Why the elites are so desperate to avoid discussing radical Islam.

David Amess and the terrorism amnesia industry

The killing of Sir David Amess is starting to slip from public consciousness. You can feel it. Just two weeks after the Conservative MP for Southend West was allegedly murdered in a suspected Islamist terror attack, it seems like this horror is fading from national memory. Yes, numerous tributes were paid. The media coverage was extensive. Parliament garlanded Amess with touching tributes. And, in his memory, Southend will be granted city status, something he campaigned for throughout his political career. So there has not been nothing. Of course not. And yet it seems undeniable now that this atrocity is not being accorded the political and historic moment it surely deserves.

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The Party’s Over in San Francisco

Key prosecutors are leaving District Attorney Chesa Boudin’s office to join the recall effort.

Mom and Dad are terrorist murderers.

How does one keep the party going when key guests gather their coats and leave? And what if they’re not leaving quietly? Such is the situation for San Francisco district attorney Chesa Boudin. Prosecutors who work in his office are defecting. In fact, since Boudin started his term in office, at least 51 of the department’s attorneys have either been fired or have left of their own accord. The most dramatic departures have been the recent resignations of two assistant district attorneys, Brooke Jenkins and Donald du Bain. Both consider themselves progressive and committed to “restorative justice,” yet they not only quit and took their scathing reviews of Boudin to the media; they’ve also joined the Safer Without Boudin recall campaign seeking to oust their former boss from office.

 

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Hating Jews is Becoming a Leftist Purity Test

The Jewish groups that failed to fight campus anti-Semitism are about to live under it.

When Sunrise Movement DC issued its ultimatum that either the Jews had to be kicked out or it would boycott a D.C. statehood rally, it was a familiar purity test. And, like most purity tests, was about testing a willingness to hate people and endorse a new extremist position on demand.

Purity tests that have no constructive purpose except to undermine and oust a leadership that is insufficiently radical have become commonplace in the Reign of Terror era of American politics.

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Progressives are a gift to Islamism Young Brits are being taught to hate their country

In the almost 30 years that I have lived in the West, discussion surrounding Islamism has been stymied by one thing: the naïve belief that it will magically disappear. After every Islamist attack, promises are made. Ambitious changes to anti-terror programmes are ordered. Politicians line up to announce that this is the last time.

And yet somehow — despite all the vigils, all the pledges, all the policy announcements — Islamism remains as potent as ever.

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Why is the US still in Syria?

A week ago, US troops camped out in the small, dusty Syrian outpost of al-Tanf suddenly found themselves under a “deliberate and coordinated attack“, as multiple explosive-laden drones barreled toward their positions. According to US officials who spoke to the AP on background, Iran “resourced and encouraged” the latest drone attack targeting US forces. The five drones were also reportedly Iranian-manufactured, leading to speculation that Tehran is testing the Biden administration at a time when nuclear negotiations between the US and Iran remain in limbo.

Fortunately, US troops managed to defuse the drone attack without suffering any casualties. But the near-miss was still deeply troubling, for it again illustrated the extremely dangerous environment in which nearly 1,000 US forces in Syria are operating.

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Just the Beginning: Ten Afghan Evacuees Detained as National Security Risks

The Biden administration is giving America gifts that will keep on giving for generations to come, and one of the foremost of these gifts is the newly-arrived group of Afghan evacuees: 70,000 are now in the U.S., and the total number is expected to exceed 124,000 before long. One of Biden’s handlers, unnamed in a Wednesday Wall Street Journal report, has admitted that ten of these evacuees have already been detained as risks to national security. Only ten out of 70,000 isn’t bad, right? Sure. But Biden’s handlers’ catastrophic mishandling of the withdrawal from Afghanistan makes it virtually certain that there will be many more.

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Canada’s grocery chains stocked with tomato products connected to Chinese forced labour

Canadian consumers who purchase popular tomato pastes, sauces and ketchups may actually be buying products harvested and manufactured by Uyghurs and other ethnic minorities under oppressive working conditions in China, according to a CBC Marketplace investigation.

Marketplace, in collaboration with the Investigative Reporting Project Italy — a non-profit media association — and The Guardian, found some of the world’s biggest grocers, including ones here in Canada, are stocked with tomato products that could be tied to forced labour in Xinjiang, a remote area of western China where Uyghurs are subjected to mass detention, surveillance and torture by the Chinese government, in what many countries have labelled a genocide.

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British Theatre Adds Trigger Warning to Shakespeare’s Macbeth

A London theatre has added a ‘trigger warning’ to its production of William Shakespeare’s 415-year-old play Macbeth, because it contains scenes of violence, suicide, fake blood, and smoking.

The Almeida Theatre in north London includes this “content warning”: “This production includes extreme scenes of violence, including violence against children, suicide, and the use of blood, firearms and knives. It also contains flashing lights, vaping and the smoking of real cigarettes.”

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William Watson: After reconciliation, reparations?

Is the government of Canada planning to give all the land back?

The Fraser Institute has a new study out, called “ Fiscal explosion ,” on the spike in federal spending on Indigenous matters since 2015. It’s by Tom Flanagan, emeritus professor of political science at the University of Calgary and former adviser, campaign manager, and chief of staff to Stephen Harper. Flanagan is maybe our best example of a noted academic who entered what Teddy Roosevelt called the arena. His little book on game theory, using real-word examples from Canadian politics, is one of the best introductions to the subject I know. There aren’t many like him. Jean-Yves Duclos, a top-flight economist who is now federal health minister, is one. Let’s hope Duclos brings serious economics to health policy — starting maybe by figuring out what Ottawa is doing in a provincial field.

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“White People, You Are the Problem”

AT&T’s new racial reeducation program promotes the idea that “racism is a uniquely white trait.”

AT&T Corporation has created a racial reeducation program that promotes the idea that “American racism is a uniquely white trait” and boosts left-wing causes such as “reparations,” “defund police,” and “trans activism.”

I have obtained a cache of internal documents about the company’s initiative, called Listen Understand Act, which is based on the core principles of critical race theory, including “intersectionality,” “systemic racism,” “white privilege,” and “white fragility.” CEO John Stankey launched the program last year and, subsequently, has told employees that private corporations such as AT&T have an “obligation to engage on this issue of racial injustice” and push for “systemic reforms in police departments across the country.”

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‘Yeah, we’re spooked’: AI starting to have big real-world impact, says expert

A scientist who wrote a leading textbook on artificial intelligence has said experts are “spooked” by their own success in the field, comparing the advance of AI to the development of the atom bomb.

Prof Stuart Russell, the founder of the Center for Human-Compatible Artificial Intelligence at the University of California, Berkeley, said most experts believed that machines more intelligent than humans would be developed this century, and he called for international treaties to regulate the development of the technology.

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Stiffest charge sticks for ex-officer who shot Daunte Wright

Former Minneapolis police officer Kim Potter has lost her bid to shed a first-degree manslaughter charge in the shooting death of Daunte Wright earlier this year.

Potter had previously been charged only with second-degree manslaughter for killing the 20-year-old Black man during a traffic stop on April 11, alleging she’d mistaken her weapon for a taser.

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Mocking Meta: Facebook’s virtual reality name change prompts backlash

The announcement by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg that the social media giant will change the name of its holding company to Meta in a virtual-reality rebrand has prompted dismay and bemusement.

On Thursday, Zuckerberg said Meta would encompass Facebook as well as apps such as Instagram, WhatsApp and the virtual reality brand Oculus.

“Announcing Meta — the Facebook company’s new name,” the tech giant said in a tweet. “Meta is helping to build the metaverse, a place where we’ll play and connect in 3D. Welcome to the next chapter of social connection.”

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