I have always been conflicted about intellectuals. On the one hand, it must be a wonderful thing to be recognized as an expert in one’s particular field of intellectual excellence. On the other hand, I recognized that many intellectuals have an overwhelming sense of superiority not only about their field, but a strange sense of self-righteousness about areas far removed from their particular discipline. Many have a belief that they understand so much more than the average person and that the world would be so much better if only they were allowed to direct the fortunes of humanity. All too often, when they have exercised power or influence outside of their specific field, the results have been disastrous. Seldom have they ever admitted their failures (the one exception I can think of is Robert McNamara’s written regrets of his decisions in the Viet Nam war) and in fact, their opinions are still sought and carry weight.

The attached link is an interview with Thomas Sowell, himself an intellectual, as he discusses the rise of intellectuals and their influence in our Republic. They can shape public opinion and policy but as he says, they never have to pay a price for their actions. Mr. Sowell is the type of intellectual who exemplifies what is the best of that title. I hope you enjoy the interview.

You may have to copy the link and put it in your search bar.

Thomas Sowell on the second edition of Intellectuals and Society (youtube.com)

Niall Ferguson is a noted historian and social commentator. In this interview, he discusses and compares the modern-day university with the German universities of the late Weimar Republic and how German universities acted as a recruiting ground for Hitler and the Nazis. He points out that just as the German universities of that time stifled free speech and drove out those who dared to question the direction of the universities, so too today many universities have become merely reflecting pools for those who espouse antisemitism and strict adherence to DEI which is the exact opposite of individual freedom and opportunity.

In the university world today, Jews who were once at the top of the academic food-chain in Germany are now, along with whites and Asians, at the bottom and viewed as the oppressors in much of the West. Antisemitism has a long history of being used by the Left such as when the Soviet Union used it to win over various Arab states.

In the end, unlike many talking heads, Ferguson offers solutions to undo the damage done by the Left at universities; these include but are not limited to excluding government participation in the administration, funding, rules for scholarship and the mountain of reports demanded by the government in return for funding. Money always comes with strings and there is no indication that those strings have done anything except hinder independent thought at the university level.

It is a pleasure to hear such clarity of thought on the subject and a welcome change from the bloviating that we hear every day on the various “news” outlets.

“The Treason of the Intellectuals,” with Niall Ferguson | Uncommon Knowledge (youtube.com)

It is reported that Mae West once said, “the difference between free love and paid sex is that free love is more expensive.”  A wise woman.

In the attached video, Jordan Peterson speaks extemporaneously about what he calls, “the unbelievable technological triumph of birth control.”  We are still trying to make some sense of fallout of that triumph with some of the most conservative options being offered by the radical left.

As he speaks, you realize that the adage, “what is the next question” is again proven to be of value, but he follows his thoughts to their logical ends.

I hope you enjoy this timely and timeless video.

The immigration bill is dead. Whose fault is that? We are told even by the conservative editorial pages of the Wall Street Journal that it was a good bill, worthy of support. If the bill was so good, surely it should have found widespread support, yet even the President did not use a full court press to force passage. How strange.

Yet, the real question should be, why the sudden urge to create and pass such a bill? For three years we have been told that the border was closed and that we had operational control of the border. Why the sudden need for a bill that did not address any of the major concerns regarding illegal immigration? Did the bill limit the number of immigrants? No. Did it give more power to the immigration service to battle the cartels who are making more money from transporting the illegals than they do from drugs? No. Does it disincentivize the illegals from crashing our borders by not allowing them to work? No, in fact it provides work permits to any illegal who makes it across the border.

Could it be that the bill was a bit of political theater given that this is an election year? Heaven forbids, how could anyone be so suspicious! But, since those Republicans decided to oppose the bill, the President does have a new set of talking points with which to throw at the Republicans.

The link below will take you to an article that provides, in one location, the numbers behind the true disaster which the past three years of open borders have inflicted on our nation. But the pain is just beginning for no one speaks of the 100,000 unaccompanied children that have crossed who have disappeared. How many of them will be victims of sex trafficking? What will be the cost to U.S. citizens in the decades to come as they see their tax dollars diverted from social services, schools, police protection, etc. and use to house, feed, education and provide free medical care to millions of illegals?

The wounds caused by the open border policies of this administration will fester for decades , but have no doubt, there will be political forces which will profit from the open border policy; they will profit, and the average U.S. citizen will pay on ongoing price.

The linked article is sobering.

An Immigration Crisis Beyond Imagining – Imprimis (hillsdale.edu)

Despite the best efforts of the far Left (and their allies, the regular Democratic party,) I still believe that I won the lottery in life when I was born in the United States. I went back to “the old country” and after that visit, I was even more thankful for the bravery and sacrifices of my grandparents for immigrating to the United States. Without their bravery, I could picture myself growing up in a Communist nation with little freedom and little opportunity.

Their migration to the U.S. was not easy and like most immigrants, they decided to live in an ethnic neighborhood (south side of Chicago), near steady work (steel mills). I remember one of my grandmothers talking about how she thought Chicago was so backward; the sidewalks were wood (unlike Warsaw which used concrete) and the bathroom was in the back yard (unlike Warsaw which had indoor plumbing). They worked hard, saved, invested their money and their children spoke perfect English and could and did go to college. The great American dream fulfilled.

A friend of mine came over to the U.S. much later and he still talks about how the immigration process was so strict. You could only come over if you had the promise (in writing) of a job and a sponsor. You had to register where you lived, and he had an immigration officer visit him to make sure he was working and at that address! He received no welfare of any type because if he did, back he would go to “the old country.”  He married, opened a business and his four children are all strong Americans.

How times have changed! You can easily read of cities and states where non-citizens, including illegal and legal immigrants, foreign students and diplomats can vote in local elections, get driver’s licenses, etc. (Washington D.C., Minnesota, Rhode Island, Vermont, etc.)  The state of California just announced that despite its deficit of nearly seventy-billion dollars ($70,000,000,000), it will provide free health care to all illegals in the state. Where will the state find the money? Take a guess; the citizen who pays the legal taxes due. Of course, illegals already receive a free education and yes, many receive welfare.

At the same time, citizens need to pay for their health care, pay their state and Federal taxes, are required to show identification when boarding an airplane (unlike illegals), can lose their car if they are guilty of drunk driving (unlike illegals in California), etc. Something is very wrong with this picture! The backbone of any successful society in the West is a strong middle-class and yet it seems our governments at various levels are doing all they can to denigrate and destroy that group.

It may be a good time to ask, why is American citizenship being so degraded by many of our political leaders? What exactly is the upside for our nation of allowing five, or eight or ten million illegals into our nation? Most do not speak English, most have no real job skills; yet we give them free food, shelter, clothing, work permits, cell phones, etc. Millions of people around the world would love to become U.S. citizens, so it is not out of fear that no one would show up if we enforced our own laws. What is the purpose of ignoring all the laws, rules and guidelines that are there for our nation’s benefit? Immigration is designed to benefit the receiving nation; that is the first priority. We can have the pick of the best and brightest, the ones who would be thrilled to be U.S. citizens, but instead we let in millions of unknowns and who picks up the bill? Have you watched the news in the last three years? Those who pick up the bill see their neighborhoods overrun, their children’s schools being turned into migrant camps and the crime rate spiraling out of control. Who pays? It is the millions of U.S. citizens and legal immigrants who play by the rules, pay their taxes, and expect a minimum amount respect from our elected officials. Apparently, that is asking too much.

The recent court decision against former President Trump re: E. Jean Carroll points out some disturbing actions in terms of altering basic Constitutional protections, political manipulation of the justice system regarding elections and the politization of said system.

The attached article by Victor Davis Hanson should open the eyes of many readers. As you read it, you should picture yourself in former President Trumps position. It does not matter if you hate him or love him; would you want to be treated in such a manner?

Please copy the link below and post it on your header.

https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/83-million-just-beginning-donald-trump-soldier-on

There are those out there who bemoan the decreased readership of newspapers. They may wonder why, but one glaring reason is that if you have read one of the major metro newspapers, you have read them all about politics, international relations, Congress, or any other topic of national interest. Why? Because a dull gray cloak of uniformity has engulfed the traditional press as monolithic cadres of new “journalists” are spewed forth by monolithic university professors. It is no secret that well over 95% of university professors favor the party of the left and contribute to it in every election cycle. So too, the students they teach learn to either toe and accept the party line or they will face a very lonely future.

The results of that gray cloak of uniformity can be seen in the report from the Columbia School of Journalism’s scathing report on the actions of the New York Times reporting of the Russian collusion story. Sloppy reporting, lack of fact checking, partisan prejudices, favoritism, and the desire to snuggle up to politized governmental agencies led to inaccurate reporting and a national herd mentality of other major city journals.

The link below will provide you with a brief but biting overview of the failings of the New York Times. Despite the sloppy reporting, the paper was able to capture another Pulitzer Prize for reporting on the Russia election hoax. Having no shame, the Times has kept the prize but then what did one expect of the paper which accepted the Pulitzer as they helped to cover up the slaughter of six million Ukrainians thanks to their star reporter, Walter Duranty?

Newspapers should begin to do a bit of self-examination and realize that with all the competition in the real world, they need to offer a better-quality product rather than being a publishing mattress for the political forces they favor.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2023/02/06/columbia_journalism_review_russiagate_post-mortem_is_a_good_start_148821.html

How about some common sense about Race?

https://www.wsj.com/articles/notable-quotable-shelby-steele-on-affirmative-action-sweetly-insidious-fd38cf4d?reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

I recently re-read an old article from the WSJ on the Magna Carta, the document which Lord Denning said was “the greatest document of all time, the foundation of the freedom of the individual against the arbitrary authority of the state.”  I thought that the following was really inspiration and worthy of remembering:

“Liberty and property; how naturally those words tripped, as a unitary concept, from the tongues of America’s Founders. These were men who had been shaped in the English tradition and they saw parliamentary government not as an expression of majority rule, but as a guarantor of individual freedom. How different was the Continental tradition, born 13 years later with the French Revolution, which saw elected assemblies as the embodiment of what Rousseau called the “general will” of the people.

In that difference, we may discern explanation of why the Anglosphere resisted the chronic bouts of authoritarianism to which most other Western countries were prone. We who speak this language have always seen the defense of freedom as the duty of our representatives and so, by implication, of those who elect them. Liberty and democracy, in our tradition, are not balanced against each other; they are yoked together.

Most other countries have fallen for, or at least fallen to, dictators. Many during the 20th century, had popular communist parties or fascist parties or both. The Anglosphere, unusually, retained a consensus behind liberal capitalism.

This is not because of any special property in our geography or our genes, but because of our constitutional arrangements. They work because, starting with Magna Carta, they have made the defense of freedom everyone’s responsibility. Americans, like Britons, have inherited their freedoms from past generation and should not look to any external agent for their perpetuation. The defense of liberty is your job and mine. It is up to us to keep intact the freedoms we inherited from our parents and to pass them on securely to our children.”

There are those who believe that we need a “living Constitution,” more open to changes based on the moods, whims, and foibles of the lowest common denominator. Let us hope that we do not overthrow our proven vehicle for untried and fashionable experimentation.

I hope you enjoyed the points above. Thank you.

Political movements are always evolving out of necessity. That is because each movement as it gains adherents gains strength and those new adherents have their own ideas of how that movement’s goals should be as they grow. This means that the basic tenants of the movement will gradually be altered, even ignored; the original purity will disappear to be replaced by the internal conflict caused by growth and success. Additionally, if that movement has any success and achieving its’ goals, it will produce new demands/ideas or wither and die.  Life is movement and as Napoleon realized that he needed new wars to stay in power, so to do movements need new goals. If they do not, the bureaucracy of that movement will be out of work. There is no movement that has ever decided to dissolve itself because it has achieved all its’ goals. Thus, new demands and as we can see with the “Progressive” Left, there is no end to causes and wrongs that must be addressed.

The article linked below points out that at a certain point, a movement may grasp onto any excuse to exist. This is amazingly easy for movements on the left as they have no moral guideposts. If one believes that all morality can be found withing oneself, then ten different people will have ten different moral guideposts and who can say which is “right” or “wrong”? In fact, if you are on the left you cannot question any moral guidepost or else you are reactionary, unenlightened, etc. Eventually the lunatic fringe, which exists on both the Left and Right, becomes the driving force and the rest of the movement is dragged along. This means that if you are a moderate on the left, you cannot condemn the most extreme elements of the left and thus you support by your silence, their most crazy, foolish, and ignorant demands.

Thus, the title of the post and article, Has Hitler Won on the Left? The article is by Carl Trueman a professor of biblical and religious studies at Grove City College and a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2023/12/has-hitler-won-on-the-left