*Will Political Correctness Kill
Classic Movies?:
The rise of political correctness can be seen across movie screens this weekend. “The Hustle,” a gender-swap remake of 1988’s “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels,” rails against the patriarchy between sight gags. “Avengers: Endgame” shoehorns a minor gay character into the story as a super-virtue-signal. “Long Shot” shows Seth Rogen apologizing for the United Statesbombing Japan to help end World War II. Even older films, and the stars who made them great, are now seen through the PC prism. Just ask the estate of John Wayne. The legendary star got pummeled a few months ago, decades after his passing, for a racially insensitive Playboy interview in 1971. Some critics demanded that his name be stripped from John Wayne Airport in Orange County, Calif.
Singer Kate Smith’s film career is dwarfed by her radio, TV and stage accomplishments. Yet Smith’s recording of two 1930s songs deemed racist convinced two professional sports teams — the New York Yankees and the Philadelphia Flyers— to strip her iconic rendition of “God Bless America” from their programming. It’s easy to imagine the culture attempting to do something similar to films that don’t mirror today’s cultural mores. Molly Ringwald, who brought some of John Hughes’s best films to life, turned on her collaborator last year, saying that his films weren’t “woke” enough in our “Me Too” era.
Those films primarily hit theaters in the 1980s. So what about older films? Would any modern studio greenlight 1974’s “Blazing Saddles,” the Mel Brooks farce teeming with racial and sexual humor? What about James Bond‘s early adventures, in which 007 treated female characters in a sexist fashion? Even a comedy classic such as 1959’s “Some Like It Hot,” featuring two men dressed in drag, could be insensitive given modern mores.
Could problematic films eventually be pulled from home video and streaming services? Sound hysterical? It’s currently in vogue to tear down statues that don’t align with current groupthink. So why would pop culture artifacts be spared? In fact, it’s already been done.
Two years ago, a Memphis theater nixed a screening of the 1939 classic “Gone with the Wind” because of its “insensitive” content. Disney’s Oscar-winning “Song of the South” won’t be seen on the company’s forthcoming streaming platform. The 1946 film’s antiquated, and some say racist, portrayal of black life turned the movie into cultural poison. It’s never made it to home video, and that’s unlikely to change in the near future.
*Why Doris Day Won’t Have a Funeral:
Doris Day won’t be having a funeral, simply because she “didn’t like death.” “No funeral, no memorial and no [grave] marker,” her manager Bob Bashara said. “She didn’t like death, and she couldn’t be with her animals if they had to be put down,” he added. “She had difficulty accepting death.”
“I’d say we need to provide for her dogs [after she died], and she’d say, ‘I don’t want to think about it’ and she said, ‘Well, you just take care of them.’ She had several when her will was written, and she wanted to be sure they were taken care of. She didn’t like to talk about the dogs dying.” Day died on Monday at 97 years old. She is best known for her Oscar-winning movie, “Pillow Talk” and her role in “Calamity Jane” among her other 30-plus films. She later became an animal rights activist.
*DANGEROUS Bureaucrats! – Flint, Michigan Administrators Mismanaged Clean Water Funds, Hired Firm With No Experience Replacing Pipes:
A new report claims that the city of Flint, Michigan, which has suffered from a headline-commanding water crisis for half a decade, may have steered tens of millions in aid money meant to help replace lead water pipes to a contractor that had no experience, but who did have a close relationship with Flint city officials. The controversy may go straight to the top: to the Flint mayor’s office. The report that $22 million in “water crisis aid” was directed to a company with ties to city officials, even though that company didn’t have experience replacing leaded water pipes — what the aid money was meant to help do.
Administrators in charge of the project also ignored cost-saving models that would have allowed water replacement companies to test for older pipes before digging up huge swaths of land, opting instead to follow a plan that had contractors digging up yard after yard to replace water pipes, even if they found copper or new piping underground. “The city prohibited contractors from using an efficient method of digging holes known as hydrovac excavation,” a Flint councilwoman said. “That leveled the playing field for a contractor, WT Stevens, with no experience or the appropriate equipment — and let it bill far more to taxpayers, she says. All of these factors, [the councilwoman] adds, needlessly led to more waiting for anyone who actually has lead pipes.”
*Kennedy Family Members Hit Out at RFK Jr. Over His Anti-Vaxx
Conspiracy Theories:
The most famous family in American political history is at war over anti-vaxxing. Three Kennedys have co-authored a piece for Politico that hits out at Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who they say is leading a “misinformation campaign that’s having heartbreaking—and deadly—consequences.” RFK Jr.—the son of the assassinated Virginia senator and former attorney general—is one of the country’s most prominent anti-vaccine activists and has previously called the inoculations “a holocaust” and accused drug makers, the government, and the press of being in cahoots to hide danger from the public.
In their article, Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Joseph P. Kennedy II, and Maeve Kennedy McKean write: “We love Bobby. He is one of the great champions of the environment … However, on vaccines he is wrong.” They went on: “[RFK Jr.] is part of this campaign to attack the institutions committed to reducing the tragedy of preventable infectious diseases. He has helped to spread dangerous misinformation over social media and is complicit in sowing distrust of the science behind vaccines.”
*America Is a Global Hotbed of Climate-Change Denial: Poll:
The United States has a higher proportion of climate-change deniers or doubters than almost anywhere else on Earth, according to a new poll. A 23-country survey carried out by the YouGov-Cambridge Globalism Project revealed that only the populations of Saudi Arabia and Indonesia have higher levels of climate-change denial than the one recorded in America. A total of 13 percent of Americans polled agreed that climate is changing “but human activity is not responsible at all;” a further 5 percent said that they didn’t believe the climate was changing at all.
Americans were also more likely than people in any other Western country surveyed to say they didn’t know whether the climate was changing or if people were responsible—a position held by 13 percent of those polled. However, a huge majority of U.S. citizens do accept the science of climate change, The Guardian reports, with nearly four in 10 saying human activity was at least partially responsible. A further third responded that they believe human activity is the main cause of climate change.
*CREEP – Stormy Daniels’ Shocking Confession: I’m Not Sure Trump Is Worse Than Avenatti:
This week, Stormy Daniels cycled through a lifetime’s worth of material at the first stop of her tell-all tour. “An Intimate Evening with Stormy Daniels” quickly revealed itself to be an opportunity for Daniels to set the record straight—or, as she explained during the inaugural performance at Stand Up NY, “I can say whatever the f*** I want and nobody can stop me.”
Daniels went on to breeze through a number of questions aboutMichael Avenatti, her recently indicted former attorney. Asked if she was ever attracted to Avenatti, Daniels revealed that she was actually never alone with her ex-lawyer—“not once.” Besides, she quipped, “he thought he was prettier—that’s a huge problem for me.” Responding to a follow-up—who’s a better person, Trump or Avenatti?—Daniels seemed uncharacteristically stumped, conceding, “I don’t know.”
*Seattle School District Wants Teachers To Bless Muslims During Ramadan:
A school district in Seattle has sent out a letter asking teachers to bless its Muslim students in Arabic during the month of Ramadan and give them preferential treatment, such as obtaining dispensations for classes and exams.
In response to the letter, the religious liberty legal defense group Freedom of Conscience Defense Fund (FCDF), has threatened the Dieringer School District with a potential lawsuit for violating the conscience of its employees. FCDF alleges that the district followed edicts put forward by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) that advises schools to accommodate Muslim students by wishing them “Ramadan Mubarak” (Happy Ramadan) or “Ramadan Kareem” (Have a generous Ramadan). The edicts also instruct teachers to respect the Ramadan fast by not scheduling any tests during the holidays of Eid Al-Fitr and Eid Al-Adha.
Daniel Piedra, FCDF’s executive director, said in a statement that the Seattle-area school district is violating teachers’ First Amendment rights by exerting pressure upon them to engage in religious speech with which they do not agree. Piedra argues that the district would never advise teachers to accommodate Christian students in such a similar manner.
“By urging teachers to bless Muslim students in Arabic, the district is running roughshod over the First Amendment’s mandate of government neutrality toward religion,” said Piedra. “A school district would never order teachers to ‘welcome’ Catholic students during Easter with ‘He is risen, alleluia!’ Singling out Muslim students for special treatment is blatantly unconstitutional.”
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*EXAMINER–INVESTIGATES:
Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) is the only U.S. president who was also a licensed bartender. He was co-owner of Berry and Lincoln, a saloon in Springfield, Illinois.
*EXAMINER–VIDEO LINK:
Welcome to Episode #1 of the revealing TV show “Without Notes” with Judith Regan, an American editor, book publisher, and producer – Episode 1: The Early Years:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HWqjTWMCvvA&feature=youtu.be
*EXAMINER–A LOOK BACK:
1944 renderings by the U.S. government of possible disguises Hitler might attempt.
*EXAMINER–SPOTLIGHT:
Dr. Srini Pillay, Best-Selling Author, Discusses the Epidemic of “Performative” Care
Although caring is fundamental to human society and how people live with their loved ones, Srini Pillay and Bob Gowerhave noticed a disturbing, predatory trend that they believe is destroying the authenticity of society. They call the trend “performative care” or pseudo-care. It’s described as the situation when a person demonstrates care for secondary personal gain — a kind of pathological altruism.
“Though leaders and businesses who practice performative care will frequently talk about ‘empathy’ or ‘making the world a better place’ which are excellent values — when authentic,” explains Pillay, “but they become performative when they are used primarily to garner approval or to sell an idea.”
Srini Pillay, M.D. is the founder and CEO of NeuroBusiness Group, voted one of the Top 20 movers and shakers in leadership development in the world by Training Industry. He has worked with leaders internationally in many Fortune 500companies, and is currently an invited member of The Consortium for Advanced Adult Learning and Development (CAALD) at McKinsey &Co. and The Tranformational Leadership Council (TLC). Meanwhile, Bob Gower is the co-founder of Ethical Ventures, a consulting firm that helps organizations eliminate waste and align behind coherent and unified strategies so they can do more with less.
The two agree that in order to identify performative caring, people should listen for an earnestness that is intended to attract people, but actually grates against them. A common sign is someone who has adopted some facet of caring like “empathy” or “empowerment” as part of their core brand identity and presents this with an air of persuasion.
“You will hear it on stage, or see it on social media where it often acts as a mask for anger or selfishness. Usually these folks are trying to sell a product or run for office,” continues Pillay, “and often, the call for greater caring is accompanied by other inauthentic self-descriptions like ‘I just want to get real’, when the person is doing anything but getting real.”
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