Post your questions for Bill Whittle in the comments below for possible inclusion in Thursday night’s (6/20/19 at 9:00 p.m. Eastern) livestream of The Stratosphere Lounge…also available on Twitch.tv.
The Management makes no claims or assurances that Mr. Whittle will use your question, nor that his answer will directly address your query without veering wildly in a predetermined, or entirely spontaneous, direction. The state of California has determined that The Stratosphere Lounge, and its host, contain trace (and/or saturation) amounts of several chemical and biological compounds determined to have a carcinogenic, cardio-thoracic, or psychotropic, effects on laboratory animals — which, of course, were not harmed during the making of The Stratosphere Lounge, and were determined by a panel of micro-expression analysts to have given implied consent for their service.
33 replies on “Questions for The Stratosphere Lounge 6/20/19”
It’s my 10th wedding anniversary. I have a lovely lady to take to dinner tonight,so I will not be present. Have fun!
Happy Anniversary, Matthew!
1979, I was on the U.S.S. Midway, GONZO Station, Iranian Hostage Crisis. We were set to blockade Iranian ports with air laid mines. Carter wouldn’t pull the trigger. Do you think we should mine them?
What is it about liberal Psychological makeup that they put so much emphasis on feeling? Feelings over fact. Feelings over science, you must not offend someone, because feelings. They even express their thoughts and opinions as “I FEEL that X is better than Y…” rather than “I THINK that X is better than Y”
one of the most difficult issues for me to understand was “Net-Neutrality” it seems it was sold to prevent exactly the corporate censorship we are seeing from Youtube, Facebook, and others.
Can you please explain how Net Neutrality would or would not have prevented this problem, and what measure could actually require large platform corporations to protect freedom of speech?
When debating with Collectivists they will often bring up the analogy of the Fasces: Individual sticks can be easily broken but when they are bundled together they are far harder to break. My question is: Are they wrong about a collective being stronger than individuals, and what is the Individualist counter to that argument?
of course a collection of individuals is stronger than 1 individual. That is why we have the United States. But are you willing to give up your individual freedom in order to obey the collective directives of the central party? It is Typical of collectivist societies to have 1 type of phone, one color. One phone case, also one color. and you only get to OWN a phone if Central command deems that you NEED one.
the issue is not about Strength, the issue is about freedom.
and if a collectivist is really arguing for Fascism. (after all, that is what they are doing) tell them so, in no uncertain terms. Because apparantly, the worst label these collectivists can put upon somebody is “fascist”
AOC, like most liberals, Believes that the Earth has 12 years remaining. Delusional! She Believes that detention facilities for foreign invaders are on par with NAZI death camps. Delusional!
She believes that America is bad and Globalism is Good. Delusional! She believes that Amazon mistreats their employees and that a facility in her city would be a bad thing. Delusional!
Pretty much everything she believes is not only not true, but very far from reality.
Would it be a good idea to call these liberal fantasies “Cortezian Delusions?”
I would like to know what you think about the recently-erupted debate between the conservative and libertarian wings of the general conservative movement, as delineated by some writers at First Things, and discussed over the last few weeks all over the place, including at the Daily Wire. Part of me wants to reject the dichotomy as presented as false, but it is hard to escape the truth that our founders saw, that our republican system preserving individual liberty only works for a fundamentally moral people. When a society has become as degraded as ours has, how can we argue for conservative libertarianism when every time we turn around, the Overton window shifts away from our moral foundation?
Does Congress’s enumerated power to establish post offices and post roads extend to email and the internet? By this I mean, could Congress legally create a federally managed email program and network as a public amenity? Should they? It could be a neutral and benign alternative to big-tech run email systems like gmail. What would happen if they did?
I’ve cogitated on this question for some time, but I can’t come up with a way to ensure it would be and would remain “neutral and benign.” It is simply the nature of the beast that it would not (something the founders understood). We are better off with Big Tech than we would be with real-life Big Brother.
As digital technology advances, are you concerned that the ability to cheaply fabricate photo-realistic video will destroy the credibility of videos as evidence in court? I can see us returning to a time when you can’t trust anything you or someone you trust didn’t see with their own eyes. The digital capture technology you want to use for the aurora project could nullify the truth-spreading power of video.
Do you think a nation or system of government fundamentally better than America can/will ever come along? In other words, is America the best we can do? I know American ideas are not implemented perfectly, and that could be improved, but that isn’t my point. Do you think people long before America believed a fundamentally better civilization than all they had seen could come about?
Would you like to talk about the Kratos XQ-58 Valkyrie? If nothing else, it would be a good opportunity to say, “Kratos XQ-58 Valkyrie” several times, and that’s always fun.
How about an update on the original Declaration Entertainment projects that brought many of us citizen producers into the fold? I saw The Arroyo recently on Amazon Prime and thought it was fantastic. Are you still working on Big Bat Problems and Aurora?
Can you describe the main points of contention between the Conservative base and the Libertarian Archipelago and could you apply these differences to Justin Amash’s hopes to unset Trump?
“unseat”
Questions for Stratoloungers – We get to ask you questions every week, do you have questions for us? Interacting with the live stream could be fun
I have a question for you, Steve: Why can’t you just ask a question like everyone else?
I ask plenty of questions so I thought it would be fun for Bill to turn the tables on us. Not related, but text me when you get a moment, please
Oooh. The “Turning the Tables” Edition! I love that idea!
With all of the hullabaloo surrounding the adding of “citizen” to our census, and adding in the angst over gerrymandering of districts, identity politics being at the forefront of life, what do you think about Trump coming in with a completely redesigned census form. It would have the following questions.
What is your address?
How many US Citizens live at this address?
And that’s it.
If we don’t know the ethnic makeup of the country, we can’t gerrymander. Make the whole thing color blind.
I love this.
Having done vast amounts of genealogical research using past censuses, I can tell you that that is pretty much what the 1790-1820 censuses looked like, though it broke it down into sex and age categories. Each line had the name of the head of household, followed by columns, say aged 1-5, 5-15, 15-20, 21-30, 31-40, and so forth. (The age categories were different for each sex.) The census taker wrote the name of the head of household at the beginning of each line and the number of individuals present in each column. The location data was at the top of the page (i.e., the same for everyone within an enumeration district).
Each census added more data. Starting with whether a person was a veteran (sometimes of specific wars), all the way up to whether a household had a wireless (radio) in 1930. In other words, they started using it to collect all sorts of data to track demographics, such as mortality rates, veterans and widows eligible for pensions, men eligible for the draft, what percentage of the population was rural, etc.
Cutting the census back to those essentials as recorded in the first few enumerations would be a stunning example of reverting to the constitutional limits of government.
Bill, Dr. Karen Siegemund, President of the American Freedom Alliance, was fired by the private school where she taught. Her crime was espousing the advantages of Western civilization, outside the purview of her place of employment. She never brought her views into her classes (she taught math).
Meanwhile, there are classes being taught in my high school promoting the ideas of white privilege and Black Lives Matter; where the philosophies of WEB DuBois are applauded, and Booker T Washington is painted as a subversive shmuck.
I know you have given speeches for the AFA. My question to you is this: Is it worth it for educators like Dr.Siegemund to push back? I do, in little ways, but never enough to make a dent. How hard should conservative teachers buck the system, in the hope for a change?
BTW, they finally broke me. This WILL be my last year in public education. I’ve experienced the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back, and I’m getting out.
Wow! Where to next for you? I wonder to what extent “get out [and invest your efforts in building a better school elsewhere]” may be a good solution (though this makes the environment one leaves even more homogeneous for the students who stay). Seems like a hard calculation to make: Stay in the hope of making a difference in public ed. (arguably useless if the institutional culture is beyond repair, which I think it may well be) or leave to someplace where your efforts are better received, and you can act more freely and make a positive difference for students there. What was the last straw for you?
The last straw was my end of the year evaluation.
My supervisor was retiring this year, and was battling cancer, as well. To make her last year easier, I took a lot of her duties off her shoulders, staying late on a regular basis to get it all done. My commitment to my job, and my students, was obvious, or so I thought.
She gave me an evaluation that was mediocre, saying I performed my duties as expected, nothing more. Never in my career have I received such a low rating. I had to go way above her head to get my evaluation changed, but it finally was, to my satisfaction. I felt angry and betrayed.
Aside from the personal, the blatant leftism of the profession has gotten to me. I just am sick and tired of coming face to face with a viewpoint meant to undermine my personal philosophy, and having no recourse to defend it without looking anti education.
What’s next? I’ll probably work with one of my students one to one after she graduates this year (I promised her I’d stay until she graduates. Her mother told me I’m the only reason she’s staying her final year). If that doesn’t work out, then I’ll be working in the local children’s museum.
Neither of those options will grant me the pay or benefits I would earn working for the state, but I needed to weigh that against my peace of mind and happiness. Guess which side won?
Wow, the evaluation was actually the straw that got my wife. Lowest she ever got and at direct odds to the previous year. A real slap in the face.
She is probably going to work part-time at one of the little shops she frequents until she figures it out.
Best of luck, but I think you’ll figure it out. A co-worker’s wife is teaching kids in China over the web 3 hours a day and doing well with that and enjoying it. All in English. Want some details I can message you?
Thank you for your words of encouragement, Ralph, and I wish Mrs. Ralph the best of luck in her career change!
Teaching over the internet is a bad idea for me. being a natural introvert, I fear that I would become a total recluse. Thank you for thinking of me, though!
Peace of mind and happiness go a long way, and can’t be bought with pay & benefits alone — at least not in a hostile environment like that. Good that you fought for it and managed to get your evaluation corrected. Sad and unjust that you had to. I imagine an employee review can be an easy place to hide a pre-existing agenda/grudge that has nothing to do with job performance. The bias could be hard to prove, though I suspect you were probably able to argue your case purely on the merits of all the work you’d put in.
It will ask some difficult changes of us, but I think the thing we need to do to get ahead of this stuff is to get on active rather than reactive footing. We need to seek out (and build) places where our skills are valued and our values are not despised. I have some hope that the ability to make connections, build alliances, and help one another out via places like this will help us eventually crack this important problem. As for the short term, your plan sounds good, and I wish you the joy that being able to feel at ease will bring. Keep us posted!
Oh, my goodness, I am so sorry to hear this. What an awful way for it to end.
I agree with what Ralph and Troy say below. I hope that if you want to continue teaching you can find a place at a private school, or perhaps one of those tutoring companies, or your local home-schooling association. Some of them have robust programs.
I hope you have enough time this summer to rest and restore your equilibrium before the fall semester starts.
We are too nice, it seems. Contra the Left’s claims, we as a culture are kind, patient, and tolerant to a fault, as evidenced by the fact that we pay them to complain about us and brainwash our kids. How can we keep this rightly prized kindness of spirit, which seems to enable Progressivism’s incrementalist advance, from becoming our undoing?
Have you had any further thoughts about decentralization, or building “parallel institutions” as alternatives to Progressive-dominated strongholds? It’s hard to know where to start with this, but it seems like an important idea that I’d like to be involved in and contribute to.
Does our overall ‘digital dinner table’ conversation suffer from the lack of a common Cronkite or Huntley-Brinkley on which to base the debates and conversations? (Damn, how old does that make me sound?!)
Back in the day several generations had a common source to base their discussions on, all be they leftist, now every small faction has their own ‘sources’ making it almost impossible to have thoughtful communications among individuals, much less generations.