangerously close to thermonuclear war.
Several years ago,  I read  Rockets and People, the totally fascinating memoir of Soviet rocket developer Boris Chertok, which I reviewed here.
Chertok’s career encompassed both military and space-exploration projects, and in late October 1962 he was focused on preparations for launching a Mars probe. On the morning of Oct 27, he was awakened by “a strange uneasiness.” After a quick breakfast, he headed for the missile assembly building, known as the MIK.
At the gatehouse, there was usually a lone soldier on duty who would give my pass a cursory glance. Now suddenly I saw a group of soldiers wielding sub-machine guns, and they thoroughly scrutinized my pass. Finally they admitted me to the facility grounds and there, to my surprise, I again saw sub-machine-gun-wielding soldiers who had climbed up the fire escape to the roof of the MIK. Other groups of soldiers in full combat gear, even wearing gas masks, were running about the periphery of the secure area. When I stopped in at the MIK, I immediately saw that the “duty” R-7A combat missile, which had always been covered and standing up against the wall, which we had always ignored, was uncovered.
Chertok was greeted by his friend Colonel Kirillov, who was in charge of this launch facility. Kirollov did not greet Chertok with his usual genial smile, but with a “somber, melancholy expression.”
Without releasing my hand that I’d extended for our handshake, he quietly said: “Boris Yevseyevich, I have something of urgent importance I must tell you”…We went into his office on the second floor. Here, visibly upset, Kirillov told me: “Last night I was summoned to headquarters to see the chief of the [Tyura-Tam] firing range. The chiefs of the directorates and commanders of the troop units were gathered there. We were told that the firing range must be brought into a state of battle readiness immediately. Due to the events in Cuba, air attacks, bombardment, and even U.S. airborne assaults are possible. All Air Defense Troops assets have already been put into combat readiness. Flights of our transport airplanes are forbidden. All facilities and launch sites have been put under heightened security. Highway transport is drastically restricted. But most important—I received the order to open an envelope that has been stored in a special safe and to act in accordance with its contents. According to the order, I must immediately prepare the duty combat missile at the engineering facility and mate the warhead located in a special depot, roll the missile out to the launch site, position it, test it, fuel it, aim it, and wait for a special launch command. All of this has already been executed at Site No. 31. I have also given all the necessary commands here at Site No. 2. Therefore, the crews have been removed from the Mars shot and shifted over to preparation of the combat missile. The nosecone and warhead will be delivered here in 2 hours.
continued at Chicago Boyz

8:00 AM

Thursday, October 13, 2016  
HIRING A PRESIDENT

When hiring someone for an important job, it is of course important to assess whether or not that person has the skills you think are necessary for doing the job well.  But it’s important to also assess what they think are the important aspects of the job, and make sure these line up with what you think are the most important job factors.  You want to know what they are ‘passionate’ about, to employ a currently-overused term.
And when hiring an executive, keep in mind that you are also likely gaining access to his network of former employees, customers, suppliers, consulting firms, etc.  A similar but even more powerful dynamic plays out in politics, as Daniel Henninger of the WSJ reminds us:
A recurring campaign theme of this column has been that the celebrifying of our presidential candidate obscures the reality that we are not just just electing one famous person.  We will be voting into power an entire political party, which has consequences for the country’s political direction no matter what these candidates say or promise.
By that measure, there is a reason not to turn over the job of fighting global terrorism to the Democrats.  They don’t want it.
So, what are they key aspects of the Presidential job that needs to be done over the next four years, and how do the candidates and their beliefs about what is important stack up against those factors?  Here’s my list..
The suppression of radical Islamic terrorism.  Henninger is completely correct: the Democrats don’t want this job.  Henninger notes that during a House hearing in 2005, Guantanamo Bay was denounced (almost entirely by Democrats, I am sure) as ‘the Gulag of our times.’  Whereas GOP Congressman Mike Pence correctly responded that the comparison was ‘anti-historical, irresponsible and the type of rhetoric that endangers American lives.’
Henninger continues: ‘Dahir Adan invoked Allah while stabbing his way through the Minneapolis mall.  Both Mrs Clinton and President Obama consistently accuse their opponents of waging a war on all practitioners of the Islamic religion. Presumably, if instead we were being attached by Martians, they’d say any criticism of Martians was only alienating us from all the People on Mars. The problem is we aren’t getting killed by Martians or Peruvians or Finns but by men and women yelling ‘Allah Akbar’…Virtually all Democratic politicians refuse to make this crucial distinction.’
The protection of free expression. As long as we have free speech and a free press, there is a possibility that our array of problems can be solved.  But once this crucial feedback connection is cut, problems of all kinds are likely to compound themselves until catastrophe happens.
Remember, Hillary Clinton’s response to the Benghazi murders was to blame them on an American filmmaker exercising his Constitutional rights, and to threaten to have him arrested.  Which threat she was indeed able to carry into execution.
And note that Hillary Clinton’s Democratic Party is closely aligned with the forces on college campuses which are creating a real nightmare for anyone–student or professor–who dissents from the ‘progressive’ orthodoxy or who even demonstrates a normal sense of humor.
There is a very strong tendency among Democrats to call for the forceable government suppression of political dissidents, and to carry this belief into action when they can get away with it:  the witch-hunt in Wisconsin and the IRS persecution of conservative organizations and individuals being only two of many examples.  More here.
Trump is by no means ideal on this metric: he is thin-skinned and is shown himself to be very litigious.  But he is far preferable from a free-expression standpoint to Clinton and the forces that she represents.
Economic growth.  Clinton herself would surely like to see economic growth, if only  for political reasons.  But there is in the Democratic Party a very strong strain that believes Americ is too wealthy, that our people have too many luxuries, that we need to be taken down a peg. I have ever seen attacks by ‘progressives’ on the existence of air conditioning. The Democrats are generally willing to sacrifice economic growth on the altar of environmental extremist and to serve their trial-lawyer clients. Sexual politics represents another cause for which growth is readily sacrificed by Democrats–remember when Obama’s ‘shovel-ready’ stimulus package was first mooted, there was an outcry from left-leaning feminist groups concerned that it would be too focused on ‘jobs for burly men.’
And whatever her ‘small business plan’ may be in her latest policy statement, Hillary has an underlying dismissiveness to those small businesses–the vast majority of them—that do not enjoy venture capital funding.  Remember her remark, when told back in the Bill Clinton administration, that aspects of her proposed healthcare plan would be destructive to small businesses?  Her response was:  “I can’t be responsible for every undercapitalized small business in America.”  No one was asking her to be responsible for them, of course; only to refrain from wantonly destroying them.
It is important to note that many of the top Democratic constituencies don’t really need to care, on a personal level, about economic growth. Tenured academics have salaries and benefit packages which are largely decoupled from the larger economy.  Hedge-fund managers often believe they can make money as readily in a down market as an up market. Many if not most lawyers are more dependent for their incomes on the legal climate than the economy. Very wealthy individuals may care more about social signaling than about money per se, given that they already have so much of the latter.  And the poor and demoralized will in many cases care more about transfer payments than about the growth of the economy.
Improving K-12 Education.  Much of the nation’s public school system is a disaster.  There is no chance that Hillary would be would care enough about fixing this system, and preventing or at least mitigating its destruction of generation after generation, to be willing to take on the ‘blob’…the teachers’ unions, the ed schools…these being key Democratic constituencies.  Also: the Democratic obsession with race/ethnicity has led to demands from the Administration that school disciplinary decisions must follow racial quotas.  Policies such as this, which would surely continue under a Clinton administration, make it virtually impossible for schools to maintain a learning environment for those students who do want to learn.
The current state of K-12 education is a major inhibitor to social mobility in America.  Anyone who claims to care about the fate of families locked into poverty, while at the same time supporting a Hillary Clinton presidency, is either kidding themselves or straight-out lying.
continued at Chicago Boyz

8:44 AM

 
TWITTER SUPPRESSES O'KEEFE

James O’Keefe of Project Veritas has been locked out of Twitter after posting videos said to expose Democratic Party electoral fraud and just before he was able to post additional videos on the same subject.
Here is the link to Project Veritas.   I recommend posting it on any blogs for which you are a writer or commenter.
The degree of control of the national dialog which is enforced by the Democrats and their media operatives is getting very scary.  It is still possible to bypass it, but for how much longer?
cross-posted at Chicago Boyz

5:28 AM

Saturday, October 01, 2016  
METAPHORS, INTERFACES, AND THOUGHT PROCESSES (rerun)
Writing in today’s WSJ, Peggy Noonan says: “This year I am seeing something, especially among the young of politics and journalism.  They have received most of what they know about political history through screens  They’re college graduates…they’re bright and ambitious, but they have seen the movie and not read the book….They learned through sensation, not through books, which demand something deeper from your brain.  Reading forces you to imagine, question, ponder, reflect…Watching a movie about the Cuban Missle Crisis shows you a drama.  Reading about it shows you a dilemma.”
The article reminded me of Neal Stephenson’s book and of this post, which I originally ran in late 2007.
My post today is inspired by In the Beginning was the Command Line, by Neal Stephenson, a strange little book that will probably be found in the “computers” section of your local bookstore. While the book does deal with human interfaces to computer systems, its deeper subject is the impact of media and metaphors on thought processes and on work.
Stephenson contrasts the explicit word-based interface with the graphical or sensorial interface. The first (which I’ll call the textual interface) can be found in a basic UNIX system or in an old-style PC DOS system or timesharing terminal. The second (the sensorial interface) can be found in Windows and Mac systems and in their respective application programs.
As a very different example of a sensorial interface, Stephenson uses something he saw at Disney World–a hypothetical stone-by-stone reconstruction of a ruin in the jungles of India. It is supposed to have been built by a local rajah in the sixteenth century, but since fallen into disrepair.
The place looks more like what I have just described than any actual building you might find in India. All the stones in the broken walls are weathered as if monsoon rains had been trickling down them for centuries, the paint on the gorgeous murals is flaked and faded just so, and Bengal tigers loll among stumps of broken columns. Where modern repairs have been made to the ancient structure, they’ve been done, not as Disney’s engineers would do them, but as thrifty Indian janitors would–with hunks of bamboo and rust-spotted hunks of rebar.
In one place, you walk along a stone wall and view some panels of art that tell a story.
…a broad jagged crack runs across a panel or two, but the story is still readable: first, primordial chaos leads to a flourishing of many animal species. Next, we see the Tree of Life surrounded by diverse animals…an obvious allusion (or, in showbiz lingo, a tie-in) to the gigantic Tree of Life that dominates the center of Disney’s Animal Kingdom…But it’s rendered in historically correct style and could probably fool anyone who didn’t have a PhD in Indian art history.
The next panel shows a mustacioed H. sapiens chopping down the Tree of Life with a scimitar, and the animals fleeing every which way. The one after that shows the misguided human getting walloped by a tidal wave, part of a latter-day Deluge presumably brought on by his stupidity.
The final panel, then, portrays the Sapling of Life beginning to grow back, but now man has ditched the edged weapon and joined the other animals in standing around to adore and praise it.
Clearly, this exhibit communicates a specific worldview, and it strongly implies that this worldview is consistent with traditional Indian religion and culture. Most viewers will assume the connection without doing further research as to its correctness or lack thereof.
I’d observe that as a general matter, the sensorial interface is less open to challenge than the textual interface. It doesn’t argue–doesn’t present you with a chain of facts and logic that let you sit back and say, “Hey, wait a minute–I’m not so sure about that.” It just sucks you into its own point of view.
continued at Chicago Boyz

12:59 PM

 
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