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On May 11, 1996, a McDonnell Douglas DC-9 took off from Miami International Airport bound for Atlanta. A little over one hour into the flight, an improperly stored oxygen generator exploded in the airplane’s cargo hold. Seconds later, a fire broke out in the passenger cabin and the plane began rapidly losing electrical power. At this point, a fateful decision was made to open the cockpit and, as the plane banked hard toward the nearest airport to make an emergency landing, the flight crew became incapacitated by smoke. All 110 people on board ValuJet Airlines Flight 592 died when the plane crashed into the Florida Everglades.
Although it was perhaps unfair, the carrier took the blame for this incident. The brand “ValuJet” had always been “vaguely unsettling,” according to TIME magazine , in part because it evoked in the minds of consumers corner-cutting measures that only reduced the cost of flying at higher risk to passengers. Within a year, “ValuJet” was gone. The carrier bought out the smaller competitor AirTran Airways, assumed its name, and resumed normal business operations. But the carrier’s fleet continued to suffer malfunctions associated with “an array” of “maintenance problems.” The problem was the product, not the brand. In 2010, Southwest bought out the airline, and the troubled carrier had ceased all operations by 2014.
I was reminded of this story by a spasm of outrage on the progressive left over the term “woke.” Amid the dawning realization among Democratic political professionals that the uncompromising, absolutist, and illiberal brand of social-justice activism overtaking their party is an electoral drag, the party’s youngish activists are trying to anathematize the word that describes this phenomenon. But the problem is the product, not the brand.
“What went wrong is this stupid wokeness,” said Democratic strategist James Carville when asked why Democrats lost winnable races in places like Virginia, New Jersey, Minneapolis, Buffalo, and Seattle. Everything from the movement’s race essentialism to its hostility toward law enforcement is a proven political loser. The party’s activist class, Carville suggested, “need to go to a woke detox center or something.” To this, one of […]
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I hate being “that guy” who asks people to donate because I think our conservative news network is so crucial, but here I am…
When I left my cushy corporate job in 2017, I did so knowing that my family would have to make sacrifices. But I couldn’t continue to watch the nation slip into oblivion and was inspired by President Trump’s willingness to fight the good fight even at his own personal expense. What I didn’t realize then is that conservative media would be so heavily attacked, canceled, and defunded that the sacrifices would be extreme.
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