The New York Times occasionally has excellent and insightful news articles. Then there's stuff like
this, "reporting" on Donald Trump's speech accepting his NRA endorsement:
Mr. Trump, whose record of sexist remarks, among other things, has left him at a potentially crippling disadvantage among female voters, polls show, appealed directly to women in his speech, imbuing his defense of gun rights with an undercurrent of fear.
"In trying to overturn the Second Amendment, Hillary Clinton is telling everyone -- and every woman living in a dangerous community -- that she doesn't have the right to defend herself," Mr. Trump said. "So you have a woman living in a community, a rough community, a bad community -- sorry, you can't defend yourself."
If Mr. Trump's comments seemed reminiscent of an era when crime rates were far higher -- the Willie Horton ads attacking Michael S. Dukakis, the Democratic nominee, in the 1988 presidential race came to mind -- they also appeared somewhat at odds with the broad bipartisan consensus on the need to reduce incarceration rates and prison populations: Mr. Trump sought to frighten voters about the idea of criminals being released from prison.
The idea that this is a news story, as opposed to an editorial hatchet job, is preposterous. Let's take it one line at a time.
Mr. Trump, whose record of sexist remarks, among other things, has left him at a potentially crippling disadvantage among female voters, polls show, appealed directly to women in his speech, imbuing his defense of gun rights with an undercurrent of fear.
1. It's true that Trump made what I consider sexist remarks. Indeed, "sexist" is a charitable word for them. But it's a heavily loaded term, essentially a disqualifying accusation. What is it doing in a "news" story?
2. Rather than Trump's being at a "crippling disadvantage," three national polls I have seen over the last week have him very slightly behind, or very slightly ahead, of Ms. Clinton, who seems not to be able to put away a challenge from a 73 year-old socialist with nothing like her money or machine.
3. It's by now a Leftist canard that conservatives appeal to "fear." Yes, well, in the words of the oft-heard saying, when seconds count, the police are only minutes away. Guns are sometimes indispensable to self-defense; that's one of the main reasons the Founders adopted the Second Amendment (and why Clinton-appointed Justices would effectively nullify it by over-ruling Heller).
News flash to NYT: Fear in the face of an imminent, grave threat is a gift of our evolution. What's odd is not fear, but the liberal reaction of complacent snickering in the face of a national spike in murders, a spike that's gone on for at least a year and a half as the Left continues its "police-are-Nazis" campaign.
If Mr. Trump's comments seemed reminiscent of an era when crime rates were far higher -- the Willie Horton ads attacking Michael S. Dukakis, the Democratic nominee, in the 1988 presidential race came to mind...
Actually, they're "reminiscent" of the much more recent and deadly Wendell Callahan triple murder enabled by the 2010 version of sentencing "reform." If only Erveena Hammonds had had a gun to protect herself and her daughters from being sliced to death by a violent drug dealer given early release. But because Willie Horton is a catch phrase on the Left for "Republican campaign tricks," and Wendell Callahan and his victims need to be swept under the rug, the NYT evokes the former and whites-out the latter.
Imagine that.
...they also appeared somewhat at odds with the broad bipartisan consensus on the need to reduce incarceration rates and prison populations: Mr. Trump sought to frighten voters about the idea of criminals being released from prison.
Only there is no such consensus. There's agreement on the pro-criminal Left and the addled-headed Right, you bet. But
their agreement is not a "broad" consensus. Indeed, in the only
national poll I know of that asks directly whether we're doing too much or too little to keep drug traffickers off the street, "too little" wins by 2-1. And that poll was taken last November, before the extent of the heroin and murder epidemics became well known.
Moreover -- as to the supposed consensus -- there's the fact that the sentencing reform bill can't get beyond its Committee report-out a distant seven months ago. One might think that politicians in an election year would be well-attuned if there were a "consensus" for going soft on drug pushers. Of course, it's precisely because they are well-attuned that the leniency bill just sits there, looking more and more like the complacency-hatched anachronism it is.
Finally, as to whether voters should be "frightened" about "the idea of criminals being released from prison:" With a 77% recidivism rate among the huge bulk of the nation's prisoners, and a 70% rate for those convicted of violent crimes -- not to get into the aforementioned heroin and (very likely related) murder surge -- to fail to be concerned about what criminals do when released is to be unconscious.
Unless, that is, you happen to be one of the folks who run the NYT, and the only time you interact with the Erveena Hammonds' of the world is when you hire them to bring around the finger sandwich trays at your Upper East Side Justice for Dzhokhar parties.
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