Moral Equivalence Means Either Moral Confusion or Hatred of Israel

Dennis Prager Oct 17, 2023 

Moral equivalence has two purposes. One is to enable the morally confused to hide their confusion. The other is to enable the immoral to hide their immorality. Here are two examples as applied to the Israeli-Arab conflict: One is the assertion we hear regarding the latest Israel-Hamas war by members of the Western Left, by Muslim supporters of the Palestinians and even by a few individuals on the right: "Palestinian babies are as precious as Israeli babies."

Professor Cornel West, a lifelong progressive running for president as a Democrat:

"As I have said for the past 50 years, a precious Palestinian child has the same value as a precious Israeli child." David Cronin, an editor at Electronic Intifada, a large pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel website: "Palestinian babies are just as precious as my new daughter." 

A second example is to avoid condemning Hamas for the wars they start by instead condemning the "cycle of violence."  Let's analyze the two statements

That the lives of Palestinian children are as precious as those of Israeli children is a given. But it is meaningless given that virtually no Israeli or Israel-supporter has ever claimed otherwise. Indeed, it is usually worse than meaningless. It is usually a nice-sounding way to attack Israel and its supporters. ......To Read More....

 

Why the Left Is Pro-Mask

Understand the Left's support for mask-wearing and you will understand the Left. 

By Dennis Prager @ American Greatness

The world’s most trusted evaluator of medical studies, the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, has just released as close to a conclusive report on the effectiveness of masks against respiratory viruses such as COVID-19 as we are likely to have for the foreseeable future. The report assessed data from 78 different studies, including 11 new randomized controlled trials involving 610,872 participants.

Cochrane concluded, in the words of one of the authors, Dr. Tom Jefferson of Oxford University, “There is just no evidence that they (masks) make any difference. Full stop.”

Among the reasons for that assessment was Cochrane’s conclusion that states and countries with mask mandates fared no better than states and countries without.

Moreover, Dr. Jefferson’s conclusions were not limited to cloth and surgical masks. Regarding N95 masks, Jefferson said the same thing: “Makes no difference—none of it.”

As for the early COVID-19 studies that policymakers cited to justify mandates for mask wearing, Jefferson said: “They were convinced by nonrandomized studies, flawed observational studies.”

For example, PolitiFact, one of the so-called “fact-checkers” whose primary function is to declare whatever differs from the Left as “false,” declared in 2021 that studies “have consistently found that mask mandates cause sharp declines in coronavirus case rates.”

Bret Stephens, one of the two or three non-Left columnists at the New York Times, wrote this about the Cochrane study: 

“Mask mandates were a bust. Those skeptics who were furiously mocked as cranks and occasionally censored as ‘misinformers’ for opposing mandates were right. The mainstream experts and pundits who supported mandates were wrong. In a better world, it would behoove the latter group to acknowledge their error, along with its considerable physical, psychological, pedagogical and political costs.”

Stephens’ description of those who differed with the Left and the “experts” on universal mask-wearing as having been “furiously mocked as cranks and occasionally censored as ‘misinformers'” is, of course, entirely accurate.

We were right, but the Left controlled all the tech giants—and except for Twitter, they still do. They, not we, were the ones who spread misinformation about masks—and about lockdowns, the origins of COVID-19, the claim that there was no early treatment for COVID-19 (just wait for the vaccines and hope you don’t die in the meantime), Trump campaign collusion with Russia, the Hunter Biden laptop and every other issue that divides Left from Right.

Even now, after the Cochrane report, the Left continues to push for mask-wearing.

There were more than 3,000 comments on Bret Stephens’ column in the New York Times. Every single one of the most popular comments said the Cochrane report was flawed. I did not read all 3,000-plus comments, but I could not find one that agreed with Stephens or Cochrane. Note that in order to comment on a New York Times article, one must be a New York Times subscriber. These people are as representative of the American Left as any group could be.

And the Washington Post Editorial Board just published a lead editorial, “In a crowded place, a face mask or respirator keeps the virus away,” taking issue with the Cochrane review.

The people who boast that they—unlike the Right—only “follow the science” are lying to themselves, to us, or to both. Leftists have no interest in “the science” when it conflicts with any position they hold. Science said schools should be kept open, that closing them would do great damage to many young people. Yet, with a few exceptions such as Sweden, the Left clamored for, and where in power, closed schools. Science tells us that COVID-19 vaccines are not helpful—and even potentially injurious—to young people (Denmark strongly discourages any healthy person under 50 from getting a COVID-19 vaccine). Yet until this year, nearly every American university forced students to get vaccinated, and many still do.

So why, even despite the science, does the Left insist on wearing—and forcing others to wear—masks?

I will offer four reasons.

One reason is that the further Left one goes, the more fear governs an individual’s life.

This is true because the more one is governed by fear, the more one is likely to take left-wing positions. And it is true because left-wing positions inculcate fear. In other words, the frightened gravitate to the Left, and the Left makes people frightened.

The second reason the Left still insists on mask wearing is that leftists don’t ask the question, “At what price?” In fact, the moment one asks that question, one becomes a conservative.

The price paid for mask wearing is huge. Not seeing people’s faces has a negative impact on human relations. People whose face cannot be seen are less human—isn’t that why people who oppose the Muslim veil oppose it? Doesn’t the veil dehumanize the woman whose face disappears behind it? What is the effective difference between the veil and the mask? There is none. And what about children who don’t see faces outside of their house? What about patients who don’t see the faces of nurses and doctors? The nursing home residents who can’t see the smiles and hear the unmuffled speech of their caregivers? The harm done is huge.

A third reason for left-wing support for masks is that leftists read, listen to, and watch left-wing media only. Thus, they were completely ignorant of all that we who opposed masks knew thanks to the fact that we also consume non-Left media.

A fourth reason the Left insists on forcing others to wear masks is that controlling others’ lives is in the Left’s raison d’etre. Controlling others is what leftism is all about. That is why the Left seeks ever-expanding government. There is no such thing as increasing the size of government but not increasing the amount of government control over people’s lives. By definition, more government means more control over people’s lives. There is no example of the Left gaining power anywhere in the world and at any time since the Left took over Russia in 1917 and not restricting the freedom of its citizens.

Understand the Left’s support for mask-wearing and you will understand the Left.

Leftists Defend Those Who Won't Allow Conservative Parents to See Them or Their Grandchildren

Dennis Prager  |  Dec 27, 2022 @ Townhall.com

My last column, "Why Many Conservatives Won't Be with Their Children or Grandchildren This Christmas," dealt with the issue of parents whose left-wing adult children have cut off all contact with their parents because the parents are on the Right -- children who will not even allow their parents to have contact with their grandchildren.

One would think that any person with a functioning conscience and a normal human heart would feel for these parents. As I wrote in the column, if the roles were reversed -- that is, if a right-wing child severed all contact with his or her parents because the parents were on the Left, I would feel awful for those parents and condemn any conservative child who did such a thing.

Here are three of the many typical comments from conservative parents and grandparents (from Townhall.com):

Vermonter: "Sadly this is a nationwide trend. Neither of my college educated children have contact with me anymore. Yes it's painful, especially regarding my grandson. I have apologized for offending them, to no avail..."

Dmckinleyp: "Dennis, this is so timely. Things were bad enough between me and my two daughters, first after I volunteered for the Tea Party and then when I supported Trump. Then my daughter and her husband -- who was raised by Leftists working for the federal government -- had a baby. She wrote me a farewell email saying she never wanted any contact with me again. I will never see my lovely granddaughter. I am sending her presents and hoping to proceed without confrontation, but prayer is about all I have left."

GS69: "Yep. I'm in that boat. My youngest daughter -- a graduate of Evergreen State College in Washington(!) and my sister, who went to Harvard and volunteered for John Kerry years ago, stopped talking to me when I voted for Trump..."

The column was apparently forwarded to many leftists and discussed on various left-wing websites.

Even though I believe that the further left one goes, the more likely one is to be mean, I admit to having been surprised at the cruelty, even sadism, that characterizes left-wing reactions to my column.

I assumed that the dominant left-wing responses would be either that I exaggerated how widespread this problem is or that many conservative children act the same way.

My assumptions were wrong.

Nearly every one of the many left-wing responses I read -- both on right-wing and left-wing sites -- supported the left-wing children who deprive their parents of contact with them and with the grandchildren.

Here are some typical left-wing responses (from a conservative site, American Greatness):

yung god money stax: "... conservatives are whiny, mean little people and their kids don't want to listen to their racist, homophobic, sexist bs any more or let their kids be around that crap."

Dennis Prager's butthole: "This might be the dumbest article I've ever read anywhere."

Loona Chan: "I'm sorry Mr. Prager, you cannot claim after 6 years of Trump being the leader of the Republican Party that 'meanness' is not a central component of the current Republican project. Republicans now make being as offensive and disregarding of other's humanity paramount to their political rhetoric... When a parent on facebook 'jokes' about inflicting violence and even killing trans people and their children or grandchildren happen to be gay or trans, I think it is perfectly reasonable to no longer want to associate with that person..."

Austin Tucker the_dster694: "There is not an ounce of tolerance in conservative circles.

"Tolerate the intolerance is what you're asking, and we won't."

BartonsInk4: "I'm pretty sure I speak for all of the children who've cut off their parents when I say:

"1. We don't f---ing miss you. At all.

"2. We should have done this years ago."

Of the nearly 1,000 comments on American Greatness, most of them are like the ones quoted here.

Then there are left-wing websites. I'll cite two examples. The first is the feminist site, Wonkette, which headlined:

"Won't Someone Think Of All The Bigots Who Won't Be Invited To Christmas This Year?"

The article goes on to say:

"People who vote Republican right now ... (hold) views that are hurtful to actual human beings, who may or may not be their children, their grandchildren or friends thereof... it is quite easy to imagine that conservatives would freeze out any relative, parent or not, who belonged to one of the various groups they are currently mad at. We know for sure they have a tendency to throw their LGBTQIA+ children out on the streets...

"...apparently 'parents' are the only people God demands conservatives be nice to...

"...conservatives who just go around believing everything Tucker Carlson and Dennis Prager tell them are frequently very angry and thus perhaps not the world's best dinner guests at Christmas or any other time...

"It seems highly unlikely that the parents being frozen out of Christmas dinners are those who 'just happen' to vote Republican, but rather those who insist upon torturing their relatives with QAnon conspiracies..."

Then there is an atheist website called OnlySky, which in its own words, "explores the human experience from a secular point of view."  Its headline read: "Conservatives are upset their kids don't want to spend Christmas with them: Dennis Prager believes we're all obligated to spend the holidays with parents who embrace right-wing cruelty"  The author fully defends left-wing children who break off contact with their parents and prohibit the parents from seeing their grandchildren. For example:

"If you care about your health, then people who reject vaccines and spread conspiracy theories about COVID ... are literally putting lives at risk. All of that's before we get into banning books, denying election results, whitewashing history, denying science, demanding more guns in more hands in more places, and believing whatever other lies FOX hosts shove into their heads...

"Why invite people with dangerous views into your home voluntarily? That's especially true if you have kids. Parents want to protect their children, and that may mean protecting them from their grandparents' cuckoo bananas beliefs."

The author of the piece is identified as "the founder of FriendlyAtheist.com, a YouTube creator, podcast co-host, and author of multiple books about atheism."

If you have a woke child who talks to you, give him or her a hug.

 

Democrats Are Reality-Phobic

Derek Hunter Jul 14, 2022

There have always been crazy people, those with issues in need of help. And we, as a species and a country, have done a poor job of helping those people in the most desperate of need of mental health help.............the people leading Democrats couldn’t possibly believe the things they say. Joe Biden, for example, is senile but he’s also incredibly stupid. He’s been dumb his whole life, he’s only been senile in the last few years. What’s he’s never been is principled. Like most Democrats, Biden goes wherever the wind takes him. The left has always been this way..............

But a funny thing happened on the way to the abortion clinic…Democrats completely forgot what a woman was.............Khiara Bridges wiped out the existence of women with the phrase “people with the capacity for pregnancy.” There are 330 million people in the country, THIS was what Democrats chose to represent their side in this discussion? ..............Sadly there are real impressionable and confused kids being marinated in this garbage from adults in trusted positions who, through the natural confusion of puberty and loneliness of lockdowns, buy into these insane notions. 

Democrats don’t give a single damn how many lives or physical bodies are ruined as long as they win. There are plenty of ways to describe “a person with the capacity for pregnancy,” but the easiest way is “woman.” And there are just as many ways to describe what Democrats are doing to so many children out there, but the easiest and most accurate is “evil.”.........To Read More....

• Hawley: It Is a ‘Religion’ to the Left That You Affirm Men Can Get Pregnant -  Jeff Poor13 Jul 2022 - During an appearance on FNC’s “Hannity,” Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO), fresh off of his dust-up with a University of California Berkely professor over the ability of men to get pregnant, discussed the exchange.  He likened Democrats’ belief in blurred lines of gender to religion.  “I think it’s a fact, Sean, and you know what, but for today’s Democrats elite and Democrat leaders, it’s not only not a fact, it is religion to them that you affirm that men can get pregnant and if you don’t say it, then you are responsible for violence,” he said. “I mean, this is their line.”.............

My Take - I keep waiting for someone to ask them to show those men who've become pregnant, and no one seems to ask that.  After all, if university professors believe such a thing then they must have evidence of it.  Right?  Well,  finally Dennis Prager has caught up to me, when he posted this article,  You're a Scientist? So What?, noting that when someone claims "I am a scientist", "we need not take that as seriously as we once did"........" that the same rule now applies to "I am a professor," "I am a teacher," "I am a rabbi," "I am a priest," "I am a pastor," "I am a journalist," and "I am a doctor."

Dennis Prager’s profound and disturbing meditation about “good Germans”

January 6, 2021 By Andrea Widburg 

 

Sometimes, someone writes an article that is more than just an article. It is an urgent warning bell telling us something very profound about ourselves and the path that we’re on. Dennis Prager’s most recent article sees him come to terms with the fact that even Americans can become the functional equivalent of “good Germans;” that is, we are on the verge of becoming the type of people who, while not actively complicit in evil, just go along with it.

Many years ago, when Obama was consolidating his changes in America, an Irish friend of mine told me that it was inconceivable to him that Americans would give up their liberty. He felt that liberty was in Americans’ DNA and that nothing would cause them to abandon that core principle. My friend never imagined the Wuhan virus, an infectious disease with a 99% survival rate for people under 70.

In a matter of months, in most American states, millions of Americans meekly abandoned liberty. They allowed themselves to be imprisoned in their own homes, they gave up their businesses, they stopped educating their children, and they treated religious worship as something akin to a satanic death ritual............To Read More.....

• America's rendezvous with destiny - How many of our elected officials today will be able to tell their children that they "did all that could be done"?  
• Tuesday as prelude to a historic day: January 6th  - As a genuine constitutional crisis looms today, Congressional cowards show their mettle and someone appears to be preparing for violent destruction on the streets of DC. 
  
• What should Trump do with the time he has left? The naked truth of this election must be revealed.
• The only institution that can address our current crisis refuses to act  Congress may put on a good show tomorrow, but it’s not the branch of government that is set up to discern truth from falsehoods.
  

 

Thoughts in a Dark Time

Half this country believes, with good reason, that if Democratic Party officials believe they can get away with cheating, they will do so.

Dennis Prager Nov 12, 2020 46

As there is too much to say in the space of one column, I will simply offer some thoughts on the state of the country a week after the 2020 elections.

No. 1: While I am not certain the reported election results are dishonest, I suspect they are. Worse, about half this country believes this, too.

This is unprecedented in American history.

One might counter that this is not unprecedented, that this was precisely what half the American electorate felt in 2000, when many Democrats rejected the 2000 Supreme Court decision regarding Florida’s ballot counting. But that was entirely different. No one alleged widespread Republican fraud in the election of George W. Bush. The issue in that extremely close election involved a faulty voting system that resulted in hand recounts using differing ballot-counting standards from one jurisdiction to the next. Liberal justices joined the 7-2 vote in ruling for Bush that the recounts could not constitutionally go forward.

Therefore, the fact that nearly half the country is far from certain that Joe Biden was honestly elected is unprecedented..........To Read More....

 

 

The Lockdown Has Gone From a Mistake to a Crime

Dennis Prager Sep 01, 2020

Four months ago, I wrote a column titled "The Worldwide Lockdown May Be the Greatest Mistake in History." I explained that "'mistake' and 'evil' are not synonyms. The lockdown is a mistake; the Holocaust, slavery, communism, fascism, etc., were evils. Massive mistakes are made by arrogant fools; massive evils are committed by evil people."

Regarding the economic catastrophe in America and around the world -- especially among the world's poor who are dependent upon America and other first-world countries for their income through exports and tourism -- I wrote, "It is panic and hysteria, not the coronavirus, that created this catastrophe."

Unfortunately, I was right.

The world should have followed Sweden's example. That country never locked down and has even kept children under 16 in school the entire time. As Reuters reported on July 15, the number of Swedish children between 1 and 19 years of age who have died of COVID-19 is zero. And the percentage of children who contracted the illness was the exact same in Sweden as it was in Finland, which locked down its schools..........To Read More.....

The Dehumanization of Blacks

Tue, Jul 21, 2020  Prager's Column

 

 If you take black and white left-wing rhetoric seriously, blacks are not human beings like members of other races. They are first and foremost black; they are human beings defined before anything else by their color — not their humanity, their personality, their character, their mind or their heart. So much so that, according to white and black leftists, if you dissent from this racist view, you are now labeled racist. 

 

The idiocy and inhumanity (literally) of this, the “progressive” view of black people, is easily demonstrated. Do any blacks see themselves first as black? When a black man, let’s call him James, looks into the mirror, does he first see a black person, or does he see James? When a white woman, let’s call her Karen (I’m playing with the left here), looks into the mirror, does she first see a white person, or does she see Karen? Does any human being first see his or her color?

Of course not. Yet, we are supposed to believe that the most important thing about a black individual is that he or she is black. And if we do not honor that fact — if we aim to be “colorblind” — then we are labeled racist.

This dehumanizing nonsense goes for racial truth these days. Thus, for example, we who are not black are supposed to acknowledge that we cannot possibly see the world the way a black person sees the world; we cannot possibly understand what it is like to be black. This is part of the dogma the left imposes on society through the media, through cancel culture (say that you are colorblind and you might lose your job and your reputation), and through racial sensitivity training seminars at colleges and in the workplace..........To Read More....

If America Is So Racist, Why Are There So Many Race Hoaxes?

Dennis Prager Jul 07, 2020 @ Townhall.com

As I wrote nearly three years ago: "Perhaps the second greatest libel -- and certainly the most widespread -- is that America is a racist country that oppresses its minorities and women. We can call it the American Libel." (The greatest libel was the infamous blood libel, the fabricated charge spread in Europe for hundreds of years by Christian anti-Semites that Jews kill Christian children to use their blood to bake matzos -- unleavened bread -- for Passover.)

But if America is so racist, why are there so many race hoaxes?

Virtually every time we read about a swastika painted on a door, or a noose hanging from a tree to taunt blacks, it turns out to be either a false alarm or, more frequently, a hoax.

Here are a dozen examples:

No. 1: The Duke lacrosse team (2006): Three white members of the Duke University lacrosse team were falsely accused by Crystal Mangum, a black student at North Carolina Central University, with having raped her. The charges were all fabricated, but the American media and Duke University faculty rushed to judgment and devoted months to smearing the three lacrosse players and Duke University itself as racist.

No. 2: UC San Diego library noose (2010): "Student apologizes for noose in UC San Diego library" (Los Angeles Times). A "minority student" was responsible for placing the noose in the university library. Previously, the Associated Press had reported, "Anger boiled over on the University of California San Diego campus today, where students took over the chancellor's office to protest the hanging of a noose in a campus library."

No. 3: Truck at Oakland's Corporation Yard (2014): "A reported 'noose' tied to the back of a city truck in August, which stirred already simmering racial tensions at Oakland's Corporation Yard, was not an intended act of racial harassment, a city-commissioned report has found" (Mercury News).
No. 4: University of Delaware (2015): "'Nooses' Found Hanging on University of Delaware Campus Were Lanterns" (NBC).  University President Nancy Targett had earlier announced, "We are both saddened and disturbed that this deplorable act has taken place on our campus."

No. 5: The LSU noose (2015): It was widely reported that a noose was sighted at Louisiana State University leading to protests against racism there. It was later reported, "LSU said a picture of what appeared to be a noose hanging from a campus tree Thursday was not what it appeared to be" (WBRZ).

No. 6: University at Albany (2016): "A state appeals court has upheld the University at Albany's expulsion of a woman who along with two friends falsely claimed to be the victim of a racially motivated attack on a CDTA bus in January 2016" (Times-Union). The three black women had attacked a white woman and then claimed they had been racially attacked.

No.

 7: Bowling Green State University (2016): "Bowling Green police say student lied about politically driven attack" (ABC).  "The day after the 2016 election, Eleesha Long, a student at Bowling Green State University -- about 90 miles west of Oberlin -- said that she was attacked by white Trump supporters, who threw rocks at her. Police concluded that she had fabricated the story" (City Journal).

No. 8: Dreadlock cutting hoax (2019): "A black student at a Christian school in Virginia who accused three white sixth grade boys of cutting her dreadlocks and calling her ugly now says she was lying about the attack" (NBC).

No. 9: Jussie Smollett (2019): In one of the most notorious hoaxes, actor Jussie Smollett claimed he was attacked by white racists in Chicago on a freezing night. The story was a hoax. The "noose" was a rope his two co-conspirators had purchased for staging the "attack."

No. 10: Oakland's Lake Merritt (2020): After the city of Oakland launched a hate crime investigation regarding a noose hanging from park trees, Victor Anari Sengbe, a black man, tweeted: "It's not a noose, this guy climbed the tree and put up the rope for a swing months ago, folks used it to exercise... ITS NOT A NOOSE."  Nevertheless, Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf then tweeted, "Intentions do not matter. We will not tolerate symbols of hate in our city. The nooses found at Lake Merritt will be investigated as hate crimes."

No. 11: NASCAR (2020): A "noose" was found in the Talladega, Alabama, racetrack garage assigned to black NASCAR driver Bubba Wallace. FBI investigators determined it to be one of several such ropes placed sometime the year before in Talladega garages as door pulls, long before that garage was ever assigned to Wallace. But Wallace continued to maintain it was, in fact, a noose.

No. 12: University of La Verne (2020): "Racist Threats and Attacks that Rattled a California University Campus Were Faked, Police Say" (Newsweek).

There is not enough space in a column to cite all the hoaxes and mistaken charges of racism in recent decades. Interested readers can also look up: a hoax perpetrated by Fynn Arthur, a black student at Goucher College in 2018; Samantha Wells, a black student activist, who was responsible for a racist threat she left on her own car at St. Olaf College in 2017; and the hoax perpetrated by three black Oberlin students, Jonathan Aladin, Endia Lawrence and Cecelia Whettstone, who claimed racial profiling at Gibson's Bakery, which, after serving Oberlin for over 100 years, was nearly put out of business by the false claims.

Here's why this is so important. If there were a lot of racism, there would be no need for hoaxes. No Jew in Germany in the 1930s made up an anti-Semitic hoax. No Jewish shop owner ever made up a charge that a Nazi hurled a rock through his store window. The reason? None was needed. Nazi hatred against Jews was real. It didn't have to be faked. To convince people that America is racist, you have to fake it.

Dennis Prager is a nationally syndicated radio talk-show host and columnist. His latest book, published by Regnery in May 2019, is "The Rational Bible," a commentary on the book of Genesis. His film, "No Safe Spaces," came to theaters fall 2019. He is the founder of Prager University and may be contacted at dennisprager.com.

America's Jews and Christians Are Failing the Test of Their Lives

Dennis Prager Jun 23, 2020

If you are a Jew or Christian in America, the seriousness of your Judaism or Christianity is now being tested.

People look back in time and wonder how religious people, especially religious leaders -- specifically, the clergy -- could have failed in times of moral crisis. The failure of most rabbis, priests and pastors to speak out today -- when the risk to personal safety is so much less than it was in communist and fascist countries -- should provide the answer: Religion doesn't have all that much impact on most religious people. During comfortable times, it provides two essentials to a happy and fulfilled life -- community and meaning -- but when tested, it often fails like an umbrella that fails to expand just as it starts to rain.

America is being taken over by violent mobs; a vast amount of destruction and stealing has taken place (with little police intervention and the apathy of our political leaders). Why aren't all clergy delivering thundering sermons about the Seventh Commandment, "Thou shalt not steal"? Does it now come with an asterisk?...... To Read More....

Some Thoughts About Being Safe

Dennis Prager May 19, 2020

In a recent “Fireside Chat,” my weekly talk show on the PragerU platform, I commented on society’s increasing fixation on being “safe.” The following is a condensed version of what I said:
 We have a meme up at PragerU: “‘Until it’s safe’ means ‘never.’“

The pursuit of “safe” over virtually all other considerations i life-suppressing. This is true for your own individual life, and it is true for the life of a society.

I always give the following example: I have been taking visitors to Israel for decades, and for all those decades, people have called my radio show to say, “Dennis, I would so love to visit Israel, but I’m just going to wait until it’s safe.” And I’ve always told these people, “Then you’ll never go.” And sure enough, I’ve gone there over 20 times, and they never went.

I have never led my life on the basis of “until it’s safe.” I do not take ridiculous risks. I wear a seatbelt whenever I’m in a car because the chances are overwhelming that in a bad accident, a seatbelt can save my life. But I get into the car, which is not 100 percent safe...........To Read More....

My Take - This insistence on everything being safe is one of the constants in leftist arguments.  In this case it's a variation of the Precautionary Principle: if something isn't proven safe it can't be used.   There's only one problem with that. Nothing is safe!  Everything is unsafe at some level, and you can't prove things are safe, you can only prove things are unsafe.  It's called proving a negative, and it's impossible.

As an example.

Ask a room full of people if they're married, and to put their hands up if they are, and keep them up.  Then ask them if they're cheating on their spouse.  Every one of those hands will go down...at least in a normal crowd of people.  Then say to them:  I don't believe you! Prove to me you aren't cheating!  They can't. You can only prove what people are doing, not what they're not doing. 

The Question That Explains Almost Everything

Fighting President Trump means fighting for the very existence of the world’s order and for democracy in America. What could possibly give those devoid of meaning more meaning than that?

Dennis Prager  February 4th, 2020

If you want to understand a human being or the human condition, what is the single most important question you should ask?  Most religious people would probably ask, “Do you believe in God?”

The most important question most secular people, especially progressives, could imagine asking is probably a policy question. Today it would be “Do you support Donald Trump?” Otherwise it might be “Do you support abortion rights?” or “Do you support gay marriage?”

As important as all of these questions are, in attempting to understand human beings, especially large groups of human beings—i.e., their society—the most important question to ask is “What in life gives you the most meaning?”

The answer does not explain everything, of course, but it explains the human condition better than any other question. The reason is this: After food, the greatest human need and human desire is meaning.  ..........To Read More....

An Open Letter to Sergey Brin

Dennis Prager Oct 15, 2019

Dear Mr. Brin: Fifty years ago this week, when I was a 21-year-old college senior, I was in the Soviet Union, sent by the government of Israel to smuggle in Jewish religious items and smuggle out names of Jews who wanted to escape the Soviet Union and could then be issued a formal invitation to Israel.

I was chosen because I was a committed Jew and because I knew Hebrew and Russian. I was no hero, but the trip did entail risk. The Soviets did not appreciate people smuggling out names of Soviet citizens who sought to emigrate, information the Israeli government and activist groups in America used to advocate on their behalf.

My four weeks in the USSR were, of course, life-changing. This young American, lucky beyond belief to have spent his entire life in the freest country in the world, experienced what it was like to live in a totalitarian police state.............That has changed............The company that you co-founded, Google, the greatest conduit of speech in world history, is also suppressing speech. I have asked myself over and over: How could the company founded by a man whose parents fled the Soviet Union do this?...........To Read More.....

The Equation That Explains Evil

Dennis Prager Sep 10, 2019

Our age loves scientific equations. Here's one you weren't taught at college but which affects you as much as the law of gravity:

GI - W = E   

Good Intentions (GI) minus Wisdom (W) leads to Evil (E).

You weren't taught this rule at college because the modern university believes only science has rules. "Rules of life" is another term for wisdom, and there is no wisdom -- or even pursuit of wisdom -- at our universities. Life has rules just like the natural sciences do. Examples include:

• Ingratitude makes happiness impossible.
• Corrupt people think everyone else is as corrupt as they are.
• Human nature is not basically good.
• Feelings are far less important than actions.
• Most men need a woman to mature.
• Most women need a man to mature.

The list is long. And the more life rules people know and live by the better people they'll be -- the better the world will be................ Communism, the greatest mass murder ideology in history, was for almost all its rank-and-file supporters rooted in their desire to do good. (This was rarely true for its leaders, whose greatest desire was power.).................. The problem with communists and with leftists who don't consider themselves communists is not that none of them mean well. It's that they lack wisdom. There are wise and foolish liberals, wise and foolish conservatives; but all leftists are fools............To Read More.....

My Take - Dennis Prager has been one of my favorite writers for many years, but this piece is one of his best.  "They mean well" isn't an acceptable excuse any longer because we have so much history that shows what they want is disastrous.  We now know better, and so now, tt's time to call for an accounting.

Leftism Makes People Meaner

By Dennis Prager | June 10th, 2019

The sadistic treatment of Paul Manafort illustrates something I have believed since I attended graduate school in the 1970s and saw the behavior of left-wing students: Leftism makes people meaner.  There are kind and mean conservatives and kind and mean liberals. Neither liberalism nor conservatism makes people kinder or meaner. But this is not the case with leftism. With the handful of exceptions that accompany every generalization, leftism makes people meaner, even crueler.

Take the transfer of Manafort, the one-time Trump campaign manager, from a federal prison to New York’s Rikers Island prison. Rikers Island is universally regarded as a wretched place. As Harvard law professor Alan Dershowitz wrote:..........To Read More....

Are You Sure You Want to Play Russian Roulette With Your Child's Values?

Dennis Prager May 21, 2019 @ Townhall.com

Most Americans are not aware how morally and intellectually destructive American colleges -- and, increasingly, high schools and even elementary schools -- have become. So, they spend tens of thousands after-tax dollars to send their sons and daughters to college.

But today, to send your child to college is to play Russian roulette with their values. There is a good chance your child will return from college alienated from you, from America, from Western civilization and from whatever expression of any Bible-based religion in which you raised your child.  If you think this is in any way an exaggeration, here is some of what has happened on campuses in recent months:

Harvard University fired law professor Ron Sullivan from his position as faculty dean of Winthrop House, a student residential hall, because he was one of Harvey Weinstein's lawyers. (He has since resigned from the Weinstein legal team.) Some female Harvard students said they felt "unsafe" with Sullivan as a faculty dean.

Alan Dershowitz, a professor emeritus at Harvard Law, said the decision "may be the worst violation of academic freedom during my 55 year association with Harvard." Laurence Tribe, also a professor at Harvard Law, said he could not recall a "worse" blunder in his 50 years as a professor there.

Also at Harvard, all-black graduation exercises were initiated. And like most other colleges, Harvard has long allowed an all-black student dorm to exist on campus.

If nothing else, this provides additional proof of the vast difference between liberalism and leftism. That is why liberals such as Dershowitz, Tribe and numerous liberal writers have condemned Harvard's cowardly capitulation to a few female students. Unfortunately for America, however, most liberals will not confront the fact that they have far more to fear from the left than from the right. Conservatives are not the enemy of liberalism; the left is.

 

In Minnesota, some students at South St. Paul Secondary petitioned the administration to allow students to wear sashes -- stoles -- with ethnic and LGBT colors to celebrate their identities. As one student said in leftist English, "I'm able to repurpose what was once an obstacle into a source of energy and pride."

 

As reported in the Minneapolis Star Tribune: "If they're not allowed to don the sashes, some students have talked about wearing them anyway, said Naomi Gedey, a Black Pride Organization leader. Gedey added that many immigrant students also hope to wear flags of their nations of origin."

Other Minnesota schools already allow students "to don so-called 'identity adornments.'"

Those who still believe that one of the primary purposes of American public (and most private) schools is to Americanize students should know this is no longer the case. On the contrary, most American high schools now celebrate every identity except American identity (which the left brands a euphemism for white supremacy).

Meanwhile, at its commencement next month, the City University of New York will award an honorary doctorate of humane letters to Al Sharpton.

Among the many nonhumane activities Sharpton has been involved in was the infamous Tawana Brawley hoax, in which he fabricated a charge that four white men had raped a young black woman named Tawana Brawley.

Sharpton also runs a phony civil rights organization called the National Action Network, which has collected many millions of dollars from corporations in what essentially amounts to an extortion racket that enables those corporations to buy racial peace.

And Sharpton helped stoke the Jew-hatred that sparked black anti-Jewish riots in 1991. In a book published in 2006, Edward S. Shapiro, a Brandeis University historian, described the riot as "the most serious anti-Semitic incident in American history."

In Pennsylvania, the Sabold Elementary School in Springfield announced that its principal will no longer say "God bless America" after the Pledge of Allegiance. The school district released a statement two weeks ago stating that the principal saying "God bless America" "violated the law." 

And of course, college students across the country are increasingly taught, often from their first day at college, that being male and female is a choice, not a biological fact.

Other than Hillsdale and a handful of other colleges and religious colleges, the American university has become nothing more than a left-wing seminary.

Buyer beware.

Dennis Prager is a nationally syndicated radio talk-show host and columnist. His latest book, published by Regnery in April 2018, is "The Rational Bible," a commentary on the book of Exodus. He is the founder of Prager University and may be contacted at dennisprager.com.

Dennis Prager's Latest Book "The Rational Bible," a commentary on the book of Exodus is available on Amazon

Are Women Malcontents?

Dennis Prager Apr 09, 2019

I have decided to finally read what is widely regarded as the literary work that unleashed the modern feminist movement, Betty Friedan's "The Feminine Mystique."

I am halfway through the book, and I find it to be a well-written cri de coeur (cry from the heart). Historically speaking, there was always much to lament regarding the status of women. Though I have none of the contempt Friedan has for "housewifery," her description of women who felt they had no sense of self because they were only someone's wife and some children's mother is emotionally compelling.

But a big and troubling thought hit me while reading the book. In the 56 years since "The Feminine Mystique" was published, every complaint Friedan made regarding the situation of the American woman has been addressed. Few American women are forced into "housewifery." The few women who choose to place marriage and home over career have truly chosen to do so; it is the rare young woman for whom marriage and family are greater goals than a successful career. Nor do women any longer go from high school to the wedding chapel. They go from high school to college and often graduate school. In fact, far more women go to college than men..............To Read More.....

The Bitterness of Leftism

By Rich Kozlovich

David Horowitz wrote an article about a man named Alex Cockburn who recently died of cancer and is described by Horowitz as dying as a ‘spiteful and bitter man’!  A man who was “anti-American and an anti-Semite and a cheerleader for “Islamo-fascists of Hizbollah, Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood bent on destroying us.” He went on to say he “devoted his life” to “the vile ideologies of the 1930s and 1960s”. A lifetime of devotion to a movement promoted by Karl Marx with its foundation in the horrors of the French Revolution, which is directly responsible for the deliberate murder of untold millions….. “in peacetime”.

A movement that over the last 100 years caused billions to be turned into miserable suffering slaves of leftist governments. He went on to say regarding his spiteful bitterness that, “This was the predictable fruit of a life spent badly in recrimination and anger.”

Dennis Prager is noted for stating that haters can’t be happy and happy people can’t be haters. Although the left is unendingly driving studies to prove that conservatism is a form of insanity; it is abundantly clear to me that the left must be where the insanity is rich. They all seem to suffer from a form of collective insanity, how else can anyone explain their affinity with such unending hatred for so many? That is completely and uncompromisingly strange. How can that then be considered anything except insanity?

They hate Jews, Christians and religion as a whole, unless the religion hates the same people they hate, as does Islam, who they love. They hate the police, the military, the government, the banks, Americans and America, business people, conservatives, everything that is stable and anyone else who disagrees with them. And as this article shows they will happily turn and rend one of their own for daring to step outside of leftist "borg-like" herd thinking. They will unendingly criticize the right for the smallest infraction of perfection, and yet they love socialist states and the Islamo-fascists who have imposed the most abusive tyrannies the modern world has known!  Especially since the historical record is replete with all of the abject and unbelievable failures of the very cause they promote. How is that sane?

That shouldn’t surprise anyone since herd thinking is one of the requirements of ‘the collective’, going back to the French Revolution. Why do they attack their own when they step out of line? Ask why did the French Revolutionists have to murder the king and his family, along with all the other 'noble' families? There is a reason why that part of the revolution is called 'The Terror"! Ask why did the Russian Communists have to murder the Czar and his family? Why did all of these monsters deliberately murder tens millions of innocent citizens of their own nations? Can any other explanation other than insanity as an explaination for such actions?

On the right you will see abundant disagreement without brutal recrimination, unless of course your name is John McCain, but who ever said he was on the right, or very bright? Not to mention the fact that being a war hero doesn’t give you a pass on the rest of life, especially since he was vindictive right up until the point of his death.

Since the leftists have spewed out hate all of their lives, one has to wonder; what must that do to their health? It is known that our mental attitudes impact our physical health. When we harbor strong negative feelings, such as anger or hate, chemicals are released into the body which is destructive to the body. When we harbor strong positive feelings of love, kindness and happiness the body releases other chemicals that are beneficial promoters of good health. I think that we can assume that the bitterness and unhappiness these people feel is deserved, and they have brought it on themselves?

The thing I wonder about with these people is this. As atheists, what goes on in their heads as they lay there painfully dying? My guess is that the only regret they have is that they can’t have those they have hated for all these years right there beside them, suffering too; miserable to the end. And they won’t even be missed by the "borg-like" leftists of their collective since there is always some other foolish, hateful leftist salivating to take his place. And those who finally have the opportunity to take his place will be happy he’s dead.

After all….they’re leftists too.

Coming Home From College

When you send your child to college, you are playing Russian roulette with their character.

By Dennis Prager March 12, 2019

Every year, many thousands of American parents find that the son or daughter they sent to college has been transformed by college into a leftist. For left-wing parents, this may be a blessing, but for parents who are not leftist — not to mention those who are conservative — it is often painfully jolting.

It is jolting because their beloved child now holds America in contempt; prefers socialism to capitalism; regards all white people and police as racist; believes the Bible, Christianity, and Judaism are not only nonsense, but dangerous nonsense; no longer believes that men and women are inherently different — or even that male and female objectively exist; is uninterested in getting married and having children; believes the president of the United States is a fascist, as are all those who voted for him; and supports the suppression of speech that he or she regards as “hate speech.”

While this is music to the ears of left-wing parents, most traditionally liberal parents will not be all that happy with this transformation. Unlike leftists, most liberals do love America and think that, despite its flaws, it is worthy of respect. They do not believe male and female are subjective categories, and they believe in free speech — even for “hate speech.”

For conservative parents, the transformation is far worse. “Nightmare” is not too strong a description. Not only does their child hold everything they cherish in contempt, but their child, who loved and respected them a year or two before, now holds them in contempt.............To Read More....

Video: Prager on White Privilege