[guest post by Dana]

A humble man bows out:

After days of prayer, reflection, and serious study of the possibilities, I am not going to run as an independent candidate for president of the United States.

…

As I’ve written many times before, nations are built on virtue — and courage is indispensable. But there is also prudence, and it was simply not prudent for me to take on this task. I remain against Trump and against Hillary, but I will do all I can where I am.

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

At first, I wasn’t going to post about this because it’s Hollywood. Enough said, right? The pixie-dust bubble where illusion and insipidness seem to be a way of life for so many. And that insipidness is never more on full display than when Hollywood self-righteously gets on their SJW soapbox to rage about the latest perceived Insult To Humanity. This time, it’s actress Rose McGowan, who is Outraged by this depiction of violence toward women as seen in a poster advertising Twentieth Century Fox’s X-Men:Apocalypse:

McGowan’s denouncement:

There is a major problem when the men and women at Twentieth Century Fox think casual violence against women is the way to market a film. There is no context in the ad, just a woman getting strangled. The fact that no one flagged this is offensive and frankly, stupid.

Wait just a second. If there is “no context in the ad,” then how does McGowan know that Mystique is really a woman? And since you mentioned “stupid,” Ms. McGowan, you know what I think is stupid? I think it’s stupid that you see a sci-fi comic book character named Mystique who is a “mutant” that typically wears nothing more than head-to-toe blue gills and has the ability to instantly change her appearance into anything she wants, as a real woman. Right up there with that stupidity, is that you see another sci-fi creature named Apocalypse as doing harm to a real woman. Am I losing my socially-conscious mind here??!

Of course Twentieth Century Fox caved to pressure and issued an apology:

“In our enthusiasm to show the villainy of the character Apocalypse we didn’t immediately recognize the upsetting connotation of this image in print form,” Fox said in a statement. “Once we realized how insensitive it was, we quickly took steps to remove those materials. We apologize for our actions and would never condone violence against women.”

Tell me that outrageous level of insensitivity toward women didn’t just leave you reeling!

All I can say is, thank God Mystique wasn’t a rural school teacher who turned down a marriage proposal from a colleague, only to find herself being set on fire and dying from the honor killing an excruciating four days later. Although, since we are to believe that Mystique is a real woman, her unique ability to change her appearance in an instant would no doubt have saved her from such a fate.

And thankfully, Mystique isn’t the young Iraqi woman in a village near battle-torn Mosul, filming a music video “in an effort to support & inspire Kurdish troops there fighting against ISIS”. And talk about your violence toward women: Helly Luv is now on ISIS’s Most Wanted List. But that’s just something she just doesn’t have time for:

I’m going against the most dangerous terrorist group in the whole world but I feel that there are thousands of people risking their lives against them on the battlefield…If my life is at risk but I can get the message to millions of people then that is a privilege.

Moreover, it’s a good thing Mystique isn’t in “Sultana’s” shoes, and confined to her Afghanistan home located in the belly of the Taliban beast because her family was told if she went to school she would have acid thrown in her face. You know, where I come from, that’s considered real violence toward real women. Now she’s trying to overcome real-life obstacles and devouring things like English, algebra, trig, calculus, and learning about string theory and reading Kant with hopes of becoming a physics professor. Likely she won’t have an opportunity to slip out to the movies and see some Hollywood-type violence toward women, given that she only leaves the house five times a year because of that whole acid thing. Plus living in a third-world hellhole has its limitations: no movie theaters.

Clearly not everyone has the luxury of existing in the insular pixie-dust-bubble of Hollywood and stamping their foot in faux-outrage over imagined offenses. Especially not those real women facing actual violence.

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

This was released by the San Jose Police Dept. on Friday:

On Thursday, June 2, 2016, approximately 300-400 protestors gathered outside a Trump rally in San Jose. The San Jose Police Department designated two locations for supporters and demonstrators. The Department had an operations plan in place in an effort to ensure the safety of everyone attending the event. However, officers were confronted by some protestors who became violent, aggressive and began to throw objects in their direction. A majority of the violence occurred at the conclusion of the event. While several physical assaults did occur, the police personnel on scene had the difficult task of weighing the need to immediately apprehend the suspect(s) against the possibility that police action involving the use of physical force under the circumstances would further *insight the crowd and produce more violent behavior. As Trump supporters were exiting the Convention Center, officers directed the crowd away from the protestors and suggested alternate routes of egress in order to prevent violence or a large-scale confrontation. This required the forming of crowd control lines of uniformed officers to act as a physical barrier to facilitate the movement of the crowd out of the area. The San Jose Police Department subsequently made four arrests for incidents including assault with a deadly weapon and unlawful assembly. A San Jose Police sergeant suffered minor injuries after a protester struck him with a metal object. The Department is currently reviewing available footage and beginning the investigative process to identify suspects who were involved in criminal behavior, particularly physical assaults, so that warrants can be sought for their arrest. The Police Department encourages any members of the public who witnessed assaults or who are possession of video footage depicting physical assaults to contact the San Jose Police Department and cooperate with the ongoing investigations.

[emphasis added] (*San Jose Inside editing error…incite)

Yes, it feels a bit familiar.

Interestingly, while the overwhelming majority of comments at the San Jose Police Dept. Facebook page condemn the mayor, police chief, and officers for their lack of response, there is barely any mention of Trump, other than indirectly. Further, a number of retired law enforcement officers have also taken to the page to condemn the lack of responsiveness, focusing primarily on the mayor and police chief.

This is the “supplemental statement” released by Mayor Sam Liccardo’s office, in which the mayor blames both the violent offenders and Trump:

I condemn all acts of violence committed against people who exercise their rights to free speech and assembly, regardless of their political views. Nothing that Donald Trump says absolves those individuals of responsibility for their violent conduct last night.

Our Police Department and District Attorney’s Office will proactively and thoroughly investigate and prosecute the offenders, and Police Chief Eddie Garcia has called for all members of our community who have video and other evidence to submit that information to the authorities so it can be used for arrest of the violent perpetrators.

That said, I think we all need to acknowledge that each of us — presidential candidates, local leaders, and individual citizens — have a responsibility for our own speech. It is regrettable that this has become a pattern for cities hosting Mr. Trump across the nation. “

–Dana