Tag Archives: #PhiladelphiaInquirer

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Even The Philadelphia Inquirer realizes that people are getting fed up with #COVID19 restrictions Once rights have been lost, they are very difficult to regain

Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump 3,458,229 (50.01%) to 3,377,674 (48.84%) in Pennsylvania, but in Philadelphia County, Mr Biden’s margin was 603,790 (81.44%) to 132,740 (17.90%), 471,050 votes, far greater than the 81,660 votes by which President Trump lost the Keystone State. I think it fair to say that Philadelphia is a very heavily Democratic area.

So, when I see The Philadelphia Inquirer, itself a very liberally-oriented newspaper, telling readers that Philadelphians are individually rebelling against the mask mandates of Governor Tom Wolf (D-PA) and Mayor Jim Kenney (D-Philadelphia), I take note.

After a year of pandemic, wearing masks outdoors is up for debate

Even as the city holds firm with its mask mandates, Philadelphians are making their own decisions about whether to mask or not.

by Laura McCrystal and Jason Laughlin | Earth Day, April 22, 2021

White and pink pastel blossoms frosted the trees beneath a blue sky Tuesday afternoon in Old City, the kind of spring day that makes long sleeves optional. For many, though, masks were not.

“I do it because it’s the right thing to do,” said Ellen Stroman, as she walked by the colonial columns of the Shambles near Second and Pine Streets with her husband, their daughter, and dog.

Is it? Mrs Stroman was walking with her husband and her daughter, presumably members of her own household. If any of them have the China virus, then they all have it. If “it’s the right thing to do,” then the right thing for Mrs Stroman is to signal her virtue, not somehow fight the virus.[1]See here for my explanation as to why I have started to, occasionally, call it the China virus

There is ample evidence that masks help prevent COVID-19′s spread, and their value indoors, where transmission is almost 19 times more likely than outside, isn’t disputed. The risk of infection outside, especially through passing contact, appears much lower. Researchers have found COVID-19 spreads primarily through aerosols expelled by activities like talking, singing, sneezing, or coughing, and those disperse quickly in open air. Sunlight and humidity also play roles in reducing the risk of outdoor transmission. A letter to the German government from the Association for Aerosol Research this month stated, “Transmission outdoors is extremely rare and never leads to cluster infections as can be observed indoors,” according to Germany’s international broadcaster, Deutsche Welle.

The mass protests in summer 2020 that followed George Floyd’s death didn’t appear to cause coronavirus case surges in Philadelphia, and evidence is uneven about what role, if any, protests played in transmission nationwide.

Heaven forfend! Is the Inquirer, that bastion of the #woke, telling us that the authoritarian decrees of the Governor and Mayor might not be justified?

The Atlantic published an article recently asking whether it was time to consider lifting outdoor-masking mandates, noting confirmed cases of outdoor transmission almost always include close conversation or yelling. Once a person is vaccinated, the risk of being infected outdoors is “microscopic” to “nonexistent,” the magazine reported.

The article notes what we’ve all known: mask wearing has become highly politicized.

That highlights the unusual intersection of biology and social science that health experts and the public have navigated over the last year. Masks have moved beyond a public health precaution to become variously a courtesy, an indicator of solidarity, a symbol of respect for science — or a sign of reluctant acquiescence to government control. Some are so adamant about refusing to wear them they won’t enter places where they’re required.

“In America it’s been politicized,” said Eric Zillmer, a professor of neuropsychology at Drexel. “If you’re wearing a mask, you’ve kind of bought into the idea that there is danger.”

No, it means that you have bought into the idea that the government can tell you what to do and how to live your life!

I never wear a mask outside. If I am entering someone’s private property, and they have a notification up that they will decline service if I am not wearing a mask, I will comply; it is, after all, their private property. But, several times recently, I’ve come across businesses in which they have the signs up, but once inside I note that masks are optional, at which point I immediately exercise that option.

There were several paragraphs about how different people were behaving concerning mask wearing and, as usual, the obsessive controlling nature of government officials, but this is the one that struck me:

On the streets of Philadelphia, people make their own subtle adjustments. Some were masked up on a warm afternoon this week, while others went entirely without. Some kept masks ready to quickly put on if another person came nearby.

Uhhh, if you are outside, without a mask, and someone else chooses to come nearby, that’s on them, and they have clearly decided that they are not worried or do not care.

Well, we’re having a family gathering this Sunday, on our farm, of at least three households, and I guarantee you, there won’t be any masks worn! That will put us all in violation of Governor Andy Beshear’s (D-KY) latest executive order:

3. People in Kentucky must cover their nose and mouth with a face covering when they are in the following situations that represent a high risk of COVID-19 transmission:

a. . . . any other indoor public space in which it is difficult to maintain a physical distance of at least six feet from all individuals who are not members of that person’s household;

c. While in outdoor public spaces in which the person cannot maintain a physical distance of at least six feet from all individuals who are not members of the person’s household and is not otherwise covered by previously issued guidance.

I suppose that my property might not be considered a “public space”, but I very much wish to consider my actions as defiance of our insipid Governor’s cockamamie and illegal orders. If the Governor showed up at my property — something extremely unlikely to occur — I would tell him to remove his mask or get off my land.

We must do all that we can to resist the encroachment of government on our individual rights. Once rights are lost, they are very difficult to regain.

References

References
↑1 See here for my explanation as to why I have started to, occasionally, call it the China virus
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An interesting juxtaposition #BlackLivesMatter protesters celebrate the conviction of Derek Chauvin, but don't help police solve murders of black Americans by other black Americans

There they were, two stories, side by side on the Lexington Herald-Leader’s website main page:

Lexington Herald-Leader website main page, 8:36 AM EDT, April 21, 2021. Screenshot by DRP.

Two stories, one about the glee being felt by some over the conviction of Derek Chauvin for the killing of George Floyd, and one about the black lives that really don’t matter to the #BlackLivesMatter activists:

‘Justice can prevail.’ Group gathers in Lexington after verdict in Derek Chauvin trial

By Karla Ward | April 20, 2021 | 7:43 PM EDT | Updated April 20, 2021 | 8:11 PM EDT

A group that has been protesting since last summer against police violence gathered Tuesday night in downtown Lexington to hear the verdict announced in the trial of Derek Chauvin, who was found guilty on all counts in the death of George Floyd.

April Taylor, a member of LPD Accountability and a prominent protest organizer in Lexington, was emotional after the verdict was read. She addressed the group of a few dozen that gathered in front of the Fayette County courthouses.

Taylor said Tuesday night that she was grateful for the guilty verdict, but that police reforms are needed to prevent more deaths.

“I am worried about what will happen on appeal,” Taylor said. And she said, as a tear rolled down her cheek, “There are so many other people who have lost their lives who did not get justice.”

Taylor hopes that the verdict in Chauvin’s case will encourage people to keep fighting because “there are moments when we can have wins, when justice can prevail.”

It was only a few days ago that we noted Lexington Police Chief Lawrence Weathers and his complaint:

Lexington Police Chief Lawrence Weathers urged people with information regarding homicide investigations to speak with police. He said some witnesses don’t cooperate with police investigations, making it more difficult to identify suspects.

The other article noted the difficulties in obtaining justice on Lexington’s mean streets:

‘Tired of burying one another.’ Families of Lexington homicide victims rally to end violence

By Jeremy Chisenhall | April 20, 2021 | 8:14 PM EDT | Updated April 20, 2021 | 9:42 PM EDT

Concerned about a recent spike in fatal shootings, Lexington community members on Tuesday gathered to say they’re “sick and tired of burying one another.”

That was Pastor Joseph Owens’ message as he spoke to other residents gathered in the parking lot outside Shiloh Baptist Church. Lexington has had 15 homicides in 2021, all of which have been shootings, according to police data.

An early spike in shootings this year follows a record-setting year for homicides in 2020. Lexington reported 34 homicides last year. Some of the people at Tuesday’s rally were concerned that violence involving gangs and other groups is a significant contributor to the spike in shootings.

It was just two days ago that we noted that Lexington’s 15 homicides by April 18th put the city on a path toward 51 homicides for 2021, and a 15.78 per 100,000 population homicide rate. But, at least the Herald-Leader regards homicides as newsworthy, something The Philadelphia Inquirer does not. Of course, when Lexington has an average of one murder a week, while the City of Brotherly Love averages 1.4 per day, I suppose I can see why the Inquirer doesn’t bother.

Today’s Inquirer? Their website main page was filled with articles of gloating and joy that Mr Chauvin was convicted:

You know what I didn’t see on the Inquirer’s main page? I didn’t see a single story about the the people who were murdered in Philadelphia last night. The Philadelphia Police Department’s Current Crime Statistics page noted that there had been 154 homicides in the City of Brotherly Love by the end of April 20th, a 31.62% increase over the same date last year — and 2020 being a leap year, April 20th of 2020 was the 111th day of the year, not the 110th as it is this year — and three more homicides than just the day before.[1]It’s worth noting that very white Uber-feminist Amanda Marcotte, herself a resident of South Philadelphia, never writes about the black-on-black homicide rate in her adopted home town, but sure … Continue reading

But that didn’t matter to the editors of the Inquirer. It didn’t matter that former Police Commissioner Charles Ramsey used to lament the “no snitchin'” culture which hindered the police in finding and arresting the thugs who killed so many Philadelphians, it doesn’t matter that the city had a higher homicide rate than Chicago, it doesn’t matter that the vast majority of the homicide victims are black, because #BlackLivesMatter only means that black lives matter to the #woke of the Inquirer newsroom when they are taken by white policemen.

We noted, last October, in an article entitled We need to stop pretending that #BlackLivesMatter, because in the City of Brotherly Love, it’s very apparent that they don’t, that:

(A)s of 11:59 PM EDT on October 21th, 391 souls had been sent to their eternal rewards. That isn’t the record, of course, but 2007 is the base year on the Current Crime Statistics website, and that was the number of people killed that year in Philly. This year has now matched that total . . . with 71 days left in the year.

The math is simple: 391 people killed in 295 days so far equals 1.325 people killed every single day. With 71 days left in the year, at that rate the city should see another 94 people sent to their deaths before the ball drops in New York City.

By October 21, 2020, summer had been over for a month, and summer is the season when most murders occur in our major cities. But the math I did, 391 + 94 = 485, turned out to be short, as the daily homicide rate in Philadelphia increased, and 499 souls were sent early to their eternal rewards. And Philly’s homicide rate of 1.40 dead every single day, in just the depths of winter and the first month of spring is higher than it was that October day last year.

But that’s not news to the inquirer! Oh, there was an article by columnist Will Bunch blaming the increase in homicides on increased gun ownership, but the increase in black-on-black murders in Philly was never mentioned. As always, the problem was “gun violence,” rather than the culture and attitudes of the bad guys who used the guns. Malcolm Jenkins, formerly a safety with the Philadelphia Eagles, and Natasha Cloud, a guard with the Washington Mystics, wrote an article published yesterday blaming the police, even though deaths of blacks at the hands of the police are minuscule compared to the deaths of black Americans at the hands of other black Americans.

Michele Kilpatrick, one of District Attorney Larry Krasner’s minions, came ever-so-close to describing the problem:

In 2020, there were four victims of shootings in the Philadelphia Police Department’s 5th District, which includes the affluent, majority-white neighborhoods of Roxborough and Manayunk. Just a few miles away in the 14th District, which includes the low-income, majority-Black neighborhood of Germantown, there were 121 victims of shootings. That disparity is not new: In 2018, the 14th District had 20 times the number of shooting victims than the 5th. In 2016, there were 80 shooting victims in the 14th and none in the 5th.

We know that proactive policing policies like stop-and-frisk, which sometimes yields unlicensed or unregistered guns, are not the reason shootings have remained so low in Chestnut Hill — because the same policies have consistently failed to make shootings also rare in Germantown.

Instead, throughout Philadelphia and cities nationwide, generations of low-income Black and Latino residents have lived and died in communities that have been reduced to symbols in the public imagination — the South Bronx, Compton, South Side of Chicago — as we mistake failed policies for failed people and resign ourselves to the idea that certain types of places and people are just inherently dangerous.

Occam’s Razor is:

a scientific and philosophical rule that entities should not be multiplied unnecessarily which is interpreted as requiring that the simplest of competing theories be preferred to the more complex or that explanations of unknown phenomena be sought first in terms of known quantities.

Miss Kilpatrick is apparently not a fan of William of Occam, because she, like so many others, feels the need to go beyond the simple, go beyond the obvious, and find all sorts of reasons why bad people are bad people beyond them simply being bad people! She wants to blame poverty, but I grew up poor, grew up without a father, and it didn’t lead me to kill anyone. I didn’t have the community services she advocates, yet I wasn’t out committing crimes or shooting at people.

Mt Sterling, Kentucky is a small town, and we had something called October Court Day. On Court day, the third Monday of the month, the country folk would come to town and set up along Locust Street and other areas on the south side of town, to sell and trade for their products. On two separate October Court Days, I walked up North Maysville Street, in full view of where the city Police Department used to be on Broadway, across the street from the Montgomery County Courthouse, carrying long guns that I had bought, when I was still in high school . . . and nobody cared, because nobody thought that I was going to shoot anybody.[2]Sadly, Court Day has degenerated into nothing more than a professional vendor-driven flea market.

Why? Because everybody knew that my mother had taught me right!

There’s no way my solutions are politically correct, and many of the Special Snowflakes™ on the left who read it will be absolutely triggered, but I, of course, don’t care; it’s still the truth.

And that’s what it all boils down to: bad kids are brought up by bad parents, assuming that anybody brings them up at all. Adam Toledo, a 13-year-old in Chicago, is stone-cold graveyard dead after being shot by a police officer, because young Mr Toledo was outside, consorting with a 21-year-old convicted criminal, and fleeing with a gun, at 2:30 in the morning. The officer thought that Mr Toledo had turned on him with a gun, though the body camera footage shows Mr Toledo had dropped the weapon, but the real fault is that his parents were letting him run around at 2:30 on a Monday morning.

Miss Kilpatrick got it wrong: the problem really is failed people, failed people in the neighborhoods she mentioned, the South Bronx, Compton, South Side of Chicago, and the ones she left out, Philly’s own Strawberry Mansion or Nicetown, because they are being brought up, are growing up, in a culture which glamorizes violence, which doesn’t teach right from wrong, and in which “street cred” is of major importance.

Well, I’m just enough of an [insert slang term for the rectum here] to tell you what the real solution is. It won’t be politically correct in the slightest, and will doubtlessly offend some people, but I’m retired, and can’t be ‘canceled,’ can’t be fired from a job for telling you the truth. They key to understanding the causes of violence is understanding what is most important to teenaged boys and young men: pussy!

There is nothing teenaged boys and twenty-something men think about more than sex. I know; I used to be a teenaged boy and twenty-something young man, sometime just after Johannes Gutenberg invented the printing press. The greatest reward for young men of those ages is getting laid, and therein lays the key: when young girls reward the behavior of the bad boys with pussy, bad behavior is incentivized, and good behavior devalued. When the gang-bangers get laid, and the nerds do not, the girls wind up with some exciting times, but with guys who will never provide any sort of reasonable and safe future for them.

The key is the education of teenaged girls, teaching them that the nerds they are shunning are the guys who will be there when they get into their thirties and forties, the guys who will actually be fathers to their children, and the guys who will help provide a solid and reliable middle-class home for them. They will be the men who can be with them every day, and not be spending five-to-ten years away in Graterford or Eddyville prisons.

In the end, the solution to the problem is black mothers, teaching their black daughters how their behavior affects their neighborhoods, their cities, and all of society. The black mothers of Lexington and Philadelphia and Chicago and St Louis, mothers who now have a 69.4% out-of-wedlock birth rate, need to realize and teach their daughters that there is a better way of life than the ones the mothers have, need to rear their daughters to do what’s right for themselves and their neighborhoods and their eventual children rather than just what is exciting in the moment.

There’s no way that is politically correct, and many of the Special Snowflakes™ on the left who read it will be absolutely triggered, but I, of course, don’t care; it’s still the truth.[3]Trigger: to cause an intense and usually negative emotional reaction in (someone)

References

References
↑1 It’s worth noting that very white Uber-feminist Amanda Marcotte, herself a resident of South Philadelphia, never writes about the black-on-black homicide rate in her adopted home town, but sure jumps on the Derek Chauvin bandwagon.
↑2 Sadly, Court Day has degenerated into nothing more than a professional vendor-driven flea market.
↑3 Trigger: to cause an intense and usually negative emotional reaction in (someone)
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Is it time to change the spelling of ‘journalist’ to ‘journolist’? The Associated Press and The Philadelphia Inquirer try to deify Daunte Wright

Sometimes it’s easier just to embed a few of my tweets than write a separate article/ Because of the way Twitter does embedding, I had to embed the second and fourth tweets to let readers see the whole thing.

We are supposed to thing that Daunte Wright was just an ever-so-nice young man, and the woman who was copulating with George Floyd, another criminal, a convicted felon and serious drug abuser, told us that young Mr Wright was just “a wonderful, beautiful boy.”

No, he wasn’t. According to the Associated Press story:

According to court records, Wright was being sought after failing to appear in court on charges that he fled from officers and possessed a gun without a permit during an encounter with Minneapolis police in June.

A search of court records shows Wright had a minor criminal record, with petty misdemeanor convictions for possession/sale of a small amount of marijuana and disorderly conduct.

So, resisting arrest and escaping, both criminal acts.

What Is Resisting Arrest?

Resisting arrest in Minnesota is also called obstructing legal process, arrest, or firefighting. A person is guilty of obstructing legal process if they intentionally obstruct, resist, or interfere with a police officer in the performance of legal duties, or obstruct, hinder, or prevent a person’s apprehension on a criminal charge.

The Minnesota legislature intentionally wrote the law in very broad terms. Under the law, resisting arrest means:

  • Refusing to be handcuffed;
  • Refusing to surrender;
  • Struggling with the police;
  • Wrestling or fighting with the police; or
  • Somehow preventing the police from making an arrest.

Acts such as running from police, refusing to stop for police, and escape from a detention facility are crimes governed by other Minnesota laws.

Penalties For Resisting Arrest In Minnesota

The possible sanctions for resisting depend on the severity and dangerousness of the conduct alleged by police. Minnesota law punishes resisting arrest as a felony if:

  • The person knew or should have known the act created a risk of death, substantial bodily harm, or significant damage to property; or
  • The act did cause death, serious bodily injury, or substantial property damage.

Felony resisting arrest carries a maximum state prison term of five years, a fine up to $10,000, or both fine and imprisonment.

Resisting arrest is a gross misdemeanor punishable by no more than one year in prison, a $3,000 fine, or both if the act or threat was forceful or violent but did not cause death, substantial bodily injury, or substantial property damage. Otherwise, misdemeanor resisting arrest carries a maximum sentence of 90 days, a $1,000 fine, or both.

Also see: Nothing Can Placate the BLM Riot Mob, and ‘Journalists’ Are Part of the Mob

Escaping from the police on an attempted arrest can be a felony in Minnesota if the escapee flees in a car, or a misdemeanor if he escapes on foot.

In Minnesota, you are required to have a valid permit to carry in order to possess a handgun in a public place. The penalties for carrying a handgun without a valid permit are strict. For a first offense it is a gross-misdemeanor and any repeat offense becomes a felony. It is your burden to prove that you have a valid permit to carry when requested by law enforcement.

It seems that this “wonderful, beautiful boy” had racked up some previous charges, and that’s why there was a warrant out for his arrest.

The officer who shot and killed Mr Wilson has resigned and is facing criminal charges; she may well be convicted, and it’s difficult to believe that she mistook her service weapon for her taser. But the credentialed media are hyping up the notion that Mr Wright was some kind of sweet, innocent kid. At some point, we need to be honest here and change the spelling of journalist to journolist.

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The Philadelphia Inquirer tries to make the Derek Chauvin trial about racism and stereotypes rather than the arrest of a criminal It seems that Cassie Owens doesn't like the fact that Mr Chauvin's defense attorney is actually trying to defend him

I confess: it might seem that my many referrals to The Philadelphia Enquirer Inquirer may seem close to an obsession, but, let’s face it, the paper seems to provide more silliness and stupidity every single day. You’ll love this one!

Stereotypes of larger Black men still persist at the Derek Chauvin trial

Research shows that big and tall Black men are more likely to be seen as threatening, and these notions trace back to slavery.

by Cassie Owens | April 9, 2021

During the trial of Derek Chauvin, the former Minneapolis police officer charged with killing George Floyd, Chauvin’s defense attorney Eric Nelson has repeatedly pointed to Floyd’s size.

Nelson raised size again Tuesday, when he confirmed with a police instructor that officers are trained to consider size difference for use of force. He first brought it up during opening statements in late March.

“You will see that three Minneapolis police officers could not overcome the strength of Mr. Floyd,” Nelson said. “Mr. Chauvin stands five-foot-nine, 140 pounds. Mr. Floyd is six, three, weighs 223 pounds.”

In the conversations around victims of police brutality, pointing to a victim’s size to justify or disregard the violence has become a feature, not a bug. Prominent examples include Eric Garner, Alton Sterling, and Michael Brown. But why is size so often mentioned in these cases?

Uhhh, maybe because all of these suspects were big men? If you do a Google search for George Floyd gentle giant you’ll get 2,690,000 results, including George Floyd: “Gentle Giant” Who Became Symbol Of Fight Against Racism, which lists Mr Floyd’s height as 6’4″, not 6’3″, Friends Remember George Floyd As A Gentle Giant, and George Floyd was ‘very loving’ and a ‘gentle giant,’ friends and family say.

Read more: The Chauvin trial so far, by John Hinderaker on Powerline.

When I searched for eric garner gentle giant, I got 878,000 results, including Friends: Eric Garner was a ‘gentle giant’, ‘Gentle Giant’ Dies After NYPD Cop Puts Him In Chokehold, and Friends: Man in NYC chokehold case ‘gentle giant’. The latter article stated that Mr Garner was 6-foot-3, and 350-pounds.

St George of Floyd

My search for alton sterling gentle giant yielded 480,000 returns, including returns which noted that he was a convicted felon, was brandishing a firearm at police when he was killed, and a registered sex offender for knocking up a 14 year old girl; he had a long criminal record and spent much of his life behind bars. Giant maybe; gentle, not so much.

My search for michael brown gentle giant yielded 8,270,000 results in 0.69 seconds, including Michael Brown remembered as a ‘gentle giant’, and Brown Remembered As a Gentle Giant, even though Mr Brown, all 6’4″ of him, was caught on video roughing up an elderly shopkeeper during a robbery just minutes before his ‘encounter’ with Officer Darrin Wilson.

So, why was the size of these criminals — and let’s make no bones about it, they were criminals — mentioned? Because they were all large men, men who used their size for physical advantage.

Back to the Inquirer:

Anna Mollow, a Santa Rosa, Calif.-based disabilities studies expert who sees similarities in the cases of Barbara Dawson and Tamir Rice, said in a recent interview this reflects forms of oppression that are familiar in our society.

“I would, indeed, say that the defense’s comments about George Floyd’s size do draw upon, and do recirculate, stereotypes of Black people as possessing superhuman physical strength,” wrote Mollow, “while at the same time calling up dehumanizing stereotypes about Black people’s supposed moral and intellectual inferiority — for example, the notion that they need to be brought ‘under control,’ as Chauvin said of Floyd.”

Cassie Owens, the Inquirer article author, is trying to claim that Eric Nelson, Derek Chauvin’s defense attorney, was playing on stereotypes, but Mr Nelson is doing his job the best he can, in trying to defend his client. It is not playing a stereotype to note that George Floyd, a drug-addled convicted felon caught in the act of passing counterfeit money, was significantly larger than Officer Chauvin. At 5’9″, Officer Chauvin was very much of average height, in the 50th percentile of adult male height, while the 99th percentile begins at 6’3½”, roughly where Mr Floyd stood. Mr Floyd outweighed Mr Chauvin by roughly 80 lb, more than half again the officer’s mass.

Miss Owens is, of course, utterly appalled that Mr Nelson is doing something really radical like defending his client.

Ben Brooks, a diversity and inclusion expert who was one of the first Black officers to enlist in the Pennsylvania State Police in 1961, said that bias, in general society, isn’t well understood. People use bias to detect danger, Brooks continued, and for some, their danger detectors don’t respond fairly to Black people. . . .

“If you approach [an] individual with dignity, respect, and self worth, then you’re on an even keel,” he said. “But when it’s anything other than that, that means psychologically the temperature rises.”

Empathy, he said, is critical for officers: “When you can approach members of the public with an empathic approach, you’re more likely to make an emotional connection and see them on a human level.”

(Anna Mollow, a Santa Rosa, Calif.-based disabilities studies expert) noted that it was important to be mindful of how different forms of oppression, like racism and sizeism, intersect. Thinking that way, she said, invites more space for self-criticism for everyone across groups, rather than thinking confrontationally: “It’s more about continuing to really explore the way that we might be perpetuating forms of oppression without realizing it, and then to explore the ways that we can work together and change that.”

In all of this, in all of her attempts to paint Mr Floyd as a victim of racism and stereotypes, Miss Owens, whose Inquirer bio says, “I cover sociocultural dynamics, as well as how Philadelphians contend with them these days,” ignores that Officer Chauvin was called to the scene by the officers who arrived there first, noting that Mr Floyd was acting drugged up. Mr Chauvin would already have been on alert when he arrived, in that the suspect was described as acting erratically and irrationally, and was resisting arrest.

Yes, Officer Chauvin (probably) was “thinking confrontationally,” given that he was called as backup to a confrontation with a resisting perpetrator. While it is certainly arguable that Officer Chauvin used excessive force against Mr Floyd — that Mr Floyd dies while being restrained certainly makes the officers’ actions subject to question — this trial is about the proper use of force against a resisting criminal suspect, not about racism. But the left want to make it about racism, so they’ll have yet another excuse to riot and loot and burn if Mr Chauvin is acquitted or even just convicted on a lesser charge than second-degree murder.

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I am wryly amused

As my too-few regular readers know, I have not been exactly charitable in my writings concerning The Philadelphia Enquirer Inquirer.[1]RedState writer Mike Miller called it the Enquirer, which brings to my mind the National Enquirer, probably by mistake, so I didn’t originate it, but I thought it very apt.

Thus, I was somewhat amused when I received this in my e-mail:

<

Dear Dana,

We wrote to you earlier this week to share the news of our $20,000 match to raise support for The Inquirer’s high-impact journalism. Your generosity ensures that The Philadelphia Inquirer can continue to tell important stories like the recent Under Fire series on the tragedy and impacts of gun violence in Philadelphia.

We invite you to support this kind of public service journalism by making a gift to support The Philadelphia Inquirer’s High-Impact Journalism Fund.
Yes, double my gift!

Best,
Rebecca

Rebecca Forman
The Lenfest Institute for Journalism

Of course, being the [insert slang term for the rectum here] that I am, I had to respond:

Dear Miss Forman:

 
I might consider making such a gift when the Inquirer stops referring to “gun violence” and starts calling it what it is: criminality on the part of a criminal population.
 
I know, I know: it isn’t politically correct, but you can never solve a problem if you are not honest about what the problem is, and the Inquirer is not honest. Guns do not have some sort of malevolent intelligence all their own, like the One Ring of Sauron, but are inanimate objects which are picked up and misused by criminals.  
 
I live out in the country, where almost every home has a firearm or three, yet people out here, despite a too-large illegal drug problem, simply aren’t killing each other at anywhere near the rate that Philadelphians are. 
 
When I lived in Jim Thorpe, from 2002 through 2017 just seventy miles up the Northeast Extension of the Turnpike, the county went eight entire years without a homicide, and when that streak ended, the murder was committed not with a gun, but by strangulation. The next murder, a few years later, was committed with a knife. All of this, in a county with thousands of hunters, a county in which firearm ownership was widespread. And Carbon County was under the same gun control laws as Philadelphia, as the rest of Pennsylvania. Perhaps the Inquirer ought to ask why this disparity exists, but I’m certain that such a question cannot ever be asked, because the answers that might be found could never, ever, be published.
 
I have written frequently on what passes for journalism in the Inquirer; you may read my articles at your leisure.
 
Sincerely, Dana R Pico.

I do not anticipate a response. 🙂

References

References
↑1 RedState writer Mike Miller called it the Enquirer, which brings to my mind the National Enquirer, probably by mistake, so I didn’t originate it, but I thought it very apt.
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More #woke reporting from The Philadelphia Inquirer

We noted last week that the Lexington Herald-Leader declined to post the freely available mug shot of a suspected murderer on its website, even though all of the other media sources in that fair city did so, and I speculated — and yes, that is the correct word — that the editorial decision not to do so was because the suspect is black.

Justin Smith, named a ‘person of interest’ in the murder of Dianna Brice, as pictured in the New York Post.

Now comes The Philadelphia Enquirer Inquirer doing the same thing. The New York Post ran a story on Dianna Brice, 21, a missing and pregnant Delaware County woman, whose body was found in:

a wooded area in southwest Philadelphia, about one mile from where the car of her boyfriend, Justin Smith, 23, was found engulfed in flames hours after she vanished on March 30, WPVI reported.

CBS Philadelphia, citing police, said she had been shot. Smith is a person of interest in her slaying, the station reported.

One would think that the Inquirer would, as a public service to its readers, include the photo of Mr Smith, whom the Philadelphia Police Department have named as a ‘person of interest’ in the investigation of Miss Brice’s murder, in case one of the readers happened to spot Mr Smith, so that he could call the police. But if you thought that, you would be wrong.

Body of missing Upper Darby woman found in Southwest Philadelphia; boyfriend still missing

Dianna Brice had been reported missing March 30. Police tracked her cellphone and found her body in a wooded area in Southwest Philadelphia. Her boyfriend remains missing.

by Vinny Vella | Updated April 6, 2021

A pregnant woman reported missing from her home in Upper Darby was found dead late Monday, nearly one week after she disappeared, police said. Meanwhile, detectives continued their search for Justin Smith, the woman’s boyfriend and the last person seen with her.

Philadelphia police recovered the body of Dianna Brice, 21, in a wooded area near 58th Street and Eastwick Avenue in Southwest Philadelphia, according to Kevin Ryan, a private investigator working with Brice’s family. Officers found the body about 11 p.m. Monday, and forensic investigators later identified it as Brice’s, he said.

Upper Darby Police Superintendent Timothy Bernhardt on Tuesday said the investigation into her death is being handled by Philadelphia police and is being treated as a murder case.

It remained unclear how Brice died. Sources familiar with the investigation said officers found the body by tracking the young mother’s cellphone.

The Inquirer story was updated the day before the Post story was published, so while the Inquirer might not have known, at the time of publication, that the Philadelphia Police Department said that Miss Brice had been shot, they did know, as they published, that it was being treated as a murder case.

So, why not post a photo of the ‘person of interest’ on the Inquirer’s story? Yes, the Inquirer is a non-profit business now, and yes, bandwidth costs money, but the Inquirer had enough bandwidth available to include a photo by staff photographer José F Moreno of the site in which Miss Brice’s body was found. That means, among other things, that the Inquirer spent the money to send Mr Moreno out to the site to take the picture.

Now, to be fair, in an earlier story, the Inquirer did embed a tweet from the Upper Darby Police, in a story on the search for Miss Brice when she was missing, and that included a photo of Mr Smith:

But the newspaper couldn’t manage to include it in the story in which Miss Brice’s death was noted and in which Mr Smith was named as someone whom the police sought in the case. [1]This story was last checked by me at 11:49 AM EDT on Wednesday, April 7th, and this statement was accurate at that time. The photo might be added in a subsequent update, but I have no way of knowing … Continue reading

So, why wouldn’t a credentialed media source I have mockingly called The Philadelphia Enquirer not have published Mr Smith’s photo? [2]RedState writer Mike Miller called it the Enquirer, probably by mistake, so I didn’t originate it, but I thought it very apt. The paper had the photo, and the paper had enough bandwidth available to include a photo of the street near where Miss Brice’s body was found. I can think of four possible reasons:

  1. Vinny Vella, the author of both stories on Miss Brice, forgot that he had included that tweet, with the photo, just the day before. If that is the case, Mr Vella isn’t particularly bright.
  2. Mr Vella’s editor — and yes, I am presuming here that an editor actually reviewed the story, as has been a journalistic tradition for, oh, more than a hundred years — didn’t remember the included tweet from the previous day, and never asked a question as to whether Mr Smith’s photograph was available, in which case that editor wasn’t doing a very good job;
  3. The Inquirer has taken an editorial decision not to publish very many photographs of suspects in criminal cases; or.
  4. The Inquirer has taken an editorial decision not to publish very many photographs of suspects in criminal cases, if those suspects are black.

Reasons 1 and 2 are evidence of incompetence. Could it be the third reason, that the Inquirer doesn’t print photos of suspects, period, for whatever reasons? That, I suppose, is possible, though if they are going to print the suspects’ names, that would seem more damaging, as those names could be much more easily found in future Google searches by prospective employers or whomever.

How about the fourth reason? That, I believe, is the more probable one, and given the #woke nature of the Inquirer staff, the ones who forced the firing resignation of Executive Editor and Senior Vice President Stan Wischnowski over the headline Buildings Matter, Too, I think it is a reasonable suspicion.

References

References
↑1 This story was last checked by me at 11:49 AM EDT on Wednesday, April 7th, and this statement was accurate at that time. The photo might be added in a subsequent update, but I have no way of knowing that at publication of this article.
↑2 RedState writer Mike Miller called it the Enquirer, probably by mistake, so I didn’t originate it, but I thought it very apt.
Posted on by

No media bias there, huh?

I have previously referred to The City of Brotherly Love’s venerable newspaper as The Philadelphia Enquirer, in mocking reference to the National Enquirer, and it seems as though every day brings more justification of that.[1]RedState writer Mike Miller called it the Enquirer, probably by mistake, so I didn’t originate it, but I thought it very apt.

Had an experience with extremists or conspiracy theories? Tell us about it.

Have you experienced extremism in your community, or seen family or friends divided by conspiracy theories? Tell us about it and a reporter may reach out to you.

by David Gambacorta | April 7, 2021

We are living in a paranoid time.

Communities of conspiracy theorists have sprouted online in recent years in response to school shootings, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the 2020 presidential election — distorting reality, amplifying divisions, and fueling real-world harm.

» READ MORE: From Philly to the Capitol, conspiracy adherents have fractured families and harmed communities

A recent Quinnipiac University poll found that 73% of Americans believe that conspiracy theories are out of control. The Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, which left five people dead, illustrated the risks of allowing extremism, and conspiracy theories like QAnon, to spread unchecked.

Have you experienced extremism in your community, or seen family or friends divided by conspiracy theories? Tell us about it in the form below and a reporter may reach out to you.

That’s all of the text. Mr Gambacorta’s end of article bio blurb is a short one:

I work on the investigative team, and narrative-driven projects.

I guess that the older style, something along the lines of “Mr Gambacorta is part of the Inquirer — to use the newspaper’s real name — investigative team,” isn’t young or #woke enough, and has to be more personalized.

But I digress. The article then gives four options in a response form:

Which extremist groups or conspiracy movements have you had an experience with?

  • QAnon
  • Proud Boys
  • Covid-19 Truthers
  • Other

Did you notice? All of the “extremist groups or conspiracy movements” given as options are those attributed to conservatives. There is no option to choose Antifa or #BlackLivesMatter as an extremist group with which one has had experience, even though Philadelphia experienced plenty of damage and violence in the protests over the killing of George Floyd and Walter Wallace.[2]Walter Wallace Jr was a mentally disturbed man who charged police with a knife, when officers responded to the fourth call from his family over his erratic behavior; the officers, who did not have … Continue reading

The Proud Boys, huh? A site search of the Inquirer’s website turned up this:

Far-right Proud Boys march through Center City

The alt-right Proud Boys marched through Center City Saturday with nearly 60 participants, many wearing body armor and helmets.

by Staff Reports | September 26, 2020

The alt-right Proud Boys conducted a march through Center City Saturday with nearly 60 participants, many wearing body armor and helmets, some waving American flags, and occasionally engaging in sharp verbal exchanges with onlookers.

They stopped in front of Independence Hall to sing The Star-Spangled Banner and then proceeded to City Hall, where they posed for a group photo, some displaying a white power sign with their fingers.

On the way there, they crossed paths without incident with the March to End Rape Culture, a protest to raise awareness about rape and express solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement. Later, the Proud Boys chanted “Back the blue” as they made their way to a parking garage at Penn’s Landing, where police closed off access until members of the group drove off.

The action came a week after the Proud Boys were expected to rally in Clark Park, when instead about 500 counterprotesters showed up to the popular West Philadelphia site in a progressive, racially diverse neighborhood.

Social media posts claimed Proud Boys were present, but were disguised as journalists to gather information about leftist activists.

If you open that article, you will see several photographs of the Proud Boys march in Philly, none of them showing any violence, none of them showing the buildings they burned or the stores they looted, because none of that happened! Not one story concerning the Proud Boys indicates any violence, any violence at all, by them in Philadelphia.

There was plenty, though, concerning the arrest of Zach Rehl, a Philadelphia man whom federal prosecutors say was a Proud Boys leader and participant in the January 6th Capitol Kerfuffle. The Feds want to keep Mr Rehl locked up before his trial begins, even though they have conceded that Mr Rehl did not participate in any violence himself:

Assistant U.S. Attorney Luke Jones conceded in court Friday that the government had no evidence that Rehl had directly participated in any property destruction or violence against police once he was inside Capitol grounds. But he balked at the suggestion from Rehl’s lawyer that the man was being jailed pretrial solely for expressing controversial political views.

“He is not before the court because of his opinions,” he said. “He’s before the court because of his actions and the people he led.”

Yet it was the Proud Boys, not Antifa and not Black Lives Matter, who organized and committed actual violence and vandalism, whom Mr Gambacorta listed as an extremist group!

Even though I am no longer a Pennsylvania resident, I do pay attention to foul, fetid, fuming, foggy, filthy Philadelphia, enough so that I broke down and subscribed to the Inquirer — after my wife told me to do so, seeing the conniptions through which I was going to get their stories without paying for them — but it doesn’t take much to see the leftward bias of that newspaper.

The editors, writers and reporters of The Philadelphia Enquirer Inquirer have, of course, their absolute First Amendment rights to think and say and print whatever they want, but I have the same rights to point out their utter stupidity.

References

References
↑1 RedState writer Mike Miller called it the Enquirer, probably by mistake, so I didn’t originate it, but I thought it very apt.
↑2 Walter Wallace Jr was a mentally disturbed man who charged police with a knife, when officers responded to the fourth call from his family over his erratic behavior; the officers, who did not have tasers available to them, defended themselves.
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With Donald Trump out of office, The Philadelphia Inquirer thinks nothing of publicizing criminality, knowing it won’t be punished

One way that you can tell that Donald Trump is no longer President of the United States is to read The Philadelphia Inquirer:

An undocumented house cleaner loses her job in Philly, but finds her mission

Altagracia Maria Herrera is an undocumented house cleaner who was excluded from most government aid, making the pandemic the first time she felt she didn’t belong in the United States.

By Robin Shulman | Monday, March 22, 2021

Altagracia María Herrera poses for a portrait outside of her home in Northeast Philadelphia on Wednesday, March 10, 2021. Herrera is an undocumented house cleaner who lost all her work during the pandemic. Photo by Heather Khalifa, Philadelphia Inquirer Staff Photographer

One night, as the pandemic shut Philadelphia down last March, Altagracia María Herrera, who cleans houses for a living, answered her phone.It was one of her employers, who, in broken Spanish, told her to stay home for the next few weeks, Herrera recalled.

“I understand,” responded Herrera, who was born in the Dominican Republic, lives in Northeast Philadelphia, and is a single parent to two U.S.-born daughters.

Then, over a few days, all her other cleaning jobs evaporated. Herrera had just enough saved to make her $750 rent. “After that, there was no money,” she said. As an undocumented immigrant, she didn’t qualify for relief from Washington — no stimulus checks, unemployment benefits, or ongoing salary funded by Paycheck Protection Program loans.

There’s much more at the original, but one thing is clear: she feels that she doesn’t belong in the United States because she really doesn’t belong in the United States. She is, the story tells us, “an undocumented immigrant,” the mealy-mouthed, Associated Press Stylebook term for an illegal immigrant, someone who is not an American citizen, someone who sneaked across the border illegally, someone who broke the law!

When Mr Trump was President, the Inquirer would never have printed her name, or noted that she lived somewhere in Northeast Philadelphia, or pointed out, in the photograph caption, that she was in the city on Wednesday, March 10, 2021. Why? Because under the Trump Administration, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents might have used the information, tracked her down, arrested and deported her back to the Dominican Repub

Further down, the article tells us that Miss Herrera “followed her dream of a better life and joined a friend in Philadelphia” in 2000. the article does not tell us how she got to the United States from the Dominican Republic, an nation sharing the Caribbean island of Hispaniola with Haiti.

How did she enter? Did she overstay a legitimate visa, and simply not return home? Was she somehow smuggled into the United States via a private boat that landed at night on the Jersey shore or the Outer Banks of North Carolina? Either way, she broke the law!

The story tells us that Miss Herrera had two illegitimate children in the United States, which, sadly, makes them American citizens. The two daughters are now 17 and 15, and almost certainly have sucked up taxpayer dollars by attending Philadelphia’s public schools.

When the pandemic began, Herrera lost all five of her regular cleaning clients and pay of at least $650 a week. One employer said she had lost her job, and in a kind of trickle-down unemployment, could no longer pay Herrera.

Really? Five regular cleaning jobs? That means that either five separate clients were paying Miss Herrera cash ‘under the table,’ meaning that they were not withholding federal income taxes, state income taxes, the city wage tax, Social Security taxes and Medicare taxes, which is illegal, or Miss Herrera had presented falsified documents so that they could pay her legally, but also means she either forged documents herself, or paid someone else for forged documents.

Did Miss Herrera somehow pay her federal, state and local taxes? Did she pay her share of Social Security and Medicare taxes? Did she file her federal and state income tax forms? If she failed to do any of those things, she committed felonies!

The Inquirer article noted that Miss Herrera had an account with Wells Fargo bank. What documents did she present to open an account in her name. Was the account opened after the PATRIOT Act was passed, in which the documentation requirements became more stringent? Regardless, Miss Herrera must have presented some form of identification, and that means she presented forged documents to the bank. That is a felony.

So many people seem to think that crossing into the United States illegally is really no big deal. But living in the US illegally requires the commission of other crimes virtually every day. If someone is in the US, and has to work, he is doing so illegally. If he is working here illegally, and being paid in cash under the table, he is evading income taxes. If someone is paying him in cash that way, and fails to file a Form 1099 for the employed person — which would bring that person to the attention of the Infernal Revenue Service — the employer is committing a felony. There are so many things required to live and work in the United States which require the payment of taxes and having documentation that it really cannot be done legally if a person is an illegal immigrant.

And The Philadelphia Inquirer is covering that up!

“It has become increasingly clear that the restrictions placed on many resources prevent those who have greatest need from accessing them,” said Mayor Jim Kenney. The city is building another fund to lift 100,000 Philadelphians out of poverty over the next five years — and that fund will include undocumented immigrants, said Councilmember Maria Quiñones-Sánchez.

So, the great Mayor of Philadelphia, who has presided over 109 murders so far this year, an increase of 29% over the same date last year, a year which fell just one killing short of the city’s all-time record, is going to give money, including taxpayers’ dollars, to non-citizens, to people in the city and country illegally. He can’t do his job in making the city safer, but he can enable more crime.

That’s just great, isn’t it?

In a wryly humorous link at the bottom of the Inquirer article was an OpEd about ‘vaccine envy.’

There is massive inequity in vaccine distribution. Black, Latinx, and low-income communities are being underserved while continuing to bear the brunt of the virus. For those fortunate enough and healthy enough to just be waiting your turn, it’s easy to get impatient.

According to the Inquirer, Miss Herrera, an illegal immigrant, not only got her first shot of the COVID-19 vaccine earlier this month, but got a new cleaning job as well. She stepped in front of an American citizen, one who hasn’t been able to get the vaccine yet, and she got another job it is illegal for her to have.[1]Despite being in Tier 1C, and just a month short of my 68th birthday, I have not been able to schedule my vaccine appointment yet with the Estill County Health Department, even though my 32 and 29 … Continue reading

This is what is wrong with liberalism, with the left and the #woke. This is why Donald Trump won in 2016, and may well contribute to another populist candidate winning in 2024. When we are allowing blatant violations of the law to not only go unpunished, but seeing our credentialed media publicizing them without any fear of law enforcement stepping in, things have gone very wrong in our country.[2]From Wikipedia: Woke (/ˈwoʊk/) as a political term of African-American origin refers to a perceived awareness of issues concerning social justice and racial justice. It is derived from … Continue reading

References

References
↑1 Despite being in Tier 1C, and just a month short of my 68th birthday, I have not been able to schedule my vaccine appointment yet with the Estill County Health Department, even though my 32 and 29 year old daughters, both living in Lexington, have gotten their first doses. I cannot blame Philadelphia for that, but the vaccine rollout in Kentucky has been, despite Governor Andy Beshear’s high praises, pretty bad.
↑2 From Wikipedia:

Woke (/ˈwoʊk/) as a political term of African-American origin refers to a perceived awareness of issues concerning social justice and racial justice. It is derived from the African-American Vernacular English expression “stay woke“, whose grammatical aspect refers to a continuing awareness of these issues.
By the late 2010s, woke had been adopted as a more generic slang term broadly associated with left-wing politics and cultural issues (with the terms woke culture and woke politics also being used). It has been the subject of memes and ironic usage. Its widespread use since 2014 is a result of the Black Lives Matter movement.

I shall confess to sometimes “ironic usage” of the term. To put it bluntly, I think that the ‘woke’ are just boneheadedly stupid.