After Trying to Defund Police, Minneapolis City Council Asks: ‘Where Are the Police?’

Now that Al Sharpton has lost interest in Minneapolis — after all, there are no more televised funerals of criminal suspects who died in police custody for him to hijack — the rest of his comrades in the national media have moved on as well. The vultures got what they needed from George Floyd’s corpse and flew away, so now the people of Minneapolis are left to their own devices. Their riot-ravaged neighborhoods and crime-ridden streets don’t fit the preferred narrative, so they’re being ignored.

But the residents still have to live there. They’re still trying to go about their daily lives. The people who can afford to move away from Minneapolis are fleeing in droves, but what about the people who are stuck there? What can they expect from their local leaders, who have spent months trying to #DefundThePolice because it was trending on Twitter?

Minneapolitans can expect what we can always expect from politicians: whining, blame-shifting, and cowardly ass-covering. Brandt Williams, Minnesota Public Radio:

The meeting was slated as a Minneapolis City Council study session on police reform.

But for much of the two-hour meeting, council members told police Chief Medaria Arradondo that their constituents are seeing and hearing street racing which sometimes results in crashes, brazen daylight carjackings, robberies, assaults and shootings. And they asked Arradondo what the department is doing about it.

“Residents are asking, ‘Where are the police’?” said Jamal Osman, newly elected council member of Ward 6…

The number of reported violent crimes, like assaults, robberies and homicides are up compared to 2019, according to MPD crime data. More people have been killed in the city in the first nine months of 2020 than were slain in all of last year. Property crimes, like burglaries and auto thefts, are also up. Incidents of arson have increased 55 percent over the total at this point in 2019.

You want to get rid of the police? This is what it looks like. When you stop enforcing the law, you get anarchy and chaos. You get ruined lives and billions in damages. The only thing worse than cops is no cops.

And that’s after we saw nonsense like this, from Minneapolis City Council President Lisa Bender:

The whole “Defund the Police” movement is moronic, and the Democrats have made a huge mistake by embracing it. They can’t see past their own noses. Comedian Ryan Long sums up the “thinking” in his latest satirical video:

“Problematic police? No more police! People not obeying COVID rules? Hire more police to arrest them!”

They don’t think, they just react. It doesn’t need to make sense, it just needs to feel right. And when they’re proven wrong, again and again… “Hey, look over there!!”

And the great thing about the people who want to defund the police and now demand more policing? They’re the same people who don’t think you should be able to own a gun to defend yourself.

The single biggest misstep the media and other Biden campaign surrogates have made this year is downplaying the riots as “mostly peaceful protests” and blaming all the violence on the cops. That’s why they’re now panicking about this joke, which Trump just retweeted:

When Trump retweets a joke, it automatically becomes a hate crime. Twitter has slapped a “Manipulated Media” tag on that, and CNN and the rest of their ilk are flipping out about it being “misinformation.” But that’s not the real reason. They’re freaking out because:

1. It’s funny and they hate being mocked
2. It reminds voters that Biden spent the summer ignoring the riots and bashing the police
3. That’s it

It’s one thing to say Trump shouldn’t be RT’ing stupid jokes, about Biden or anybody else. That’s arguable. But to call this “doctored” or “manipulated,” as if there’s some effort to deceive here, is itself deceptive. That’s because they know policing is an issue where Biden is very vulnerable.

Just ask the people of Minneapolis. Their entire city and state is controlled by Democrats. The Democratic Party’s nominee is parroting BLM propaganda while their town plummets into lawlessness, along with dozens of other cities across the country. Why should they vote for this guy? Why should they keep voting for the local Democrats who got them into this mess?

For all my problems with Trump (sorry, MAGA Nation!), he’s right on this one and Biden is wrong. A lot of Americans are suffering because their leaders have forgotten this immutable fact: If you don’t enforce the law, it’s not really law at all.

P.S. Case in point: BuzzFeed just published a puff piece about the two Brooklyn lawyers who face 45 years in prison for throwing a molotov cocktail at a cop car. The two criminals are painted as victims:

They’re the children of immigrants and their friends like them? Well then, never mind! They’re free to go.

SOURCE

MacArthur Prevails – Judge Denies LA County’s Fourth Attempt to Shut Down Grace Community Church

On August 25, 2020, in California Superior Court, Judge Mitchell Beckloff issued a five-page opinion, County of Los Angeles et al. v. Grace Community Church et al., denying the County of Los Angeles’ renewed application for a temporary restraining order against the church and Pastor John MacArthur.

Thomas More Society attorneys are defending the renowned pastor and his congregation against an aggressive assault by the county over the right to hold indoor worship services.

In a very well-reasoned analysis of the prior proceedings, the court held that the county’s attempt to obtain a restraining order did not meet statutory requirements and that the Court of Appeal’s order did not justify a new temporary restraining order; rather, it simply stayed Judge Chalfant’s August 14 order and gave the county permission to enforce its own health order.

Thomas More Society Special Counsel Paul Jonna explained, “The court correctly concluded that Los Angeles County’s renewed application for a temporary restraining order was both procedurally and substantively defective. This was their fourth unsuccessful attempt to obtain a court order prohibiting indoor worship services at Grace Community Church. We look forward to fully vindicating our clients’ constitutionally protected rights in subsequent proceedings for this important case.”

“We look forward to fully vindicating our clients’ constitutionally protected rights in subsequent proceedings for this important case,” said Thomas More Society Special Counsel Paul Jonna.

Pastor John MacArthur said of the decision, “We are very grateful to Judge Beckloff for his reasoned opinion and for taking great care to review this very important matter. As I said in my declaration to the court, we see this action against us as an illegitimate misuse of power. It should shock the conscience of every Christian that churches are coming under assault from our own government simply for holding church. Church is essential.”

Thomas More Society Special Counsel Jenna Ellis added, “This should signal to LA County that California courts will not quickly or easily trample the constitutionally protected rights of churches. We maintain that their health order is unconstitutionally burdening the right of churches to worship, and there exists no rational basis, much less a compelling interest, to try to shut down indoor services at this point, particularly when the county is allowing strip clubs to operate and massive riots to take place – and not seeking restraining orders against them. We look forward to making those arguments at a subsequent proceeding, where we will ask the court to properly check this power grab by Los Angeles County and the State of California’s executive branch.”

The next hearing in the case is scheduled to take place on September 4, 2020 in Los Angeles Superior Court.

SOURCE

Voters Who Live in ‘Riot Zones’ Back Trump 2-1

Democrats and the media who’ve confidently predicted that Donald Trump’s pivot to a law and order campaign wouldn’t work should take notice.

They’re wrong.

The issue of law and order — regardless of who perpetrates the unrest and for what reason — hits every American in a personal way. Trump’s target may be “suburban moms” and ex-urban whites, but his message is resonating with those most directly affected by the issue: those who live or work in “riot zones.”

Washington Examiner:

In the latest Rasmussen Reports survey, 63% of voters who have seen violent protests in their community “strongly approve” of the president — just 35% don’t.

The survey is the latest showing Trump winning the “law and order vote” as the country sees violence from the protests expand from big cities to smaller communities, such as Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

Rasmussen, who has consistently shown higher approval for Trump than other surveys, has the president at 51 percent approval. That tops Obama’s numbers at this stage of the campaign in 2012.

The law and order vote is a big one. Rasmussen said that 42% of likely voters said that their communities have hosted the anti-police protests in their communities. And nearly half said those protests turned violent, making them a big issue, even to those who haven’t witnessed the violence.

The correlation between Trump’s approval and the support of those living in riot zones is striking.

Among all voters, 65% say the violent protests are important to their vote in the presidential election this fall, with 41% who say it’s ‘Very Important.’

“Among those who have had violent protests in their community, even more (76%) rate them important to their vote, including 54% who say they are ‘Very Important.’ Sixty-three percent (63%) of these voters ‘Strongly Approve’ of the job Trump is doing versus 35% who ‘Strongly Disapprove.’”

Joe Biden and the Democrats aren’t fooling anyone. Their “Road to Damascus” conversion to condemning the violence in the streets while saying they support Black Lives Matter is political doubletalk and voters know it. The fact is, they don’t trust liberal Democrats to keep them safe.

Voters have reached an important distinction. As long as the unrest was seen as a legitimate protest, Black Lives Matter and the Democrats had their support. But the tide has turned and now, and more people see the unrest as riots rather than protests.

New York Post:

The poll, published Sunday, found that 48 percent of likely voters surveyed described violence in New York, Portland, and Kenosha, Wisconsin to be riots, compared to 40 percent who saw them as protests.

The results break down in part along party lines, with 68 percent of Republicans calling the unrest riots, compared to 30 percent of Democrats.

There has been much discussion of a “hidden” Trump vote. Many of these law and order voters could very well say they’re voting for Biden but vote for Trump on election day. Much will depend on whether Black Lives Matter heeds the pleas of Democratic candidate and stops fomenting the violence. They know the score. They read the same polls as Trump. This is an election-winning issue for the president and Republicans and only peaceful streets will neutralize the issue.

SOURCE

Scientific American Makes an Unscientific Endorsement

They have long been a Leftist organ

“Scientists are most effective when they provide sound, impartial advice,” said acclaimed MIT climate scientist Kerry Emanuel, “but their reputation for impartiality is severely compromised by the shocking lack of political diversity among American academics, who suffer from the kind of group-think that develops in cloistered cultures. Until this profound and well-documented intellectual homogeneity changes, scientists will be suspected of constituting a leftist think tank.”

The above warning seems to have aged quite well, given that it was issued a decade ago. If anything, the leftist lurch within the scientific community has only worsened since then.

Case in point: Scientific American, which, as it proudly proclaims, had never endorsed a presidential candidate in its 175-year history, recently endorsed everyone’s favorite Man of Science, Joe Biden. But the editors don’t do it lightly, they’ll have us know.

“The evidence and the science,” the magazine’s sages somberly write, “show that Donald Trump has badly damaged the U.S. and its people — because he rejects evidence and science. The most devastating example is his dishonest and inept response to the COVID-19 pandemic, which cost more than 190,000 Americans their lives by the middle of September. He has also attacked environmental protections, medical care, and the researchers and public science agencies that help this country prepare for its greatest challenges. That is why we urge you to vote for Joe Biden, who is offering fact-based plans to protect our health, our economy and the environment. These and other proposals he has put forth can set the country back on course for a safer, more prosperous and more equitable future.”

It’s hard to imagine Biden’s own press secretary putting together a puffier piece of political spin. But that’s what “science” has come to.

Of course, this isn’t the first time we’ve lamented the politicization of science. As we wrote back in 2016, “There is a political party that is behind much of the so-called science we hear about these days. That of course is the Democrat Party. There is a major problem with the Party of Science™, though, and that is every time science doesn’t jive with their worldview, they ditch the evidence.”

We also noted the defenestration of Harvard President and former Clinton Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers for having had the temerity to suggest that there might be some intellectual differences between men and women that allow them to excel in certain areas while not reaching the highest heights in other areas. There are also the pesky realities that keep intruding on the “settled science” of the climate change crowd, and the Left refuses to so much as look at an ultrasound for fear that it might actually settle the science of life itself. We might also mention the Left’s opposition to genetically modified foods, which could’ve saved millions of Africans from starvation; or the Left’s efforts to ban animal experimentation, which would devastate the field of medical research; or the Left’s knee-jerk resistance to studying the genetic basis for human behavior; or the Left’s insistence that a man can be a woman.

After yammering on about the settled science of Donald Trump’s awfulness, the Scientific American’s Biden PAC closes with this: “Although Trump and his allies have tried to create obstacles that prevent people from casting ballots safely in November, either by mail or in person, it is crucial that we surmount them and vote. It’s time to move Trump out and elect Biden, who has a record of following the data and being guided by science.”

Got that? Joe Biden and his party are “guided by science.” Except when they’re not.

SOURCE

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Political correctness is most pervasive in universities and colleges but I rarely report the incidents concerned here as I have a separate blog for educational matters.

American “liberals” often deny being Leftists and say that they are very different from the Communist rulers of other countries. The only real difference, however, is how much power they have. In America, their power is limited by democracy. To see what they WOULD be like with more power, look at where they ARE already very powerful: in America’s educational system — particularly in the universities and colleges. They show there the same respect for free-speech and political diversity that Stalin did: None. So look to the colleges to see what the whole country would be like if “liberals” had their way. It would be a dictatorship.

For more postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, GREENIE WATCH, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS and DISSECTING LEFTISM. My Home Pages are here or here or here. Email me (John Ray) here. Email me (John Ray) here.
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