Author Archives: Bok
Steve Bannon Eclipse
Steve Bannon is back at his old job as executive chairman of Breitbart News.
Bannon Eclipse
Here’s a timeline of the Bannon eclipse. The last straw may have been his claim in the American Prospect that there’s no military solution to North Korea. Just as Trump was explaining to Kim that he’s locked and loaded for fire and fury.
Alt Right Antifa Moral Equivalency
Democrats, the media, CEOs, Republican leaders, conservative pundits, and Mexican bandits hammered Trump for saying there were two sides to the Charlottesville brawl.
And if there were any “very fine people” in Charlottesville, as Trump said there were, they weren’t to be found among the alt right or antifa combatants. Maybe he meant very fine thugs.
Moral Equivalency
The moral equivalency thing is what really brought trouble for Trump. The idea that neo-Nazis and KKK types were the moral equals of the protesters they were fighting was too much.
Maybe, but the antifa types are pretty bad. Here’s Jonah Goldberg:
These goons and thugs oppose free speech, celebrate violence, despise dissent, and have little use for anything else in the American political tradition. But many liberals, particularly in the media, are victims of the same kind of confusion that vexed so much of American liberalism in the 20th century. Because antifa suddenly has the (alt-)right enemies, they must be the good guys. They’re not. And that’s why this debate is so toxically stupid. Fine, antifa isn’t as bad as the KKK. Who cares? Since when is being less bad than the Klan a major moral accomplishment?
So maybe it’s not moral equivalency. Just Extremely Ugly vs Very Ugly.
Tiki Torch Bigots
Images of the Klan carrying torches through the night are ugly. But the images of white nationalists parading through Charlottesville over the weekend were just plain ridiculous. They were carrying tiki torches. The kind you buy at Walmart to keep pests away from your garden party. Except in this case the pests were the bigots carrying the torches.
Tiki Torch Bigots
The CEO of the company that makes the torches rejected the free product placement:
W.C. Bradley CEO Marc Olivie told the Columbus Ledger-Enquirer on Monday that the Columbus-based company’s staff was “appalled and saddened” that the torches were “used by people who promote bigotry and hatred.”
Trump Speaks Kim Jong Un’s Language
Give President Trump credit. He speaks Kim Jong Un’s language. Trump promises Kim Fire and Fury. Kim says Trump is “a lump he can beat to a jelly.”
Google Engineer James Damore
There are certain things one doesn’t ask in polite elite society. Lucky for you you’re nowhere near there. You’re in Bokbluster, so I’ll ask:
Is it possible, on average, that girls don’t like math as much as boys? It’s possible, on average. Unless you’re Larry Summers, the former president of Harvard.
Is it possible, on average, that girls are less fond of computer engineering than boys? That’s a possibility too. Unless you’re another Harvard guy, former Google engineer James Damore.
Damore’s Downfall
Damore wrote a 10 page memo (screed to the politically correct among us) asking if it’s possible that women are underrepresented in engineering because of biology rather than bias.
Google management was having none of that. Here’s Google CEO Sundar Pichai:
To suggest a group of our colleagues have traits that make them less biologically suited to that work is offensive and not OK.
Coming down firmly on the side of bias, he fired Damore.
