It’s Ok If We Do It
US Military Admits It Killed 10 Civilians and Targeted Wrong Vehicle in Kabul Airstrike (CNN, 10 min.)
A Kabul drone strike on a vehicle in August killed 10 civilians, seven of them children, none of them associated with ISIS-K.
The top general of US Central Command told reporters that the strike was a "mistake" and offered an apology, adding that he is "fully responsible for this strike and this tragic outcome."
The Pentagon had maintained that at least one ISIS-K facilitator and three civilians were killed in what the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs had previously called a "righteous strike.”
Asked by a reporter to explain how the "complete and utter failure" could have occurred, the general said, "I would not qualify the entire operation in those terms."
The Secretary of Defense apologized for the strike in a statement on Friday, saying that when the military takes the lives of innocent people, they “investigate it and, if true, we admit it."
'We want justice,' Say the Family of 10 Civilians Killed in a US Airstrike That Officials Now Say Was 'a mistake' (CNN, 5 min.)
No US officials have reached out to the family directly.
When asked what they want from the US, Emal Ahmadi and his brother Romal, whose three children -- Aayat, 2, Binyamen, 6, and Armin, 7 -- were also killed in the strike, said "justice."
Romal Ahmadi, whose children, brother and other family members were killed, told CNN he wants the drone operators to be tried for the killings in court.
Toddler-Masking Biden Says Governors Are 'Playing Politics With the Lives of…Children' (Matt Welch, Reason, 10 min.)
There are scientists all over the US, UK, and Western Europe who do not agree with the CDC that masking kids in group settings has a demonstrably positive effect on stopping the spread of COVID-19, let alone one large enough to offset the costs in learning, communication, and emotional well-being.
Biden's CDC in particular has repeatedly allowed teachers unions to influence what are supposedly scientific recommendations about masking and reopening requirements.
Children are especially unlikely to get seriously sick or die from COVID-19, regardless of their governor's party affiliation.
Don’t Look Into It
The University of Wisconsin Smears a Once-Treasured Alum (John McWhorter, The New York Times, 15 min.)
Without proper caution, antiracist activism can detour into mere posturing, led by people studiously impervious to explanation in favor of battle poses, at the cost of justice itself.
Most of us want to turn a corner on race in America. The witch-burning mentality is one we less concur with than fear.
The administrators who caved to weakly justified demands are too scared of being called racists to take a deep breath and engage in reason.
The Wi Spa Debacle Continues (Cathy Young, 20 min.)
Why aren’t reputable journalists pursuing this story? (Previously covered here.) It has two possibilities, neither of them very “politically correct”:
A serial sex offender using California’s “self-identification” law, under which you can be legally a woman simply by declaring yourself to be one, to get away—or try to get away—with sexually predatory behavior.
An individual who is apparently over six feet tall, weighs 200 pounds, and has intact male genitalia who identifies as a woman is using women’s facilities due to genuinely feeling more comfortable there.
Personal Autonomy: Costs and Benefits
W.Va. Gov. Frustrated Over Vaccination Rate: 'We just are going to keep lining the body bags up' (The Hill, 3 min.)
West Virginia Gov. Jim Justice (R) expressed frustration with his state’s vaccination rate, warning constituents that people are either going to get inoculated against COVID-19 or “we just are going to keep lining the body bags up.”
Understanding the Motivated Reasoning of Anti-Vax Refuseniks (Richard Redding, Quillette, 10 min.)
For many, flouting public-health advice has become a point of pride—as people now often invest their sense of self in their political beliefs.
Many people feel alienated culturally and politically. Resisting the vaccine can give them a sense of agency, control, and even dignity, as it’s one of the few things they can do to assert their autonomy in a way that the wider society will actively observe. The fact that their vaccine aversion is a source of anger and frustration among the rest of the country is actually a plus: These negative responses constitute evidence that they are being noticed by the elites; that what they do matters.
Stop Calling It a ‘Pandemic of the Unvaccinated’ (Yasmin Tayag, The Atlantic, 12 min.)
Vaccine requirements can be counterproductive, making people feel pressured and increasing distrust of public-health initiatives.
A recent study showed that a lower willingness to get a shot is associated with a feeling that one’s autonomy is being compromised.
If there’s any chance of persuading the vaccine-hesitant - our family, friends, colleagues - to get a shot, it’s not going to happen through policies that exclude them, foster resentment, and make them feel like their fears and concerns are being dismissed.
The Danger of Treating Everything as an Emergency (Conor Friedersdorf, The Atlantic, 15 min.)
Powerful factions on today’s right and left are perpetually seduced by the prospect of imposing their favored policies by fiat, seeking to sidestep public opinion and democratic deliberation by exploiting emergency rules.
Every time politicians say “We should treat this like a public-health emergency,” the public should reflect on whether their intention is to wield power they couldn’t otherwise get.
On the Border
FAA Bans Drone Flights Over Texas Bridge Sheltering Mass of Migrants (The Washington Times, 4 min.)
Almost 10,000 migrants, mostly Haitian, are temporarily staged under the International Bridge in Del Rio, Texas, where the FAA has placed a temporary flight restriction covering a two-nautical-mile radius that is specific to unmanned aircraft systems operating up to 1000 feet above ground level.
News outlets cannot document the unprecedented surge of migrants amid relaxed border enforcement.
Why Democrats Are Losing Texas Latinos (Jack Herrera, Texas Monthly, 60 min.)
Last year, Laredo and McAllen, both border towns, experienced bigger shifts in party vote share, toward Donald Trump, than any other large city in the country.
No area fled further into the GOP camp than South Texas, where 18 percent of the state’s Hispanic population lives.
In Starr County, 96 percent of census respondents were Hispanic, and almost 99 percent identified as white. That means the county isn’t just one of the most Hispanic in the country. It’s also one of the whitest.
Race alone does not determine how an individual votes. But it is impossible to understand the politics of Texas without reckoning with its racial history.
Scandals
The Facebook Files
The Facebook Files, Pt. 1: 'Elite' Exempt From Rules (Jeff Horwitz, The Wall Street Journal)
The Facebook Files, Pt. 2: It Knows Instagram Toxic for Girls (Wells et al., The Wall Street Journal)
The Facebook Files, Pt. 3: The Anger Algorithm (Keach Hagey, Jeff Horwitz, The Wall Street Journal)
The Facebook Files, Pt. 4: Overseas Horrors Ignored (Scheck et al., The Wall Street Journal)
The Facebook Files, Pt. 5: Antivaxxers Thwart Zuckerberg Schechner et al., The Wall Street Journal)
Facebook Fact-Checking
Leaks Renew Concern Over Facebook's Fact-Checking Sway (Kalev Leetaru, RealClearPolitics, 10 min.)
A central theme of the reporting is the degree to which Facebook’s own research is at odds with its public statements, and that internally it has recognized the harms the platform causes for society even while publicly touting its benefits.
The Journal’s reporting raises myriad concerns over the state of social platforms generally today, from Instagram’s toxic influence on teenage girls to the impact of algorithmic changes on political discourse to how Facebook secretly shields influential users from its content moderation rules.
Given the growing influence of fact-checkers as the ultimate arbitrators of “truth” in the digital world, the Journal also reported that their verdicts may not be as independent as publicly portrayed: “Facebook has asked fact-checking partners to retroactively change their findings on posts from high-profile accounts.”
For an industry built on trust and transparency, it is remarkable that neither the IFCN nor PolitiFact were forthcoming on these allegations regarding Facebook’s request to protect powerful causes and people. Yet if true, this would largely undermine and delegitimize their work if the powerful were able to ensure favorable verdicts for their falsehoods.
Facebook helps fund the fact-checking community, accounting for more than 5% of PolitiFact’s revenue in 2020 and is one of the top funders of many other checking operations. If fact-checkers are facing pressure to change their verdicts, even if they don’t ultimately honor those requests, such demands could have a chilling effect on their independence. Given fact-checkers’ ability to halt the online distribution of stories and ideas they deem false or misleading, the public should have a right to know the degree to which outside forces are shaping their rulings.
Facebook’s Response
What the Wall Street Journal Got Wrong (Nick Clegg, Vice President of Global Affairs, Facebook, 5 min.)
Russia Collusion
Clinton Lawyer’s Indictment Reveals ‘Bag of Tricks’ (Jonathan Turley, The Hill, 10 min.)
The 26-page indictment of former cybersecurity attorney and Hillary Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann by special counsel John Durham is as detailed as it is damning on the alleged effort to push a false Russia collusion claim before the 2016 presidential campaign. One line, from an unnamed “university researcher,”however, seems to reverberate for those of us who have followed this scandal for years now: “You do realize that we will have to expose every trick we have in our bag.”
The big trick in 2016 was the general effort to create a Russia collusion scandal with the help of Justice Department insiders and an eager, enabling media.
It was only last October, for instance, that we learned that then-President Obama was briefed by his CIA director, John Brennan, on an intelligence report that Clinton planned to tie then-candidate Trump to Russia as “a means of distracting the public from her use of a private email server.” That was on July 28, 2016 — three days before the Russia investigation was initiated.
Other Stories
Officials: NJ Officer Caught Child Dropped From Balcony (Associated Press, 2 min.)
Egypt Team Identifies Fossil of Land-Roaming Whale Species (Associated Press, 5 min.)
A Chinese Student in Canada Had Two Followers on Twitter. He Still Didn’t Escape Beijing’s Threats Over Online Activity (Joanna Chiu, Toronto Star, 20 min.)
Newsmax Host Screams at Guest for Critiquing Trump on Afghanistan: 'Cut Him Off!' (The Hill, 3 min.)