Rebane's Ruminations
May 2023
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[The following is a recent commentary by Victor Davis Hanson, an academic and national intellect familiar to RR readers.  In it he again summarizes the socio-political travesties that America’s Left, abetted by our foreign enemies, daily visits upon our people most of whom ill-prepared by their schooling to understand, let alone resist, these propagandized assaults.  VDH’s commentary was first posted on townhall.com.  gjr]

Victor Davis Hanson

The Left is waging a full-fledged cultural revolution against traditional America. And the Maoist results are often as absurd as they are terrifying.

Special-counsel John Durham just issued his final report on wrongdoing within the FBI, CIA, and the Department of Justice.

The summary confirms that our premier investigatory and intelligence agencies interfered in the 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns.

Directors and high-ranking FBI officials lied under oath. They misled Congress. They altered court documents and deceived federal judges.

The FBI hired a foreign national to gather dirt on Donald Trump's 2016 campaign – while he was being paid by the rival Hillary Clinton campaign.

The FBI contracted Twitter to suppress news stories. It kept the Hunter Biden laptop under wraps, even as former intelligence officials flat out lied it was likely "Russian disinformation." That was a blatant effort to aid the 2020 Biden campaign.

The IRS just conceded whistleblowers were correct and the agency fired its entire multi-year audit team responsible for investigating Hunter Biden's purported tax irregularities.

The agency claimed it was ordered to do so by the Department of Justice, headed by Biden's appointee Merrick Garland.

California is facing a crushing $32 billion deficit. Yet it flirts with an $800 billion-dollar "reparations" payout to the state's Black residents.

No one has any idea where the money for that would come from. No one can define who would qualify. No one can explain why a state that never allowed slavery eight generations ago now owes selected Californians billions of dollars it does not have.

One of the reparations board leaders asserts Blacks might be willing to accept an "installment" plan of payments.

The NAACP just issued a "travel alert" advising Blacks not to visit Florida. The announcement was timed to draw negative attention to conservative Florida Governor Ron DeSantis' announcement of a presidential bid.

Chicago, Baltimore, Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, Los Angeles, and Indianapolis – all outside Florida – have the highest Black murder rates in the nation.

Florida by contrast, with a Black population of 3.3 million, has the second largest number of Black businesses in the nation. The chairman of the NAACP's board of directors is himself a Florida resident!

Black Lives Matter has just announced it lost millions of dollars in investments and ran up huge deficits. The culprit was its former corrupt leadership.

Its extravagant spending, plush homes, and family hangers-on have nearly bankrupted the advocacy group. It cannot account for the millions of dollars in corporate guilt and protection money it leveraged following the George Floyd riots in 2020.

In New York, a threatening subway career criminal with 42 prior arrests was subdued by a bystander and died during the confrontation. The criminal is now deified. The would-be Samaritan is charged with felony manslaughter.

The deceased's uncle is vocal about his late nephew's confrontation. But he himself was just arrested with stolen property and armed with a knife. He was mysteriously still roaming the streets despite 70 prior arrests and current active arrest warrants.

In almost every American city and town, biological males, with enormous advantages in size and musculoskeletal mass, routinely win women's sporting competitions.

They are systematically destroying decades of progress that sought to ensure parity between men and women's sports.

Corporate America has joined this cultural revolution hysteria. Companies are apparently now hellbent on destroying their brands, profits, and net worth.

Under pressure from the LGBTQ activists, the Los Angeles Dodgers reinvited the "Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence" to celebrate Pride night at Dodger Stadium.

Catholics and Christians had objected to the invitation because the group's notoriety hinges on its sexualized and often pornographic mockery of Catholic ritual, the Holy Trinity, and Christian faith.

The supposedly courageous group would never dare extend its street-theater blasphemy to other religious groups such as Muslims or Hindus.

The Dodgers apparently do not care that Greater Los Angeles may be home to 6 million Mexican American citizens and resident Hispanic immigrants. Most are Catholic and many were avid Dodger fans.

Anheuser-Busch has nearly destroyed its best-selling Bud Light brand by hiring transgender performance-art activist Dylan Mulvaney to hawk the brand – and his own transitioning – to America's working classes.

The Disney corporation, for decades, has enjoyed multibillion-dollar concessions and a veritable 40-square mile private fiefdom gifted from the taxpayers of Florida.

No matter. Disney has rebranded it films, amusement parks, and television offerings to reflect radical transgender, gay, and race advocacies.

The results so far are billion-dollar losses in Disney stock, subscribers, and viewers.

A woke CNN has all but destroyed its once-global audience. It now has fewer viewers than certain popular podcasts.

All these implosions are not just shocking but surreal. Why are our government, corporations, and popular culture colluding in mass suicide – to the delight of our enemies like Communist China?

Posted in , , ,

94 responses to “America’s Mass Suicide in Progress”

  1. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    All these statements are just an opinion of one person and do not in any way attempt to present any factual basis for these conclusions. As I have stated many times in the past Victor Davis Hanson was a notorious neo-can and a big supporter of our invasion of Iraq and that disqualifies his opinions from further consideration without at least some factual basis of support. Here he presents around 40 opinions with no documentation.

    Like

  2. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    sp. Neo-Con

    Like

  3. The function derived from another function 🐠 Avatar
    The function derived from another function 🐠

    Posted by: psul Emery | 25 May 2023 at 12:26 PM
    Thanks Mr. RawSewage.com

    Like

  4. Scott O Avatar

    Paul 12:26 – “and that disqualifies his opinions from further consideration without at least some factual basis of support. Here he presents around 40 opinions with no documentation.”
    If Hanson said the sun rises in the east, Paul would not believe it.
    “…with no documentation”
    The Durham report is NOT documentation??
    Bud Light sales have collapsed – needs documentation??
    Try reading the news, Paul – it’s all well documented.
    You just can’t admit reality.
    Maybe Paul doesn’t believe the Hispanics in SoCal are heavily Catholic.
    Maybe Paul can be specific about which fact in Hanson’s opinion piece in wrong?
    Or is he suddenly bizzy, bizzy, bizzy?

    Like

  5. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    There is zero documentation Scott. Only one persons opinion.

    Like

  6. Don Bessee Avatar
    Don Bessee

    Here is a gift that the ponytail of ignorance can wail about all weekend –
    https://www.breitbart.com/2024-election/2023/05/25/poll-donald-trumps-net-favorability-rating-reaches-all-time-high/
    😉

    Like

  7. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    Scott
    Even the website that published the piece does not necessarily stand behind the opinions. Direct quote
    “The opinions expressed by columnists are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of Townhall.com.”

    Like

  8. Scott O Avatar

    Paul is slow – I’ll ask again:
    “Paul – what specific item mentioned in the opinion piece is not correct?”
    If this question is too hard for you, maybe I can type in a bigger font?

    Like

  9. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    That’s great news for the Dems Don. The good news for the Dems is that the biggest political loser since the 1800’s will likely be the Repubs choice for Pres in ’24. Go Trump I say.

    Like

  10. scenes Avatar
    scenes

    lol.
    In …3….2….1 the Topic At Hand becomes not about the essay and it’s actual contents but about Paul Emery.
    It’s in the nature of minstrels to become the center of attention but it becomes damned tiresome. Scotto, you know that he won’t bother to argue a case. It would requiring freeing up the other hand to help run the keyboard.
    re: Disney and AB InBev, it is peculiar that they’ve decided to become activist organizations and push money-making to the side to some extent, but I guess that large organizations always become enslaved to the C-suite at some point. What’ll stop it isn’t so much political backlash from government, that just gives them a chance for more virtue signalling, but a good hard shareholder lawsuit. Of course, that implies that BlackRock isn’t the majority shareholder.
    As an aside, you can argue that a place like BlackRock, if actively managing funds, should be subject to anti-trust law. They are large enough to produce the same anti-market force that a monopoly does. (should a monopsony fall into that category also?).
    In general, I’d say that any company willing to spend a boatload of money on DEI efforts probably is in a non-competitive market. Something is broken if they have the dosh to spend on nonsense like that.

    Like

  11. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    (C) 2023 Tribune Content Agency, LLC. is the copyright given in the place where I picked it up early this morning, at RealClearPolitics.com
    Punchy is all punched out.
    VDH has gotten it… it is an American Maoist cultural revolution that is underway, and a key to stopping it is to call it out.

    Like

  12. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    Don was the one bragging about his guy Trump rising in the polls. I agreed with im that it’s good news because he’s such a loser the Dems will surelywin in ’24.

    Like

  13. scenes Avatar
    scenes

    from psul:
    “As I have stated many times in the past Victor Davis Hanson was a notorious neo-con and a big supporter of our invasion of Iraq and that disqualifies his opinions from further consideration without at least some factual basis of support.”
    from wikipedia:
    “Ad hominem (Latin for ‘to the person’), short for argumentum ad hominem, is a term that refers to several types of arguments, most of which are fallacious. Typically this term refers to a rhetorical strategy where the speaker attacks the character, motive, or some other attribute of the person making an argument rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself. This avoids genuine debate by creating a diversion to some irrelevant but often highly charged issue. The most common form of this fallacy is “A makes a claim x, B asserts that A holds a property that is unwelcome, and hence B concludes that argument x is wrong”.”
    oddly enough, a quote from psul in April 2018 said: “I agree with Victor Davis Hanson when he writes:”. Go figger.

    Like

  14. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    Who is psul scenes? My name is Paul Emery

    Like

  15. Scott O Avatar

    “My name is Paul Emery”
    That’s just an opinion – I saw no documentation.

    Like

  16. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    I could have sworn his name is “Punchy”.

    Like

  17. Scott O Avatar

    Getting back to the topic – I’m wondering how far the crazy will go?
    As we see from one “correspondent” there is no crazy at all. It’s all just a made up opinion. And it’s not going crazy evenly. Some areas aren’t too bad, but Chicago just doubled down on crazy. It simply wasn’t crazy enough. The big place where it counts is DC and a lot of them can’t hurl themselves over the edge fast enough.
    Living here in Cozy Town I still have a hard time really believing the utter disaster DC has become. It’s as if the Dems raided the rehab centers, old folks homes, intensive care units and freak shows for their ‘leaders’. It was bad enough they elected a person so stupid he actually thought an island would tip over if there were too many people on it. Then we get a SCOTUS justice that can’t tell us what a woman is.
    “Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad”
    Looks like it.

    Like

  18. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    What does “O” stand for Scott? Looks like you’re another one who is embarrassed to use your real name. Very fish like.

    Like

  19. Don Bessee Avatar
    Don Bessee

    We know oh great ponytail of ignorance, dont you? Ah yes the memory issue again. @551
    😉

    Like

  20. Scott O Avatar

    Paul’s back to form – he loses the argument, so he starts in with an unrelated peeve.
    I did explain why I no longer use my full last name not too long ago, Paul. Look it up.
    I’m retired and couldn’t care less what folks think of my opinions.
    I’m fully capable of embarrassing my kids in oh so many other ways.

    Like

  21. scenes Avatar
    scenes

    “It was bad enough they elected a person so stupid he actually thought an island would tip over ”
    That is a beautiful thing.
    I haven’t seen it for some time and thought it worth a watch again. It never grows old.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QjG958lZ1KI
    Naturally, he’s still in office. https://hankjohnson.house.gov/
    I’d say it’s fairly likely he’s the most intelligent man in his district.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QRmYlCJ70z8

    Like

  22. Scott O Avatar

    scenes – The best part for my money is the military guy keeping a somewhat straight face and coming up with “uh, we don’t anticipate that…”
    My reaction would have been a jaw-dropped stare and maybe after awhile: “whiskey tango foxtrot”.
    And when that came out, I was naive enough to think the Dems had actually struck the bottom. I now think they don’t have one.

    Like

  23. 🐠 Avatar
    🐠

    Posted by: Scott O | 25 May 2023 at 06:33 PM
    Another classic from psul “memory issues” Emery.

    Like

  24. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    There are vast times I don’t follow this site Scott so I likely missed it (the “O” question)h owever it’s obvious you are a solid Trumper therefore you would support pardons for those Proud Boys convicted of Seditious Conspiracy on Jan 6 as Trump has promised he would do.

    Like

  25. Don Bessee Avatar
    Don Bessee

    Wheres the dark lord of liberal lament land when you need a punctuation shrew?! @735 LOL
    😉

    Like

  26. Scott O Avatar

    Paul – “it’s obvious you are a solid Trumper”
    Really? Is that your opinion? Where is your documentation?
    And this has what to do with the topic?

    Like

  27. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    All you’ve got to say Scott is that you wouldn’t support pardons for the Proud Boys convicted of Seditious Conspiracy as Trump promised. So would you support pardons by Trump or not?

    Like

  28. 🐠 Avatar
    🐠

    Posted by: psul Emery | 25 May 2023 at 07:35 PM
    ..:.. There are vast times I don’t follow this site Scott so I likely missed it (the “O” question)h owever

    Given your history you didn’t “miss it” you forgot it.
    You really should take notes psul! It would cut down on this sort of thing….the constant repetition of questions, the litany of unsupported assertions, and the clearly incorrect conclusions that you constantly make.
    Vast times indeed.

    Like

  29. scenes Avatar
    scenes

    “There are vast times I don’t follow this site Scott so I likely missed it (the “O” question)h owever it’s obvious you are a solid Trumper therefore you would support pardons for those Proud Boys” -psul
    ‘Vast’ = ‘about two weeks’.
    Proud Boys are sort of non-existent outside of the imagination of the Chattering TV Left, but there are a bunch of people he should let out.
    – Julian Assange (not in US custody, but in the custody of those who dance to the 17 intelligence agency’s tunes).
    – Shut down Guantanamo Bay. Either put them in US jail with US legal protection or kick them out to some Arab country. The whole thing is utterly grotesque at this point, it’s as if the intelligence people are run by executives with a sadism fetish.
    https://www.foxnews.com/politics/arkansas-man-feet-nancy-pelosis-desk-during-capitol-protest-sentenced-prison plus a bunch of others held in what is basically political prison.
    – heck, I’ll throw in Matthew Coulter.
    OTOH, burning buildings, throwing bombs at federal courthouses, organized shoplifting (while a POC), and assault/kidnapping ( https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/07/us/former-ncaa-swimmer-riley-gaines-assault-san-francisco-state-university/index.html ) is A-OK if done by the bureaucrat’s street army.
    It’s hard to escape the opinion that the legal system is arbitrary and largely run by ego and inertia. At this point in history, I’d say that neither Biden or Trump is in charge, but a great big machine that they serve at the sufferance of is. The deep state is kind of a silly description as it’s simply The State.

    Like

  30. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    From Punchy:
    “As I have stated many times in the past Victor Davis Hanson was a notorious neo-con and a big supporter of our invasion of Iraq and that disqualifies his opinions from further consideration without at least some factual basis of support.”
    A notorious neo-con who agreed with most folk over Iraq. A neo-con is a newly minted conservative, changing their Democratic spots to match conservatives. What did he write? Let’s look:
    “Special-counsel John Durham just issued his final report on wrongdoing within the FBI, CIA, and the Department of Justice.
    The summary confirms that our premier investigatory and intelligence agencies interfered in the 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns.
    Directors and high-ranking FBI officials lied under oath. They misled Congress. They altered court documents and deceived federal judges.
    The FBI hired a foreign national to gather dirt on Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign – while he was being paid by the rival Hillary Clinton campaign.”
    Looks correct to me, not strictly opinion but a factual accounting of the Durham report. Good so far?

    Like

  31. scenes Avatar
    scenes

    Scotto: ‘scenes – The best part for my money is the military guy keeping a somewhat straight face and coming up with “uh, we don’t anticipate that…”‘
    That’s how you get to be a flag officer. I just assume that any rank over about O-6, in peacetime, requires the ability to schmooze and listen to idiots without laughing. The system for choosing a Congressman certainly isn’t a meritocracy and one has to keep the funds flowing and the career trending ever upward. The result ends up being as expected and nothing new.
    Nothing is as stupid as all of us together. Luckily, there are plenty who want to grow the government in an ever-expanding swirl of stupid. How else would so many funny things happen?
    (I’ve probably quoted this before. From the ‘Viktor Suvorov’ book on the Soviet Army)
    “Before the arrival in Severodvinsk of Marshal of the Soviet Union
    Grechko, the high command of the Northern Fleet decided to paint the
    shore-line cliffs grey. In all, over twenty kilometres of coastline were
    painted. The sailors of two whole divisions and the men of a marines
    regiment laboured over this titanic work for several weeks and, in the
    process, used up the whole allocation of anti-corrosion paint supplied to
    the entire fleet for a whole year. The Minister liked the colour of the
    rocks, and from that time forth the painting of rocks before the arrival of
    a high-ranking commander became one of the more remarkable traditions
    of our Fleet. “

    Like

  32. Scott O Avatar

    Paul 11:30 – “All you’ve got to say Scott is that you wouldn’t support…”
    First of all, Paul, this has nothing to do with the topic and secondly I’ve told you before I don’t have to say shit.
    You tried to post on the actual topic and put your foot in your ass and when called on it, you revert to whining about my name and then it’s off to Trump-land.

    Like

  33. The Estonian Fox Avatar
    The Estonian Fox

    scenes at 02:25 PM-
    Monopsony also applies to the U.S. Army, Navy, Air Force as well, especially for many contractors with only that single customer. Since they have pledged allegiance to the U.S., I will grant them a special forgiveness, though not so much many of the command elements in them. How many generals can be fir- retired in a year?

    Like

  34. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    Scott
    The Durham report is ALL about Trump. Thought you knew that.
    Gregory
    Since you are an expert on the report can you tell me what indictments does the Durham report recommend? Also did you read the report to document Sansons allegations?

    Like

  35. Scott O Avatar

    Paul – “The Durham report is ALL about Trump.”
    Totally wrong, Paul.
    Maybe you should actually read the report.

    Like

  36. scenes Avatar
    scenes

    EF: “How many generals can be fir- retired in a year?”
    You know, it’s a problem that’s existed since a)people started living so long and b)there was such a thing as a military pension/inactive duty. The Royal Navy ended up with scads of ‘Yellow Admirals’ on half pay forever. No doubt any culture that goes in and out of war on a regular basis ends up with a top-heavy officer class.
    Thank God that the defense contractors need so many salesmen, or these people would be as bored as you can imagine.
    It’s an interesting thing to think about. How do you optimize flag officers, Presidents, CEOs for age? There’ll be a few older ones that are tolerably competent, but even Eisenhower, Kesselring, etc. weren’t all that old. Maybe MacArthur was as close as you might get to an outlier. Naturally, practically any serious war starts with your existing commanders, who then get fired and replaced by the more high-functioning (or lucky) colonels and the like. It’s an age-old cycle.

    Like

  37. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    This is the final product of the Durham report Gregory
    “Though Durham had broader powers than the Justice Department’s watchdog, he pursued prosecutions of just three people, two of whom were acquitted. The third, a former FBI lawyer, pleaded guilty.”
    https://www.cbsnews.com/news/read-full-durham-report-here/

    Like

  38. Scott O Avatar

    More news on America’s suicide – The trouble at Target:
    The backlash from the backlash. How many times are these stupid companies going to try “woke-ism” before they learn that once they start down that road, they’re screwed no matter what they do.
    https://www.marketwatch.com/story/target-doesnt-have-a-spine-workers-slam-retailers-decision-to-pull-lgbtq-pride-themed-products-amid-backlash-73c1e4a3?mod=home-page
    Most laughable quote:
    “Many Target employees believe the company pulled Pride products in order to salvage sales, worker-advocacy group says”
    Yeah – who needs “sales”?
    Companies operate on “feelz” doncha know.

    Like

  39. scenes Avatar
    scenes

    “worker-advocacy group says”
    lol. Why does a ‘worker-advocacy’ group give a damn about rainbow-color underwear with that amazing ‘tuck feature’?
    You’d think they’d be for, well, the workers. Like wages or hours or something.
    Maybe there’s a Leonard Cohen song about all this.
    Come over to the window, my little darling,
    I’d like to try to read your palm.
    I used to think I was some kind of nancy-boy
    But then I’d tuck my groin
    Now so long, Marianne, it’s time that we began
    to laugh and cry and forget that I was a man

    Like

  40. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    Imagine a reality where your jury pool was as flawed as the District of Columbia’s.
    I sat on the jury for a DUI trial in Nevada City. The accused was obviously drunk at the time and drove through Grass Valley during the height of the feeding time for cops… about 2AM. The accused was also a USAF ossifer, a pilot of one of those long range, very high altitude single engine taildragges that are based down the hill.
    It hurt to vote guilty, but I did my sworn duty, knowing it probably put him out of a job.
    Now, how many DC jurors would do that to a Deep Stater who they’ve seen on MSNBC? The two acquitals, test cases by Durham, were as guilty as the pilot I condemned to being on the ground.

    Like

  41. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    Your opinion Gregory. The FACTS are Durhams total products were three prosecutions two of which were acquittals and one guilty plea. That came at a cost to taxpayers of 6.5 million dollars.
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/12/23/durham-special-counsel-russia-costs/

    Like

  42. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    Punchy 115p
    OJ Simpson… in reality… guilty or not guilty?

    Like

  43. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    So, in Paul’s tiny world… is it a FACT that OJ Simpson didn’t grusomely kill a woman and a friend of hers with a big f’ing knife, and the Not Guilty verdict forever erased what happened and freed OJ to search for his ex wife’s killer on golf courses wherever he roamed, as long as he was able to stay out of jail on other charges?

    Like

  44. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    Punchy 115p
    OJ Simpson… in reality… guilty or not guilty?

    Like

  45. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    Clapper and Brennan… did or didn’t lie to Congress while under oath?

    Like

  46. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    Adam Schiff… did he lie to the American people about testimony he said he knew about?

    Like

  47. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    Paul…?
    Paul…?
    Paul…?
    Paul…?
    Paul…?

    Like

  48. Gregory Avatar
    Gregory

    Now, the nearly stolen 2016 election, the hobbling of the Trump administration and the stolen (by the FBI and CIA actions) 2020 election cost us all HOW MUCH PAUL?

    Like

  49. Scott O Avatar

    Paul 1:15 – “The FACTS are Durhams total products were three prosecutions two of which were acquittals and one guilty plea.”
    No, Paul – that was not the total product. There is the information in the Durham report that you won’t read.
    The Justice Dept is corrupt. The Obama admin was corrupt. The current admin is corrupt.
    These people are selling our country’s interests for cash to put into their own bank accounts. They are framing innocent people. They are subverting justice. They are subverting the democratic process. They are lying to the American public.
    Those are facts but you have decided to look at who has been convicted or not as the sole marker of our times.
    You do realize that by that reasoning all the blacks falsely imprisoned or hung in the Jim Crow era was OK by you. Cause no crooked white judge or jury or sheriff was convicted back then. No convictions for corrupt officials equals a nothing burger to Paul Emery.
    Good to know where we stand.

    Like

  50. Paul Emery Avatar
    Paul Emery

    Gregory
    What does O.J have to do with the failure of the the Durham report to find virtually no wrongdoing worth further inquiry? One conviction!!! What a waste of money-6.5 million.

    Like

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