FRIDAY short TAKES.

Reality will bat last.  "You can't tear down the norm and then be surprised by what comes next."  Once a grim strategy outcome ensues, getting out of it will not be easy.  "What those who enjoy mocking Christianity ought to fear is the day that certain Christians look at the Muslims and realize intimidation, threats, and violence are an effective way to make their faith un-mockable. American society is perfectly okay with threats of violence in response to blasphemous speech, but we only tolerate it for certain faiths. There are good reasons to doubt that double standard is sustainable."

The weekly round-up of pithy elaborations of traditional Cold Spring Shops themes follows.  Many of the following are brief extracts from longer essays, many touching on a variety of points, that will reward careful study.  Do so before slagging on me for cherry-picking lines.  Yes, the theme for today is "reality checks."

1.  Reality will govern Cold Spring Shops posting.  "I blog about things that I find interesting enough to comment on. These tend to be some combination of things that I have some expertise or personal experience with, things that amuse me, or things that piss me off."  That's Outside the Beltway's James Joyner, and it's sound advice.

2.  Reality will come for your debt ceiling.  "We will default sooner or later, either through interest rate hikes or the massive crush of the debt itself, there are no two ways about it. And the corrective measures needed to address it will not be fun."

3.  Reality will come for your sectarianism.  "They are deplorable for their cynicism, their use of the double standard, and their lack of goodwill."

4.  Reality will come for excessive politics.  "The fundamental problem is that most voters have little incentive to seek out information about policy issues, or to objectively evaluate what they learn. "

5.  Reality has come for the English Department.  "In the eyes of the administration, the job of the English department is remedial—getting those students 'up to speed' so that they can do the writing required by their majors."  Those students are not up to speed.

6.  Reality has come for the humanities more generally.  "Right now the humanities are transparently ridiculous."

7.  Reality will come for the Vision of the Anointed.  "Just because some people cannot be trusted with liberty does not mean others can be trusted with power."

8.  Reality must come for the diversity deanlets.  "Today, these positions are typically filled by failed academics or left-wing activists who seek the power that comes with running a school."

9.  Reality means grasping the Tragic Vision.  "Increasing numbers of students are sick of being patronised as pathetic wallflowers who must be protected from ‘controversial’ ideas."

10.  Reality will come for your celebrations of transgressivity.  "Today’s Democratic Party celebrates the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, and persecutes in court the Little Sisters of the Poor, an actual group of faithful nuns."

11.  Reality means recognizing physiology and kinesiology.  "The transgendered have done more damage in three years to women’s sports than a century of chauvinist pigs."

12.  Reality must come for your woke word-noise.  "I notice that you can say almost any damned thing about women if you add a short modifier like 'white' or 'cis' — and some of it as racism, but none of it as good."

13.  Reality is on the side of federalism.  "Generally speaking, red states are growing redder and blue states bluer, which encourages not only the perpetuation but also the sharpening of their disagreements. Though it may sound like the 1850s, the result of this process need not be secession. But it will almost certainly be further political discord."

14.  Reality is not what political parties deliver.  "If the 2024 election is a rematch between Trump and Biden, we all lose."

15.  Reality.  "Soon both Social Security and Medicare will be broke."

16.  Reality is what economists do.  "There is no clean answer. A main lesson of economics is that there is always a tradeoff between help and disincentives, between insurance and moral hazard."

17.  Reality hangs out at Wigan Pier.  "It’s still easy today to identify the sandal wearing, socialist hippies at the yoga studio but socialism no longer brings to mind visions of progress. Today, fans of progress are more likely to be capitalists than socialists. Indeed, socialism is more often allied with critiques of progress–progress destroys the environment, ruins indigenous ways of life and so forth. A traditionalist socialism along Orwell’s lines would add to this critique that progress destroys jobs, feminizes men, and saps vitality and courage. Thus, Orwell’s goal of pairing socialism with conservatism seems logically closer at hand than in his own time."