Swallowing the Codswallop

Steyn Online ^ | 17 Jan 2022 | Mark Steyn

[Rummyfan]

The weekend seizure of a Texas synagogue by a "British man" is the umpteenth example of "Let's pretend that the 37,893rd incident of Islamic terrorism is anything but Islamic terrorism". The dirty stinking rotten corrupt FBI (whom the pom-pom girls of Conservative Inc still make goo-goo eyes at) immediately announced that the "British man"'s act was "not specifically related to the Jewish community", so that's okay then, although presumably it was a bit unfortunate that some of the "Jewish community" wound up getting "detained" by the "British man", as the BBC delicately put it.

You know, "detained", like you might be if the coppers ask you for your Covid papers and you left them on your seat at the Australian Open. I mean, these days who's not liable for detention?

Circa eighteen, nineteen years ago, it became implicitly accepted that both the authorities and the media would only talk bollocks about Islamic terror attacks. In fact, if I had to date it precisely I'd go for July 4th 2002. Here's me twenty bloody years ago:

I'm a dead white male, as you can tell from my picture. Suppose on Martin Luther King Day I went to the offices of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and shot the receptionists. How many nano-seconds do you think it would take before the attack was being characterized as racially motivated? Your top Olympic hotshot could ingest every steroid on the planet and he couldn't beat that time.

[Rummyfan]

Multiple levels of law enforcement all talking drivel

[Rummyfan]

Over the weekend, I received the usual emails from panting readers on the news-cycle hamster wheel demanding to know why I wasn't writing about Texas. Because I wrote that column two decades in advance and then retired to the Bahamas. "We've failed," as David Starkey told me on Friday night. Sean Hannity, whose 2017-2020 dining companion had his entire presidency subverted by the feds, still does his "Oh, there's just a few bad apples. I know these G-men. They're salt-of-the-earth decent honorable blah-blah-blah" shtick on the FBI.

So the Texas codswallop mainly reminds us that, long before the WuFlu, the citizenry had internally accepted that officialdom and the media could tell obvious laughable lies and not be called on it. The mistake, presumably, was in thinking that this would be confined to Islamic terrorism and not metastasize to China and public health and whatever's next.

[whistleduck]

The FIB. American welfare cheats. Generally disgusting Commeyites intent on the new Stazi. Wake up DC—America needs honesty and integrity somewhere—how about starting with the G-men.

[Lurkinanloomin]