By Christopher F. Rufo
Oct. 4, 2020 4:06 pm ET

Trump is right. Training sessions for government employees amounted to political indoctrination.

Moderator Chris Wallace asked President Trump during last week’s debate why he “directed federal agencies to end racial-sensitivity training that addresses white privilege or critical race theory.” Mr. Trump answered: “I ended it because it’s racist.” Participants “were asked to do things that were absolutely insane,” he explained. “They were teaching people to hate our country.”

“Nobody’s doing that,” Joe Biden replied. He’s wrong.

My reporting on critical race theory in the federal government was the impetus for the president’s executive order, so I can say with confidence that these training sessions had nothing to do with developing “racial sensitivity.” As I document in detailed reports for City Journal and the New York Post, critical race theory training sessions in public agencies have pushed a deeply ideological agenda that includes reducing people to a racial essence, segregating them, and judging them by their group identity rather than individual character, behavior and merit.

The examples are instructive. At a series of events at the Treasury Department and federal financial agencies, diversity trainer Howard Rosstaught employees that America was “built on the backs of people who were enslaved” and that all white Americans are complicit in a system of white supremacy “by automatic response to the ways we’re taught.”

The two cases concern Arizona laws that make it harder to vote

The specific issue in the Democratic National Committee cases concerns two Arizona laws that require certain ballots to be discarded. One law requires voting officials to discard in their entirety ballots cast by voters who vote in the wrong precinct (rather than simply not counting votes for local candidates who the voter should not have been able to vote for). //

The other law prohibits “ballot collection” (or “ballot harvesting”) where a voter gives their absentee ballot to a third party, who delivers that ballot to the election office. (Arizona is one of many states that impose at least some restrictions on ballot collection.)

Both of these laws disproportionately disenfranchise voters of color. As a federal appeals court explained in an opinion striking down the two laws, “uncontested evidence in the district court established that minority voters in Arizona cast [out of precinct] ballots at twice the rate of white voters.” And Hispanic and Native American voters are especially likely to rely on a third party to ensure that their ballot is cast. //

Simply put, the right of voters of color to cast a ballot is now in greater peril than at almost any point since the Jim Crow era. Cases like Shelby County and Perez already stripped the Voting Rights Act of much of its force; the Democratic National Committee cases could finish that job.

These cases, moreover, are not just a historic threat to the right to vote. They are potentially a historic threat to the Democratic Party’s ability to compete in US elections. //

Because voters of color in general, and Black voters in particular, are especially likely to vote for Democrats, Republican lawmakers can use race as a proxy to identify communities with large numbers of Democratic voters. They can then enact election laws targeting those communities, confident that the law will mainly disenfranchise Democrats.

The Court’s decision to take these cases, in other words, puts the debate over whether Democrats should add additional seats to the Supreme Court in order to dilute its Republican majority into stark relief. If the Democratic National Committee cases end badly for the Voting Rights Act — and if Democrats control Congress and the White House when these cases are handed down — Democrats may have to choose between radical steps like packing the Court or being permanently exiled to the political wilderness.

The left likes to label everyone to their right as racist whether they are or not as they have done with virtually every Republican or Republican president.

We should not play this game of defense when the media, including Fox News, starts this nonsense. It’s an illegitimate question to begin with. //

Any time they start this nonsense, the question should be “Check the 457 times I previously said this, I’m done. Now when will you be calling Joe Biden out on his support for rioters? When will he denounce the violence connected to BLM/Antifa specifically by name?” Then move on to all the positive things that Trump has done. This is what the media wants to avoid getting out there, they want the GOP constantly on the defense. //

On the other hand, Biden endorsed the BLM at his convention, even having a musical number in support of them, while casting the riots as “peaceful protests.” He didn’t denounce the violence until he saw that the failure of Democrats to call it out and to not do anything to stop it in Democratic cities was hurting him in the polls. But even then he just talked about ambiguous violence. He hasn’t denounced the violence of BLM/Antifa by name. Where is his condemnation of their connection to 91% of the riots?

Where is the media asking Joe and Kamala to denounce BLM/Antifa by name? Kamala Harris and 13 Biden staffers contributed to a bail fund to help get people arrested during the riots out of jail. That resulted in more people allegedly being hurt. But it also indicates support for their radical actions. Why have they not been asked to rebuke that? Why has no one in media asked Biden and Harris why they/their people donated to get rioters out?

One of the tenets of the pseudo-political religious cult that is Marxism is that capitalism is doomed by its own “internal contradictions.”

Why do I call Marxism a religion? If you look at Marxism through the lens of comparative religion, what do you have? A creation myth. A fall from grace. Redemption. End times. Salvation. It has its own sacred texts and sacraments. Tell a Marxist that Marxism is fake and doesn’t work and what will xir tell you?

In the view of Marx, eventually, a tiny number of people would someday own everything, and this will lead to the final uprising by the oppressed and the Dictatorship of the Proletariat.

It is beginning to look like the peculiar variety of woke Marxism that has held sway in US educational institutions since the late 1960s is also susceptible to its own internal contradictions. Those contradictions are acquiring the velocity of a Himalayan avalanche. //

Higher education is on its own Long March, but this one has no destination. The irony of the institution that is most hostile to the American experiment being devastated by the very thing its Marxist leadership has been hoping happens to our nation is nearly too much to bear without a cigarette.

Critical race theory looks like it’s all about race. But race is merely the tool used to stir up emotional responses that play into the hands of agitators who simply want to control minds. //

the goal is to indoctrinate employees with neo-Marxist rhetoric that portrays America as a “white supremacist” nation. Critical race theory and communist tactics are pretty much interchangeable. It’s really all about brainwashing. //

Sure, at first glance CRT looks like it’s all about race. But race is merely the tool used to stir up emotional responses that play into the hands of agitators who simply want to control minds. CRT really represents a classic, textbook case of coercive thought reform, otherwise known as brainwashing. //

At the Environmental Protection Agency, CRT agitators planned to subject employees to a program in which they would be taught about “allyship, antiracism, white fragility, microaggressions, white privilege, and systemic racism.” The original source documents can be found here.

In her 1995 book “Cults in Our Midst,” cult expert Margaret Thaler Singer discusses how the brainwashing/thought reform process aims to destabilize a person’s sense of self in order to change his or her attitudes. But, she says, it is usual “a gradual process of breaking down and transformation.” No doubt CRT aids in this process.

Fact check from CNN's Jake Tapper about Joe Biden's lies about Charlottesville:

"Elsewhere in those remarks the President did condemn neo-Nazis and white supremacists. So he’s not saying that the neo-Nazis and white supremacists are very fine people”

Some new information has surfaced in the Jacob Blake case and it gives us a glimpse into the defense of the officer’s actions on the day of the incident that resulted in Blake’s hospitalization. According to his lawyer, Officer Rusten Sheskey told investigators that his actions weren’t only motivated by safeguarding his own life, but that he was also trying to defend the children involved.

Reporter: how are you going to make everyone hold hands and sing Kumbayah?
Becton: I’m not going to.
Reporter: aren’t you concerned about all the really bad thoughts out there?
Becton: No. I can’t change what you believe but I can damn sure modify your behavior.

It had an elegant simplicity that has stuck with me ever since. You can’t waste your time trying to change what people think. You need to focus on what you can change, which is behavior. When Becton left VII Corps in 1981, he left a combat-ready organization that, though it still had problems, had largely vanquished the racial divisions that had made it nearly combat ineffective.

I think the people questioning Trump’s sincerity have to ask themselves three questions. First, do the Democrats act on their promises to Black America, or are they pandering? Second, if the Democrats are pandering, how is Trump’s pander more offensive? And third, if Trump delivers on his promises, even if they are a pander, are the results less valid?

Let’s take, for instance, sentencing reform. Assuming sentencing reform is just a pander, the questions that must be answered by those carping are a) were federal sentencing procedures changed, and b) are the people released from long prison sentences under the reforms actually out of prison?

We, on the right, have gone through the same thing with President Trump and abortion. Is President Trump, in his heart, pro-life? I really have no way of answering that? Are his pro-life rhetoric and acts a pander, or do they represent an actual conversion? Again, I have no way of knowing. Putting that aside, though, I can look at his actions. He has put overtly pro-life judges on the bench. He is the first president to ever speak at a March for Life. He’s defunded Planned Parenthood and defended the Mexico City rule. He’s signed an executive order that attempts to protect the lives of children who’ve survived abortion.

I hope he’s had a spiritual conversion because we should always pray for the salvation of all souls, but do I set up night worrying about it? No. I do not doubt that George W. Bush was, deep down, pro-life. I also know that Donald Trump has done more for the cause of life in less than four years than Bush, who I admired, did in eight.

My advice to the people worrying about pandering is that they are concerned with the wrong issue. There is no way they can ever truly know the answer to that question and it is not important. They should have precisely two concerns. Does Trump deliver on his promise, and is the initiative executed in good faith, that is, is it resourced and managed properly?

I don’t care about what you believe. I do care about your actions.

That anyone could overlook the manifest good done by Coney Barrett in adopting these kids, and in not aborting her own son who she knew would be born with Downs Syndrome, in favor of trying to cast her as a racist shows just how evil the philosophy of Critical Race Theory is. It is anti-civilization in that it reduces humanity to your physical characteristics. It is anti-Christian in that it denies the common humanity we all share.

President Trump was right to start the process of eradicating it from the universe of federal agencies and contractors. Other echelons of government would be well served to do the same.

Marcellus Wiley 🧢
@marcelluswiley
Heard too many people tell me that I was wrong for misinterpreting BLM’s mission statement and I took their words out of context🤦🏿‍♂️

You were saying??? #factsoverfeelings #apologyaccepted😉🤫

http://yahoo.com/news/black-liv…
https://t.co/uuqJdM0BBW?amp=1
https://news.yahoo.com/black-lives-matter-removes-language-185621063.html

Twitter has reportedly been looking into why some of the artificial intelligence it uses — a neural network — apparently opts to display white people’s faces more frequently than black people’s faces.

Several users pointed out the issue over the weekend, posting examples of posts that contained a black person’s face and a white person’s face, only to have Twitter previews display the white faces more often.

We can’t rightfully talk about a racial war currently ongoing against white people because for some reason, talking about it is taboo in mainstream culture.

Let me say it here, though. White people are being discriminated against in overt ways. They’re being denied jobs because of diversity quotas, labeled as villains by mainstream culture, and now, the idea of simply killing white people is being laughed about on mainstream programs.

As I reported earlier on Monday, the BBC hosted a program where one of its guests openly spoke about killing white people to the laughter of her fellow panelists.

If this was said about any other race there would be endless media reporting about it. The person who made the comment would be banned from every public appearance on every network from here till the end of time. Protests would have been had in front of the network building, and think pieces would swarm the internet about how our country and our culture is racist beyond any doubt. //

There has already been violence in the streets but it will get so much worse. Racial hatreds are going to erupt where none should and those racists will teach other people to be racist either by handing down their prejudices to them or by teaching them to be prejudiced against them.

If we’re going to avoid this dark fate then we need to seize back the culture from the people who pollute it. Advocacy groups exist left and right who dedicate their time and effort solely to fighting one thing or another. They need your support.

Mike Gonzalez’s new book, 'The Plot to Change America,' provides penetrating analysis of the inherent dangers of identity politics, as well as ways to fight its creeping influence. //

In her 1989 landmark decision in City of Richmond v. Croson, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor criticized identity politics by pointing out the behavior of black politicians who had become a majority of that city’s council seats. Richmond certainly had an ugly history of discrimination against blacks, but now had created 30 percent contracting quotas for minority businesses. O’Connor declared that strict judicial scrutiny was required whenever a political majority used race to disadvantage a political minority.

If that were not the law, she concluded: “The dream of a Nation of equal citizens where race is irrelevant to personal opportunity and achievement would be lost in a mosaic of shifting preferences based on inherently immeasurable claims of past wrongs.” Although there were ongoing disputes about specific contracting policies, there were few public disagreements in that era about the fundamental principle that Americans of every race should have equal rights. After all, that is how the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment is written and that principle is the framework of all subsequent civil rights law.

Mike Gonzalez’s timely new book, “The Plot to Change America,” describes how our aspiration of granting all persons equal rights has been submerged by a form of identity politics that transforms some citizens into political, legal, racial, and ethnic categories demanding proportional representation and sometimes reparations.

The Return of Tribalism //

it can be argued that identity politics is just the current name for what was historically thought of as tribalism.

Inject this directly into my veins. //

What these woke institutions want is to have their cake and eat it, too. They want the media plaudits of proclaiming themselves to be admitted white supremacists while at the same time avoiding any of the consequences of that. Racism in a university’s practices is illegal. You can’t discriminate based on race, nationality, or religion. Devos has now painted Princeton into a corner whereby they will be forced to admit they aren’t actually systemically racist. If that’s the outcome, it’s a win, as it pushes back on the prevailing, left-wing narrative centering everything on nebulous, vague claims of systemic racism.

Honestly, this was an absolutely brilliant move. Watching these universities squirm under the weight of their own rhetoric is just amazing. Now they get to own their proclamations.

The plot thickens... //

You may have heard of the name of Alicia Garza before. She’s one of the co-founders of Black Lives Matter. According to one of the other founders, Patrisse Cullors, she and Garza were “trained Marxists.”

Turns out that a new group that Garza is heading up has some very interesting connections, according to the Heritage Foundation.

Garza is heading up something called the Black Futures Lab which says it “works with Black people to transform our communities, building Black political power and changing the way that power operates – locally, statewide and nationally,” according to Fox News.

But on the donation page, the group says it is a “fiscally sponsored project of the Chinese Progressive Association.”

https://www.heritage.org/progressivism/commentary/blm-co-founder-and-pro-communist-china-group-are-partnering-heres-why

Anthem This season, it has become all the rage for professional sports teams to do something “in your face” to deliberately offend traditional fans by raising their troglodyte consciousness to a higher level. For the NFL, in addition to disrespecting the American flag and the nation that gave a handful of people the chance to earn 8-figure salaries for throwing a ball around... //

Pittsburgh Steelers
@steelers
We don’t want him to be forgotten.

For the 2020 season, we unite as one and will wear a single name on the back of our helmets – Antwon Rose Jr.

Rose had attempted to murder a man using a stolen weapon earlier. He was legitimately stopped. He fled police as he was being arrested. He was shot. The officer was tried for homicide. The jury deliberated for three and one-half hours and acquitted the officer on all charges.

There was no racism, systemic or otherwise, in Rose’s death. //

Offensive tackle Alejandro Villanueva, a West Point graduate, alumni of 10th Mountain Division and 1st Ranger Battalion, and the recipient of awards for valor under fire taped over the Antwon Rose decal. //

ProFootballTalk
@ProFootballTalk
The Steelers announced the team would honor Antwon Rose, who was killed by a police officer, on their helmets. But Alejandro Villanueva instead honored Alwyn Cashe, who died of injuries suffered pulling fellow soldiers out of a burning vehicle in Iraq.

Black Lives Matter has been responsible for the lion’s share of destruction, violence, and mayhem this year and an independent research group now has the numbers to prove it.

The Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project (ACLED), a nonprofit organization with a focus on global conflict, collected data over the summer supported by Princeton University. As the Federalist’s Joy Pullman reported, ACLED found that of the hundreds of riots that occurred this year, 95 percent were found to have perpetrators that that had an affiliation with Black Lives Matter:

Of the 633 incidents coded as riots, 88 percent are recorded as involving Black Lives Matter activists. Data for 51 incidents lack information about the perpetrators’ identities. BLM activists were involved in 95 percent of the riots for which there is information about the perpetrators’ affiliation.

Early estimates from insurance agencies say the cost of this summer’s rioting will set a record surpassing that of the 1992 Rodney King riots, which cost an inflation-adjusted $1.2 billion.

Paging Democrats, you might want to check this out...

President Obama had a huge opportunity to advance the well being of Black Americans and put to rest the final vestiges of racism in America. He blew it. //

The first Black American President, instead of using the huge megaphone his historic presidency offered, chose instead to foment distrust and discord. The violence we now see in our streets will set race relations back for decades. Only once could history choose to offer the presidency to a Black American for the first time. President Barack Obama wasted that opportunity.

Racism is America’s original sin, and despite a century and a half and more of efforts to put it behind us, it is more of an issue than ever. A great deal of this is the responsibility of a man whose election to the presidency was hailed as the...