According to Jack Perry’s uncritical recitation of the Anti-Defamation League of New England’s warning about an increase in “white supremacist propaganda,” Rhode Island is seeing a dangerous increase. By their own standards, though, the ADL and the Providence Journal are contributing to the threat. Consider the last line of the article:
“By using propaganda to spread hate, a small number of people can have an outsized impact, giving the appearance of larger numbers and affecting entire communities,” the report says.
Exactly. Post a few stickers around, and the ADL and Projo will tell people far and wide that you’re growing in popularity.
What precisely are we talking about, here?
Rhode Island had 78 incidents of white-supremacist propaganda in 2021, up from 61 in 2020 and 19 in 2019, the report says. …
About 70 of the Rhode Island incidents involved the Patriot Front distributing fliers with messages such as, “America First,” “For the nation, against the state,” “Not stolen, conquered” and “Reject poison,” according to the ADL.
All but eight of the “incidents” were fliers (aka free speech) with some variation of these stickers. The puzzling part, to me, is why the ADL and Perry would include the “reject poison” tagline as an example of white supremacist propaganda. Of itself, it is only a message not to do drugs. Is that “white supremacy”?
The inclusion of a pro-health message is illustrative of the dangerously muddled thinking of progressive activists. Anybody who actually reads the article (rather than merely reacting mindlessly, as is probably intended) will be confused. Rejecting poison is a good idea. “For the nation, against the state” could be the motto of patriotic libertarians. Many people take “America First” to be a statement wholly in opposition to handing our sovereignty over to a global cabal. Of the provided examples, only “Not stolen, conquered” is objectionable on its face.
American progressives are in a strange place, indicative of the fundamental dishonesty of their own rhetoric. They promote the notion of a growing white supremacist threat that requires good people to be on edge and willing to compromise their civil rights like free speech and donate money to progressive causes, so they have incentive to join in the effort of promoting the propagandists. Implicit in their warning is the assumption that white people, writ large, have an innate hatred and bigotry that can easily be drawn out with goofy images deployed by strange people.
Putting aside that insulting (and racist) assumption, if progressives really believe it, they should consider the danger of their attempts to bring attention to themselves by bringing attention to it. I suspect, however, that they don’t believe it but rather are sowing division and fear for self-interested reasons.
Featured image from the Parker County Sheriff’s Office on Weatherford Democrat.
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Just as he was out and about regularly reporting on Antifa/BLM protests in the Providence area, just as he was covering large protests against Governor Dan McKee’s vaccine mandate for health care worker, John DePetro has travelled to Poland and the Ukraine border to provide live, on-the-scene reportage.
So many young children from Ukraine being swept up by their parents and carried through a busy train station in Poland after traveling days on packed trains to leave their bombed out neighborhoods. Our first week has been both eye opening and heartbreaking to watch as Putin decided to bomb Ukraine and destroy the lives of millions of people while destroying the peace we enjoyed. The people I have met and interviewed are hard working people who love their country and their President. One might think people would have harsh words for their leader after their country had been attacked but the only words of hate are directed at Putin. It is disgraceful the way some Americans blindly follow the propaganda of Russia and China and root for their own country to fail while sharing misinformation to aid the enemy. Worse, conservative hosts are being shown on Russian state-TV praising Putin and bashing Biden. Troubling to see so many people confused as to what news is real and which news is foreign propaganda.
That last sentence strikes home in a not-quite-ironic way. Imagine for a moment that it was just about any other media personality from Rhode Island who had traveled around the world to provide this sort of coverage, whether somebody from the mainstream journalist clique or one of the progressive journalists who are so well received by the mainstream. The journalists of the Ocean State would be having him or her on as a recurring guest. They’d be applauding. They’d be encouraging funding.
But if you don’t listen to DePetro’s radio show or read Anchor Rising, you’d have no idea that anybody from the Rhode Island news universe is over there.
The blacklist is real. For most of the people who claim to keep you informed, who brings you news is at least as important as whether you receive it.
No doubt, many of those mainstreamers would nod along while (accidentally) reading DePetro’s complaint about Americans’ falling for foreign propaganda. What we really need, however, is for them to realize that they’re producing domestic propaganda that is of an identical character.
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It’s interesting how topics bubble up in the constant flow of information in which we swim, these days. Yesterday, I came across Martha Rosenberg’s interview with women’s health advocate Mike Gaskins, whose research has investigated the science and politics with which the birth-control pill became a cultural mainstay:
Several years ago, I heard a lecture by an autoimmune disease expert who explained how endocrine disruptors that mimic natural estrogen play a crucial role in the condition, but when I asked him about the pill specifically, he said it played no role “at all.” In fact, he said it had never been linked to any of the diseases.
Later, I went online and discovered a study that found a significant link between the pill and the autoimmune disease lupus. I thought the expert must be unaware of the study, until there was a quote from him in that very article saying it didn’t mean women should stop taking the pill. I became interested in why the medical community seems eager to downplay the pill’s risks and began my research.
The “expert’s” response feels very much like the doggedly insistent proclamations we’ve been getting about COVID vaccines.
Earlier today, I was listening to an episode of the Jordan Peterson podcast with his wife and daughter, and the conversation turned unexpectedly toward the women’s terrible experience with the pill and how it changed their personalities starkly for the worse.
Maybe the political health establishment became so brazen with COVID that people are beginning to question other campaigns, too.
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The amazing thing about Sarah Doiron’s report on the staged protest of the state Department of Education by teachers union members is that it doesn’t say why the state took control of their schools. The audacity is nothing short of shocking:
More than 100 teachers marched the streets of Providence Monday afternoon to demand the state end its takeover of the capital city’s school district.
The state took control of Providence Public Schools in 2019, and Providence Teachers Union President Maribeth Calabro argues nothing has changed since then.
“It’s stunning that things are worse, not better,” Calabro said. “If state leaders say otherwise, they’re not being honest.”
Let’s review. The Institute for Education Policy at Johns Hopkins School of Education conducted a study finding that Providence schools were failing their students with an intolerable mess. In perhaps the single instance of real integrity of his entire time in office, Providence Mayor Jorge Elorza insisted that the state must use its authority to implement a “transformational” contract with the union as the only way to fix the travesty.
The union dug in. The state government (in which the unions hold a majority share of corruption) and Department of Education attempted to play nice. And here we are.
Now the union has flipped the script, making it the state’s fault that it didn’t force the union to comply with what needed to be done. The media is reporting the event as straight news, going back to its preferred pro-union script. Doiron actually lets union president Maribeth Calabro go unchallenged in her rhetoric about “our kids.” No. The union did this to your kids, and now it is hiding behind them.
Worst of all, nobody of any stature is pointing out the obvious.
I learned an acronym from the world of addiction and abuse the other day that describes the union’s strategy perfectly: DARVO. Deny the behavior. Attack the accuser. Reverse the roles of Victim and Offender.
This problem is not going to be fixed until something happens to shake the very soul of Rhode Islanders. (Apparently the Johns Hopkins study was not enough.)
If you are unfortunate enough to have children in the Providence schools, do anything you can to get them out. If you are considering moving to Providence and have or may have children, go elsewhere unless you are confident you can afford private school throughout your children’s education.
Abusive thugs who win a victory like this don’t say amongst themselves, “That was a close one. We better fix things in a way we like before we’re forced to fix them in a way we don’t like.” Rather, they learn that their psychological abuse technique works.
Parents must realize that the government and people of Rhode Island do not have their backs, or at least they don’t have the ability to do anything about the abuse.
Featured image by Susan Wilkinson on Unsplash.
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On WNRI 1380 AM/95.1 FM, John DePetro and Justin Katz discuss:
- The governor we have and those who’d like to be
- Gas tax politics
- Republicans in the second district
- The madness of current politics across the board
Featured image by Tengyart on Unsplash.
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I’ve been trying to figure out which is the case: Either politicians have developed such thorough contempt for the people that they assume we’re complete fools whom they can deceive with impunity or we’re allowing people to gain public office whom a healthy civilization would have kept well away from the controls.
The problem goes all the way up to the most powerful offices in our country, but for local flavor, I have in mind a series of tweets from Democrat state representative Brianna Henries:
On Wednesday, the Labor committee is hearing a bill I introduced to raise the minimum wage to $19, end the tipped minimum wage, and tie future minimum wage increases to the consumer price index. I want to share why this bill matters to me
I currently manage a makeup store and have worked in retail or as a makeup artist my entire career. I know for many Rhode Islanders, low wages has meant tough decisions between rent and utilities, gas and groceries
For everyone talking about inflation right now: if the minimum wage grew with inflation for the past thirty plus years, Rhode Islanders would be making $24 an hour today. We are being ripped off with wages this low.
This bill also eliminates the tipped minimum wage, which is $3.89 an hour in Rhode Island. I was disappointed when my colleagues refused to raise it last year when we passed the $15 minimum wage.
The most obvious problem is that she’s just making stuff up. Thirty years ago, in 1992, Rhode Island’s minimum wage was bumped up 20-cents to $4.45. Increased by inflation, that would be $8.86 in 2022. In actuality, the minimum wage is currently $12.25. So, it’s beat inflation by about 40%.
This error (or lie) points to the more profound show of ignorance (or deceit). The model Henries apparently applies to the economy is something like a permanent nonage. Somewhere out there, the true grownups do the work and run our society, and they’re supposed to give us lifelong kids a fair allowance. Why is it people who complain about the “patriarchy” seem like they would actually prefer to live under one… or at least some kind of “archy” that consolidates power in somebody else’s hands?
The vision of the economy that progressives promote (whether or not they actually believe it) is so simplistic it boggles the mind. Employers aren’t sitting on big piles of cash that they refuse to give to workers. If they were, other employers could swoop in and take advantage of that inefficiency, whether by poaching employees or luring away customers, to put them out of business. To the extent that corrective isn’t possible, it’s because government is imposing rules to make competition impossible.
Policies like a $19 minimum wage will only make the problem worse. New businesses will not be able to compete, and established businesses will invest in automation that puts employees out of work.
Who benefits? Well, ideologues like Henries for one, because they’ll turn around and take advantage of the people’s pain in order to sell them another political solution that will only make things worse.
Featured image by Jennifer Uppendahl on Unsplash.
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Varnum Armory Museum (2/28/22) from John Carlevale on Vimeo.
Host Richard August speaks with Patrick Donovan of the Varnum Armory Museum. The Varnum Continentals were charted as a militia in 1774. In 1913, they built the Varnum Memorial Armory. It has recently undergone a considerable renovation/upgrade, expanding the museum that was contained therein. The organization’s members now view themselves as a conservation organization of RI military history, which of course intertwines with U.S. history. The museum contains many valuable artifacts of this history and its people, which Donovan talks about with captivating devotion, respect, admiration and pride. The museum is free and open to the public by appointment only. Contact: armory@varnumcontinentals.org
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We recently learned, deep in a Rhode Island Department of Health report, that as of last month, 854 unvaccinated healthcare workers have been permitted to continue to work without medical exemption in violation of the state’s vaccine mandate.
Major credit to Dr. Andrew Bostom for finding and publicizing this remarkable and disturbing document.
Further to this revelation, Anchor Rising contacted Governor Dan McKee’s press office with the following questions.
– Has Governor McKee’s administration taken proactive steps to block from providing health care any of the unvaccinated health care workers (HCW’s) who either do not have a medical exemption or whose exemption was declined? If so, how many?
– Regarding the 854 HCW’s who remain unvaccinated and do not have a medical exemption, wondering why Governor McKee is permitting them to continue working despite the state’s rigid vaccine mandate?
No answers were offered by Governor McKee.
Possibly he found these questions a tad awkward in light of the retaliatory actions taken via his authority by his former Director of Health, Dr. Nicole Alexander Scott, against one and (apparently) only one healthcare worker, Dr. Stephen Skoly, for not getting vaccinated.
Fast forward now to two days ago. Dr. Skoly’s right to practice was reinstated as a function of the state lifting the health care worker vaccine mandate that same day.
But some major questions about Rhode Island’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic need to be asked and answered. The entire concept of an onerous lockdown as a response to a disease with a survival rate of 99.8% pre-vaccine. Sending COVID-positive patients to nursing homes. Mask mandates for those least susceptible to the disease. More recently, the advisability of the vaccine mandate (just lifted) against healthcare workers implemented by Dr. Alexander Scott with Governor McKee’s authority and the tacit approval of the General Assembly – a mandate that has needlessly strained the state’s healthcare system by chasing away hundreds of valued workers.
Near the top of this list of questions is the state’s treatment of Dr. Stephen Skoly. While many hundreds of healthcare workers did not comply with the state’s vaccine mandate, only one, Dr. Stephen Skoly, was singled out for punitive enforcement action by Governor McKee and Dr. Alexander Scott.
WPRO’s Matt Allen reminded me on air Friday that Dr. Alexander Scott had stated at a press conference, in her capacity as the Director of the Rhode Island Department of Health, that vaccine mandate enforcement action would only be taken against health care workers who publicly stated they would not comply. (Science side bar: Really?? So those who remain silent about their unvaccinated status acquire a mysterious ability to not transmit COVID-19???) Is that the reason Dr. Skoly was singled out for enforcement action? Because he spoke publicly about declining the vaccine for a fully valid reason?
Unequal enforcement of a law or regulation, especially when it is as glaring as it was with Dr. Skoly, is a serious abuse of power. It must be thoroughly exposed and answered for by the officials involved. In a setting that involves the prospect of perjury but absent a Press Secretary, however professional and pleasant, to remain silent behind.
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John Loughlin discusses with Todd Bensman, of the Center for Immigration Studies, the waves of illegal immigrations rolling across the southern border.
Featured image by Greg Bulla on Unsplash.
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Almost since I began keeping an eye on it, the unemployment rate has primarily been a means of disguising the underlying weakness of RI’s economy. With the latest iteration, the AP writer seems to accentuate the positive, but you don’t have to dig far to see the negative — as far, say, as the state Department of Labor and Training’s official press release. Note, in particular:
The Rhode Island labor force totaled 568,800 in January, down 800 over the month but up 3,200 from January 2021.
Since February 2020, the month prior to the pandemic-related shutdowns, there are 2,900 more unemployed RI residents and 5,900 fewer employed RI residents. Currently, there are 3,000 fewer RI residents participating in the labor force than there were prior to the start of the pandemic. …
Total nonfarm payroll employment in Rhode Island totaled 486,700 in January, a decrease of 1,300 jobs from the revised December employment figure of 488,000.
Accommodation and food services is down. Manufacturing is down for the first time since April 2020. Construction is down. All the industries where you find working people are down. On the other hand:
Offsetting some of the January job losses was a gain of 500 jobs reported in the Professional & Technical Services sector. The Educational Services, Health Care & Social Assistance and Other Services sectors each reported gains of 200, followed by an increase of 100 jobs in both the Government and Transportation & Utilities sectors.
As I’ve been warning for years, now, we’re becoming a “company state” in which the company is the government. More and more, we’re being taxed to pay people to serve other people who aren’t working. This is obviously not a workable model over the long term, requiring confiscatory taxation of the people who actually generate new wealth within the state and continual infusions of cash from other states.
Beware the year those other states decide to stop subsidizing ours!
The tragedy is that it doesn’t have to be this way. There is a lot of dynamism in our state and our country, and a compressed spring of energy ready to rocket up if we can only persuade people to slip the weight off the top.
Featured image on Washington Area Spark.
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