Tag: oppression

Today’s blacklisted American: Black DEI administrator fired by college for demanding accuracy and color-blind policies

1:18 pm

Tabia Lee
Tabia Lee

They’re coming for you next: Tabia Lee, the faculty director for the Office of Equity, Social Justice, and Education [OESE] at De Anza College in California, was denied tenure and fired from her job when she repeatedly demanded historical accuracy and color-blind policies from both her department and the rest of the college.

“Historical accuracy and color-blind policies” from a modern college run by leftists? It is to laugh.

Tabia Lee is a black woman who had been an adjunct professor at De Anza when she got the job to run part of the OESE department.

After years of working as a middle-school teacher and an adjunct professor, and founding a network to help minority teachers attain national board certification, Lee was excited get a tenure-track position at De Anza, where her job includes designing workshops to promote inclusion. “I researched them, and I thought we had similar values around diversity, equity and anti-racism,” she said. “I was selected, and I was like, wow, this is a dream come true.”

Instead, Lee found herself constantly harassed and slandered because she tried to bring to her work an even-handed philosophy that attempted to deal with the problems of racial conflict fairly. For example, when Jewish students and faculty members told her they had experienced anti-Semitism on campus, Lee tried to organize a campus event to discuss the problem.
» Read more

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Pushback: Doctors blacklisted by government for disagreeing on its COVID mandate policies now fighting back

2:04 pm

Written by many of the doctors of the Norfolk Group
Correct from the start despite government censorship,
and written by many of the same doctors of the Norfolk Group

Bring a gun to a knife fight: Eight high-ranking doctors, many who were censored and blacklisted by the government and big social media outlets for daring to disagree with the government’s lockdown, masking,, and COVID jab mandates, have now issued a detailed report, dubbed the Norfolk Group report, outlining the many errors of those policies, as well as offering what the scientists call “a blueprint” for moving forward. From their introduction:

In separate chapters we summarize key background information and propose specific questions about failures to protect older high-risk Americans, about school closures, collateral lockdown harms, lack of robust public health data collected and/or made available, misleading risk communication, downplaying infection-acquired immunity, masks, testing, vaccine efficacy and safety, therapeutics, and epidemiological modeling.

We chose not to discuss economic issues, although we recognize that negative effects on the economy have long-term negative effects on public health. We have also chosen not to engage in issues regarding media handling of the pandemic, nor questions of how, when and why the SARS-CoV-2 virus originated. Public health responses to a pandemic are devised and implemented independently of viral origin.

» Read more

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Virgin Orbit resumes limited operations

10:12 am

In anticipation of a possibly deal to save the company, Virgin Orbit officials have resumed limited operations, bringing back a small number of employees to work on crucial issues required for its next launch.

“Our first step will begin Thursday of this week, when we plan to return a subset of our team to focus on critical areas for our next mission,” Virgin Orbit said in a statement. “We are looking forward to getting back to our mission and returning to orbit.”

…Reuters reported that Virgin Orbit is working on a $200 million infusion from Texas-based venture capital investor Matthew Brown via a private share placement, citing a term sheet. Following a meeting by Virgin Orbit’s board on Tuesday, the two sides plan to close the deal on Friday, according to the non-binding term sheet, Reuters said.

Should the company resume full operations and launch again, I am certain it will not launch from the United Kingdom, at least not until the UK has fixed its launch licensing bureau, the Civil Aviation Authority, which took so long to approve Virgin Orbit’s launch from Cornwall it practically bankrupted the company.

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Today’s blacklisted American: Vermont’s organization of principals bans Christian school for being Christian

1:16 pm

Mid Vermont Christian School: banned for supporting Christianity

They’re coming for you next: One month after administrators of Mid Vermont Christian School decided to default a game against a public high school girls team that had a boy in woman’s clothing as a player, citing safety and religious concerns, the Vermont Principals’ Association moved to ban that Christian school from all sports and sponsored activities.

Jay Nichols, the executive director of the Vermont Principals’ Association, said the organization’s 15-member executive board was unanimous in its decision. “If you don’t want to follow VPA rules, that’s fine,” Nichols said. “But then you’re just not a VPA member. It’s fairly simple. That’s really all we’re gonna really say about it.” [emphasis mine]

In its letter to Mid Vermont Christian, the VPA stated “…the school’s actions do not meet the expectations of the VPA’s 1st and 2nd policy, Commitment to Racial, Gender-Fair, and Disability Awareness and Policy of Gender Identity, respectively.”

If you want to know in detail what VPA’s 1st and 2nd policies are, you can read them here. The key quote is this:
» Read more

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Pushback? University of North Carolina pretends to ban ‘diversity, equity and inclusion’ requirements in hiring

11:51 am

Failure Theater!

They’re coming for you next: On February 23, 2023 the board of governors of the University of North Carolina voted to ban all requirements that applicants in hiring and admissions make statements advocating the racist political agenda of “diversity, equity and inclusion” [DEI].

The board stated the university “shall neither solicit nor require an employee or applicant for academic admission or employment to affirmatively ascribe to or opine about beliefs, affiliations, ideals, or principles regarding matters of contemporary political debate or social action as a condition to admission, employment, or professional advancement,” according to the resolution. An employee or applicant also can’t “be solicited or required to describe his or her actions in support of, or in opposition to, such beliefs, affiliations, ideals, or principles.”

According to the now-banned policy [pdf], anyone who wanted to either go to UNC as a student, or be hired or promoted there as a teacher, had to prove they had made a “positive contribution to DEI efforts.”
» Read more

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Starship launch still stalled by FAA

3:47 pm

According to a tweet by Elon Musk today, Starship will be ready for its first orbital test launch in a few weeks.

Musk also noted however that SpaceX is still awaiting the FAA’s launch license, and because of this he now expects the launch in the third week in April.

Why it is taking months for the FAA to issue this license is disturbing, and suggests that under the Biden administration the feds are behaving more and more like the incompetent Civil Aviation Authority in the UK, which stonewalled Virgin Orbit’s launch for months so that the company now sits on the verge of bankruptcy.

Hat tip to BtB’s stringer Jay for this story, who will be gone for the next two weeks on vacation. Have fun Jay.

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Pushback: Smithsonian ordered to no longer violate the First Amendment

3:36 pm

The evil hat that Air & Space banned
The evil hat that Air & Space officials banned

Pushback: The Smithsonian Institution, which runs the Air & Space museum as well as other museums in Washington, D.C., has been ordered by the courts to stop violating the First Amendment, as it did when on January 20, 2023 it harassed and ejected students from a pro-life group, there as part of their participation in the annual March for Life demonstration, because they were wearing wool caps that said “pro-life” on them.

According to the consent order [pdf], the Smithsonian expressed “regret” for the event and promised to “remind all security officers stationed at NASM [National Air & Space Museum] of the rights of visitors.”

The order however does not simply accept the museum’s expression of regret. It specifically enjoins the Smithsonian and its employees “from prohibiting visitors to the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum from wearing hats or other clothing with messages, including religious and political speech” and requires it to distribute the consent order to “all security officers stationed at NASM, as well as other Smithsonian personnel who interact with the public, including volunteers and museum staff, within 7 days.” It also orders the museum to tell its security officers that their behavior on January 20th was wrong.
» Read more

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Today’s blacklisted American: Rhode Island school district blacklists Christian afterschool club because it is Christian

1:24 pm

Rhode Island: haven to oppression
Oppressive Rhode Island

They’re coming for you next: The Providence school district in Rhode Island has now been sued by the Child Evangelism Fellowship (CEF) for unfairly blacklisting CEF’s afterschool Good News clubs from using school facilities for meetings,

For nearly two years, the Providence Public School District has blocked CEF Rhode Island from hosting its elementary school Good News Clubs on district school facilities. However, other organizations such as Boys and Girls Clubs, Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts, YMCA, and Girls on the Run are given free use of school facilities for after school programs.

Note too that the school district had already approved CEF’s Good News clubs in 2019. According to the lawsuit [pdf], filed by the non-profit legal firm Liberty Counsel:

The District approved CEF Rhode Island’s August 2019 Rental of School Facilities application, allowing CEF Rhode Island to lead an afterschool Good News Club at William D’Abate Elementary School for the 2019–2020 school year, without any facility rental fee. Forty-eight children signed up for the club, but the club could only accommodate twenty children due to space limitations at the school.

» Read more

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Virgin Orbit pauses operations; seeks funding

9:15 am

Virgin Orbit today paused all operations for at least a week, putting almost its entire staff on furlough as it seeks new financing.

Chief Executive Dan Hart told staff that the furlough would buy Virgin Orbit time to finalise a new investment plan, a source who attended the event told Reuters news agency. It was not clear how long the furlough would last, but Mr Hart said employees would be given more information by the middle of next week.

If Virgin Orbit dies, its death will be because a British government agency killed it. The company had planned on launching from Cornwall in the early fall of 2022, at the latest, and then do several other launches in 2022, all of which would have earned it revenue. Instead, the UK’s Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) delayed issuing the launch license until January 2023, about a half a year later, preventing Virgin Orbit from launching for that time and literally cutting it off from any ability to make money. The result was that it ran out of funds.

Obviously the launch failure that followed the CAA’s approval did not help. Nor did the company’s decision to rely on only one 747 to launch its satellites. Nonetheless, the fault of this company’s death can mostly be attributed to a government bureaucracy that failed in its job so badly that it destroyed a private company.

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Pushback: Legal and public pressure forces California college to cancel plans to fire employees for not getting jab

12:21 pm

The board of trustees of San Diego Community College
The board of trustees of San Diego Community College

They’re coming for you next: The board of trustees of San Diego Community College in late February 2023 had been moving to fire a number of teachers and employees because they all refused for various medical and religious reasons to get COVID shots or boosters.

The policy was senseless in all ways. As Tracy Kiser, a pregnant black professor who was refusing the jab because of the risk it posed to her unborn child, noted in a February 21st op-ed:

“Last year, after a decline in enrollment, the San Diego Community College District dropped the COVID-19 vaccine requirement for students, but it has not been dropped for faculty and staff,” wrote Kiser, who also directs her school’s math center. [emphasis mine]

If the college’s trustees believe blindly that the jab prevents COVID (which it does not) and wants to protect its employees, why does it allow those employees to teach unjabbed students?

The board’s idiocy was further illustrated by Kiser’s description of this incident during one board meeting:
» Read more

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Today’s blacklisted American: Eventbrite routinely blacklists conservative events

1:52 pm

Eventbrite: hostile to freedom

They’re coming for you next: Eventbrite, an online “self-service ticketing platform”, has been routinely blacklisting conservative events, often cancelling already existing events or telling customers the event no longer exists, always for vague and often contradictory reasons.

What Eventbrite did to one Matt Walsh event is typical:

In late February, the website removed from its page for a [March 1st] Matt Walsh event on transgenderism sponsored by Young America’s Foundation at Stanford University. Organizers were forced to set up an alternative event page just before Walsh’s appearance. Not only did Eventbrite remove the page, “[h]undreds of registered attendees were surprised to receive emails from the company informing them that their tickets had been canceled,” YAF wrote in a Feb. 27 news release.

Though students at Stanford set fire to promotional flyers put up by YAF prior to the event, the event itself went off without incident.

The article at the first link above lists numerous other times Eventbrite cancelled conservative events without explanation, including several other Walsh university events, a screening of Dinesh D’Souza’s film 2000 Mules that documents fraud and election tampering in the 2020 election, a event in support of the U.S. military, and a Memorial Day event honoring veterans.

All of this blacklisting contradicts Eventbrite’s own mission statement:
» Read more

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Space startups get their SVB assets back when Feds move in

9:34 am

Because of the decision of the federal government to guarantee all deposits at the failed Silcon Valley Bank (SVB), even those above the $250K limit set by the FDIC law, several space rocket startups are no longer threatened with failure, for now.

Astra for example is now seeking to move as quickly as it can its assets, equaling about 15% of the company, to other financial institutions.

I would expect this incident will cause every company to make sure their assets are distributed more widely, as a hedge against the failure of one bank.

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The sad state of free speech in America illustrated by three top universities

1:03 pm

Cancelling the Bill of Rights

Events in the last two weeks at three of America’s top universities, Stanford, Cornell, and Yale, have illustrated starkly how many young Americans and their teachers now either support censorship and violence against dissenters, or are too cowardly to defend the rights of Americans when their free speech rights are attacked.

At the Stanford Law School a 5th Circuit Judge, Stuart Kyle Duncan, was shouted down and then lectured by a dean at the school for daring to have opinions she disagreed with. Stanford officials have issued a weak apology, but have done nothing concrete to discipline anyone for enforcing a heckler’s veto at the school.

At Cornell, the promise of university officials to punish students who participated in a protest that shouted down Ann Coulter has apparently been put aside once the heat died down.

Cornell University’s media team has not responded to multiple inquiries in the past months on possible punishments for the student activists. The College Fix also emailed communications director Rebecca Valli on March 6 and asked for an update on investigations into the students involved and what Cornell planned to do in the future to prevent similar problems.

The silence comes despite an initial strong statement from university leadership that criticized the Nov. 9 disruption.

Finally, officials at Yale Law School have attempted to fix things after being badly embarrassed by a similar violent protest in March 2022, when students shouted down Kristen Waggoner, the president of the non-profit law firm the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF). » Read more

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Some space startups threatened by Silicon Valley Bank failure

9:41 am

Link here. The companies mentioned in the article are Astra, BlackSky, Planet, Redwire, Rocket Lab, and Space Perspective.

Rocket Lab has about 8% of its cash assets now trapped by the closure. All the companies had loans from Silicon Valley Bank, some of which were paid off prior to the crash. This quote suggests the situation is critical for some space startups:

“It’s a very serious situation,” said a space sector entrepreneur who asked not to be identified. “Our balance is suddenly only $450. There has been no communication from SVB even after the event became known. Our primary SVB liaison, who has been very attentive in the past, is unreachable by any means. It’s appalling.”

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Today’s blacklisted American: Mother sued by teacher’s union for requesting her child’s kindergarten curriculum

2:14 pm

Nicoletta-Solas
Nicoletta-Solas testifying to Congress

They’re coming for you next: Nicoletta Solas, a Rhode Island mother of a 5-year-old, was harassed by her school board and sued by the National Education Association (NEA), the largest teacher’s union in the nation, for simply requesting her child’s kindergarten curriculum. As she stated bluntly during her testimony at House hearing on March 2, 2023,

If you ask questions about public education, they will come after you. … My school district and my teachers’ union didn’t want to just hide the curriculum from me, they wanted to ruin my life.

Below is video of her full testimony. All she wanted to know was whether the school would be teaching queer theory to her 5-year-old. The ugly and vicious response to this request, by the school, the school board, and the NEA, is striking.
» Read more

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House subcommittee proposes five bills that would change FCC operations

10:06 am

The House Energy and Commerce subcommittee on March 8, 2023 approved five bills affecting the FCC and how it operates.

The first bill [pdf], Satellite and Telecommunications Streamlining Act, is the most significant, as it appears to try to establish legal limitations and rules specifically designed to address the FCC’s recent effort to expand its power and regulatory authority beyond what its legal authority allows. While most of the bill’s language appears to allow the FCC to do what it wants (including limiting or regulating future space stations and setting lifetime limits on all orbiting spacecraft), it also insists that licenses be approved quickly and adds this caveat:

[T]he Commission may not establish performance objectives that conflict with any standard practice adopted by the Secretary of Commerce.

In other words, the FCC cannot grab the regulatory responsibilities of other agencies, especially the Commerce Department, where Congress in recent years has been trying to shift most commercial regulatory authority.

Nonetheless, this bill appears to mostly endorse the FCC ‘s power grab.

The bills still have to be approved by the full committee, then approved by the full House, then approved by the Senate, and then signed by the president.

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Pushback: Texas A&M to stop favoring minorities in hiring & admission policies

11:56 am

Texas A&M logo
Texas A&M: abandoning its discriminatory
policies?

Bring a gun to a knife fight: Less than a month after Texas governor Greg Abbott ordered all state agencies to cease considering race and gender in hiring, Texas A&M (TAMU) officials announced they were removing all mention of diversity, equity, and inclusion policies from the university’s hiring and admissions practices.

After receiving the Feb. 6 memo, Texas A&M Chancellor John Sharp immediately ordered all A&M System institutions to review their employment and admission practices and confirm their compliance, according to the university. … Sharp directed all universities and agencies within the TAMU system to remove the DEI statements from their employment or admissions practices. The directive also standardizes faculty and staff applications, limiting them to a cover letter, curriculum vitae, statements about research and teaching philosophies, and professional references. It further instructs universities and agencies to make all websites or printed materials dealing with employment and admission practices compliant with the directive, says TAMU.

Will this change anything? It appears that for now, no, not much. » Read more

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America’s blacklist culture: Survey finds almost half of America’s major corporations are eagerly willing to blacklist others

1:00 pm

1792 Exchange: Exposing oppression in corporate America
1792 Exchange: Exposing blacklisting in
corporate America

They’re coming for you next: A survey by the non-profit 1792 Exchange has found that almost half of a list of 1,000+ major corporations, from Google to Kroger, are very willing and eager to “cancel a contract or client, or boycott, divest, or deny services based on views or beliefs.”

Of these, 160 companies were found to be “high risk” for blacklisting. For example, its report [pdf] on high-risk Coca-Cola found the following:

Coca-Cola Co. has demonstrated a willingness to terminate relationships with organizations based on ideology and require unconstitutional diversity mandates from vendors and suppliers. It lacks policies to prevent viewpoint discrimination, while it denounced local legislative efforts to reform election security and protect the unborn. Coca-Cola will not give to faith-based charities but gives to the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). Based on its policies and past practices, Coca-Cola Company receives a “High Risk” rating.

Note that Pepsi was also considered “high-risk”, even though it was slightly less willing to blacklist. According to the survey’s report of Pepsi [pdf]:
» Read more

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America’s blacklist culture: Republican in Florida proposes bill to regulate speech

1:09 pm

Jason Brodeur: Republican politician in love with restricting free speech
Jason Brodeur: Republican politician in love with
restricting free speech

They’re coming for you next: The desire of people in our culture today to control and regulate the behavior of everyone else is not a partisan thing. Though the Democrats and their leftist allies have certainly led the way in blacklisting, censoring, and destroying anyone who disagrees with them, Republican politicians are just as likely to try to use their power to squelch opposition, and should never be trusted either.

Today we have a perfect example of this non-partisan lust for power. On March 7, 2023, Florida Republican state senator Jason Brodeur introduced a bill that would amend state law to require all websites to register with the government if they made any money reporting on government actions.

You can read the bill here. The underlined portions are the sections that Brodeur wishes to add to the law. The key paragraphs state the following:
» Read more

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A blacklist victory? Professor wins million dollar settlement for being blacklisted

1:37 pm

Daniel Pollack-Pelzner, blacklisted for being Jewish
Daniel Pollack-Pelzner, blacklisted for being
white, Jewish, and willing to speak the truth.

Today’s blacklist story is a followup on one from April 2022, in which Jewish English professor at Linfield University in Oregon, Daniel Pollack-Pelzner, was fired without due process because he reported the sexual misconduct of four of the university’s ten trustees. Before they fired him however school officials, including its university president and chair of the board of trustees Miles Davis, spewed anti-Semetic comments against him, including joking about sending Jews to gas chambers.

Pollack-Pelzner has now gotten some financial satisfaction in the courts, though hardly justice.

Linfield University has agreed to settle a lawsuit filed by former Professor Daniel Pollack-Pelzner for $1,037,500 in compensation for emotional distress, lost wages, and attorney fees.

The University insists that it is not admitting guilt and only wants to avoid further loss of “time and energy from the mission of the institution.” If so, it found a weird way of doing it. They have litigated this weak case for two years and were compelled to reach a seven figure settlement.

» Read more

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AGs from 22 states blast Biden’s attempt to illegally insert racial quotas and climate change into federal contracting law

1:56 pm

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez
Joe Biden imposes Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s
Green New Deal on all federal contractors

In May 2021 President Biden signed an executive order [pdf] requiring federal agencies to make climate change and helping “disadvantaged communities and communities of color” a major priority in all their work.

That executive order, which in many ways was simply a rewording of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s communist and bigoted Green New Deal, required agencies to do things like reconsider where their pension funds were invested and to change those investments — not to get the best return on the dollar as required by law — but to protect them from “the threats of climate-related financial risk.”

The executive order also demanded that the Federal Acquisition Regulatory Council (FARC) require federal contractors to:

…publicly disclose greenhouse gas emissions and climate-related financial risk and to set science-based reduction targets; and (ii) ensure that major Federal agency procurements minimize the risk of climate change, including requiring the social cost of greenhouse gas emissions to be considered in procurement decisions and, where appropriate and feasible, give preference to bids and proposals from suppliers with a lower social cost of greenhouse gas emissions. [emphasis mine]

» Read more

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Denial in the post-COVID era

2:47 pm

For too many, it is too difficult to enter the Truth booth
For too many, it is too difficult to enter the Truth booth

The stream of new data about the failures of all the policies imposed on free Americans during the Wuhan panic has become so consistent and repetitive that, to a certain extent, I have become bored reporting it — especially because I have been reporting these facts over and over again since March 2020.

Nonetheless, it is important to do so. When the next new flu-type strain appears, and the power-hungry thugs that run our government try to fear-monger us all to gain power, it will help the general citizenry resist that fear-mongering by having more knowledge.

This essay is also partly inspired by my own doctor, Robert Lending, M.D., who since 2020 has been sending out periodic email updates on the state of the epidemic. From the beginning Lending tried to be as neutral as possible, avoiding any political battles or taking sides. He was not against lockdowns or mask mandates, but he also respected those that opposed them. Thus, he did not insist his patients where masks, especially when they had health reasons to not do so, unlike almost all other doctors. Nor did he ever require the jab to see his patients. His updates simply reported on the research and situation at the time, based on real data.

His most recent update, #107, however was different. It began with this blunt headline: “Should we start renaming COVID-19 to Pfizer-23?” and continued like so:
» Read more

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UK’s bureaucracy blasted for delaying Virgin Orbit launch

10:10 am

At parliamentary hearings yesterday, the United Kingdom’s Cival Aviation Authority (CAA) was heavily criticized by commercial satellite companies for delaying the launch Cornwall launch by Virgin Orbit by six months.

The harshest words came from a manager at Space Forge, that lost a satellite on that launch when Virgin Orbit’s rocket failed to reach orbit.

Patrick McCall, non-executive director at Space Forge, told MPs on the Science and Technology Select Committee, that if the company sought to launch again in the UK it would be given “short shrift” by investors. “I think unless there is a seismic change in that approach the UK is not going to be competitive from a launch perspective,” he said. “There is no chance that Josh Western [the Space Forge CEO] would win the argument to do the next launch in the UK. Even if the UK came and said you can do it for free, I would say don’t do that.

“I don’t think it’s deliberate, I think people at the CAA want to make it happen, but it’s not working, and either we change that with a seismic shift or we save the money and spend it on other things which are achievable.”

The delay also caused Virgin Orbit serious financial problems, as it prevented it from doing any other launches in 2022, resulting in a significant loss of income.

The committee chair, MP Greg Clark, underlined the testimony afterward:

“It’s a disaster isn’t it?” he said: “We attempted to show what we are capable of, and the result is it’s now toxic for a privately funded launch. We had the first attempted launch but the result is that you as an investor in space are saying there is no chance of investors supporting another launch from the UK with the current regulator conditions.”

During the hearings CAA officials justified their actions, and appeared unwilling to consider any changes.

There are two spaceports now being built in Scotland. If the CAA is not forced to change, it is very likely that commercial satellite companies will find other places in Europe to launch, such as the new Esrange spaceport being developed in Sweden.

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Today’s blacklisted Americans: Pro-lifers banned from the Washington Monument because it is a “First Amendment-free zone”

12:41 pm

banned by the Biden administration
Banned apparently by the Biden administration

They’re coming for you next: As part of the annual pro-life March for Life demonstration in DC on January 20, 2023, volunteers running a food table were forced to move away from the Washington Monument because, as one park ranger told them, they were in a “First Amendment-free zone.”

The women were setting up a table to provide some fellow pro-life supporters with bagels and coffee when a park ranger told them they were in a “First Amendment-free zone” and had to move out of the granite plaza surrounding the famous obelisk. They relocated on the grass, inches next to the plaza, with the approval of the park ranger. Later, a police officer approached the ladies and told them they were allegedly “getting complaints” about their table being on the path. Police told them they had to leave, and the women complied.

These women had set up the same table at the same spot the year before, with no problems.

Though the granite plaza itself is considered a “restricted zone” where “Activities may only occur within these areas on specified dates to maintain the contemplative and respectful environment of the memorial,” these women were only running a craft service table, an activity that the park service only the year before did not consider a violation of this rule.

Furthermore, we know this was not the reason the ranger and police officer moved to remove them. By his own words, the ranger called this area a “First Amendment-free zone,” thus telling them that they were not allowed to express their opinions there and had to leave, even though the park website itself specifically contradicts this ranger, proudly stating that.
» Read more

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UK bureaucracy provisionally clears Viasat-Inmarsat merger

9:40 am

We’re here to help you! The United Kingdom’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) has now provisionally approved the merger deal between the two communications satellite companies Viasat and Inmarsat by admitting the obvious, that the deal will do nothing to reduce competition in the presently thriving communications satellite industry.

Over the past 4 months, an independent CMA panel has gathered and scrutinised a wide range of evidence in order to better understand the sector, as well as the potential impact of the deal. This included internal documents from Viasat and Inmarsat, as well as the companies’ competitors (including their plans for future expansion); evidence from airlines; the CMA’s own analysis of sector conditions – and how these could change.

…The CMA’s investigation into the Viasat/Inmarsat deal has provisionally found that, while the companies compete closely in the aviation sector – specifically in the supply of satellite connections for onboard wifi – the deal does not substantially reduce competition for services provided on flights used by UK customers.

Duh. In other words, these bureaucrats spent four months determining what is self-evident to every person who pays any attention to the business of space. Furthermore, both companies are badly threatened by the new players in this industry, like OneWeb and Starlink. This dithering by bureaucrats threatens their survival, as these older companies want to merge to give them the resources to better compete. Being forced to sit and wait only increases the chances that both will go bankrupt, thus reducing competition, the very thing this government agency is supposed to encourage and protect.

Not that the CMA has come to any real decision yet. As its press release notes so nobly, “Today’s findings are provisional, and the CMA will now consult on its findings and listen to any further views before reaching a final decision.”

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ESA invites private companies to build lunar satellites for communications and navigation

9:47 am

Capitalism in space: The European Space Agency (ESA) has now invited European and Canadian companies to build the lunar communications and navigation satellites that will be needed to serve the many future manned and unmanned missions presently being planned by the U.S. and Europe.

Under its Moonlight programme, ESA is inviting space companies to create these lunar services.

By acting as an anchor customer, ESA is enabling space companies involved in Moonlight to create a telecommunication and navigation service for the agency, while being free to sell lunar services and solutions to other agencies and commercial ventures.

Once Moonlight is in place, companies could create new applications in areas such as education, media and entertainment – as well as inspiring young people to study science, technology, engineering and maths, which creates a highly qualified future workforce.

According to the press release, almost 100 companies have already expressed interest.

It is however unclear how much freedom the companies will have in designing and creating these satellites, based on ESA’s own descriptions of the project. It appears that ESA wants to design them, and is simply looking for private companies to build them. Under this arrangement, ownership will not belong to the companies, even if they are given the freedom to make money selling the capability to others. In fact, past history suggests that in the end, ESA will eventually retract this part of the deal, because of its desire to fully control the satellites it designed.

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The shift away from government schools, at all levels, accelerates

3:51 pm

Parents are rejecting this in droves
Parents are rejecting this mantra in droves

It has been clear for decades that the public schools in most major urban areas — all of which have been run by Democrats — have been failing badly at their primary task of educating children. Two recent stories underlined this failure.

First, in Baltimore a study found that not one student in twenty-three of the city’s schools was proficient in math.

Through an analysis of 150 Baltimore City Schools, 23 of them, including 10 high schools, eight elementary schools, three high schools and two middle schools, no students met math grade-level expectations, according to a report by Project Baltimore. Approximately 2,000 students took the state administered math exams that tested proficiency levels.

…An additional 20 schools in the district had no more than two students proficient in math, Project Baltimore reported. Another three schools in the district, which are for incarcerated students and students with disabilities, had no students that met grade-level expectations.

Essentially, just under one third of all of Baltimore’s public schools failed to teach any of their students math. Period. For any school system to accept this level of failure is beyond disgusting. Everyone who works for Baltimore’s schools should be canned, now.

Then, just days later, another story revealed that fifty-five of Chicago’s public schools were also totally incompetent at teaching math or reading, and should find other work.
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Where to get legal help if you have been illegally blacklisted

4:39 pm

Today’s blacklist column is a follow-up of an earlier column from August 2022, when I provided a detailed list of the various legal non-profit firms that now take on cases to defend the blacklisted. The number of such firms has grown, and I decided it was time to provide a new more complete list.

These non-profit law firms are all dedicated to fighting the left’s shameless effort to illegally and immorally blacklist, blackball, censor, and destroy its opposition, and have been increasingly successfully in winning their cases. The list, though obviously not all inclusive, describes what appear to be the most active and successful non-profit law firms presently winning first amendment cases nationwide. (Note too that the ACLU is not on the list, as that organization a long time ago abandoned its foundational goal of protecting free speech and has instead become an agent acting to increase the left’s power over ordinary citizens.)

In choosing among these law firms, make sure you review their entire website and the many cases they are handling. Some firms might be less appropriate for your situation, and it is necessary on your part to do the due diligence to figure this out.
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Today’s blacklisted American: Policeman forced to resign simply because he is Christian

1:42 pm

Kersey's forbidden opinion

They’re coming for you next: Rookie cop Jacob Kersey was forced to resign from his new job on the Port Wentworth, Georgia, police force when his superiors demanded he no longer express his own personal Christian beliefs on his own private Facebook account.

The screen capture to the right was the Facebook post by Kersey that instigated his problems. On January 3rd, the day after he posted it, his supervisor ordered him to take the post down. The situation then devolved as follows, as described in the letter [pdf] sent to the City of Port Wentworth by Kersey’s legal representative, First Liberty:
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