Author: Redactor

Update

CNN, Donald Trump & Grover Cleveland

Post author By Redactor
Post date November 10, 2024
No Comments on CNN, Donald Trump & Grover Cleveland

“Donald Trump will be America’s 47th president,” explained CNN on Saturday, “after mounting the most momentous comeback in political history. . . .”

But is it?

Consider the three federal elections that 19th century Democratic politician Stephen Grover Cleveland participated in (winning two non-consecutive presidencies):

Note the course of Grover Cleveland’s three Electoral College returns: 219; 168; 277. Compare with Trump’s: 304; 232; 312*. Cleveland’s popular vote went up each time. Trump’s did too: 62,984,828; 74,223,975; 74,535,879*. You do the math, but it a quick look suggests that Trump’s comeback is no more momentous than Cleveland’s.

The real anomaly in the recent series of three elections was the whopping turnout for the 2020 outing, where Joe Biden, who did not engage in anything like a normal campaign, garnered a whopping 81,283,501 votes. Compare that to Hillary Clinton’s 65,853,514 votes in 2016 and the less-than 71 million votes for Kamala Harris in 2024.

The real question is what happened, in 2024, to 2020’s over ten million “eager” voters. The question may be easy to answer, but it is nevertheless a huge one, and has elicited a popular graph online, widely shared:

Note that it has at least one obvious inaccuracy: the Republican presidential vote did not go down from 2020 to 2024.

Also note that CNN, quoted above, characterized the election as one that “will hand [Trump] massive, disruptive power at home and will send shockwaves around the world.” Accurate, or just CNN being CNN?

The asterisk, above, for 2024 returns is there to remind us that the election counts are not final.

Thought

Antoine-François Momoro

There is one thing that one must not tire telling people: Liberty, reason, truth are only abstract beings. They are not gods, for properly speaking, they are part of ourselves.
Antoine-François Momoro as quoted in Emmet Kennedy, A Cultural History of the French Revolution (1989). See also “20 Brumaire, Year II.” Momoro was guillotined on 4 Germinal, Year II (March 24, 1794).

Thought

20 Brumaire, Year II

An altar to Liberty was constructed at the dismantled cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris; an inscription “To Philosophy” was carved in stone above the doors — all at “The Festival of Reason” on 20 Brumaire, Year II (November 10, 1793).

Update

Disappointed Democrats Bemoan Lack of Censorship

Post author By Redactor
Post date November 9, 2024
No Comments on Disappointed Democrats Bemoan Lack of Censorship

In 2016, when Donald John Trump won the presidency in a squeaker election, major news media and the Deep State worked together to censor online and free speech in a big way, culminating in the election of Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr., in 2020. Now, in November 2024, with many millions fewer voting than for Biden, Trump wins handily, taking the swing states and achieving what looks like a popular vote majority.

So what are major news media mavens doing?

Complaining about a lack of censorship!

Well, some are. Specifically, as said on The View, “It would help if we could regulate social media, because one of the biggest offenders is D.C. and Congress have not been able to do one thing in regard to the rogue corporations of social media,” meaning, mainly but not exclusively, ex-Twitter/X.

There are many such laments out there. Just remember the Constitution of the United States, though:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
First Amendment, approved by Congress along with other amendments and submitted to the states for their ratification on September 25, 1789; ratified December 15, 1791.

Paul Jacob has covered online censorship extensively. Here are just a very few examples:

“Say No to Reich-Harris Reich,” September 6, 2024
“Censors Cancelled,” July 6, 2023
“Invitation to a Beheading,” March 13, 2023
“Buzz-Sawing the Conservatives Treehouse,” November 17, 2020

Thought

Will Rogers

Our constitution protects aliens, drunks, and U. S. Senators. There ought to be one day (just one) when there is open season on senators.
Will Rogers, Daily Telegram number 2678 (March 6, 1935).

Today

McNamara

On November 9, 1960, Robert McNamara was named president of the Ford Motor Company, becoming the first non-Ford family member to serve in that post — only to resign a month later to join the newly elected John F. Kennedy administration.

Thought

Herbert Spencer

The mental action by which from moment to moment we thus, in ways commonly too rapid to observe, class the objects and acts around, and regulate our conduct accordingly, has been otherwise named by some, and especially by Professor Bain, ‘discrimination.’ Intelligence is, in its every act, carried on by discrimination; and has advanced from its lowest stages to its highest by increasing powers of discrimination. It has done this for the sufficient reason that during the evolution of life under all its forms, increase of it has been furthered by practice or habit as well as by survival of the fittest; since good discrimination has been a means of saving life, and lack of it a cause of losing life.
Herbert Spencer, Principles of Ethics, Vol. 2, Part V: “Negative Beneficence” (1893), Chapter 1: “The Kinds of Altruism.”

Today

JFK Won

Montana was admitted into the United States federal union as the 41st state on November 8, 1889. On the same date in 1960, John F. Kennedy defeated Richard Nixon in one of the closest presidential elections of the 20th century, becoming the 35th president of the United States.

ideological culture media and media people partisanship

Not Now

“Reconsider Any Belief In Innate American Goodness,” Ken White advises at the Popehat Report. “A country that votes for Trump is broken in very complicated and daunting ways,” informs the attorney and podcaster.

“Fuck Civility,” he declares, and for good measure, “Stay Tuned For Violence.”

They do sorta go together, eh?

“Debate is preferable,” he notes for the record, “[b]ut most Americans would agree with what Thomas Jefferson said about the blood of patriots and tyrants. At some point violence is morally justified and even necessary. Americans will disagree on when.”

Though, let’s all agree, not now.

My thinking the day after takes a different route.

First, the lawfare unleashed on Mr. Trump helped him more than it hurt. A majority of the public did not suddenly become enamored with the idea of 34 felony convictions but stuck by the former president, now president-elect, because of their contempt for the New York Attorney General and the U.S. Department of Justice, seen as rogue players in partisan politics.

America had come to look like Egypt.

Second, the establishment media’s years-long campaign against Trump, hyperbolic and often dishonest (see Charlottesville narrative) failed miserably. Arguably, like lawfare, it was counterproductive.

“Americans don’t trust the news media,” asserted Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos, explaining his paper’s 2024 A.D. non-endorsement for president.

In the aftermath of Mr. Trump being declared the winner, Matt Walsh offered on X: “Legacy media is officially dead.”

Not dead. Just in need of rebirth. Like Democratic Party leaders, news media professionals face a choice, either (a) blame the public for not being more appreciative or (b) reflect upon its own principles and performance.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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