Category Archives: Social Commentary

Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Social Commentary, War Commentary

The Debate

7 Comments

Ashe Schow has a roundup of each candidate’s features and failures.

I have to say that I find the (mostly male) criticism of Fiorina’s “sternness” and failure to smile silly. And maybe even sexist. In her deep knowledge of the issues, willingness to do her homework, and articulation, she is the anti-Trump.

[Afternoon update]

More debate observations from Andrew McCarthy.

[Update a while later]

According to the overnights, it was Carly’s night, and The Donald is starting to hemorrhage support from women:

A Fiorina surge would be more dangerous to the rest of the field than a Carson surge because there’s no reason to think she won’t continue to have excellent substantive debates. Carson tends to disappear at these things and his policy proposals seem like afterthoughts vis-a-vis his persona. If you’re backing him, it’s because you believe in the man and what he represents as a healer and a political outsider, not because you’re excited about his immigration proposals or whatever. Fiorina knows the issues, she’s unflappable, and she’s better than the boys are at taking Trump down a peg. Her weakness is her record at HP, but she was prepared for that last night and Republican voters have proved themselves willing to nominate a CEO whose business was responsible for many layoffs. Besides, the guy who’s ahead of her in the polls is a billionaire whose catchphrase is “you’re fired.” He’s the last person who’s going to try to Romney-fy Fiorina in the debates. I don’t think she’ll be the nominee, but that feeling owes more to simple tradition — people who haven’t held office before don’t win presidential primaries — than to any reasoned “here’s why Carly can’t win” argument. Of the three outsiders in the field, she’s easily the one the donor class would be most comfortable with as nominee. If people like Walker and Christie and even Jeb start to fall away, I wouldn’t be surprised to see Fiorina pick up some of their money (although most of it will go to Rubio).

As I’ve repeatedly noted, Trump is the “front runner” only in the sense that he has a plurality in a field of over a dozen candidates splitting a majority. Seven out of ten want a non-Trump. Some non-Trump is going to consolidate that vote.

Education, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Social Commentary

The War On College Men

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A Democrat representative from Colorado steps it up a couple notches:

The main result of adopting Polis’s approach would be to create — since we all know this policy is aimed at male students, and almost exclusively enforced against them by a university “diversity” bureaucracy in which men are wildly underrepresented — a hostile educational environment for male students. As the Pope Center for Higher Education, which conducted a study of gender representation among “gender equity enforcers,” found, “Considering that the overwhelming preponderance of sexual harassment allegations are directed by women at men, the disproportion of women to men in the positions charged with interpreting and enforcing the sexual harassment rules is a legitimate concern. Are male students who are accused of sexual harassment likely to receive fair-minded treatment in these offices?”

If even a false accusation of sexual assault is grounds for expulsion, the result is to burden student sex lives with fear. That’s doubly so when the enforcers are so heavily non-male. Men who fear that they may be so targeted — and remember, you don’t even have to have dated a woman to be falsely accused — cannot possibly enjoy college in a normal fashion.

These people are insane totalitarians. If you wanted to destroy academia, it would be hard to do a better job.

Education, History, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Social Commentary

College Graduates

…don’t know much about the Constitution.

What a mess. This is shameful. They should be learning those sorts of things in high school. But instead, they’re propagandized about how we’re destroying the planet and how the US is the worst country in the history of humanity.

[Update a while later]

Related: Six questions you should ask about your children’s school:

If you want your child to grow up to be an independent thinker and a leader, take a look at the curriculum with this question in mind: Is your child being taught to learn in an objective fashion, or play political ball in a bureaucratic system?

If it’s a public school, it’s most likely the latter.