Briefly Noted: Race, Money ... Politics In America!
Race, Money, Politics--it's as American as apple pie.
I have four stories to link that all play into our increasingly dysfunctional society. But overall it could be argued that these stories mostly add up to good news.
First, Steve Sailer links to an account of a student at UVA Med School, whom the administration tried to kick out unless he went through re-education for having a bad attitude. He asked questions. Worse, since his question concerned the concept of "microaggression" it seems he must have committed a macro aggression--otherwise, why would the school have been so determined to force hin out? The good news is a federal district court has denied UVA's attempt to dismiss the student's First Amendment lawsuit. From Reason's account:
Kieran Bhattacharya's First Amendment lawsuit can proceed, a court said .
Speaking of America, where else would you run across people with unlikely names like ... Kieran Bhattacharya? Anyway, the Reason article concludes:
UVA's administration engaged in behavior that can be described as "gaslighting." Administrators asserted that Bhattacharya had behaved aggressively when he hadn't, and then cited his increasing confusion, frustration, and hostility toward the disciplinary process as evidence that he was aggressive. And all of this because Bhattacharya asked an entirely fair question about microaggressions, a fraught subject.
His lawsuit contends that UVA violated his First Amendment rights by retaliating against him for speaking his mind. UVA filed a motion to dismiss the case, but a district court judge ruled that the suit could proceed.
"Bhattacharya sufficiently alleges that Defendants retaliated against him," wrote the court. "Indeed, they issued a Professionalism Concern Card against him, suspended him from UVA Medical School, required him to undergo counseling and obtain 'medical clearance' as a prerequisite for remaining enrolled, and prevented him from appealing his suspension or applying for readmission."
Steve Sailer notes:
Back in the 1970s, the Soviets used mental health hospitals to punish and silence dissidents, ...
Here we go.
This next story is about baseball--but really we know it's about Race, Money, and Politics, all three together: Sources Claim They Know Who Convinced the MLB Commissioner to Relocate the All-Star Game .
If you guessed that the governor of Georgia, Stacey Abrams, was behind the relocation, you guessed right--according to the article. Only in America--to combat supposedly racist election laws the MLB All-Star game--with it's cornucopia of revenue for local workers and businesses, was moved from 52% black Atlanta to 9% black Denver. I'm sure that makes sense to someone. But to me it's major league good political news that this story continues to have such legs. The article goes into all the backstabbing and bad faith exhibited by all the usual suspects.
You may have been reading accounts of how the Zhou Baiden regime's "infrastructure" bill is, in significant part, a war on the suburbs. That's an issue that Stanley Kurtz has been all over for some years now. He's recently written about it at NRO, and Paul Mirengoff picked up on it from there. Today, Monica Showalter at AmThinker has a lengthy article full of informative links to explain it all--Joe Biden is coming for the suburbs . The idea is to force single residence zoned suburbs to accept, in effect, low income multi-residential apartment buildings:
Buried deep in Biden's monster $2.3-trillion "infrastructure" stimulus package is a sneaky little notation that would mandate a federal takeover for local zoning for any district that takes the proffered federal money, coming off such zones' already paid taxes.
However, it seems this whole "infrastructure" boondoggle may not be so easy. At Red State we read that Joe Manchin Knee-Caps Chuck Schumer With Latest Stand on Filibuster and Reconciliation :
In a new op-ed, Manchin reiterated his opposition to blowing up the filibuster, addressing the issue in no uncertain terms. But more importantly, he also signaled that he’s not down with abusing the reconciliation process as a way to go around the filibuster.
One tweet--no, make that, two tweets summarize the problem for Dems:
Joe Manchin op-ed in the Washington Post not only confirms “there is no circumstance in which I will vote to eliminate or weaken the filibuster,” it also seems to pour cold water on Schumer’s proposed reconciliation games. https://t.co/DwwFtaPBRHpic.twitter.com/GMW8Cs3npr
— Charles C. W. Cooke (@charlescwcooke) April 8, 2021
This comes hot on the heels of Kyrsten Sinema saying yet again that she is not open to any changes to the filibuster whatsoever. Maybe ask a different question? https://t.co/lejuXTt6Ofpic.twitter.com/NjeFEL3pKn
— Charles C. W. Cooke (@charlescwcooke) April 8, 2021
Bonchie at Red State points out that--whatever your opinion of Manchin and Sinema--this looks serious:
If Manchin is a no-go on letting Schumer push through the “infrastructure bill” (which is anything but), then that effectively kills the effort without major concessions by the White House to try to pick up GOP votes.Kyrsten Sinema has also signaled she may not be down with that approach, further putting it in peril.
At this point, it seems extremely unlikely Manchin would go back on his word. Perhaps after the first few times he said it, you could be skeptical, but he keeps reiterating his stand in a way that would doom him politically if he flipped now. That won’t stop an activist, obsessed media from continuing to question him about it, but it should stop Chuck Schumer from living out his wildest dreams via massive spending bills and federal takeovers of the voting system.
Manchin only won by 3 points last time, so appearing to be in Chuck Schumer's pocket is a bad look for him. Much better to appear as the principled independent rep for his constituents. The same is true for Sinema. What can Schumer actually do for either of them? Is he gonna stiff them on committee assignments, when the Senate is 50-50. They have too much leverage for Schumer to try to discipline them. Interesting times.