It’s Monday, July 13th, 2020…but before we begin, further evidence the only person tripping up Trump in his quest for reelection is The Donald himself, as…

Trump Plans New Executive Order Giving DACA Recipients a ‘Road to Citizenship‘

In a related item, further proof whoever’s providing Republican Presidents a shortlist for SCOTUS nominations either needs to conduct a more thorough background check on their candidates…

The Tempting of Neil Gorsuch

The Justice’s textualism hands half of Oklahoma to Indian tribes.

…or is working for the other side.

Now, here’s a surprise, somewhat abbreviated edition of The Gouge!

First up, writing at his Morning Jolt, Jim Geraghty explains why, when it comes to satisfying the social justice warriors of The Left…

“In case you missed it, a whole bunch of big names, mostly on the left side of the political spectrum, signed a letter defending freedom of expression, declaring: 

it is now all too common to hear calls for swift and severe retribution in response to perceived transgressions of speech and thought. More troubling still, institutional leaders, in a spirit of panicked damage control, are delivering hasty and disproportionate punishments instead of considered reforms. Editors are fired for running controversial pieces; books are withdrawn for alleged inauthenticity; journalists are barred from writing on certain topics; professors are investigated for quoting works of literature in class; a researcher is fired for circulating a peer-reviewed academic study; and the heads of organizations are ousted for what are sometimes just clumsy mistakes. Whatever the arguments around each particular incident, the result has been to steadily narrow the boundaries of what can be said without the threat of reprisal. We are already paying the price in greater risk aversion among writers, artists, and journalists who fear for their livelihoods if they depart from the consensus, or even lack sufficient zeal in agreement.

The majority of the letter’s signers can be characterized as progressives; many conservatives would argue they were pretty far to the left: Margaret Atwood, author of The Handmaid’s Tale; Noam Chomsky, Salman Rushdie, Gloria Steinem, Zephyr Teachout, Randi Weingarten of the American Federation of Teachers, and Sean Wilentz. There are a handful of letter-writers who could be characterized as right-of-center — Francis Fukuyama, David Brooks of the New York Times, David Frum of The Atlantic.

Another signee was J. K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter books, who is now apparently a progressive enemy because she believes that transsexual men-turned-women are distinct from biological women. Her critics are finding it infuriatingly difficult to “cancel” the woman who is arguably the most famous and successful author in the world.

The letter generated exactly the phenomenon it decried; Vox contributor Emily VanDerWerff wrote a letter to Vox management — and publicly posted it for all the world to see — that the decision of her colleague, Matt Yglesias, to sign the letter “makes me feel less safe at Vox (Seriously?!?  Precisely HOW, you sniveling boob?!?) and believe slightly less in its stated goals of building a more diverse and thoughtful workplace. (Drink in the irony if not hypocrisy: in Emily VanDerWerff world, one builds a more diverse workplace through unanimity of views and opinion!) Matt’s signature on a letter like this makes it do make my job slightly more difficult, as would-be readers do mistake my position for his.”

(Oh, really? Someone else at your publication having a different opinion makes readers mistake that colleague’s position for yours, huh? Try working with Conrad Black on one side and Jay Nordlinger and Kevin Williamson on the other and see how often your views get mischaracterized! My day just isn’t complete until I’ve been accused of being a MAGA-head drone and a NeverTrump extremist in the same hour. What VanDerWerff is complaining about isn’t a decision by Yglesias, it’s a reality of political journalism — lots of people don’t really pay attention to what you’ve written in the past, and you’re lucky if they have a vague sense of who you are and what you believe. I’m fairly certain people have had entire conversations with me believing that I’m Jim Treacher, Jim Pethokoukis, or Jim Scuitto — although thankfully, not Jim Acosta. It’s a good day when I’m not mistaken for Jim Beam.)

VanDerWerff characterized the letter as “a broadside against many disadvantaged communities, but it is _particularly_ a broadside against trans people.” Click through and read it for yourself. The only mention of “trans” is in the word “transgressions.”

The furious denunciation and blatant mischaracterization worked in some cases. Author Jennifer Finley Boylan retracted her signature, declaring: “I did not know who else had signed that letter. I thought I was endorsing a well-meaning, if vague, message against internet shaming. I did know Chomsky, Steinem, and Atwood were in, and I thought, good company. The consequences are mine to bear. I am so sorry.” (Which brings to mind today’s On the Lighter Side video accessible through link #4 before our Quote of the Day at the top of the page.)

Vox’s foreign editor, Jennifer Williams, reacted: “The Harper’s letter is revealing a deeper issue: Do we judge opinions/arguments on their merits or on who makes them? Does signing a letter mean you endorse the letter? Yes. Does it mean you also endorse the opinions of those who also choose to sign it? That’s the question here.” In other words, if you sign a letter, and someone else you’ve never met, and maybe even have never heard of, signs the same letter, are you endorsing all of their other opinions?

To most people, that is idiotic…”

Most, but not all, as this tweet from Ezra Klein…with an attached response from Kim Strassel…confirms:

One only need be a big enough idiot.

Case in point, courtesy of FOX News and one Paul Brodeur, as…

Melrose, MA police investigate ‘all lives matter’ traffic sign

“…“I have ordered that it be taken down immediately and am taking steps to find out how this happened,” [mayor Paul] Brodeur wrote in a post on Facebook. “I apologize to the residents of Melrose.”

The traffic sign was quickly altered and no longer displays the message. (Great work; that’s REAL leadership, Paul!)

“The phrase ‘All Lives Matter’ is a trigger,” Brodeur told WCVB 5. “It does not lead to an atmosphere where we can make progress, [where] we can have uncomfortable conversations and try to move it forward.”…”

So, for believing NOT in uncomfortable but meaningful conversations, but rather in meaningless monologues which only inhibit, if not set back progress, here’s to you, Mayor Brodeur:

Need we mention a particularly pandering and odiferous douchebag at that?!?

And when Progressives aren’t busy policing speech, as Beth Baumann records at Townhall.com, they’re either eagerly engaged in promoting proven propaganda utterly devoid of truth…

USA Today Gets Caught with a Bogus ‘Fact Check’ About the Trump Campaign’s Use of a ‘Nazi Symbol‘

…or otherwise occupied trampling individual rights guaranteed actual American citizens under the Constitution.

In summary, we offer an absolutely must-read commentary forwarded by Jeff Foutch in which, writing at Frontpage Magazine, Garrison Bergeron relates…

The Magic of the Democratic Party

Constant distraction is the core of dystopian politics.

“The most famous technique magicians use to fool you is distraction. They distract you with one hand while doing their trick with the other. The amazing thing is how it keeps working even though we all know about it. The next magic act comes around, and we still look at the hand that the magician wants us to watch while ignoring the hand weaving the deceit.

Nobody understands this better than the Democrat Party. Democrat mayors preside over the most horrific dysfunction and violence in America. (And have done for decades!!!) Recently President Trump called them out, claiming that the top 20 most violent cities in the USA were run by Democrats. The Democrats were livid. One of their favorite propaganda outlets, the Washington Post, “fact-checked” Trump and declared him wrong, saying: “Trump keeps claiming that the most dangerous cities in America are all run by Democrats. They aren’t.” But the article went on to document (with supporting data) that 17 of the top 20 are indeed actually the most dangerous. (Actually, we think it was 19, with the 20th being run by an “Independent”!)

Since many of us cannot witness what’s actually going on in Democrat-run cities (Nor would we wish to!), their mayors can distract us with irrelevant issues while hiding the carnage wrought by their own policies. Search for “Chicago gangs,” for example, and you’ll see a huge number of sites dedicated to the subject. High on your list will be a page called “chicagoganghistory.com.” This site alone is breathtaking in its depth; try navigating its menus.

I always felt that the bullies who tormented me in my suburban public schools were nasty, but now I realize that they were, on some levels, powerless. The bullies didn’t follow me home. They weren’t organized into gangs. They didn’t threaten my life. They couldn’t force me to join them. They couldn’t do these things because my suburban neighborhoods were rational, functioning places with mostly intact families and effective police departments.

In gang-ridden Chicago it’s different. The bullies follow you home and they murder you and your family if they feel like it. Depending on his neighborhood, a black male in Chicago may have only the choice of carrying a gun for one gang or another; “not joining a gang” may not be an option. A black female in Chicago may similarly have few options other than to run with males from one gang or another. If she has children it is unlikely that they will have a father in their lives, since most black children are now raised in fatherless households. According to various sources, the percentage of black fatherless households has either doubled or tripled from the 25% rate that existed before the Democrats began their social engineering 50 years ago. If a black female has kids, she will almost certainly send them to the Democrat-run public schools where they will be trained to expect to live under the same regime.

The social rot that pervades Chicago is one of those hands that the Democrat Party doesn’t want you watching. Over the July 4 weekend of 2020, for example, during the Black Lives Matter insurrection sweeping the country, Chicago had 87 shootings resulting in 17 deaths. Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot handed the media the same old distraction, guns are the problem:

As always, the media ran with it. She uses this excuse, this distraction, because she knows it works. The fact that millions of Americans elsewhere own guns and don’t generally shoot each other never gains any traction in the establishment media.

The local “news” does occasionally lament the ongoing carnage in Democrat-run cities, but it rarely discusses the source of the problem, since the actual problem is what Democrats don’t want you watching. To keep you looking away, they fill the media with distractions.

Black Lives Matter (Or, as we prefer, Black LIES Matter!) is a prime example. The great deception of BLM is to pretend that black people are constantly murdered by brutal police and ruined by the “systemic racism” that pervades white society. The data regarding deaths of people in police custody refute this, and thousands of blacks are killed annually by rampant gang violence in the Democrats’ cities, but BLM is the hand that Democrats want you to see. As with the magician’s trick, it’s a lie, it’s ridiculous, and it’s painfully obvious. But we keep looking at it, and the Democratic machine that controls our culture, including your company’s HR department, ensures that you won’t say a word to the contrary…”

Two thoughts: #1, we’ve never been so happy to be self-employed.  #2, if the Dimocratic Party’s “magic” is indeed a force with which to be reckoned…

Which brings us to The Lighter Side:

Finally, we’ll call it a wrap in the same way we opened, as Brit Hume reminds us not only what’s at stake in November, but emphasizes the biggest single factor weighing against the GOP:

If only The Donald would heed the advice of Inspector Harry Callahan, and…

Magoo