Tunnel Wall

Wednesday, January 23, 2019

Covington Catholic Is the Terrible Sequel to the Kavanaugh Case

Conservative parents look at liberal hate and think, “They could do that to my son.”

"Conservative parents look at liberal hate and think, “They could do that to my son.”Over the last 72 hours, I’ve been asking myself a simple question: What would happen if a group of Black Israelites had spent an hour taunting my son’s high-school football team? How would they have reacted if a Native American elder had walked into their midst – apparently not saying anything intelligible to them, but rather banging a drum and chanting inches from one kid’s face. Would they have thought that was an effort at “peacemaking,” or just more taunting? What would they have said if some of the people walking with that elder had yelled insults at them?

" I ask those questions, but I’m pretty sure I know the answer. The boys wouldn’t have reacted all that differently from the kids at Covington Catholic. They would have sung different songs, they would have chanted different chants, and maybe one or two of the kids would have lofted an obscene gesture in the direction of the Black Israelites. In other words, they would have been kids, and barring some sort of overt criminal act, the blame for any tension that followed should rest with the adults who behaved so aggressively and strangely (and, let’s face it, walking through a group of boys chanting and banging a drum is not exactly normal behavior). If a kid responds poorly to a challenging situation, you reprimand him. You teach him.

"But this is America in 2019, and it’s full of rage and hate. And parents of young men know that hostile people would instead want to destroy your child’s life. They would want to destroy your own livelihood. They would wish violence on him and you. They would try to destroy your school, and they would mock your faith. And then, even when their rage is proven to be unfounded, they would spend days hunting through your background and your school’s history to try to find some reason to hate you anyway." . . .

Kathy Griffin Tweets, Deletes Photo Of Covington Students Holding Up 'New Nazi Sign'

Esoteric Jeff

Daily Wire

"Three pointers are racist!!!"

"In yet another since-deleted tweet by a left-wing media personality unfairly targeting Covington Catholic high schoolers, comedian Kathy Griffin posted a photo from one of the school's basketball games that she claimed shows the boys "throwing up the new nazi sign."

" 'Covington’s finest throwing up the new nazi sign," read the post, which included a picture of Covington Catholic High School basketball players holding up what anybody who's ever watched a game would recognize as a "three-point" symbol. Here's a screenshot of the since-deleted post provided by Twitchy:" . . .

Thanks for highlighting them for us, Kathy.

Break Ground, Not Promises

You know those caravans marching north toward our border? They’re not giving speeches about how they’re coming north. They’re not tweeting about how they’re coming north. They’re not giving Oval Office addresses about how they’re coming north. They’re coming north

Ann Coulter "Several months into the Trump administration, I started running a daily “Border Wall Construction Update” on Twitter, announcing how many miles of the wall had been completed that day and how many miles since the inauguration. It was always the same numbers: 0 and 0, respectively.
"I was immediately attacked by people in the Trump base. You’re being unfair, he hasn’t had enough time, there’s a legislative process, he’s doing the best he can.
"As days turned to weeks and weeks turned to months and months turned to years, and not 1 inch of the wall was built, the “3-D chess” crowd dwindled.
"Sometimes Trump would concede he hadn’t built any part of the wall. Sometimes he would fib and claim it was being built. There’s no way to sugarcoat it: That was a lie.
"Drug dealers, drunk drivers, criminals, welfare dependents and low-wage workers driving down American wages continued to flow across our border.
"We are now past the midway point of Trump’s first term, maybe his only term. If Trump couldn’t come up with a legislative fix when he controlled both houses of Congress, he’s sure not going to now that he’s lost the House.
"We are headed for another failed Republican presidency.
"President George H.W. Bush promised, “Read my lips, no new taxes” — then raised taxes.
"President George W. Bush promised that America would not be “the world’s policeman” — then turned the United States into the world’s policeman.
"Whether these promises weren’t kept out of bad faith, incompetence or changed minds is of no consequence. That will be a minor footnote for future historians to debate. All that matters is that it didn’t happen. That’s why Trump got elected." . . .

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Refuses to Condemn Anti-Semitism Within Women's March

Ian Macfarlane

Townhall "On Saturday, January 19, 2018 New York Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez attended the Women's March in Washington, DC despite the group's association with anti-Semitism. The Democratic National Committee and numerous colleagues recently disavowed and dropped partnership with the Women's March due to bigoted comments amongst its national leaders. Rep. Ocasio-Cortez was asked about this yesterday and shifted the blame of anti-Semitism to President Donald Trump and his current administration while refusing to answer the question.

"As Townhall's Lauretta Brown previously reported, "The Democratic National Committee...joined a long list of Democratic groups disassociating themselves from the Woman’s March Tuesday following the repeated failures from the organization’s leadership to disavow ties with anti-Semitic leader Louis Farrakhan."

"The move was prompted after Women's March co-chair Tamika Mallory called noted bigot Farrakhan the "GOAT" or "greatest of all time." On ABC's "The View" Mallory then refused to condemn his numerous hateful statements such as saying he was "anti-termite" when referring to his feelings towards the Jewish people.

"Other reports said that from the very beginning of the Women's March, a movement claimed to be founded as fighting for the rights and empowerment of all women, Mallory and co-chair Carmen Perez “asserted that Jewish people bore a special collective responsibility as exploiters of black and brown people—and even, according to a close secondhand source, claimed that Jews were proven to have been leaders of the American slave trade.' ” . . .

Nathan Phillips Led Protest Attempting To Crash Mass After Covington Catholic Confrontation

Daily Wire

"Soon after Native American activist Nathan Phillips confronted high school boys from Covington Catholic in front of the Lincoln Memorial, he reportedly led a protest of about 20 fellow Native activists, unsuccessfully attempting to crash the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception's Saturday evening Mass.

"Catholic News Agency (CNA) reported Tuesday:

While chanting and playing ceremonial drums, a group of Native American rights activists reportedly led by Nathan Phillips attempted Jan. 19 to enter Washington, D.C.’s Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception during a Saturday evening Mass.
The group of 20 demonstrators was stopped by shrine security as it tried to enter the church during its 5:15 pm Vigil Mass, according to a shrine security guard on duty during the Mass.

"Over the weekend, the Kentucky teens were smeared by the media for allegedly harassing Phillips based off a selectively edited video clip. However, after the full video context came out, it was clear that the boys were the ones harassed by another activist group and approached by Mr. Phillips. Mainstream media outlets were forced to walk back their initial one-sided reporting after rumors of lawsuits from the boys' families floated around online." . . .

Conservatives have lifted a rock off the Democrat press and shown it for what it is

Rich Terrell's photosnark

Press failed Covington Catholic kids, Internet saved them . . . "But the Indian, Nathan Phillips, is not a Vietnam veteran. Don Shipley, a former Navy SEAL who routinely outs fake warriors checked the man out." . . .
Phillips is a bully. The press was his accomplice. Reporters in Washington love to preen about their importance and brag about how they hold the powerful accountable.
But a group of Catholic boys waiting for their bus were taunted first by a group of black nationalists, and then by Chief Annoying Orange, and the media did not call out the grownups. The media attacked the boys who turned the other cheek and held their tongues in a very Christian manner.
Now the truth has come out -- no thanks to the press.
In fact, despite the press.

Investors Business Daily: Apologies Aren't Enough After The Covington And BuzzFeed Media Fiascos "Media Malpractice: In the span of a couple [of] days, the mainstream press pushed two stories that caused a flurry of outrage. Neither was true. Both were the direct result of the media's pathological hatred of President Donald Trump." . . .

Tony Branco

American Thinker:

Thomas Lifson: Libels of and threats to Covington Kids will face Kentucky justice
. . . "There no doubt is – and properly so – a high bar necessary to meet the standards of a terroristic threat. But, having seen only a sample of hateful tweets directed at the Covington Kids, it is quite possible that one or more individuals, traceable to their own twitter accounts, have met the legal test." . . .
. . . "The other avenue for legal redress is libel suits." . . . Emphasis mine, TD

People who want to put kids in a wood chipper should maybe be on the no-fly list
. . . "As the left loves to say, "this is a teachable moment." Well, the leftists got that right, because it is finally time to teach all to finally put a stop to such horrible Orwellian minutes of hate.
"The other great leftist dodge is that "we need a conversation about" [name the issue]. . . ."

Selwyn Duke: The Ultimate Irony of the 'Native American Elder' and the MAGA Hat Kids . . . "But something occurs to me here: If the Indians had effective border security, perhaps they wouldn’t have been overrun and conquered." . . .
Demonizing Catholic Schoolboys . . . "From CNN, Ana Navarro called the boys’ parents “asswipes” for teaching them “bigotry and racism” and Bakari Sellers suggested that Sandmann deserved to be punched in the face. Other reporters accused the kids of being Nazis and white nationalists. None of the accusers bothered to gather any facts first.
"Afraid they may miss the virtue signaling bandwagon, many John McCain-type conservative pundits leaped to join the smear campaign. National Review’s Nicholas Frankovich, Ben Shapiro, S.E. Cupp, Bill Kristol, and McCain’s daughter Meghan were among those quick to believe the worst of the pro-life, conservative teens and excoriate them. Frankovich accused them of “spitting on the cross”. If ever conservatives needed an event to smoke out the true nature of fake commentators on the right, this was it." . . .

Wacky American Indian protester says Covington student 'stole his narrative'
. . . "The 17-year-old Sandmann is getting a master class in the audacity and malice of left-wing terrorists like Phillips." . . .

Monica Showalter: Covington Catholic diocese sticks to its calumny against its kids
. . . But what isn't good is the embrace of the dishonest narrative from the kids' own school and their own Catholic diocese, falsely condemning them in some amazing public calumny they have yet to retract." . . .
Ms. Showalter's words, not mine: . . . "If they don't, they're just molesting the kids another way." . . .

The Detroit Free Press's alternative facts about Nathan Phillips . . . "I don't care if Debbie Dingell and the mayor of Ypsilanti, Michigan (where Phillips lives) vouch for Phillips. He's exposed himself as a liar, and for the sake of getting publicity for himself, a lot of innocent people are going to be harmed. The Detroit Free Press, and its reporter, Niraj Warikoo, who, rather than report the facts, took dictation from an activist with an agenda and then presented it as truth, is responsible for spreading this fire."

NBC's Savannah Guthrie interviewed Sandmann, which gave rise to the expected,,,here it comes...wait for it . . . comparisons to Hitler!
. . . "After he approached the boys and became the central figure in the viral video, Phillips reportedly helped lead his activist group to crash the Saturday Mass at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception.
"NBC's announcement Tuesday that they interviewed Sandmann was met with outrage online. Some examples highlighted by Daily Wire's Josh Hammer which include comparing the high school boy to Hitler and racist mass murder Dylann Roof:

Nathan Phillips’ DD-214 RELEASED – And Shows He’s Not Quite What He Claims

Two CNN anchors, Saint Jake Tapper and Don Lemon have tweeted out the Reason article. This is pretty significant as neither are noted for bucking the latest media narrative if it hurts a group they oppose. (From RedState)

RedState "While many mainstream news outlets have been pathologically fixed on researching everything having to do with Covington Catholic High School and The Covington Kids, precious few (I’d wager none) have devoted any resources to researching anything regarding Nathan Phillips’ military service or anything else about him. On Monday Streiff reported that it was mathematically impossible that Phillips served in the Vietnam war, but Phillips’ DD-214 wasn’t publicly available.

Late Tuesday, that changed. Retired Navy SEAL Don Shipley shared Nathan Phillips’ (a/k/a Nathan Stanard) DD-214, which he’d acquired through a FOIA request. Shipley discusses its contents in this video (includes CNN footage Video. Language advisory).

. . . ", I’m not the military expert that Streiff is, but during my years living near Fort Bragg and Camp Lejeune I came in contact with quite a few soldiers and Marines. My understanding is that it takes a special talent – of the “I don’t really want to do any work” type – to not promote beyond private in four years. (I’m sure I will be corrected in the comments if my take is incorrect.)

"Also, his duty status lists “discharged,” not “honorably discharged.” That could have to do with his multiple stints in confinement after being AWOL." . . .

The whole narrative is changing

Tuesday, January 22, 2019

Celebrities have their say on the Covington kids (Delayed grace is better than no grace at all)

Jamie Lee Curtis Admits She Jumped The Gun On The Viral Covington Catholic Students Story
I suppose that is as much grace and class as we can expect from virtue-signaling Hollywood elite.
"A celeb owning up and admitting wrong? *checks for flying pigs*
"Most people jumped the gun when the viral video of the Covington High School students and Native American activist came out. Heck, I was one of those people. I tried to be

measured in my initial response and still feel good about that, but to be truthful, I really didn’t feel comfortable writing about it because my gut TOLD me there was probably more to the story. But it was trending everywhere, and I didn’t feel like I had a choice. I couldn’t ignore the story. It HAD to be covered, so "I made a judgment based on the information available to me at the time.
"I still wish I stuck with my gut, but we’ve corrected the record and have done a TON of stories in support of those boys since then.
"If you know the truth and refuse to apologize, shame on you. YEAH YOU KATHY GRIFFIN.

"It IS possible to own up and admit wrong. Jamie Lee Curtis did. "

Disney Producer Jack Morrissey Apologizes for ‘#MAGAkids into the Woodchipper’ Fantasy But his opinion of the kids is unchanged.

Trevor Noah on Covington Teenager: Everyone ‘Wants to Punch That Kid’ (Video)

Debra Messing Attacks Covington Teenager: ‘Mocking, Condescending, Disrespecting, A**hole’

However, the viral footage led to celebrities going crazy in reaction to the students. Kathy Griffin encouraged their doxxing and public shaming, while actor Jeffrey Wright fantasized about the group of students being physically beaten up.

Hollywood celebrities joined the establishment media this weekend in promoting what has amounted to a hoax campaign targeting Catholic high school students with allegations of “racism” over their encounter with a Native American man at the March for Life.

Kathy Griffin Viciously Targets Covington Catholic Kids . . . "She still wasn’t done; eleven minutes later she followed with this: “Names please. And stories from people who can identify them and vouch for their identity. Thank you.' ”

Kathy Griffin‏

The Shaming of Karen Pence

The Outline

"Will no one speak up for Karen Pence other than her husband?"

"In scarcely a week, the vice president’s wife has become a public face of hate. CNN’s John King suggests that what Mrs. Pence has done is so grievous maybe taxpayers shouldn’t fund her Secret Service security protection. The American Civil Liberties Union says she’s sending “a terrible message to students.”

"The Guardian sees in Mrs. Pence a reminder of “the vice-president’s dangerous bigotry.” During a Saturday night performance in Las Vegas, Lady Gaga told her fans that what Mrs. Pence has done confirms she and her husband are “the worst representation of what it means to be Christian.” A former Washington Post editor and senior writer for Politico tweets: “How can this happen in America?”

"So what is this terrible thing Mrs. Pence has done? She plans to teach art part-time at Immanuel Christian School in Northern Virginia. This is a small private K-8 academy where Mrs. Pence has taught before. It adheres to a biblically rooted view of human sexuality." . . .

It would be a shame if Mrs. Pence were to allow the mob to keep her from teaching art to those children at Immanuel Christian School. But however it turns out, her experience surely tells us which orthodoxies today are truly sacred and beyond question.

To her shame, Lady Gaga interrupts performance to trash the Pences
. . . "So what is this terrible thing Mrs. Pence has done? She plans to teach art part-time at Immanuel Christian School in Northern Virginia. This is a small private K-8 academy where Mrs. Pence has taught before. It adheres to a biblically rooted view of human sexuality." . . .

Sorry; this picture posted by mistake. I was looking for the Penses under "Families destroyed by Democrats" and didn't realize I clicked on this one:

More bitterly anti-Democrat material posted in The Tunnel Wall

Now Pelosi Owns the Shutdown

RealClearPolitics

"On Saturday, Donald Trump shrewdly flipped the table on Nancy Pelosi in the government shutdown standoff. He has now proposed a grand bargain on immigration: legalization of some 1 million so-called Dreamers -- the foreigners who were brought into the U.S. illegally by their parents -- and an immediate end to the shutdown, if she agrees to expand funding to $5.7 billion for the wall.

"It's the kind of checkmate political maneuver that may guarantee his re-election.

"It's smart because it now puts the onus on Pelosi to open the government. It also puts the pressure on Pelosi to act on immigration reform. For 25 years, Democrats have preferred to politicize the immigration issue -- and treat Hispanic voters as political hostages -- rather agree to a bipartisan solution to deal with the 10 million illegal immigrants residing in the U.S.

"There's no good option for Pelosi now." . . .

"Free and unfettered" press fettered by left-ism

Rich Terrell

What the right should learn from Covington Catholic flap . . . "Washington Post, CNN, and the rest were prepared to ruin the lives of some adolescents, who had come to Washington to march for life, to score a cheap political point.
"The National Review’s coverage of the Covington flap mirrors its treatment of the Trump presidency. Its editors, like those at the erstwhile Weekly Standard, have been playing by the left’s rules since the National Review denounced the John Birch Society nearly 60 years ago. Said one editor at the time in the way of explanation, “We can’t afford to jeopardize the grudging status we’ve earned in the Liberal community.”
"Still worried about their “grudging status” among liberals, many of those prominent on the right insist that Trump and others honor all the left’s silly totems, even if they are as contrived as the old man’s beating the drum. If a conservative fails to do so, his more respectable betters will join the left’s shaming posse even if the ones being shamed are 16-year-old pro-lifers."

Why hasn’t Twitter banned the accounts of users who called for death of Covington students?

The social media platform certainly had no qualms about banning a Christian pastor who had written a book promoting traditional marriage, claiming it to be “hate speech.” In October of last year, Twitter banned ten conservative accounts, giving no reason at all.

Busted: The shameful tactics used against the Covington Kids have a long history

Covington Catholic High School closes Tuesday ‘to ensure safety’ . . . "The American Indian Movement Chapter of Indiana and Kentucky is holding a 10 a.m. protest outside the Diocese of Covington.

"The protest, which so far has drawn more media than protesters, was moved from the school Monday as a precaution." . . .

"Trump hate driving mainstream media ‘journo-terrorism’ against Catholic kids at March for Life" "Over the weekend the “mainstream media” (MSM) which, in the age of POTUS Trump, has so obviously become little more than a propaganda organ for the Democratic Left, slipped back into its “journo-terrorism” role by promoting harm to a group of Catholic youngsters whose only ‘crime’ was supporting the president." . . .

"It should be noted at this point that Phillips — ever the ‘activist’ — has a history of pulling stunts just like this. As reported by The Gateway Pundit, Phillips, in 2015, targeted a group of mostly white frat boys, then ran to reporters to claim that he was the one who was harassed by them, a “racist” incident that, of course, was lapped up by the Democratic lapdog media. " . . .

. . . CNN piled on with, “Teens in Make America Great Again hats mocked a Native American elder at the Lincoln Memorial.” None of these reports could be further from the truth, as you’ve seen. In fact, the exact opposite happened.

Terrence Williams wonders at the difference in press treatment here.
At least the Covington kids didn't go with the "Hey-hey! Ho-ho! Blah blah blah blah, blah blah blo".

Leftist Activism 101: Get in someone’s face and then play victim for the cameras

Legal Insurrection

This tactic was used against me and pro-Israel students at Cornell, and appears to have been used by an activist against a high school student in D.C.

"The recent interaction in DC between high school students (one in particular) and an older activist who is Native American reminded me of a warning I once received from a colleague as to how I needed to prepare myself if I ever was in a hostile crowd or confronted.
"A classic leftist/occupy activist tactic, I was warned, was to confront a target and immediately start screaming that the target was being aggressive even though that was not true.Unsuspecting people in the vicinity would not start recording the incident until there was this commotion. The videographers accompanying the provocateur also would edit the video to start when the provocateur started screaming. The target, not knowing what was about to happen, would not be prepared for it, and might even take the bait, such as in pushing the person away physically.
"Regardless of what the target did or didn’t do, you would have video of the innocent target being portrayed as the aggressor, and the provocateur portrayed as the victim.
It happened to me at Cornell in April 2014 after the student assembly rejected a BDS motion

. . . That same tactic was used against pro-Israel students at Cornell later in 2014 by the same Ithaca activist and other SJP students, as I documented in Cornell Pro-Israel students taunted: “F**k You Zionist scums”.
"Look how the provocateur got inches from a pro-Israel student’s face, and started screaming “don’t touch me, don’t touch me” even though she was the aggressor and had not been touched. She then taunted the target to hit her, “slap me, do it, do it.” She also made a spitting sound (not clear if she actually spit) in the target’s face. The targeted student had the composure not to take the bait." . . .