Chelsea Clinton accused of causing New Zealand mosque shootings because she criticized Ilhan Omar’s anti-Semitism

March 16, 2019 • 11:30 am

What really saddens me about the killing of 49 Muslims worshiping at a mosque—beyond of course the slaughter of innocent Kiwis and the pain of their relatives, friends, and loved ones—is the immediate reaction of those who want to politicize the event. Some politicization is of course inevitable, as we don’t want this to happen again, but the sorrow and sadness of those in the West hadn’t even abated a bit before the anger set in (some even bypassed the anger to go straight to the offense). Who let the slaughter happen? Everybody must find a scapegoat, immediately.

The usual suspects were indicted: Donald Trump, the NRA (which of course doesn’t operate in New Zealand), the YouTube gamer PewDiePie, and so on. I haven’t read the suspect’s manifesto, and to be sure it may not be a complete account of his “reasons” for the murder, but people are seizing on every word so they can point a finger of blame. Right now, it seems more seemly to express solidarity with the victims (as many Kiwis, including Jews in NZ synagogues, are doing), and worry about the causes when the dust settles.

But people can’t wait. When Chelsea Clinton, now pregnant, went to a vigil at NYU for the massacred Kiwis, she was accosted by a Palestinian Muslim, whose attack was filmed by leftist Jewish activist Esor Fasa. The attacker (verbal attack!) blamed Clinton for the mosque murders.Read the Newsweek story below (click on the link) to see why Clinton took heat, as I doubt that you can guess. After all, the Clintons don’t have any history of “Islamophobia”. 

From the report:

On Friday night, the daughter of former president Bill Clinton paid her respects to the victims as she participated in a vigil at New York University in Manhattan.

However, a student at the event told Clinton “her rhetoric” had in fact contributed to help the attacks in New Zealand.

Esor, who describes herself as a “Jewish leftist, organizer & known in alt-right circles as ‘antifa chick R*se.;” then posted a video of her “best friend” lashing into Clinton, telling the pregnant mother that “it’s a disgrace that she came to the vigil, calling out Chelsea’s Islamophobia and hypocrisy.”

The video posted starts with Clinton telling Viva in reference to her supposed “Islamophobic remarks”, “I am so sorry…It certainly was never my intention..I do believe that words matter…I think we have to show solidarity…” The student then interrupts her and says, “They do matter…and this, this [vigil] right here, is the result of a massacre stoked by people like you and the words you put out into the world, and I want you to know that and I want you to feel that deep inside. 49 people died because of the rhetoric that you put out there.”

A contemplative and patient Clinton begins to say, “I am so sorry you feel that way…” before the cameraman or somebody off screen yells, “What does that mean? Like, what does “I’m sorry you feel that way mean?”

Esor Fasa also posted a tweet (now deleted, because her account is deleted), that was this one:

The video of the encounter is below, thanks to reader cesar who sent it. Above that is the notice that Esor, who is a coward, deleted her Twitter account. I’m sure she received plenty of pushback for calling Chelsea Clinton an Islamophobe, but if you can’t take the heat, stay out of the kitchen. The Muslim student is unidentified.

Notice the finger-snapping in the video, which is Woke Leftists’ way of applauding (it apparently doesn’t “trigger” those who are afraid of clapping).

The tweet below is what caused Clinton to be demonized; I wrote about it a while back, and it’s Clinton’s response to Ilham Omar’s anti-Semitism. Apparently it’s okay to be anti-Semitic but not “Islamophobic”, which is what you’re called when you decry anti-Semitism. It’s weird, though, because you’d have to say that Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats who also condemned Omar were complicit in the New Zealand murders. Such is the fury of the Woke Left.

We’ll see more of this, of course, and I don’t know how to temper the fury of those who want to demonize people who are completely innocent. I write about it, but I’m a small fish. All I can say is to urge readers not to put up with the kind of finger-pointing nonsense that this student engaged in.

Titania McGrath outed!

March 16, 2019 • 10:20 am

There’s nothing that can debunk stupidity or irrationality more strongly than satire. And that’s why, as “wokeness” floods across college campuses then spills into the workplace as members of the Offense Culture graduate, Titania McGrath, through her tweets and now in an upcoming book, has shown up the craziness of that culture. And she’s done it by pretending to be one of The Woke. She did it so effectively, even on Twitter, that she was accepted as one of them and demonized by the Right and those reasonable Leftists who didn’t get the joke.

But who was she/he/hir/it/zir? Everybody knew that Titania (and her “male” counterpart Godfrey Elfwick) were pseudonyms, but who had a sense of humor that good?

Well, as revealed in the two pieces below, one from Spiked and the other from the Torygraph, Titania is none other than Spiked columnist and humorist Andrew Doyle.

Torygraph:

 

The Spiked column is not only funny, but incisive in indicting Woke Culture, and I recommend you read it. An excerpt (my emphases):

Last April, I decided to set up a satirical account on Twitter under the guise of radical intersectionalist poet Titania McGrath. She’s a po-faced young activist who, in spite of her immense privilege, is convinced that she is oppressed. She’s not a direct parody of an existing individual, but anyone who regularly reads opinion columns in the Guardian will be familiar with the type. Given that such individuals are seemingly impervious to reason, and would rather cry ‘bigot’ than engage in serious debate, satire seemed to be the only option.

The obsession with victimhood from predominantly bourgeois political commentators is something I have always found inherently funny. It’s a phenomenon that has been amplified to a great extent by social media. This extremely vocal minority of activists enjoy pontificating to the masses from their online lectern, berating those who fall short of their moral expectations, and endlessly trawling through old tweets in the hope of discovering a misjudged phrase or sentiment that could justify a campaign of public shaming. In their eyes, there is no possibility of redemption. The most vicious remarks you’ll find on social media come from the racist far right and woke intersectionalists. They are two heads of the same chimera.

American physicist Steven Weinberg famously remarked that ‘with or without religion, good people can behave well and bad people can do evil; but for good people to do evil – that takes religion’. It makes sense, then, to think of the social-justice movement as a kind of cult. Its members are generally decent people with good intentions. They have an unshakeable certainty that their worldview is correct. They feel the need to proselytise and convert as many of the fallen as possible. And even though they are capable of the most horrendous dehumanising behaviour, they think they are the good guys.

We are in this position because identity politics in its current form is a collectivist ideology. It does not value an individual for the content of his or her character, but instead makes prejudicial assessments on the basis of race, gender and sexuality. In the name of anti-racism, identity politics has rehabilitated racial thinking. This explains why an affluent and privileged person like Munroe Bergdorf can be invited on to national television to proclaim that ‘the white race is the most violent and oppressive force of nature on Earth’. How is well-intentioned racism even a thing?

A similar regression has occurred within the feminist movement. Fourth-wave feminism is predominantly victim-centred, and is based on the conviction that women are invariably oppressed and require the protection of authority figures. When the BBC promoted a smartphone app to help women speak up in meetings, it was merely toeing the standard feminist line on the intrinsic fragility of women. So we are left with the curious phenomenon of good people who are opposed to misogyny. subscribing to an essentially misogynistic perspective. [JAC: This is also seen in the valorization of the misogyny of Islam, and of wearing the hijab.]

Can you disagree with a word of that?  Here’s Doyle (right) with his alter ego:

Doyle also reveals who is half of Elfwick (I suspect the other half was Doyle himself):

Titania was an attempt to highlight the inescapable hypocrisies of such a mindset. I was inspired by the brilliant work of the satirist Lisa Graves, who was one half of the Twitter persona Godfrey Elfwick. Although often accused of ‘punching down’ at vulnerable minorities, the actual target of Elfwick’s satire was the woke establishment. It was inevitable that he should be banned by Twitter, because those in power cannot tolerate being ridiculed.

You can see Lisa Graves’s genuine Twitter account here.

The Torygraph adds that Doyle is a former private school teacher, is 40 years old, and has a doctorate in Early Renaissance Poetry from Wadham College, Oxford. His studies gave rise to Titania’s name, which comes from the queen of the fairies in Shakespeare’s A Middsummer Night’s Dream. As Doyle explains, McGrath got her/his/hir/its name because “all of this ‘woke culture’ is an utter fantasy world.”

Doyle told the Torygraph this:

“This social justice movement is full of people who are arrogant, narcissistic and very certain in themselves. The very idea that they could be wrong doesn’t even cross their mind. That to me is incredibly funny. I thought Titania could embody all of that.

“The majority of people are desperate for this culture to be mocked. [Titania’s] account has become so popular because people are sick of feeling that they can’t say what they want. It used to be the case that if someone spoke out of turn, you would say that’s a bit much, apologise and everyone would move on. Now you post a screenshot on Twitter and try to get someone fired.

“Titania is staying the stuff that most people want to say.”

Finally, the Torygraph presents a selection of Titania’s best tweets:

Caturday felid trifecta: Cops build condo for stray “SWAT cat”; blue cats; cat-friendly work desk (plus clouded leopard lagniappe)

March 16, 2019 • 9:00 am

From the Justsomething site, we here of a stray cat that repeatedly revisited a police department, so the cops christened it a “SWAT” cat and built her a condo!

It’s not a secret that most of the times people don’t get to choose their cat, but is the cat the one who chooses them, and the Boston [Massachusetts] Police Department’s SWAT Team is no exception. One day, a stray cat started to show up on a daily basis at their headquarters. They named her ‘SWAT Cat’ and she slowly became the police department’s mascot.

They fed her and took care of her, and she greeted them whenever they returned from a call. However, SWAT Cat had no intention to become an indoor cat, no matter how much they tried to keep her safe and comfortable inside their headquarters. She just wanted to live outside.

One day, officer Jamie Pietroski came up with the idea to build a cat condo for SWAT Cat. He stayed after work hours for several days, just to create a cozy home for the her. SWAT Cat’s very own pet condo has glass sliding doors, a large deck for outdoor activities, and a roomy studio layout inside.

The cat condo looks stylish and comfortable so it’s no surprise that SWAT Cat happily moved in immediately, and she can now live in a cozy home without giving up her life as an outdoor cat.

All’s well that ends well!

 

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Clacton-on-the-Sea is in Essex, England, and there are reports from the BBC, the East Anglian Times, and the Essex County Gazette Standard of blue cats and dogs appearing. What apparently happened is that a fire in a local shed caused the incineration of sacks of blue ink powder, with the powder spreading in the wind and getting all over moggies and d*ggies. Here’s the burned-down shed:

Witold Juckiewicz, 69, from Coppins Road, claims he has been unable to leave his home following the incident.

Firefighters were called to a blaze involving a boat and a shed off Coronation Road on Tuesday, January 29, at about 8.54pm.

Mr Juckiewicz, who suffers from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) along with his wife Doula, said he was shocked to see firefighters spray water straight on to the bags, exploding blue powder into the air.

It left nearby homes, fences, patios and roofs covered in blue powder and has coated the feet of passing cats and dogs.

The retired building engineer said: “I was in bed and heard an explosion and we thought it was fireworks. We heard another one five minutes later – and then heard fire engines.

“I looked out and saw fire men coming up and spraying the bags with the hose straight away – they didn’t seem to check at all.

“It was a big bag of dye – and it exploded into the air. They all looked like smurfs – there was about 15 of them.

Fortunately, the ink powder is said to be harmless.

The results (all photos by Terry Oliver):

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From Cole and Marmalade’s site, we have the ideal desk for a cat owner. It’s called the CATable, and is manufactured by the Hong-Kong-based firm LYCS Architecture. No prices are given, and I don’t even know if it’s for sale, but wouldn’t you like to have one?:

 

It might keep your cat off your laptop, but it would also attract cats to your workspace, so it might be a tradeoff.

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Lagnaippe: Reader Michael found this video of a beautiful clouded leopard cub (Neofelis nebulosa). It’s part of a breeding program, which I suppose justifies its captivity, but unless they release the results into the wild I’m not sure I like this.

I wish, though, that I could pet this cat and have it lick me as it licked the presenter, Steve Backshall.

h/t: Moto, Kevin

Readers’ wildlife photos

March 16, 2019 • 7:30 am

It’s Saturday, and time to gather the singletons, doubletons, and tripletons that I’ve been sent.  The first three are from reader Diana MacPherson. As usual, readers’ captions are indented.

The birds are wanting seeds lately – even the poor, nervous cardinal, worried about his redness, has been on my deck. Here are some pictures of the male Northern Cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis) on the deck and a White-breasted Nuthatch (Sitta carolinensis) on the fat.

From Gary Womble:

A Tri-Colored Heron (Egretta tricolor) dragging a wing tip through the water while holding the other wing above its head to influence the movements of underwater prey.  A Roseate Spoonbill (Platalea ajaja) observes the technique.

And two photos from John Avise’s “Birds of the World” collection:

Snow goose (Chen caerulescens), California:

Laysan albatross (Phoebastria immutabilis), Hawaii:

Saturday: Hili dialogue

March 16, 2019 • 6:30 am

It’s Saturday, March 16, 2019, and National Artichoke Heart Day. In Lithuania it’s The Day of the Book Smugglers; click on the link for an interesting tale.

We have raised almost £1700 pounds for Feline Friends London, for which they (and I) are immensely grateful. The dosh will help pay vet bills for the cats. However, this is only about 10% of what I hoped to raise, so over the next week I’ll be highlighting rescue-cat stories with accompanying photos, hoping that those of you who haven’t coughed up a pound or ten might do so (donate here)

On this day in 1621, or so says that wonky source Wikipedia, “Samoset, a Mohegan, visited the settlers of Plymouth Colony and greet[ed] them, ‘Welcome, Englishmen! My name is Samoset.’” When I read that, I thought “What the hell? How did a Native American learn English before he encountered settlers?” It turns out that Samoset had learned some English from conversing with visiting fishermen. He also asked the Plymouth settlers for beer. Smart guy!

On March 16, 1872, the first FA Cup match was played, with the Wanderers F.C. beating Royal Engineers A.F.C. 1-0 at “The Oval” in London.  26 years later to the day, representatives of five colonies in Australia adopted a constitution that became the basis of the Commonwealth of Australia.  And on March 16, 1926, Robert Goddard successfully launched the first liquid-fueled rocket—in Auburn, Massachusetts.  Here he is with the device (in its “launching frame” and a schematic diagram. (The rocket only went up 41 feet, but the principle of using liquid fuel and oxidizers was demonstrated.)

Reader Frank informed me that on this day in 1934, Congress passed, and Franklin D. Roosevelt signed into law, the Duck Stamp Act (formally the “Migratory Bird Hunting Stamp Act”), specifying that a stamp be purchased yearly for those who hunt migratory waterfowl (ugh). The upside is that the sale of “Duck Stamps” is used to fund migratory bird refuges. There’s a different stamp every year; the first one below, in blue, was designed by Ding Darling, a Pulitzer-Prize-winning cartoonist as well as a conservationist. The mallards do look a bit cartoonish.

There’s a new stamp every year, and not all show mallards or even ducks (geese have appeared). This year’s stamp, which shows the pecuniary effects of inflation, also features mallards. If you see Honey and Frank, do not shoot them!

On this day in 1935, Hitler ordered Germany to rearm, which violated the Treaty of Versailles.  On March 16, 1968, the My Lai massacre took place, with somewhere between 350 and 500 Vietnamese villagers murdered by American troops.  Of the 14 soldiers charged, only William Calley was convicted, and he served only 3.5 years of house arrest.  Exactly 20 years later, Oliver North and John Poindexter were indicted of conspiracy to defraud the government in the Iran-Contra affair.

Here’s a sad fact: it was on this day in 1995 that Mississippi finally ratified the Thirteenth Amendment that banned slavery (it had been ratified in 1865 by 3/4 of the states, but Mississippi dragged its heels). Finally, it was on March 16, 2014 that Crimea voted, in a dubious referendum, to secede from Ukraine and join Russia. Putin!

Notables born on this day include Caroline Herschel (1750, astronomer and namesake of Brian Cox’s calico cat), James Madison (1751), George Ohm (1789), Henny Youngman (1906), Josef Mengele (1911), Traudl Junge (1920), Jerry Lewis (1926), Ursula Goodenough (1943, and a reader!), Kate Nelligan (1950), and Mónica Cruz (1977). Here are two Henny Youngman jokes. He was a funny guy:

A doctor gave a man six months to live. The man couldn’t pay his bill, so he gave him another six months.

The doctor says to the patient, “Take your clothes off and stick your tongue out the window”. “What will that do?” asks the patient. The doctor says, “I’m mad at my neighbor!”

Those who expired on March 16 include Tiberius (37 AD), Aubrey Beardsley (1898), Roy Bean (1903), August von Wassermann (1925), Arthur Godfrey (1983), and Gary Bettenhausen (2014).

Beardsley died of tuberculosis at the young age of 25, cutting short a career that evinced tremendous artistic talent. Here’s his “Pierrot and Cat”:

Meanwhile in Dobrzyn, Hili’s occupying Andrzej’s desk:

Hili: Do I disturb you?
A: Only a bit.
Hili: Never mind.
In Polish:
Hili: Czy ja ci nie przeszkadzam?
Ja: Tylko troszkę.
Hili: Nic nie szkodzi.

From reader Barry. This is called a “lose-lose situation”:

https://twitter.com/ZonePhysics/status/1106231020586704902

From Heather Hastie via Ann German. I don’t believe at all the described behavior of this squirrel, but you have to admit that it has a lovely tail. It turns out (see this article) that there are no observations of the vampire-ish behavior, only tales of hunters.

https://twitter.com/41Strange/status/1105181181878853632

Tweets from Grania. A great musician is on deck; his birthday was yesterday:

Well this is distressing: maybe the casualties could have been prevented if we didn’t have the Shutdown over the Big Wall:

Look at this adorable little Aby!

https://twitter.com/EmrgencyKittens/status/1106219717277175808

Red pandas (Ailurus fulgens, a carnivore) in the snow: an underappreciated animal:

https://twitter.com/AMAZlNGNATURE/status/1105697015516880896

Tweets from Matthew. Did Philomena make a new show that I missed?

This is awesome on many levels:

https://twitter.com/seanbonner/status/1096801575673028608

This is very sad:

There are a lot more species of microbes to be found out there.

I’m pretty brave with animals (I reared a botfly in my head, after all), but I’m not sure I could pose for one of these photos!

 

Swan attack!

March 15, 2019 • 3:15 pm

Swans may be lovely and graceful creatures, but they’re also territorial, as you can see clearly from this hapless swimmer attacked by two of them. According to the YouTube video, this took place in Russia. If they’re speaking Russian and you understand it, we’d welcome a translation.