Editor & Publisher of the St. Croix Review.
Our vision is to reawaken the genuine American spirit — of self-reliance and prosperity.
Our mission is to uphold American liberty, Constitutional law, and humble government.
Leftist Agitators Aren’t Fooling Americans
Barry MacDonald
It is characteristic of our time that so many people who are in positions of authority cannot be trusted. Our laws, traditions, and ideals are being trashed. Government officials are arrogant, accusatory, hypocritical, dishonest, and incompetent. They are unconcerned about the suffering their policies are inflicting on the middle and working classes of America.
The rule of law has been upended. Illegal migrants are pouring across our southern border, and federal government contractors were caught red-handed transporting migrants from the southern border to White Plains, New York. From there, the migrants were being dispersed to the tri-state area in the middle of the night. The reporter who exposed the story, Miranda Devine, estimates that two million illegal immigrants have entered America in 2021, with the connivance of the Department of Homeland Security.
Who knows how many illegal migrants have crossed our borders? Where are they being taken by the Federal government? Who are these people? We can’t get straight answers from Alejandro Mayorkas, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. Think of the irony of the name of the bureaucracy he’s in charge of. Government titles are often dishonest in practice: Mayorkas is undermining American security.
These migrants are impoverished, unvaccinated, and untested for COVID, and enter they without background checks. People from Bangladesh, Somalia, Yemen, Lebanon, Uzbekistan, Eritrea, Haiti, Cuba, Ukraine, Russia, Turkey, India, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador have been caught crossing the border. The smugglers are being paid $9,000 per person. The Biden Administration has turned the control of the southern border over to the Mexican drug cartels.
There were so many negative developments in 2021.
It is a tell-tale sign of the time that people in places of authority, from the local to the national level, are being squeezed by good-hearted opposition, and in response they are deceitful, dismissive, condescending, obstructive, and nasty. Hard-left officials can’t be honest about their intentions and about the impact of their policies.
A majority of Americans are feeling the effects of inflation and the high price of gasoline. We are noticing that the president and governors and mayors aren’t following the mandates they promulgate — they aren’t wearing masks when photographed in public. Americans understand that the vaccines aren’t preventing the spread of COVID-19, and that the forced closures of private businesses in 2020 and 2021 failed, harming people unnecessarily. The flood of illegal immigrants into America isn’t being concealed. Parents and decent Americans don’t want children taught in elementary school that they are either oppressors or hopeless victims of an inherently racist society. We expect district attorneys to prosecute criminals — we want violent offenders off the street. Americans are disgusted by the swelling encampments of homeless people in our big cities, and we are outraged that city councils and mayors aren’t cleaning up their cities. The vast majority of Americans support the police, abhor the assassinations of police officers, and oppose the defunding of police departments. Americans haven’t forgotten that President Biden and his “woke” generals abandoned large numbers of Americans, and American allies, in Afghanistan; and that he lied in doing so.
The truth is that Leftist agitators have nothing to offer America but division and misery. A majority of Americans see through their dishonesty. *
The following is a summary of the February/March issue of the St. Croix Review:
Barry MacDonald, in “Leftist Agitators Aren’t Fooling Americans,” exposes the many deceptions and failures of hard-left anarchists.
Allan Brownfeld, in “Affirmative Action vs. a Color-blind Society: Now the Supreme Court Will Decide,” he comments on an upcoming ruling by reviewing the racial discrimination against Asians in admissions to top universities; in “The Chinese Olympics Bring Back Memories of the 1936 Games in Nazi Germany,” he points out the institutional indifference on the part of prominent officials, which mirrors deplorable world history; in Violent Crime Is Escalating as Our Criminal Justice System Is in Crisis,” he reports on the change of heart public figures are having in regard to the too-lenient treatment given to criminals by progressive D.A.s and the “Defund the Police” movements in big cities; in “Distorting American History: A Growing and Destructive Enterprise,” he exposes the corrupting technique of twisting historical facts at New York City’s Tenement Museum, and in the 1619 Project; in “At His Death, Bob Dole Feared for the Future of American Democracy,” he memorializes a decent American statesman; in “Remembering Desmond Tutu: An Advocate of Racial Justice and Non-violence,” he memorializes a world figure of dignity and poise who advanced justice and liberty.
Mark Hendrickson, in “More Fluff from the Economic Establishment,” is peeved about how “establishment” economists assist politicians by endorsing economically harmful policy — he uses Princeton professor Alan S. Blinder’s advocacy for the Build Back Better bill as an example; in “Chile Veers Leftward,” he compares the brutality of Cuba’s Marxist policies to the hitherto free markets of Chile, and he regrets the election of a leftist president in Chile; in “The Biden Administration’s Ongoing, Ill-timed Battle Against Fossil Fuels,” he shows how the Biden Administration has purposely curtailed much-needed American energy production just when the world is facing a shortage of energy this winter; in “When Humans Don’t Procreate: An Update,” he offers three explanations for the decline in birthrates: ideological indoctrination, stunted psychological growth, and alienation from God; in “Five Favorite Christmas Movies and the Hope of Renewal and Redemption,” he reviews heart-warming stories to offset the dreariness of politics.
Paul Kengor, in “Teach MLK, Not CRT,” shows how civil rights leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr. and others pull Americans together, as opposed to the Marxist advocates of Critical Race Theory, who purposely pull Americans apart; in “COVID and Conscientious Objections,” he comments on the U.S. Supreme Court’s refusal to halt New York Governor Kathy Hochul’s denial of the First Amendment religious rights of health care workers.
John Sparks, in “The Supreme Court Renders Mixed Decisions on the Vaccine Mandates,” shows how the OSHA decision reins in the administrative state, and the Medicare/Medicaid opinion turns loose the potential for administrative excesses.
Gary L. Welton, in “I’m a Privileged American . . . Please Put Race Aside,” explodes a common accusation made by American activists.
Derek Suszko, in “Dialogue of the Two Founders in Limbo Concerning the Present State of the Nation,” presents a conversation between Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton on the present state of American politics and culture.
Francis DeStefano, in “Deanna Durbin: America’s Sweetheart,” reviews the career of an actress who began as a singing prodigy, matured during Hollywood’s “Golden Age,” and retired early; in “Remember the Night,” he reviews a romantic comedy in which a thief, Barbara Stanwyck, and a prosecutor, Fred MacMurray, fall in love. DeStefano provides wonderful, behind-the-scenes information on the actors, supporting actors, directors, and writers.
Jigs Gardner, in “Letters from a Conservative Farmer — Woke at Williams: The Death of Education at Another Elite Institution,” presents the sad spectacle of a fine college that has gone to pot in Williamstown, Massachusetts.
Jigs Gardner, in “Writers for Conservatives, 91: Ernest Haycox, 1899-1950 — the Writer Who Created the Western as We Know It Today,” reviews The Border Trumpet, written in 1939.
Our vision is to reawaken the genuine American spirit — of self-reliance and prosperity.
Our mission is to uphold American liberty, Constitutional law, and humble government.
A Jury Speaks in Kenosha, Wisconsin
Barry MacDonald — Editorial
Saul Alinsky, the brilliant and cynical community organizer, has revolutionized American politics many decades after his death in the 20th century. His manual, Rules for Radicals, suggests how to take power from the mighty and give it to the powerless. Several of Alinsky’s rules are: 1) demonize the opposition; 2) exacerbate the bitterness; and 3) keep the pressure on with repeated attacks.
We can see these rules in daily operation in the way that the mainstream media reports the news. The news is no longer the straightforward reporting of events; it has become a propagandistic enterprise for the advancement of a Leftist agenda. The daily news narrative is the tip of the spear. The mainstream media is following the Alinsky playbook.
Politicians set the rules of engagement; Democrat radicals are ruthless heavyweights, and Washington, D.C., establishment Republicans are self-interested and reactive. News commentators and celebrity talkers and showbiz people are clued into the game. Academics, bureaucrats, congressional staffers, lawyers, nonprofits, and left-wing judges provide intellectual muscle and leverage. The education establishment in America is busy with indoctrination in our classrooms. Billionaire tech barons provide media infrastructure. Shady billionaires like George Soros and wealthy foundations provide funding for left-wing causes.
The riots in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in the summer of 2020 were similar to hundreds of riots that followed the George Floyd incident. In Kenosha, riots erupted after Jacob Blake was shot by the police in the course of his arrest. Blake had armed himself with a knife. He admitted on national television that he had a knife. An investigation of the shooting concluded that the police were justified in their actions.
However, the Jacob Blake incident fit neatly into the pattern of the 2020 summer narrative — that another innocent black man was the victim of racist police brutality. The reporting of the news inflamed passions nationwide and a business section of Kenosha was destroyed over several days with riots and looting.
Kyle Rittenhouse was a 17-year-old who lived Antioch, Illinois, with his mother. He worked as a lifeguard 20 miles away in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Rittenhouse’s father and other relatives live in Kenosha. Rittenhouse considered Kenosha to be his community during the riots.
Like everyone else, Rittenhouse watched the mayhem going on in Kenosha, and, as he said on Tucker Carlson’s show on Fox News, he wanted to protect Kenosha. He went to Kenosha to help his community.
In the meantime, the Governor of Wisconsin, Tony Evers, refused to use the National Guard to put down the riot. The local police force was outnumbered, and did not intervene to stop the destruction of property and livelihoods. Kenosha was suffering from mob violence, and the lawful authorities abandoned their duty to protect the city.
In the absence of protection, Rittenhouse was asked by a friend to help defend a car dealership, Car Source. Rittenhouse armed himself with a rifle. He did not bring the rifle with him from Antioch, as the rifle was being kept by a friend, in a safe, in Kenosha. His possession and use of the rifle were legal, as the evidence at his trial proved. On Tucker Carlson’s show, Rittenhouse described the events of the night when he was forced to defend himself. He said that many people that night were armed — both rioters and defenders. This is a fact not reported by the media.
Rittenhouse was surrounded by chaos. Joseph Rosenbaum, one of the rioters whom Rittenhouse was forced to shoot, twice threatened verbally to kill him. As the videos of the night show, Rittenhouse was chased by a mob, attacked, knocked to the ground, battered with a skateboard, and had a gun pointed at his head. As the evidence showed, Rittenhouse did not provoke the attacks — he was retreating. He is certain that if he had not defended himself, he would have been killed. Rittenhouse shot and killed Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber; he wounded Gaige Grosskreutz.
Each person whom Rittenhouse shot had serious criminal histories — these facts went unreported by the media. Rosenbaum was a convicted child rapist. Each person Rittenhouse shot was white. Kyle Rittenhouse is white.
The media seized on Kyle Rittenhouse and demonized him. He was held up as an object to hate. Rittenhouse was smeared as a “school shooter.” Presidential candidate Joe Biden claimed, (and continues to claim as of this writing) that he is “a white supremacist.” The news narrative omitted the race of those who were shot — the implication being that Rittenhouse shot three black, Blacks Lives Matter, “protesters.” The media accused him of racism. The media downplayed the violence and destructive nature of the riots, portraying the events as “mostly peaceful protests.” The media claimed that his mother “drove him across state lines” (not true), and that he came eager to fight. The media said that he went to a community where he didn’t belong, “because he as a racist who wanted to shoot people.”
MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough said he was an “active shooter” who took his gun to a riot looking for trouble. He was a “17-year-old kid just running around shooting and killing protesters . . . who drove across state lines with an AR-15, and started shooting people up.” Even after the trial disproved his smears, Scarborough said Rittenhouse was a “self-appointed militia member . . . unloading 60 rounds.” Rittenhouse fired eight shots.
At his trial there was no evidence presented that Rittenhouse was a racist, a white supremacist, or a member of a militia — these were all lies. There was no racial component to his behavior at all. Rittenhouse was lawfully defending a friend’s property and livelihood.
The Kyle Rittenhouse case is a perfect example of an Alinskyite attack on American society. The Rittenhouse story fits within a broader news narrative that the media is spinning — that America is systemically racist. A continuing result of left-wing media reportage is the incitement of mobs that batter the rule of law and American justice. Innocent people were killed in the riots of 2020. Billions of dollars of property and livelihoods were destroyed. Criminals are now emboldened and the police have been defunded as a result of leftist agitation.
Now that the Left has taken over so many of our American institutions, how may we patriotic Americans oppose them? Let the Left, with Saul Alinsky, put their faith in Lucifer. We should put our faith in God. And we good-hearted Americans need to support each other. *
The following is a summary of the December/January issue of the St. Croix Review:
Barry MacDonald, in “A Jury Speaks in Kenosha, Wisconsin,” describes the quality of the daily news narrative as a propaganda tool used to attack America — he uses the case of Kyle Rittenhouse as an example.
Michael S. Swisher, in “Challenges Confronting Conservatives in the Coming Year,” sums up the state of the nation as an introduction to the October 14, 2021, St. Croix Review panel discussion.
Linda Stanton, in “Preserving the Legacy of Our Nation for Future Generations,” shares insightful, grass-roots advice on how Republicans can win elections.
Edwin J. Feulner, in “No Permanent Victories, No Permanent Defeats, Only Permanent Battles,” considers modern political history and finds reasons for optimism.
Philip Vander Elst, in “Conservatism and Foreign Policy,” offers seven principles as guidance in support of worldwide freedom and prosperity.
Paul G. Kengor, in “Critical Race Theory: Myths, Marxism, and More,” illustrates what CRT is and isn’t, and clearly shows how dehumanizing it is; in “My Year Without Baseball,” he talks about living without baseball this year because of MLB commissioner Rob Manfred’s politicization of the sport. He was surprised to discover that his baseball-loving friends had made the same decision.
Allan C. Brownfeld, in a Free Speech Is Endangered — Even in Discussing Climate Change at MIT,” tells the story of the cancellation of a speech by a geophysicist over identity politics (the story has a happy ending); in “Defunding the Police Loses at the Polls, but Police Accountability Remains an Important Issue,” he looks at the reasons anti-police candidates lost in recent elections, and he makes the case for continuing police reform; in “The New York City Council Removes a Jefferson Statue as the Assault on American History Continues,” he examines the complex history and personality of Thomas Jefferson, along with the historical boost that Jefferson gave to the advancement of liberty; in “Will American Freedom Survive into the Future?” he considers the odds of the survival of American history from a view of history.
Mark Hendrickson, in “Specious Theories Concocted to Justify Inflation,” explodes the Biden Administration’s flimflam excuses for bad economic policy; in “Current Tax Proposals: Critiquing Two Promises,” he exposes the shenanigans in the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill and the proposed “Build Back Better” bill; in “Learning to Defuse Anger Through Respectful Dialogue,” he gives suggestions on how to talk about political differences, if possible, and remain friends.
Derek Suszko, in “The Advent of the Cipher Presidency,” advances a theory for how such a feeble President as Joe Biden serves the purposes of the establishment Left.
Francis DeStefano, in “Les Miserables,” compares the quality of music, the direction, the acting, and casting of the movie with the Broadway stage production; in “Pygmalion,” he reviews the 1938 British film, which would later be redone with the title “My Fair Lady”; in “Our Town,” he reviews a filming of an actual stage performance that stars an aged Paul Newman and a cast of unknowns who turn in fine performances. The play is a homage to traditional mores and morality that ennobled ordinary people.
Leonard R. Friedman, in “Rethinking Robert E. Lee,” reviews an essay on Robert E. Lee and comes to different conclusions from the author as to Lee’s character and his enduring legacy.
Jigs Gardner, in “Letter from a Conservative Farmer, Ominous Signs in the Democrat Party,” is disturbed by the emergence of anti-Israeli policies and of anti-Semitism among progressive Democrats.
Jigs Gardner, in “Writers for Conservatives, 90: The Blue and the Gray, compiled by Henry Steele Commager,” reviews a collection of primary source material that provides a comprehensive, on-the-ground view of the Civil War.
Our vision is to reawaken the genuine American spirit — of self-reliance and prosperity.
Our mission is to uphold American liberty, Constitutional law, and humble government.
The Biden Bug-out
Barry MacDonald
The following two paragraphs are from a transcript of President Biden’s remarks on the day after the United States concluded its two-decade war in Afghanistan:
“Last night in Kabul, the United States ended 20 years of war in Afghanistan, the most likely longest war in American History. We completed one of the biggest airlifts in history with more than 120,000 people evacuated to safety. That number is more than double what most experts thought were possible. No nation has ever done anything like it in all of history. Only the United States had the capacity, and the will and ability to do it, and we did it today.
“The extraordinary success of this mission was due to the incredible skill, bravery, and selfless courage of the United States military and our diplomats, and intelligence professionals. For weeks, they risked their lives to get American citizens, Afghans who helped us, citizens of our allies and partners, and others on board planes and out of the country.”
Further into the speech the President touted the “success” of evacuating 90 percent of the Americans who wanted to leave. The question is: Does he know how many Americans, and how many of the citizens of allied nations, and how many Afghani interpreters, and their families, were left behind? The State Department has provided only vague assessments of the numbers.
Does stranding 10 percent of our people in enemy country qualify as a success?
In his remarks, President Biden neglected to account for the fact that he ordered the withdrawal of American soldiers before American and allied citizens, thus leaving civilians tragically exposed. Americans and allies were forced to run a gauntlet of Taliban checkpoints, only to arrive at the Kabul airport where they had to wait crammed for hours amid a crowd of thousands before they could enter the airport. The crowd of desperate people outside of the gates of the airport made a perfect target for a suicide bomber. The terrorists did not lose the opportunity to kill 13 American soldiers and 200 hundred civilians, when a bomber ignited himself. The responsibility for these death lies entirely on President Biden, because his faulty decisions created the crush of people at the gates.
One marvels at the audacity of the claim that such an obvious fiasco is an “extraordinary success.” Does the president not know how calloused, arrogant, and foolish he seems? Does he not understand how transparently dishonest he appears?
The last months have been painful to watch, but within the tragedy and the outrage. there is hope for a better future — because the incompetence and the arrogance of our so-called elites have been exposed for all to see. Perhaps the American people will wake up to the fact that the president, and fellow travelers, are dishonest and fraudulent.
What we have witnessed in the Biden Administration’s negligent and cowardly withdrawal of U.S. military forces from Afghanistan is a culmination of failure. It is a failure of the American bureaucracy: Of the State Department, of the highest reaches of military leadership, and of the National Security Agency. It is a failure of President Biden’s, who may be physically and mentally unable to uphold his duties because of his age, and who also embodies the wrong-headed tendency of Leftists to downgrade American interests in favor of a fanciful “global” ethos. It also exposes the habitual dishonesty of elected and appointed Democrats when they defend the Biden Administration’s withdrawal.
Joe Biden’s lies are so transparent that the Leftist media can’t conceal them. President Biden claims that his administration planned “for every contingency.” Does he believe that setting an arbitrary deadline for withdrawal, and sticking to it, even when doing so guarantees that Americans and American allies are stranded behind enemy lines is a good result? How many American and allied deaths does he find acceptable? Is he prepared to ransom American and allied hostages? Does he believe that allowing the Taliban to capture billions of dollars’ worth of American weaponry is acceptable?
President Biden claimed that none of our allied governments disapproved of his plan — even as the British and German governments publicly condemned him. Does he understand the permanent damage he has done to America’s standing as a leading and faithful ally?
The debacle of the withdrawal from Afghanistan is so horrendous that it delegitimizes a wide array of the Leftist agenda. It is easily associated with the willingness of President Biden and the Democrats to allow Mexican drug cartels to overrun and control our southern border. It throws a starker light on the “Defund the Police Movement,” and the willingness of the U.S. Department of Justice, Democrat governors, mayors, and district attorneys to coddle Black Lives Matter, Antifa, rioters, and other violent criminals. And it puts into scandalous context the maniacal drive of Leftists to divide and conquer Americans by introducing Critical Race Theory into our public schools nationwide. It even colors the heavy-handed and ineffective leadership of the COVID-19 crisis.
The culmination of the failure of the Biden Administration is a catastrophe for the Left, because it becomes blindingly obvious, even to inattentive and lackadaisical Americans, that the Democrats have no worthy plans for the future. Every American can understand that elected and appointed Democrats don’t care about the safety of American citizens. Americans can now recognize the continuing debacle of Leftist government.
An enduring symbol of our surrender to the Taliban will be the photos of President Biden turning his back, walking away, and refusing to answer shouted questions about Afghanistan — disgraceful! *
The following is a summary of the October/November issue of the St. Croix Review:
Barry MacDonald, in “Biden’s Bugout,” excoriates the shameful negligence of the Biden Administration’s withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Paul Kengor, in “Us vs. Them — Why We Remember 9/11 Differently,” using the words of a 9/11 terrorist, contrasts how Americans and the terrorists value human life; in “MLB Strikes Out in Cuba,” he compares the baseball commissioner’s removal of this year’s All Star Game from Atlanta over voting rights issues, with the commissioner’s silence over the ongoing Communist oppression of the Cuban people this year.
Allan Brownfeld, in “Controversy Is Renewed About the 1619 Project, Which Says Racism ‘Is in America’s DNA,’” refutes the calumny against American heritage with genuine historical perspective; in “Pride in America Is in Dramatic Decline Among Young People,” he writes: “No human enterprise is without fault, but few have the achievements which Americans used to view with pride”; in “Julius Rosenwald and Booker T. Washington: An Extraordinary Story of Cooperation to Build Schools for Black Children in the Segregated South,” he describes the philanthropic cooperation in the early 20th century between Rosenwald, the president of Sears, Roebuck and Company, and the great black educator and reformer Booker T. Washington. Washington advocated 1) education, 2) self-reliance, and 3) entrepreneurship for blacks.
Mark Hendrickson in “When a Teacher Becomes a Friend: A Tribute to My Teacher, Mr. Ted Walters,” he remembers a quiet, modest, joyful, insightful, inspiring, and patriotic soul; in “The Virtue of Chastity,” he writes about its effects, as in its absence — guilt, regret, self-loathing, anxiety — and in its presence — wisdom, character, maturity, and patience.
Earl H. Tilford, “Keeping Watch in Dr. Strangeloveland,” he compares the reported conduct of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark A. Milley during the closing days of President Trump’s term of office with the behavior of the military during the time of President Nixon’s resignation, and concludes that Milley is not blameworthy; in “Gaza: Total War Reality,” he sizes up all the factors involved in the war of both attrition and annihilation between Israel, Hamas, and Hezbollah.
Emily Burke, in “The Explosive Growth of Homeschooling, Including Among Black Americans,” provides evidence that school closures due to COVID-19, mask mandates, and the introduction of critical race theory into the public school curriculum, are leading an increasing number of parents to take their children’s education into their own hands.
Matthew B. Wills, in “The Removal of Robert E. Lee’s Name from the Lee Chapel at Washington & Lee University,” relates the sad story of a denigration of American heritage at the hands of the Board of Trustees of Washington & Lee University.
Leonard R. Friedman, in “The Historical Character of Our Best Military Leadership,” provides an in-depth look at U.S. military leadership.
Timothy Goeglein, in “Marriage Is Once Again a Priority — and That Is Good for America,” sees reasons for optimism.
Kenneth L. Beal, Jr., in “The Constitution’s Bill of ‘Absolute’ Rights,” using the Founders’ words, elucidates the framework of our federal government as established by our Founding documents, including The Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, natural rights, and the sovereignty of the people.
Don Lee, in “The Importance of Social Studies Standards,” shares his testimony before a board of the Minnesota Department of Education.
Our vision is to reawaken the genuine American spirit — of self-reliance and prosperity.
Our mission is to uphold American liberty, Constitutional law, and humble government.
A Celebration of America
Barry MacDonald — Editorial
Sometimes it is helpful to take a break from repetitive daily activity and to reflect on what it is we are trying to accomplish. This is especially true today, as America is being overrun by hairbrained socialist fanatics.
Above are two short statements. They serve as guiding principles for our continuing publication. We are in our 54th year of publication. The statements above have been revised from the last issue — you can see their old forms by referring to the last issue.
The old versions were too wordy, and were difficult to remember. We hope that these revisions will help our ideals to grow roots into the heads and hearts of our readers. These are not new ideals. They are a rewording of what has always been the prevailing American ethos.
The first is our vision statement, which is a summation of the American dream. The import is that through our cherished self-reliance, Americans may become prosperous. There is the implicit faith that God has given each of us unique abilities, and roles to play in our society. Once we are free of the chains of various forms of tyranny, we will be able to express our talents in ways that may benefit ourselves, our families, and our communities.
Our vision statement is in opposition to the thrust of the socialist propagandists who are attempting to divide Americans by race, ethnicity, gender, and gender identity. The socialists distinguish between good Americans and bad Americans. The bad Americans are white, and are inherently racist. White male Americans are to blame; even more so if they are professing Christians. The good Americans are people of color. They have been the long-suffering victims of white people throughout American history.
The socialists believe that people of color, and people who hold religions other than Christianity, have always been oppressed by the white, patriarchal, power structure; they could never prosper under traditional America. The socialists promise that once the revolution has been achieved, everyone will be showered with government benefits. Rich people will pay for everything, as they should, because they stole their wealth from the poor.
The socialist point of view is wickedly ridiculous and simplistic when it is boiled down to its essence. However, the socialists and Marxists in American universities have spent many decades squirreled away in faculty lounges inventing complicated theories, involving “intersectionality,” and so on, to give their ideas a patina of respectability. They have also been busy polluting American students.
Our vision statement, promoting self-reliance, in no way implies that those in our society who are physically or mentally unable to care of themselves are to be abandoned. The bulk of the American people are good-hearted and compassionate. It is a worthy accomplishment to create broad-based economic prosperity through the free market economy. Through our individual efforts we increase the prevailing wealth of society.
We can afford to be compassionate because we are prosperous. In socialist societies everyone is equally miserable — except the dictators who confiscate the meager degree of existing wealth, which they defend with armed guards.
The free market itself is not sufficient to instill virtue in American citizens. We rely on various religious faiths to instill compassion in our people.
Our mission statement, “. . . to uphold American liberty, constitutional law, and humble government . . .” gives pride of place to “American liberty.” American strength comes from our liberty. We believe in the energy and talent of the American people. Once we have the freedom to pursue our own self-interest, we may define our dreams and desires as we please, and we, ourselves, are best suited to bring our dreams to fruition. Because we are free, we are able to assume the task of managing our responsibilities.
We defend our liberties though our adherence to the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights. These are unique and magnificent documents in the history of the world. They are distilled wisdom, coming from millennia of Western history. They have evolved from the experience of centuries of tyranny and suffering.
It is absolutely essential to recognize that the socialists have nothing better to offer the American people. Whatever version of socialism they offer, it will surely manifest in some form of top-down governance, wherein the dictators will acquire the fruits of society for themselves, and poverty will be spread equally among Americans, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, or gender identity.
The last part of the mission statement — “humble government” — is an idealistic goal. Perhaps we will never achieve “humble government,” but we can walk in the direction of it. *
The following is a summary of the August/September issue of the St. Croix Review:
Barry MacDonald in “A Celebration of America,” explains his revisions of the vison and mission statements of The St. Croix Review.
Paul G. Kengor, in “BLM Founder Patrisse Cullors, Marxist Abolitionist, Wants to Abolish the Police,” spells out the meaning of “abolish” in the eyes of Lenin and Marx; in “Punk the Woke,” he points out that conservatives have many fervent allies in opposing cancel culture; in “Covid Vaccination: My Body, My Choice?” he makes the case that no one should be forced to take experimental vaccines against their will.
Allan C. Brownfeld, in “Finally, the Tulsa Massacre Is Becoming a Part of Our History,” reveals a part of American History that should be told; “Celebrating America on July 4: A Time to Confront the Complexity of Our History,” he points out why the founding of our nation remains a high point of world history; in “Recent Assaults on Our History Miss the Uniqueness of the American Story,” he presents additional points worthy of the celebration of America; in “One Dead White Male Is Still Popular in the Academy: Karl Marx,” he documents the extraordinary degree of Karl Marx’s racism.
Mark Hendrickson, in “Biden Resumes Obama’s Efforts Against Domestic Oil Production,” shows how Biden’s anti-fossil fuel policies are costly and counterproductive; in “The Biden Economic Team Predicts Long-term Slow Growth,” he questions whether American voters will prefer policies that only benefit the elite while progressively impoverishing the average citizen; in “The Increasing Aggressiveness of Petty Tyrants,” he provides examples of increasingly aggressive progressive impositions on society and warns of dangerous consequences; in “The Attempts to Standardize Corporate Profits Taxes: Globalist Politics Versus Sound Economics,” he reveals the damage being done by runaway spending and unsound economic policies; in “A Big Thank You” to the American Television Industry of Bygone Days,” he expresses his gratitude for the hours of wholesome programs in the 1950s and early ’60s that he grew up with, including Westerns, family sitcoms, and adventures series that inculcated timeless virtues and solid values.
Earl H. Tilford, in “Gaza: Total War Reality,” sizes up the all factors involved in the war of both attrition and annihilation between Israel, Hamas, and Hezbollah.
William Adair Bonner, in “The Chinese Challenge,” considers the leverage China is gaining, strategically, economically, militarily, over the United States.
Derek Suszko, our new associate editor, in the first of a proposed series of essays, in “Factions and the Tyranny of Bureaucratic Power,” examines James Madison’s theories of factions, and weighs whether the growth of unchecked bureaucratic power will inevitably corrupt republican principles.
Leonard R. Friedman, in “The Exploits of Early American History,” chronicles the deeds of Washington, Hamilton, Adams, Monroe, Marshall, Light-Horse Harry Lee, Winthrop, Jackson, and Lafayette.
Al Shane, in “Truths That Are Killing America,” highlights four areas of concern.
Francis DeStefano, in “The Film Noir Renaissance,” reviews over a dozen films from the “Golden Age” of Hollywood; in “Stars in My Crown,” he reviews a movie made in 1950 and set in a small Southern town just after the Civil War, which includes an indictment of racial prejudice and violence.
Jigs Gardner, in “Letters from a Conservative Farmer — My Academic Life,” writes about the several schools he attended and the incidents involved which kept him on the verge of being expelled.
Jigs Gardner, in “Writers for Conservatives, 88: Maverick by Jason Riley,” reviews Jason Riley’s biography of Thomas Sowell.
Our vision is to reawaken the genuine American spirit of living in a good, great, and growing nation of freeborn individuals.
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The Plight of Black America
Barry MacDonald — Editorial
Blacks in America are in crisis today. But the trouble has nothing to do with white supremacy, or systematic racism, or police bigotry. The people who created these denigrations of present-day America are cleverly and cynically using the leverage that these smears generate to advance a leftist political agenda.
The Democrats, the mainstream left-wing news media, Critical Race theorists, Black Lives Matter (a self-admitted Marxist organization), Antifa, propagandists masquerading as school and university administrators, teachers and professors, profane Hollywood loudmouths, and “woke” corporate indoctrinators are using the misery and deaths of black Americans to enrich themselves and to advance their careers. The heartless people who make up the Left in America today are using the misery of black Americans to intimidate and silence the Republican Party, and to intimidate and shame good-hearted Americans into submitting to a left-wing, statist, domination of society.
The Left uses the art of accusation to intimidate its opponents, and so far, its efforts have been successful. Racial animosity over the years has paid off hugely for the Democrats. The Democrats have perfected the community-organizing techniques of Saul Alinsky — to demonize the opposition and keep a pressure campaign going. Starting with the Twana Brawley hoax, and continuing with the deaths of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown, Freddy Gray, and George Floyd, the political force of the Left has taken advantage of events to exacerbate racial tensions, and with inciteful rhetoric it has cemented in the minds of black Americans, and in the minds of much of the American public, the detestable lie that America remains a racist nation today. Every police-related death of a black person is a pretext for yet another riot in some other American city.
Heather MacDonald, the renowned Manhattan Institute scholar, has pointed out that police shootings of blacks account for only 3 percent of black homicides (see essay below). In 2019, according to Statista, there were 7,484 black homicides in America. Who is killing the other 97 percent of black Americans? Are white civilians intruding into black neighborhoods and killing such a huge percentage of blacks? There are no news accounts of such killings.
How do we Americans find our way out of this terrible state of affairs? The Left would have us submit to its intolerant, dictatorial, anti-Constitutional rule. We good-hearted Americans must not submit to the Left. The Left is unworthy of authority. The Left is hiding behind its accusations — white supremacy, systematic racism, police bigotry. Isn’t it obvious that the Democrats have no answers and no solutions for failing urban schools, for corrupt big city governance, for street violence and gang warfare, and for the large number of black children who grow up without the presence of a father in the home? The Left is very good at insinuating a victim mentality into people and at fostering resentment, but when it comes to inspiring people to become independent and productive American citizens, the Left is a total failure.
Here is what a commanding and enduring majority of Americans must do before American society can achieve a state of racial reconciliation: When the agitators of racial tension — the politicians, Black Lives Matters, Critical Race theorists, newspeople, etc. — pretend to care about black people, we must resolutely come to disbelieve them. The agitators of racial tension do not care about the plight of black Americans; they are using black people to advance their cynical agenda. Black Lives Matter is aiming for political power — and it is using the lives of black people as cannon fodder. To put it simply, the Left doesn’t care about what happens to most blacks in America — they are lying when they say that they do.
Hopefully, once the ploy of using black deaths for political advantage has been broken and discredited, black Americans will liberate themselves from their bondage to Democrats, and they will gain self-confidence and self-reliance. In the meantime, Republicans should take pains to reach out to the black community, touting messages of economic prosperity and school choice, and to recruit as many courageous, passionate, and articulate black Republicans who are in the timeless tradition of Booker T. Washington as possible.
Heather MacDonald presents the truth in the article “A Grim — and Ignored — Body Count, the Problem in the American Inner City Is Not Racism but Drive-by Shootings of Blacks by other Blacks,” published in City Journal, on November 2, 2020. She reveals a nightmarish reality that Democrats and leftist agitators don’t want to talk about — because they don’t care to do anything to address the problem.
Below is a listing of shooting and killings, that took within four months — July through October — in 2020. The list is ignored by Democrats and the media because it doesn’t advance the leftist agenda:
On October 23, a 3-year-old boy was shot twice in Southwest Philadelphia.
In Baltimore, a 12-year-old boy was shot on October 21; the man standing next to him was killed. That same afternoon, a 16-year-old boy was killed and the 12-year-old boy with him was shot. The 16-year-old was the fifth teenager killed in Baltimore over the previous two weeks.
On October 13, a 35-year-old probation officer who was eight months pregnant was fatally shot in the back outside of her home on the far South Side of Chicago.
On October 10, a 16-year-old boy turned Lake Shore Drive in Chicago into a “shooting gallery,” according to the police, shooting out the eye of a 19-year-old girl in a nearby car.
On October 8, a 51-year-old bus driver in Baltimore reprimanded a couple for getting on his bus without paying. The female grabbed the driver’s backpack and ran off. The bus driver gave chase; the male opened fire and continued pumping bullets into the driver as he lay on the ground, killing him.
In Sacramento, a 9-year-old girl was killed on October 3 during a family gathering in a park. Her 6-year-old cousin and aunt were also shot. Two hours later, a 17-year-old crashed into a pole after being fatally shot. Shortly thereafter, a 17-year-old girl was shot.
On October 2, a 14-year-old girl was shot from a passing car in the West Englewood section of Chicago while standing on a sidewalk. The 35-year-old man standing next to her was killed.
On September 26, a 15-year-old boy was fatally shot in the head on the Far West Side of Chicago.
A 3-year-old boy in Orlando was fatally shot in the head while playing in his living room on September 22, when a passing car sprayed bullets at the front door and windows of the home. The day before, a 14-year-old boy in the same neighborhood was killed with a shot to his head while he was sitting on his front porch. A 15-year-old next to him was critically wounded.
On September 21, a 1-year-old boy in Kansas City, Mo., was killed when someone walked up to the car in which he was riding and riddled it with bullets. The victim, Tyron Patton, was among the 13 children who had been killed in shootings through late September in Kansas City.
Five people were shot on September 19 when two cars sped down a street on the South Side of Chicago, spraying bullets across a sidewalk, onto a porch, and inside a home. That same day, a gunman opened fire on a group of men in West Englewood before escaping down an alley. Four people were hit.
A 15-year-old girl was shot to death in St. Louis on September 15.
That same day, gunfire broke out on Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago; the suspects fled in a car, then crashed into three other cars.
A man on house arrest for a gun case opened fire on September 12 at a family he had just met on the West Side of Chicago. He killed two people and wounded another three.
On September 11, a 14-year-old boy was killed in a drive-by shooting in Northeast Baltimore, part of a burst of violence that killed 12 people and wounded another 45 over six days.
On September 10, a female mail carrier on the Far South Side of Chicago was fatally shot in the head, abdomen, legs, and buttocks by occupants of a car speeding down the street.
On September 9, an 11-year-old girl in Bethlehem, Pa., was shot in the face as she answered a knock on the back door of her home.
A 6-year-old boy was shot on September 7 at the annual J’ouvert party that opens the West Indian Day Parade in Brooklyn (both the party and parade had been officially canceled, to no avail.) Five other people were shot that night in what is a longstanding West Indian Day Parade tradition of deadly weapons violence.
Also on September 7, a young girl and three adults in a car were seriously wounded in a drive-by shooting on the South Side of Chicago.
A 7-year-old girl was killed on August 29 while at a family birthday party in South Bend, Indiana; the assailants shot from a passing car.
On August 31, an 11-year-old girl was shot in the hip in Wilmington, Delaware, while playing outside in the morning.
August 22: A 25-year-old woman was killed with a bullet to her head in the Bronx. Twelve hours later, a 33-year-old man playing basketball in Queens was shot in the head. Four days before, an 18-year-old was killed and a 33-year-old man was shot in the spine in a Brooklyn gang shooting.
August 19: A 9-year-old boy was shot in the lower back on the West side of Chicago when gunmen got out of a car and started shooting at a group of men on a sidewalk. The boy’s mother was also hit in the back.
August 18: A 4-year-old girl in Asbury Park, New Jersey, was shot outside an apartment complex.
August 17: A 9-year-old was shot in the head in a car on the South Side of Chicago.
August 16: A 46-year-old man at a vigil in Brooklyn for a man killed two days before was fatally shot twice in the head. A day earlier, a man in Canarsie, Brooklyn, was shot in the face, one of three shootings within 15 minutes. The day before, four people were killed, including an off-duty corrections officer at a party in Queens, and another 11 people wounded, bringing that week’s shooting toll in New York City to 14 fatalities and 48 wounded.
August 12: A 14-year-old boy opened the door of his mother’s apartment in St. Louis in response to a knock and was fatally shot in the head.
On the morning of August 11, an 11-year-old girl was shot in the head in an SUV in Madison, Wisconsin; two days later, her family took her off of life support.
August 11: A 12-year-old boy and a 15-year-old boy were hit in two separate afternoon shootings in Philadelphia.
August 9: Over 100 shots were fired into a block party in Southeast Washington, D.C., killing a 17-year-old boy and injuring another 21 people.
August 5: A 6-year-old girl in West Philadelphia was shot while playing outside her home.
August 1: A 7-year-old boy was shot in the head while sitting on his family’s front porch in West Philadelphia. A shootout had broken out when a man drove onto the street and unloaded his weapon at a group of people standing outside. The boy died two days later.
August 1: A 9-year-old was fatally gunned down on the near the North Side of Chicago while playing with friends. The gunman had fired into a parking lot at a group of males standing nearby. As of August 1, the number of shooting victims 10 or younger in Chicago was three times that of 2019, according to the Chicago Tribune.
July 31: A 17-year-old in Chicago was killed on a sidewalk in a case of friendly fire. His companion had started shooting at a passing car whose occupants were flashing gang signs.
July 22: 1-year-old Ace Lucas was killed in his bed in Canton, Ohio; his twin brother sleeping next to him was wounded.
July 14: 9-year-old Devonte Bryant was killed with a shot to his head in New Orleans; a 13-year-old boy and a 15-year-old girl were hit in the same shooting.
July 12: A 1-year-old boy in a stroller was killed by a shot to the stomach at a cookout in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn; three men were also hit. That same night, a 12-year-old boy was shot in Brooklyn’s Crown Heights section and a 15-year-old boy was shot in Harlem.
July 8: A 12-year-old boy was killed inside his home in a drive-by shooting in Wadesboro, North Carolina.
July 5: A 6-year-old boy was fatally shot in a drug hot spot home in Northeast Philadelphia.
At least eight children were killed in drive-bys nationally over the Fourth of July weekend: 8-year-old Secoriea Turner was in a car with her mother in Atlanta trying to inch past a barricade illegally erected by Black Lives Matter protesters. Two people opened fire on the car. Michael Goodlow III, age 4, was fatally hit in the head on July 4 in St. Louis. In Hoover, Alabama, a gun battle broke out between three males in a mall. Royta De’Marco Giles Jr., 8 years old, was caught in crossfire and killed; the other innocent bystanders were wounded. In Galivants Ferry, South Carolina, a 4-year-old boy was killed on July 4. Davon McNeal, 11, ran toward his aunt’s house in Southeast Washington, D.C., to get a cell phone charger and was killed in gunfire between a group of five males. In Chicago, Natalia Wallace, 7, was playing in a yard when three males exited a car and opened fire at a group standing on the street. Wallace was fatally hit in the head. A 14-year-old boy was also killed playing basketball on the Fourth of July. In San Francisco’s Bayview district, a 6-year-old boy was shot and killed.
July 2: An 11- year-old girl and a 12-year old girl were killed in a drive-by shooting at a birthday party in Delano, California.
June 30: A 3-year-old girl was shot while playing in the front yard of her Englewood, Chicago, home.
June 29: 4-year-old LeGend Taliferro was killed while sleeping in his father’s apartment in Kansas City.
June 27: In the Englewood section of Chicago, 1-year-old Sincere Gaston was killed in his mother’s car as it was returning from a laundromat.
A 3-year-old girl was shot on June 22 playing outside her home in Chicago Lawn.
On June 20 in Chicago, 3-year-old Mekhi James was killed in his father’s car. A 13-year-old, a 16-year-old, and a 17-year-old were also fatally shot that day.
On June 19, a 23-year-old woman who was eight months pregnant was killed in her car in Southwest Baltimore. Her 3-year-old daughter was also killed. Both were left in the car for 14 hours.
In South-Central Los Angeles alone, nine children under the age of 10 have been shot in 2020, and 40 children under the age of 18. In Philadelphia, as of early August, 11 children had been fatally shot, six of those victims under the age of 10. One in 10 shooting victims in Philadelphia have been children.
At least 17 children have been killed in St. Louis this year. St. Louis hospitals have treated 114 children, including an infant, for gunshot wounds through October 8, according to the Washington Post. The average age of drive-by victims in St. Louis is dropping and the wounds are more serious, due to gangbangers’ increased firepower. The number of homicides in black St. Louis neighborhoods rose 800 percent over the summer, from one every four days to two a day. “It’s like it’s no big deal. They’ve accepted homicides, too,” the mother of two males killed in 2014 told the St. Louis Post Dispatch in September 2020.
The killers have not been identified in many of these shootings, despite ample witnesses, because of the ghetto code against “snitching” and cooperating with the police.
In the weeks immediately following the Floyd riots, homicides were up by 100 percent in Minneapolis, 200 percent in Seattle, 240 percent in Atlanta, and 182 percent in Chicago. The violence continued over the summer and into the fall. In a sample of 27 big cities, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston, Milwaukee, Nashville, and Louisville, homicide rates rose an average of 53 percent between June and August. *
The following is a summary of the June/July issue of the St. Croix Review:
Barry MacDonald, in “The Plight of Black America,” reveals a nightmarish reality of present-day America that Democrats and Black Lives Matter don’t want to talk about.
Allan C. Brownfeld, in “Critical Race Theory’s Assault on Teaching the History of Western Civilization,” articulates the enduring value of Western civilization to all the nations of the earth; in “China’s Tyranny Is Clear to All — Something Which Was Not Always True,” he reveals China’s present-day and historical crimes against humanity, and illustrates the long-practiced naiveté of the U.S. government and the media; in “First Principles: What the Founding Fathers Learned from the Greeks and Romans,” he reviews the book First Impressions, by Thomas E. Ricks, which documents the intense interest that the Founders of the United States had in the ancient world.
Mark Hendrickson, in “The Big Green Lie,” he exposes the lies involved with climate change hysteria, one of which is the implication that prosperity is sinful; in “Guilt, Condemnation, and Totalitarian Punishment,” he comprehensively takes on the entire leftist agenda; in “Urban Emigration: A Worrisome Outlook for American Cities,” he believes that, unless city leaders provide safety and order, big cities are heading towards decline; in “Raise the Corporate Tax Rate? Economic Obtuseness in High Places,” he demonstrates how man-made economic policies cannot overcome natural economic principles; in “Washington’s Bi-partisan Fiscal Folly,” he notes the alarming trend where big-government spending far outstrips government revenue, and he states the timeless truth: people should support the government, but the government should not support people.
Paul Kengor, in “The Early Church Was Not Socialist,” quotes the Bible, Pope Pius XI, Lenin, and Marx to make his point.
Earl H. Tilford, in “From the Dawn of the American Twilight,” recalls with regret a battle of the Vietnam War that epitomized dishonest American military leadership.
Thomas Martin, in “The Ideology of Sex Ed Passing for Health,” considers a new draft proposal from the State Health Education Standards which is to be debated by the Kearney (Nebraska) School Board, involving “gender identity” and “gender-role stereotypes.”
William Adair Bonner, in The Culture War: Have We Entered a New Phase?” writes that Americans are now “assaulted by political and ideological forces . . . which enforce censorship, political correctness, cancel culture, conformity, and acquiescence to the most aggressive forces seeking to dominate society.”
Jerry Hopkins, in “Lying Rights,” explores what it means in America to exercise “rights.”
The life — January 7, 1923 - April 15, 2021 — and distinguished military service of John A. Paller is celebrated in his obituary.
Francis P. DeStefano, in “Monsignor Quixote,” reviews a film about an elderly country priest living in a Spanish village who fancies himself a descendant of Cervantes’ famous hero and who behaves accordingly; in “A Foreign Field,” he reviews a film performed by an ensemble of famous film stars near the end of their careers who play men and women who either fought in or were impacted by the D-Day invasion of Normandy — they assemble in Normandy on the 50th anniversary of D-Day; in “American Literature on Film,” he reviews four excellent novels that were adapted into stupendous films: “Moby Dick”; “The Red Badge of Courage”; “The Magnificent Ambersons”; and “Dodsworth.”
Thomas E. Wilson, in “The Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow,” writes about the great American poet’s accomplishments and his sorrows.
Jigs Gardner, in “Letters from a Conservative Farmer — Can the GOP Survive Trump?” asks whether the Republican Party has the good sense to adopt for itself the beneficial policies and accomplishments of the Trump administration.
Jigs Gardner, in “Writers for Conservatives, 87: Memoirs of a Cape Breton Doctor by Dr. C. Lamont MacMillian,” reviews the memoirs of the hardships of doctoring to five thousand souls on the island of Cape Breton during the time of the Depression.
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