For the Times They are Achanging

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

Sixteen years ago, when I was first on the blogs (under deep cover, with mustache and sunglasses) there was a lot of talk about the cold civil war.

It is only now that I understand the name wasn’t EXACTLY right.  Sure, there were two camps sharply divided, and the fact that we were geographically enmeshed meant that it couldn’t go hot in the traditional way.  But there were other factors too.

In the cold war, what prevented it going hot was Mutual Assured Destruction.  Sure, the Soviets were fanatics, but they weren’t the sort of fanatics who want to make sure they die TOO.  They wanted to win.  They wanted for various and complicated reasons, among them that the only way a communist society can be prosperous is through theft, to own the Earth.  We weren’t about to allow that and we had the nukes to enforce it.

Oh, they grabbed what they could, mostly because the left here were very susceptible to Soviet propaganda, and the idea MAD was wrong, and we should disarm first.  (Honestly, sometimes I think they’re aliens.  That’s not how the world works, that’s not how humans work.  That’s not how any of this works.  The one who disarms first is known as “victim” or perhaps “dead.”)

But in the Civil War we fought, they commanded all the positions of power.  It wasn’t just the arts, or publishing, just the press or universities.  If you were fairly wealthy, even back in the eighties, you made “left noises” because being leftist was aspirational and a positional good.  Their control of the rest of the culture had a hard lock on the idea that leftist ideas were not just right and good but “Smart”.  Opening your mouth in public and revealing right-wing (and right wing was anything non-left, like supporting Ronald Reagan) opinions was the equivalent of committing social suicide.  If you said you supported Ronald Reagan, all your acquaintances would SAY you were dumb, and whisper you were racist, sexist, anti-Semitic. (In fact I was reading a mystery by a very liberal writer, set in the eighties and the MOST unbelievable thing she has is high-class white people in the South being openly racist.  Oh, my, no, that wasn’t done. I know, I lived there at the time.  Forget saying racist things in public.  They wouldn’t even voice a support for free markets in public.  It just wasn’t DONE.)

This is not a Cold Civil War.  We were occupied.  The Vichy had full control of society, and we were the plucky resistance.  We didn’t even have a flight helmet, or an egg beater, but we were doing what we could, in the shadows.  Those of us in the arts ported seemingly incongruous bits into our stuff, at great risk of discovery or at least suspicion.  Local journalists sometimes broke with the narrative.  But none of this had a great deal of effect.  We were mostly sidelined, and when someone managed to break through, he or she was immediately demonized.  Even a hero of the gonzo right like P. J. O’Rourke had to refer to Reagan as “his dumbness” to prove he was cool and hip enough.  (No one referred to Carter as his dumbness, and having heard the man, this is a miracle of the controlled press.)

It is no longer like that.  Things have changed.  Now we are in a cold civil war with occasional flare ups.

There are two problems.  I’ve never condoned the wholesale condemnation of GOP stalwarts, partly because the press still had a bunchaton of power until … they didn’t.

What I’m saying is that if they could demonize a squishy left and frankly morally impeccable man like Romney as an uber-fascist, they could demonize anyone and anything.  Which meant for a long time, when the right got pressured, they buckled.  They had to.  It wasn’t a cold civil war.  It was a guerilla war.  If you’re caught running with a bunch of dynamite to bring down a bridge before the Nazis bring in reinforcements, you don’t die bravely.  That just neutralizes you.  Instead, you invent a story and heil Hitler with all your might.  Which is what the US right — btw, as far from fascists as it’s possible to be, while the left often uses fascist tactics — did.  They buckled and lived to fight another day.

I thought that’s where we were.  I thought that’s where we’d be for another hundred years.

Yeah, I’d heard of the power of online communication, but I didn’t buy it.  I thought it would be very gradual.

You see, I did this with ebooks too.  when I started writing in 1985, every conference and every writing magazine had a thing on ebooks.  And it made no earthly sense to me.  Who in actual hell wants to take a computer to the bathroom with them, or bring the computer to the kitchen while washing dishes, or…  No one.

For twenty years they talked about ebooks, and I thought it would never happen.  And then Amazon…

I don’t know what happened with this election cycle.  Perhaps it was that the economy is really, stupendously, bad.  We don’t know for sure, because the press would rather die than report on it until a year from now, when they can blame it all on Trump, and also because Obama played tiddly winks with our number gathering, making things mean not what they say they mean. But the signs on the ground, they suck.  I belong to a highly educated/trained/hard working set, and the best of us have been holding on for the last ten years (since the Dems swept the legislature in 06) without a raise, in face of growing, unacknowledged inflation.

Then there is the fact that the internet reporting MIGHT have achieved just enough penetration to start getting to people through the rumor mill.  People saying that Obama was the most ethical president ever were met with open laughter from friends and relatives who read the blogs, and who brought out chapter and verse on what really happened in Benghazi and the horror that was Fast and Furious.  The indication of this is the approval rating of the MSM.

Then there is the fact that so many of the left’s theories are self-exploding.  I’ve been telling lefties since Trump was elected that he can’t put gays in camps, because Bush has already done that, and in fact, Bush couldn’t even do it, because we all died in the war Reagan started by talking tough to the Russians.

Sure, we all know people who buy each one of these self-panics afresh, as if they never heard it before, but it has to peel off those on the margins.  It does, in fact.  Even in science fiction cons, the audience looks vaguely embarrassed when the idiotic boogeyman of global warming is trotted out.  I mean, you can only have eminent DOOOOOOOM and the urgency of socialist measures now for so long before people stop going “aren’t we supposed to already have baked to death?”

And there was the fact that during Obama’s presidency, the left thought it had ALREADY won (their fault.  By silencing opposition on threat to jobs or even lives, they lost sight of how big it was and wishfully convinced themselves there were only a few dead enders left) and acted at their most repulsive, from “I have a pen and a phone” to the outbreaks of SJWs trying to squish life out of the things people did for fun and demanding it all be “meaningful” and in aid of progressivism and by the numbers.

Then there is the situation with terrorism and Islam.  By shouting Religion of Peace and reclassifying every incident as workplace violence or disgruntled soldiers or need for gun control, they tried to convince people not to see what their lying eyes told them.  And they didn’t have that kind of power.  And there was the internet.

Because they’d made it impossible for people to speak openly and keep working, or keep their social position, people didn’t.  Not even to pollsters on the phone.  Trump’s election was not only a shock to the left, it was a shock to most of the right.  Metaphorically, I’m still jaw-dropped, sitting in Stephen Green’s living room, un-drunk cocktail in hand.

The problem with this is not that the cold war has gone hot.  It hasn’t.  I think instinctively that’s what the left fears.  They’ve been doing all this stuff to keep us down with the understanding there were few of us and most very old, and now a preference cascade has revealed we were just lying to them.  They’re afraid we’re going to, at the very least, do to them what they’ve been doing to us.  And they might be right on that.  But of course they can’t say that.  They can’t say “I’m afraid I won’t get job perks for mouthing the right opinions” or “I’m afraid that my job won’t promote me because of my aggressive SJW blackmail.”  Instead, they have to exaggerate their fears into extermination camps and women losing their right to vote, and other insanity that everyone (probably in their hearts of hearts even they) knows is insanity.

Hence the insurgence of the pussy hatters.  (BTW they’re calling it three million — rolls eyes — yeah, there MIGHT have been three million all over the country, many of them elderly women who don’t seem to be quite sure what they were protesting or why, or old progressives recreating sixty eight out of sheer nostalgia, but that’s counting the not-women not-march on not-Washington (since it had to take all self identified women, it was more of a stroll, and most of them never went near DC) )  They think if they make a big display of force, we’ll be scared to do to them as they’ve been doing onto us.

They don’t realize it’s having the other effect.  Because they are protesting, essentially, against election results, they have NO moral high ground.  People watching can only think they’ve lost their minds.

Sure the media is inflating them, like they did with the Occupy Wall Street astroturf.  Sure, leftist politicians will lend them credence and treat them as heroes.  BUT the media and the lefty politicians CANNOT make them sound sane and justified.  Nothing can.  What the heck are they protesting, with their symbolic genitalia hats, anyway? All they can do is make themselves sound crazy by associating themselves with the crazy.

In other words, the people calling them the Trump 2020 dancers are more right than not.

Also, btw, three million?  In a country of three hundred million, where we probably have fifty million aging hippies who long to recreate sixty eight?  And countless vile prog teachers who dragged their classes to this thing?  Three million?  We laugh at your puny numbers, your vile smugness, your crazy assumption of moral rightness.  And the vast majority who won’t answer polls or play your games anymore, laughs with us.

The fury of the left is the fury of someone playing by the rules, who has done everything that has ever worked before and yet finds themselves getting the opposite results of what they wanted.  It often happens in societal change.

We are now, actually, and openly in a situation of Civil Cold War.  The right has its own power to punish those who offend them, and who thought they were insulated by taking the command positions in the culture (often by skulduggery and by paying more attention to politics than competency, which is why every field the left takes over gets cacked.)  Are you going to boycott us?  We’ll counter boycott and take you down.  Or worse, we’ll buycott.  Remember Chick Fil A?  It should have been a warning sign to the left.  But it wasn’t.

They’re going to blow past all the warning signs, because people do.  People’s minds aren’t that elastic.  The situation they grew up with is the “right and just” one to which we’ll return.  Note all the publishers waiting for ebooks to disappear.

Only the left’s displays are going to get more frantic and even aggressive.  And I’m seeing signs, particularly among the young, that no one really cares about their sensitivities anymore.  Which will only make them more frantic.

What can we do? How can we prevent the cold civil war going hot?  And yes, as angry as we are, we really want to do that.  Because if it goes hot what emerges at the other end won’t be the republic we love.

I don’t know.

So you must prepare.  Prepare for disruptions.  Prepare for attacks.  Prepare for them to take our institutions down in a final attempt to destroy us.

Prepare.  Be aware.  Build under, build over, build around.

In the end we win, they lose, and we might get lucky and avoid the worst on the way.  But the water will get very rough, so you have to make sure to have life preservers.

And be not afraid, for the times, they are achanging.

270 thoughts on “For the Times They are Achanging”

  2. It seems their ’60s Redux has skipped the nice parts of that era and gone straight to the smelly hippies and would-be revolutionaries.

          1. Early to mid-’60s fashions, to be exact. Towards the end, they were mutating into hideous ’70s fashions.

              1. Watching The Man From UNCLE and The Rockford Files recently. The shows began only a decade apart, but the fashions might as well be from different decades.

            2. Blue jeans, sandals, and peasant blouses were fine. Plastic mini skirts and chunky go-go boots, eh, not so much.

              BTW, I have a theory on the required extreme skinniness of the 70s, which parallels a similar situation in the 20s. At both times, women rebelled against restrictive undergarments – corsets in the 20s, girdles and bras and such in the 60s/70s. The problem is, to get away with no support garments, one can’t have any jiggly fat or sagging boobs, which means you have to be extremely thin.

              1. And if one is in their teens, early 20’s, sure.
                But age does tend to add a bit to most of us.

          2. I hope I’m not committing a bannable offense here, but…

            60s music + fashion + science fiction = space hippies

            1. All Copies Of That Episode Should Have Been Destroyed! 😦

              Note, I won’t say that is a “ban-able offense”. 😉

              1. Actually, that was a brilliant episode and its message is just as relevant now. A charismatic, sociopathic leader enraged by his perceived victimhood convinces a bunch of impressionable people to follow him to utopia.
                After failing to BS the rational people to join and aid him in his quest he leads his followers to commit sabotage and steal the resources needed to further his ’cause’.
                The reality of that “utopia” turns out to be deadly. The leader then choses death rather than face the consequences of his actions.

                Looks almost like the nightly news to me.

                  1. And SJWs miss the point and will always claim that if only the reasonable folk had gone along with charismatic sociopath, the place WOULD have been a true utopia, and not a death trap . . . because feelz!

                    1. Spock rocked out in this episode, but he didn’t sing… that was the episode Plato’s Stepchildren and the movie The Final Frontier.

                      But, if you want Nimoy singing…

                    2. In the middle of the earth, in the land of Shire,
                      Lives a brave little hobbit whom we all admire…

                  2. William Shatner did “Lucy In the Sky with Diamonds.” I found the LP at a flea market and bought it for a friend who’s a Trekkie and collects terrible records. He said it pretty much grossed out the local Trek meeting…

            3. I enjoy observing how the female starfleet officer uniforms are shorter than the hippie dresses.

                2. They were lucky it was the 60s…these days wanting to be sexy and pretty will get you sent to the re-education camp.

                  However, the episode “Miri” does have Ensign Rand telling Kirk how she’d tried to get her to notice her legs.

                  1. I’m almost certain that a desire to be pretty is a social construct and cause for you to be burned at the stake for Patriarchy-induced self-loathing. 😉

            4. You know, I had a discussion with my kids about peer pressure recently. I showed them things like “man” buns, boys wearing girl pants, mullets, cleft tongues, kids wearing their clothes backwards, etc. I told them, “You might think you’re really cool following the crowd. In reality, this is how cool you look,” and I showed them Pee-Wee Herman dancing to “Tequila.”

              Now I think I should have showed them this clip. 😉

        2. Based on what little I saw of the demonstrators, burning their bras would have constituted a tripping hazard. Not to mention having tremendous negative impact on any normal males in line of sight.

          1. ‘S OK. The weird Left is going after the wymyn’s Left because the protest was too gynoco-centric and all the pussy-cat-hats excluded trans[whatever] and non-cis-normative individuals.

            Off to get more hot-cinnamon and more three-cheese popcorn. Any other requests for the cart?

              1. kettle corn please. It may turn hot one of these days. If the leftists do something that makes the majority of the country see red..

            3. Speaking of, why does every man who wants to express even a tiny bit feminine these days have to be trans? What happened to good old fashioned crossed dressing?

                1. Seriously, the ones that I fear for are the girls who are competitive and driven — and oh, yeah, like to play with stuff like blocks, toy trains and trucks and engineering sets. Or are even casually interested in those sports traditionally seen as “male.” They used to be indulged as “tomboys” and allowed to find their somewhat eccentric way to adulthood . Now those with trend-attentive and virtue-seeking parents run the danger of being seen as “trans” and shuffled off into a hell of testosterone injections and god-knows-what, because they “Identify As Male.”

                  Sheesh. Whatever happened to the kid just being a kid.

                  1. Kind of a politically correct Münchhausen by Proxy. They get to abuse their kids while collecting all sorts of sympathy points.

                  2. I’ve had to stand by and watch a friend do that to herself unsure what to say. It is horrid.

                    That said at least tomboys were given space…instead of this trans bs I’d prefer we found away to indulge sissies the way we did tomboys as well as keeping the tomboy tradition alive.

                    3. Not just heartbreaking for the poor folks caught in the inappropriate push for trans – heartbreaking for the trans who are getting brushed off as “just another fad”, because “everyone knows”…

                      You know who some of the most intolerant, bigoted, sneering, assholes toward rape victims are? The “All PIV is rape!” and “he touched me sixteen months ago and I didn’t mention that I didn’t want it – Rape! Sexual Harassment!” assholes. Because if they have to admit that there’s a major difference, they have to admit how much they’re lying, attention-whoring, and crybullying-ways are built on lies.

                      Seriously. I certainly would never choose to go through that again, but there is a certain schaudenfruede to looking a SJW in the eye and honestly saying “You are a f****** liar. I’ve been raped. You haven’t. You just want to be a special victim, you spoiled rotten little c*nt. Just because you had regret sex doesn’t make you a rape victim, it makes you a slut.”

                      Huh, look at that soapbox I’m standing on. Where did that come from?

                    1. I think a whole lot of us here would be diagnosed as such. I still can’t quite believe such craziness exists.

                    2. A lot of kids were already being pressured to “admit” that they were lesbian or gay. But this is the world where message t-shirts are less popular than message tattoos. People want something with commitment and interoperability, and they pick body surgery instead of vows or careers.

                    3. A lot of kids were already being pressured to “admit” that they were lesbian or gay. But this is the world where message t-shirts are less popular than message tattoos. People want something with commitment and irreversability, and they pick body surgery instead of vows or careers.

                    4. Hell, I could now…there are websites out there to prep you to answer the questions correctly to qualify for transition and surgery.

                      I wish there were ones that gave stats for 5 and 10 year outcomes for both as prominently.

                    5. @suburbanbanshee: between how well we’ve treated vows and the current economy I can’t blame millennials for treating both as impermanent things. I know more people my age who have at least one divorce than not, for example.

                    6. But the operation is PERMANENT and it’s not usually what people really want (which I assume is a fully functional body of the other gender.) AND they’re pushing it on the flimsiest of pretexts. This worries me.

                    7. AND they’re pushing it on the flimsiest of pretexts. This worries me.

                      The effects are already visible. Look at the very high suicide rates among post op transsexuals

                    8. Johns Hopkins will no longer do the surgery because of the limited positive outcomes compared to the risks so there is push back.

                    9. John Hopkins noted the post-op uicide rate, and wrote an op-ed piece for the WSJ explaining that the rate was part of the reason why they don’t perform the surgery. Last I heard (less than a year ago), they’d come under lots of pressure to “recant”.

                    10. Last I heard (less than a year ago), they’d come under lots of pressure to “recant”.

                      For what? “Heresy”?

                  4. Or you could have the not-exactly tomboys* like me, raised by parents who basically said “whatever you’re interested in is fine,” raising kids the same way. Societal pressure is insane; I should not have to repeatedly tell my first grader that “that’s not a girl’s color; that’s just a color.”

                    *I never wanted to be a boy. I just wanted some of the things that people said belonged only to boys. Not entirely a coincidence that I ended up a summer camp counselor at a BOY Scout camp—of course, the fact that they were willing to hire and pay me makes a huge difference.

                    1. We do that, sort of– I know the kids have my weakness about catching unspoken things, so I’ll explain that yes, nail paint is pretty, but if the Baron wears it he’s not saying “I think this is pretty,” he’s saying something more like “I want to be a girl.” (He’s three. KIS all the way.)
                      Now, if he uses that pretty on his matchbox cars, on the other hand… (Mom Tip: it’s cheaper, easier to clean up, and easier to clean OFF than model paint.)

                      In color terms, it’s the difference between a guy in a pink bowling shirt, and a guy wearing a lady’s blouse. They “say” different things.

                      It helps that they know that mommy wears crazy/ugly socks because it was something with bright colors and FUN when she had to be wearing a uniform all the time– because the uniform said “I am this person, doing this thing, following those rules” but the socks (under my uniform socks…) said “I like color,” even it was just to me.

                    2. *makes note of the fingernail polish/model paint thing…* Might be useful when/if my two year old gets into models… or painting his toys.

                    4. Currently only have the one. (Working on the second, but she won’t be at the nail polish stage for a while yet.) Still a good trick to remember.

                    5. One girl who was the baby of her family (all older sibs were boys) really loved BSA. All her brothers were Eagles, so at 14 she joined Venture. She was a counselor at the local camp for 6 years until she got married. Now she has 3 boys all in Cub Scouts and a devoted den Mom.

                  1. Did not know that. But knew Alice Cooper is. It would be a hoot for them to do a “We are Republicans” spot while in costume. How many liberal heads would go explody?

                    1. Not only that, but I gather Alice Cooper also conducts Bible study groups, and is pretty much a devout Christian these days. Ahhh, the schadenfreude…

                    2. Alice Cooper also warns adamantly against taking political advice from rock stars as they are among the folk least in touch with reality.

                      Alice Cooper’s Political Makeup
                      By Richard Leiby
                      Tuesday, August 24, 2004; Page C03
                      No more Mr. Nice Guy: Alice Cooper, a shock rocker back in the old days and now a fan of President Bush, says rock stars who’ve jumped on the John Kerry bandwagon — Sheryl Crow, Dave Matthews, James Taylor and Bruce Springsteen among them — are treasonous morons.

                      “To me, that’s treason. I call it treason against rock-and-roll, because rock is the antithesis of politics. Rock should never be in bed with politics,” the 56-year-old told the Canadian Press news service as he embarked last week on a 15-city Canadian tour.

                      Never one to avoid self-examination, Alice (aka Vincent Damon Furnier) added: “If you’re listening to a rock star in order to get your information on who to vote for, you’re a bigger moron than they are. Why are we rock stars? Because we’re morons. We sleep all day, we play music at night and very rarely do we sit around reading the Washington Journal.” (We think he meant watching C-SPAN’s “Washington Journal,” or maybe he meant perusing the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal, but either way you get the idea.)

                      “Besides, when I read the list of people who are supporting Kerry, if I wasn’t already a Bush supporter, I would have immediately switched. Linda Ronstadt? Don Henley? Geez, that’s a good reason right there to vote for Bush.”

                      [END EXCERPT}
                      Emphasis added.

                      More recent interviews reinforce his prior expressed views:
                      Speaking with Metal Hammer: In Residence on Spotify (via Classic Rock Magazine), Cooper weighed in on the subject by bluntly stating, “I absolutely hate it. It’s the worst idea ever. First of all, why do people think rock stars know more than they do? That is the biggest fallacy in the world – if anything, we’re dumber. We’re not smarter than anybody else. I mean, why do you think we’re rock stars?”

                    3. Re: political advice from entertainers: As a group their skill is in presenting material that’s in a script, written music, etc. … not in creating those things. So WHY would we expect a high level of excellence in original political or social analysis and formulation of the same, from that group? Better to go to primary sources if we want to research leftist philosophy.

                2. Because Jamie Farr never did the work…adopting a woman’s beauty routine for the first time is eye opening.

                  But, seriously, I doubt it will surprise anyone that I have some knowledge of the topic and I get seriously annoyed when I am told, “well, honey, you are clearly trans” because I’m not.

                  1. I’ve always figured a return in male fashion to things like lace, makeup, heels, and other sparklies would make more men out there than are willing to admit it happy, and it’s got nothing to do with being trans. I mean, 17th/early-mid 18th century fashion for men was as flamboyant–if not more so–than women’s!

                    And then Beau Brummel (and later the Victorians) happened…

                    2. I confess, I have a thing for a guy in a musketeer shirt (and hey, that era’s fashions were very figure flattering for both men and women).

                    3. Honestly, I have long wondered if the historical reenactor fondness for certain pre-mid 19th century garb isn’t a socially-approved outlet on the part of straight males for a longing on their part for a bit of sartorial splash. Bright regimental colors, gold lace, brocade, plain old white lace, tight trews, stockings and boots with jingly spurs, hats with feathers … it’s an expression of a longing on their part – to be a peacock, show off the male physique in splashy feathers…

                      And nice weapons, of course.

                    4. I have wondered how many guys agreed to do a Renaissance themed wedding when they were told “you get to carry a sword” 🙂

                    5. Beau Brummel was pretty much inevitable. The invention of mass-produced textiles meant that one no longer needed to be rich to wear flashy clothes, but the general absence of indoor plumbing and prevalence of manual labour meant that one still needed to be rich to be conspicuously clean. Brummel’s rules of fashion included a high fanaticism about personal hygiene, which fenced out the Lower Orders.

                    7. I thought we went through that in the 70s. Not just the hair, but gold chains, and by the 80s we’d reached earings and by the 90s piercings. An odd thing about earings. They make great handles in a fight . . .

                      Seriously. We’ve had hair and bling, the man-purse and musk. What else is there?

                    8. Quite possibly…as a friend (female who strives for androgynous display) loves to point out, heels started out as a male fashion.

                      I’ve gotten to where I’ll wear some makeup and everyone who has an issue can notice that these are my middle fingers and some outerwear is from Torrid (like my regular coat this winter and the cardigan for cool weather). That said I’m careful around work (eyes if anything and muted color wise).

                      I wish I’d had the support and courage to do this at 20 instead of 50 (although the military would have put a dampener either way so make that 30 instead of 50).

                    9. “to be a peacock, show off the male physique in splashy feathers…”

                      ::cue a rousing rendition of “The Creation of Man” from The Scarlet Pimpernel musical:: “And THAT is why the Lord created MEN!”

                      (Seriously, though, if you haven’t ever listened to that song, you totally should. It will leave you in stitches. The entire musical is awesome, but that song in particular–especially seeing it performed in its full glory with the costumes–is memorable indeed.)

                    10. My students always giggle when I demonstrate how 17th-18th century gentlemen “made a leg” as they bowed to show off their calves. And the multiple brocade waistcoats and other splashy styles.

                    12. If I recall right, the entire romantic plot of one of Heyer’s novels (I beleve it was Powder and Patch) revolved around the hero not getting the time of day from the heroine/love interest/childhood friend initially because he didn’t dress flashy enough. (And if I recall right, the solution was somewhere in the middle–she had to learn that there needed to be more to a man than his clothes/jewels/wigs, and he had to learn that it’s cool to dress up and is actually kinda fun. But it was very charming, because Heyer.)

                    14. When I saw the musical Wicked, I was interested to note that the costume designer had snuck in a few skirts for the guys in formals—and it looked about as natural as the Slavic designs it was probably based on (which means that yes, it looked totally natural and masculine.)

                      Of course, I’m married to a guy who wears kilts eight months out of the year, and bless the folks at Utilikilt and their counterparts for bringing back the kilt as a men’s fashion. (Another thing Heinlein predicted accurately.)

                    15. “heels started out as a male fashion.” – hmm… I haven’t checked dates on that lately; assuming you’re not just talking about heels to keep your boots in stirrups. Chopines – very high women’s platform shoes, Wiki says 15th-17th c., taken to their max in Venice as I recall.

                3. Because Klinger was only wearing dresses in an attempt to get out of the Army; wearing dresses was an attempt at getting a psychological discharge, and he never identified as anything other than a straight male.

                  Using Klinger as a mascot would be saying that cross-dressing (and by extension whatever other letters of the alphabet might apply) is at best a ruse, at worst a psychological disorder.

                4. I was at an Ansel Adams exhibit once with my father, and towards the end we come to a photo Adams had taken of an older Georgia O’Keeffe in a dress. We stare at, puzzled, for several seconds, like bells were ringing but we couldn’t make out what they were sounding. And then it dawned on me. “She looks like Klinger from MASH, doesn’t she?”

              3. I always thought “Lesbian trapped in a man’s body” and “Gay man trapped in a woman’s body” were just JOKES. But a lot of my contemporaries are taking it deadly-serious.

                2. The idea of a man trapped in a woman’s body or vice versa is a gnostic concept (or perhaps Hindu) where the real person inhabits a body but exists separately from the body. Amazing how few Christians realize the incompatibility of the idea with Christianity.

                  1. Don’t you know your not allowed to bring Christian ideas into an argument unless the argument is about Christianity?

                3. I remember reading about men who had the surgery after nuking their relationship with the family and children… then as a transsexual woman, got a girlfriend, or came to be with a ‘relationship’ with the ‘female friend who supported them the most.’

                  The cynic in me sees the transpeople who get into such relationships in the following categories (in no particular order):

                  1) regret (because this does exist)
                  2) had a relationship with the woman before, but society frowns more on cheating than lesbians
                  3) probably was not happy with the sex as a trans. (I know there are who have perfectly enjoyable sex lives after; I’m talking about the ones who don’t enjoy it.)
                  4) the emotional relationship with the ‘now opposite gender’ isn’t as satisfying

                  Now before I get jumped on understand I’m not talking about the majority of the (admittedly small in comparison to the general populace) population of folks who go transition and are happy about it; but rather the ones who aren’t. And I gather that expressing any kind of regret isn’t going to be welcome – not to those who are hoping for the surgery to be the miracle they want it to be; not to those who hope that transitioning would make them happier, and especially not to those types who see any kind of opposing opinion as a denial of their own choices and feelings (which, to any one sane, it isn’t.)

                  I mean, if it has made them happy, someone else who isn’t happy about their changes doesn’t take away the happy person’s happiness nor does it lessen it in any way.

                  Though, there are supposedly some statistics out there of people who regret their transition as being higher, than not, but at the moment it isn’t germane to my point.

              4. Because that is needed to inflate their numbers.

                Like the disgusting spectacle in Vermont where two lesbians are being allowed to tell a little boy that he’s transsexual because they found him looking through a fashion magazine when less than two, and they’re supported by the school and people.

                1. I prefer looking at pictures of clothed women in fashion magazines over naked women in x-rated mags. And always have, as far back as I can remember. The old saying about clothes makes the man applies equally well to women. In social settings or on the street choice of clothing sends a message.

                  1. Fashion magazines can be a bit weird for me because attractive women come in three types:

                    1. Be with her
                    2. Dress like her
                    3. 1&2

                    It is a fun bit of weirdness, though

                  2. I never forgave Victoria’s Secret for dropping the “pensive young woman staring out the window in a country manor bedroom–who happens to be in a state of partial undress in a private place,” in favor of the “slut in underwear” photos they now use (in imitation of everybody else). Those were some of the *sexiest* photos I ever saw.

                    1. While understanding you (although I would be wondering why the young lady in question had bothered to put on sexy lingerie to stare pensively out a window), it is probable that you are…not the target audience.

                    2. As any student of cinematic depictions of college life knows, comely young ladies are inclined to change to lacy lingerie and sit about the dorm/sorority common room. Any such lass sitting pensively gazing out the window is probably wondering when and how a pillow fight will break out.

                      Surely Hollywood wouldn’t depict anything not reflective of reality?

                    3. @RES – I used to do that, actually; and this was something I startedduring a time I wasn’t romantically attached to anyone. Prior to that, I was very much a shirt, jeans and ponytail tomboy. Dressing up wasn’t limited to pretty lingerie – I liked to dress up to please myself; so if all I could manage with the weather and having nowhere to go was a silky negligee and pretty panties, I’d do that. For some reason, doing this, just for myself? Made me feel… good and confident. Some days I didn’t feel like dressing up much clothes wise (spaghetti strap top, shorts) but then I’d put on a couple of pretty earrings and I would ‘feel cute.’

                      I’m sure that some of the classic fashion mavens and the women’s fashionistas have a way of putting it that’s succinct and to the point, but making the effort for myself, and only myself, gave me a good sense of my own skin and what suited me.

              1. This could be staged. The “punchline” is a little too neat and tidy. But it’s still hysterical.

                1. That was the concensus over at Ace’s blog (where I saw this linked earlier today) – that the woman was doing performance art, but the audience wasn’t in on it.

                2. Perhaps but I personally have done similar; and it was part of training to let the customer vent for a bit then interrupt politely and get back to business at hand. Ok I was call center customer service; but the principle was the same.

                  In my case the customer was enraged at her credit card bill and was saying she was cutting up her card. I politely tried to catch her attention and she said I couldn’t stop her. I said she could cut the card if she wanted and no I couldn’t stop her but I said I was obligated to let her know that even if she cut the card we still had to send her a bill. That actually stopped her from being full on ragey and asking how could she end the contract. I said that particular query was not my department but if she wanted me to I could transfer her to the correct department; which she said “please do” to. I got the calls that other folks had problems with; that one got me a standing ovation because she was so abusive that she had been dropped by half a dozen people before that.

                  1. I do a similar thing. Wait and then continue troubleshooting. Though sometimes I end up having to send a ticket so someone can go to their desk and show them what happened since they refuse to cooperate at all.

                  2. yeah, it MIGHT be staged, but I’ve seen meltdowns close to this, and I’ve had reports of friends who faced this kind of thing since the election because they’re a minority or gay (and mostly Trump voters. Or at least anti-Hillary voters.)

                    1. Ah the pet minority act where if you think differently you are worse than even the rabidest of puppies.

              2. …. I’ve tried to come up with a suitable response to that, but… I just can’t.

          2. They would have to actually be wearing bra’s to bring to burn. (still rinsing the eyes with bleach)

            1. How about women who don’t want to dress up on a daily basis? Is that just a sign of depression?

              3. I can relate to the depression = don’t want to dress up. There’s some truth to it (I won’t say it’s like that every time though; because dressing for comfort is also a mindset that has a positive reaction, and it’s vastly different to being indifferent or sloppy.)

                I say there’s some truth to it because during my depressive periods where getting up to Do Stuff That needs Doing takes all my effort, I’ll just throw on a housedress; and I’ll hate how I look and how awful it’ll make me feel. But on days where I’m not depressed, I’ll throw on the same housedress and I don’t have the ‘I hate how I look, I hate myself, ugh,’ reaction.

            2. Today my husband introduced me to one acceptable time for a well-endowed woman to not wear a bra out in public: after slipping and landing badly on the kitchen floor, he made me take off my bra before driving me to the ER.

              The admit nurse, and the X-ray tech, both thanked him for the removal of the underwire bra. I was in too much pain to be half as mortified as I’d otherwise be, but it makes sense when they want to poke at the injury and take pictures without metal reinforcements in the way.

              Otherwise… good gracious, I can’t imagine anyone over a B-cup willingly stepping out the door braless. Stairs, people! And brisk walking! My pectoral muscles cringe at the very thought. There’s a reason we only dared burn our corsets after the bra was invented!

              1. I know of a few women who are bringing back Corsets/bustier for support work too. They found that wearing the things helps lessen the cramps when dealing with PMS. One I knew personally is rather well endowed and bought it for Mardi Gras, and the PMS came while out and about wearing it, but not as bad, until she tried to take it off. She stayed in it almost 24/7. even sleeping in the thing until it went away. The next time I saw her she was still using them instead of medication, though that Mardi Gras she wasn’t dealing with it, it was again for the looks, (and ease of flashing for beads).
                Another is Jen from Epbot/Cakewrecks, who found her getup as Lady Vador was helping her issues and bought some less fancy ones to use when her body gets mad at her.

        3. At a Paul Simon concert around 75, the crowd called for “Kathy’s Song” during the encore. Simon demurred, saying that he felt about that song the way he felt when he looked at a picture of himself with long hair, wearing a pair of bell bottoms, paisley print shirt, and love beads. It seemed as if the entire crowd laughed ruefully at the same instant as we remembered old pictures of ourselves. (The one of me featured white shoes with pointy toes.)

        1. Is that freedom rock, man? Turn it up!
          And yes, I love the music of the late 60’s. Jefferson Airplane, Cream, Traffic (mix the two and get Blind Faith), Santana, Pink Floyd, Led Zep, and onward.

      3. Try Underground Garage on XM Radio or online lots of brush invasion and girl group awesomeness plus power pop and trash pop fun.

  3. “People saying that Obama was the most ethical president ever were met with open laughter …”

    It is true that, as the Obama Administration claims, they were scandal free. That is more condemnation of a sycophantic, credibility-be-damned, journo-list MSM than it is praise of that administration.

    Heck, the Clinton Administration would have largely been scandal free had it not been for Drudge and his report.

    As the internet reporting credibility has grown, the MSM has retreated more harshly into partisanship, openly proclaiming their allegiance to the Left.

    1. Beg to differ. Their claim of being scandal free is so much bull twaddle. But you are correct in that all of the many scandals of the past eight years were dreadfully under reported by the traditional media. And of course those news outlets that did speak truth became the targets of an active campaign to delegitimize them. Every embarrassing fact reported on Fox, or Breitbart, or any of the honest blogosphere were immediately disparaged as racist attacks on our wondermus multiracial President.

      1. A scandal is not a scandal because someone did something wrong. A scandal is people talking about people doing wrong. No talk, no scandal. The problem for Obama is that there are cracks in the MSM edifice. Obama’s scandals were mostly internet and Fox scandals. That is why he abhors Fox News. They actually, occasionally actually talked about his ill deeds.

        That’s why the NYT can call it a scandal free administration with a straight face. Nobody they respect talked about evil deeds. That and the fact that they are brown nosing weasels.

      2. Scandal:
        1. A publicized incident that brings about disgrace or offends the moral sensibilities of society

        2. A person, thing, or circumstance that causes or ought to cause disgrace or outrage

        3. Damage to reputation or character caused by public disclosure of immoral or grossly improper behavior; disgrace.

        4. Talk that is damaging to one’s character; malicious gossip.

        Source: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/scandal

        Emphasis added.

        Two of the four definitions clearly include a requirement of public disclosure, while a third implicitly includes such.

        The scandal (person, thing, or circumstance that causes or ought to cause disgrace or outrage) is the MSM’s lack of reporting — indeed, active whitewashing — of scandalous actions.

        2. I notice the 4th definition doesn’t require the scandal to be based on any truth. That sounds… familiar.

          1. It’s the theological/sin one– “causing scandal” can be rephrased as making someone think less of another person without good reason.
            Interestingly enough, the “other person” can be yourself– say, by doing something where you make it look like you’re committing a sin.

  4. Hot YouTube clip yesterday of that gray haired lady on a plane with her milktoast husband. Asked the dude in the window seat what he’d been doing in DC. When he replied he’d been there to participate in the inauguration she lit into him with screeching curses and all the tired old strawman crap. Flight attendants at first tried to calm and quiet her. When that didn’t work they got the cops to show up and tell her she was being removed from the flight. Naturally at that point she went all entitled and tried to play the victim card.
    Rather difficult to watch, but the very best part was how the rest of the passengers cheered when she and her husband were escorted off the plane.

      1. That cheering should frighten the left. They are increasingly making those who normally don’t care allies of the right because the uninvolved are sick of the left’s bs.

        1. Wasn’t that on a flight to Seattle? If so, odds are that at least some of those cheering were Clinton voters.

          1. Apparently the guy sitting next to him was a Clinton voter, and the two of them had a pleasant conversation afterwards.

    3. I think the venue for her little act was poorly chosen. Most people, having faced the ordeal of TSA, having fought their way on the plane and struggled to fit their carry ons, don’t really have a lot of patience for more B.S. to potentially delay their flight.
      As Randy mentioned, the best way to get Clinton voters to support Trump is to waste their time with silly crap like this.

  5. “The fury of the left is the fury of someone playing by the rules …”

    That was because they had claimed authority to write (and rewrite, at need) the rules. Their fury is because this authority is being taken from them.

    The 1964 British musical, The Roar of the Greasepaint – The Smell of the Crowd addressed this shift in the power dynamic within Britain’s class system:

    Resembling a music hall production more than a book musical, the allegorical plot examines the maintenance of the status quo between the upper and lower classes of British society in the 1960s. The two main characters are Sir and Cocky. Since Sir is forever changing the rules of the game of life, downtrodden young Cocky always gets the short end of the stick. Assisting Sir is his eager disciple Kid, anxious to pick up bits of wisdom while helping keep Cocky in his place. Cocky tries to beat Sir at the game, first by getting a job, and then with love, but Sir bests him both times. Cocky is re-inspired when he sees a new character, the Negro, win the game behind his and Sir’s backs. By ignoring the rules, Cocky manages to win, but neither he or Sir can function without the other. The show ends with both of them frozen in a pose similar to that of the dab.
    Wiki

    Emphasis added.

    1. Oops – can’t add emphasis by italicizing within italics.
      Since Sir is forever changing the rules of the game of life, downtrodden young Cocky always gets the short end of the stick.

      Emphasized.

    2. I remember *heavy* TV advertising for that in the 1970s.

      Ads so well-crafted, I thought they were describing some movie and never bothered to tell us the title…

  6. What is a riot other than the cold civil war going hot locally and temporarily? Perhaps we need to bring back the riot act? It would probably take a Constitutional amendment, but it might be worth it to be able to treat the rioters as the enemy terrorists that they are.

  7. when the left issues one of their boy-cotts, should we not be calling them the sexist that they are.
    off to work

    1. I’m more partial to ordering bulk 9mm online, especially defensive ammo.
      You can get usually get the good stuff (HST, Gold Dots) in the 50 round LEO boxes for the same price Walmart sells the old stuff in those 20 round unopenable plastic boxes.

      2. I’m with you on online ordering – ammoseek.com for up to the second best pricing of online vendors.

        1. Depending on who you’re ordering from, check all the shipping options if they’re not out where you can see them. Sometimes prices vary quite a bit.

          Also, some places only ship “signature required,” which can be a hassle if there’s nobody home during the day, or you have a sticker-and-run delivery driver.

          1. If it’s shipped ups you may be able to have it held for pickup. FedEx does it to but more pain in the ass. I’ve done both.

    2. I’ve been considering finally buying a sidearm. It’s something that I’ve been mentally debating with myself for a while. But it’ll need to wait until after I start working again.

      1. Bad idea. Once you buy a gun you’ll have to buy ammunition, and cleaning supplies, and maybe a holster (or three, or five…), and range fees, and then you’ll wind up buying another gun for reasons that seemed logical at the time, and then…

        1. Best to have three of the same or similar handgun- where all three can share the same holsters, mags, ammo, ect. One to train with, one to carry, and one to sit in the safe as a backup.

        3. Holsters…

          Those are used for carrying guns outside, correct?

          Since I live in LA County, and am not a celebrity or contributor to the County Sheriff’s political campaign, I think I can safely ignore that item for .

          :p

          1. Well, the county sherifff who used to be known for doing that is no longer there…. so unless we win Peruta, no dice.

      2. Talking with yourself may be a manifestation of a mental disorder and, if that disorder is severe enough, may disqualify you from purchasing arms. At least from a licensed dealer.

          1. To talk with yourself can be
            1) You’re talking to the most intelligent person around
            or
            2) You’re talking to the person most concerned about your problems
            or
            3) Both of the above. 😉

            1. A tactical note: Nowadays with an earbud or bluetooth thingee in place, you can talk to yourself all day long and never get more than one look.

          2. For you maybe. While I often talk to myself I never* make the mistake of listening to myself; I know the amount of careful consideration not occurring in my head.

            *Well, there was this one time, but nothing more shall be said before the Statute of Limitations expires (I believe, in this instance, it expires on Judgement Day.)

  9. “The fury of the left is the fury of someone playing by the rules, who has done everything that has ever worked before and yet finds themselves getting the opposite results of what they wanted. It often happens in societal change.”

    This is the fury of the right too. All of us productive “normal” hard workers in the middle, playing by the rules, and falling behind. While large swaths of the population get subsidized housing, phones, medical care, food, and education, we pay our mortgages, buy our own food, are forced to pay for ever crappier health insurance AND for their insurance, etc, etc, etc.

    We’ve just been playing by different sets of rules. Of course, our rules built western civilization, and prosperity, while theirs eat the heart and soul our of it.
    zuk

  10. Pussyfooters – let’s bring back that neglected word for pink-hatted marchers (amblers, actually).

  11. Prepare for them to take our institutions down in a final attempt to destroy us.

    Well, that has the ring of truth to it. And might just explain some things. And I imagine the attempt is reflexive / unconscious / visceral. “We’d have our utopia if it wasn’t for this… *grunt*… stupid… *oof*… patriarchal institution… *ugh*…!”

    Hmmm… I need to ponder this in light of some of the stuff that’s been going on with my church recently.

    1. I’ve been more concerned with their attempt to take down our tools – e.g. an open internet – than our institutions. Those can be rebuilt, built around, etc. to a large extent.

  12. As I mentioned yesterday, a lot about now reminds me of Nixon’s taking f the White House. The madness of the 60s (as described to me by a friend) followed by the election of a Republican president.

    My hope is that we’ll manage to avoid one of the often ignored elements of that time, namely the domestic political terrorrism.

    1. Yeah. I knew some people who thought the Weathermen were heroes helping to usher in the revolution. Then there was the SLA. Whackos right out of the movie Network. Black Panther shootouts. SJWs are winps compared to the 60s radicals

      1. Hopefully SJWs will stay that way…remember, the Weathermen used the SDS to recruit and used Maoist re-education techniques to select for those willing to be red guards. I worry what such methods would recruit out of SJWs.

          1. I dunno. Punctuality isn’t exactly one of their strong suits, so the vests couldn’t be on timers. Having the triggers activated by cell phone signal is problematic for people who are incapable of laying off Twitter, FB, Instagram and such.

            In all likelihood the majority of their “successes” would prove to be self goals.

                  1. My older next door neighbor dressed up as a whoopie cushion on Halloween. None of the youngsters seemed to comprehend, and she complained. I assured her that the old farts got it. 🙂

                3. I’d used the site for years before I ever heard of the domestic terrorist group– the name made perfect sense in context.

                  Not sure if they were likewise never told about the group (which I am not really sure I’ll make sure my kids are taught the names of all the various groups… what they DID, yeah, but other than the Black Panthers, not really specifically worth knowing about, any more than I know all the various sub-groups in the terrorist IRA blob.)

                4. That’s actually my favorite weather site because of how they present the information. And you don’t have to be a complete old fart to get the joke; anyone with an interest in history will probably pick it up.

            2. In all likelihood the majority of their “successes” would prove to be self goals.

              You say that like it’s a bad thing.

    2. There is a new book out, “Days of Rage”, on the thousands of domestic terrorist acts of the 70s. I had started to believe I imagined a lot of it so it is good to have someone pull all the history together.

      Listening to the campaign for the new DNC Chair with the white woman talking about her job would be to shut white people up because people of color have all the answers I couldn’t help but think of groups like the SLA made up of white, generally female, radicals fetishizing black leadership (was the SLA just a sexless BBC thing?)

  13. The fundamental principle of the Left is the denial of human nature. Human nature is by turns messy, ugly, dangerous, and beautiful. It’s very tempting to deny the messy, ugly, and dangerous parts, or worse, to wish them away so all you have it the beauty. But you invariably find that the parts you wish away are the parts you have left.

    1. That contrast is part of what makes the beautiful work – we have a suspicion, at least, of our capacity for darkness, and appreciate when someone fights against it to bring beauty into the world.

        1. Maybe it’s a matter of truth?

          If I pretend that I’m cooking with wonderfully tender, highly flavorful slices of meat when I’ve really got a gristly roast, it won’t work.
          If I say “this is what is, and I want to make it better,” I can get a wonderful result.

  14. “They’re afraid we’re going to, at the very least, do to them what they’ve been doing to us.” Like the guy who called in a plumber, and suddenly thought the plumber might have voted for Trump (OH, the HORROR!!)

      1. To be fair, if the plumber had said “You voted for Hillary? Well, I’m afraid I can’t help you, then.” … Oh, my. Oh, my my.

        Which is a shittier situation: to have a plumber leave you to your own shit, or to have a nervous breakdown because the plumber helps you and takes your money, but doesn’t say a thing about your voting?

        I’m going for nervous breakdown. There’s absolutely no way he can retaliate against the plumber, then. No happy warm burn of self-righteous glows… just unease and nervousness!

  17. Conservative web sites and conservative posters on Twitter and Facebook might have gone the way of the dinosaur if Hillary had been elected.

    Early on election night Hillary was predicted to win so I got my pajamas on and grabbed a novel and mentally ticked off what I would shut down the next day: twitter, facebook, I even planned to shut down my e-mail and start a new one. You know, Hillary Gestapo would have eventually found me but I was going to delay it.

    Even now Germany plans to fine any social media comment they don’t like – ie. disagreement with Merkel’s migrant policies.

    The Right Side Broadcasting videos of the Trump rallies were and are amazing. My youngest son lives at home and voted for the first time this year. The debates were at night and he watched every one. The rallies were usually day time. In the evening he watched the Right Side Broadcasting Youtube videos at of the Trump rallies. I overheard them from the kitchen and went in to watch. AMAZING. AMAZING. These videos showed what the tens of thousands of rally attendees experienced. Excitement. Group celebration. It was 1968 for sensible people. I knew watching those videos that Trump might win.

    Here’s a fun video I saw today of an American on a bike stopping to be interviewed and trying to enlighten to some crazy lady protesters. Guaranteed to make you SMILE. https://twitter.com/joshgremillion/status/823609001594089473

    3. “Even now Germany plans to fine any social media comment they don’t like …”

      There is an easy answer for that — enthusiastically endorse Merkel’s policies for all the wrong reasons.

      I say it is well past time the True Deutsche blood stock was diluted to protect the world from the tyranny of Aryan militarism! Intermingling the racial vigor of Syrians should establish a hybrid that will not threaten civilization. Who cares if Deutsche culture is eradicated to make this migrants more comfortable in their new home? What has Deutsche culture ever given the world, anyway?

      1. Owch. Sorry, RES, that hits way too close to the bone. It’s not funny to me, even in military-paramedic-black-humor sort of way. I realize you’re firing for the effect, but you’re not too far from quoting that Green Party member of the Bundestag about the need to destroy German culture, and her bile and the results that kind of thinking have wrought in Central Europe make me want to cry, then go hurt someone. Little close to a very sensitive nerve there.

        1. My apologies — I did say “or all the wrong reasons.”

          Sometimes it is impossible to be more over-the-top than the nutcases. Just as I would never attempt to parody the nuts who denounce all PIV as rape I should eschew parodying the Euro-Left — however deep into the tall weeds I try to get, they’ve already blazed the path.

                    5. He’s not God, he’s St. Mattis, of the Holy Hand Grenade!

                      (I also recently saw official Philippine government communication to the public -facebook posts telling people what to do in case of terrorist attack during a local festival. “This being social media… we will use dank memes.” Or something like that.)

                    6. Saw one yesterday: that’s not a bearskin rug on the floor in General Mattis’s office. It’s a bear that’s too scared to move.

                      I do believe we may have our new “Chuck Norris” meme starting. 😀

        2. “…quoting that Green Party member of the Bundestag about the need to destroy German culture…”

          Amen Sister! Let’s finally toss Marx, Engels, Hegel, and other Teutonic worshipers of the State uber alles on the crapheap of history where they belong!!!

          Oh, wait… that’s not the German culture that she’s referring to… never mind.

      2. Deutsche culture has only ever given the world awesome architecture, beloved beers, confusing comedy, excellent engineering, magnificent music, sensational science, thrilling technology, wearisome words, and. . . far too many pretentious ponderous pernicious political theorists.

        2. I misread the ‘confusing comedy’ for ‘confusing pornography’ for a moment, then shrugged at my brain’s word anticipation suggestions and figure, both are true anyway.

          (And, it was one of those times where my friends wanted to do the ‘laugh at the porn’ sessions at a party.)

  18. Extra kudos, Ma’am, for the flight helmet and the egg beater. But don’t forget the celery!

    Two things our situation has in common with Allo! Allo! –

    1. The Communist Resistance hate us far more than they hate the occupying forces.

    2. Endless theatre of the absurd.

    (Btw, RIP Gorden Kaye.)

  19. On the media and Carter and Reagan. The media twice portrayed Carter as a hick, which has the “stupid” mem built in. The first time they painted him as a John Boy in derision, but at a time when the US was looking for a John Boy instead of a Washington insider. The second time was when Kennedy was running against him for the nomination. We in the South noticed how they made fun of his choice of good ol’ boy casual wear, but uttered nary a peep when Reagan worn the same get-up on his ranch.

    The media’s derision of Carter tended to vanish when he went up against the Republicans. They painted Reagan as a cowboy in derision, but at a time when the US was looking for a cowboy type. The “stupid” mem was more tied to his age in an attempt to imply he was senile. That really took off when he ran against Mondale – and led to his classic comeback when someone brought up the issue of age and he said no one should hold Mondale’s youth and inexperience against him.

    1. In the 1980’s I happened across an unlabeled (alas..) tape of some Canadian singer-comedian recorded in the 1970’s. So during the Reagan years when the media was in hysterics about the warmongering President who’d end the world by accident or design… I heard the reminder that Carter was also seen as such…

      Let’s have a nice, clean holocaust,
      With a nice, clean neutron bomb!
      …
      He’s the Lord of Love, the Prince of Peace,
      He’s J.C., President Carter,
      Spearhead of the anti-war machine,
      He’s determined if we’re to have a nuclear war,
      America will fight it clean!

      [Sample lyrics not necessarily in proper order, and decidedly incomplete.]

      Alas, I never discovered who the singer was, to give proper credit, or find more of his work.

        1. Nah – hose out the T-72s and they’re good to go!

          I remember reading in the 80s about a study of the environmental impact to Europe comparing a tactical nuclear exchange vs. the Soviet’s preferred alternative, chemical warfare. Chemical warfare won out in the biomass-killed count hands down, with solid dead critters and plants from the Alps to the Baltic. Even with “non-peersistent” agents, damage to ecosystems was expected to last for generations.

          Funny how the Euro-Greens never mentioned that before the Soviet Union fell.

          1. From what I remember reading about the chem stuff, the required decontamination was intense. As in if some was left on the bottom of a fence board and someone touched it, they were dead.

            Neutron bombs, though, where a good stop-gap between conventional weapons and tactical nukes, should the Soviets come looking for real estate. Minimal fallout without all-out nuclear war. I remember that, at least what we civilians heard, was that if the Warsaw Pact came across in force, NATO would just about have to go nuclear.

            Anyway, Carter caved on the neutron bomb. Naive.

            Memory is hazy. Didn’t the Warthog come later and turned out to be the equalizer?

              2. There is a very good chapter on the development of the Warthog and an excellent discussion of the development of the F-15 in Robert Coram’s biography of John Boyd, Boyd: The Fighter Pilot Who Changed the Art of War.

              3. And the Leopard 2 and the Challenger.

                NATO doctrine emphasized trading space for time while bleeding the Warsaw Pact white (conversely, Soviet doctrine emphasized more casualties early on to avoid even greater casualties later). The arms build-up in the 80s gave NATO the ability to actually have a chance at doing it.

                1. Three developments in tanks gave NATO a chance – effective stabilized aiming systems allowing fire-on-the-move (developed mostly by the US), the Rheinmetal 120mm smoothbore (Germans) and Chobham armor (Brits). WIth those integrated on vehicles with sufficient powerplants to be really mobile, NATO armor stopped being a speedbump for the massive Red Army armored formations and started to be a threat to a Soviet Sunday Drive Through The Fulda Gap.

                  Add in the advances in non-tank anti-armor weapons (TOW missiles), air superiority (F-15 and especially AWACS), aerial attack (A-10 and Apache for the front, and F-16, F-111 and Tornado for deep interdiction – and maybe the B-1, though I think they were still exclusivley nuclear in the 80s), and artillery (MLRS and the SP tube artillery systems), and the Soviets could no longer assume they could certainly get away with driving to Paris if they decided to kick it off.

                  And add to that the vast improvements in anti-submarine warfare and the revolution in anti-surface warfare triggered by the introduction of the Harpoon missile across the US Navy, and the Soviets could no loger count on interdicting the follow on brigades coming across under REFORGER-for-real.

                  I always hoped that since I could see much of this dwindling chance of success, the Kremiln could as well, but I guess in the end they didn’t – back in 1988 when they kicked it all off and rolled West, and, frustrated by Reagan and Thatcher leading the successful effort to stop the Red Army, the Supreme Soviet escalated to a general nuclear exchange and we all died.

                  Oh, wait, wrong timeline – in this one the Kremlin did figure it out, they didn’t do anything stupid except eventually try to overthrow Gorby in a badly plotted attemped coup, and that was that for the Soviet Empire.

          3. Tom Clancy brought that up in RED STORM RISING. The *East Germans* realized what would happen to *them* if the Soviets brought out the gas, and basically threatened to effectively go neutral if the stuff was used. The Soviets decided they were going to have enough enemies in *front* of them…

            1. The reverse was apparently used in the WW3 novel “Red Army”.

              In any event, mass use of chem weapons is very stupid. Modern armies have counter-measures, and the territory you fought over is effectively ruined by them, meaning you spent lives and material for little gain.

  20. >the MOST unbelievable thing she has is high-class white people in the South being openly racist.  Oh, my, no, that wasn’t done. I know, I lived there at the time.  Forget saying racist things in public.  They wouldn’t even voice a support for free markets in public.  It just wasn’t DONE

    Much may depend on the meaning of public. There may be a generation gap there as well. I knew the woman married to the one time and emeritus Dean of the business school at Emory. She was shocked – both at the sentiments and the public expression – to find her social equals – who may or may not be high class? – were vastly amused at jokes about going to Cancun while O.J. the c…….n went to the can.

    Violence against approved targets always grows. I’d like to see Wobblies stick to folk singing and forget the pepper spray but I don’t expect my wishes to prevail.

    Cabela’s in Lone Tree is always worth a visit if for nothing but the view. Sportsman’s Warehouse has tended to better prices. Bass Warehouse is true destination gorgeous store but not much tactical. TacticalRx is a great place for prescription explicitly for shooting (or other sports) glasses.

    Anybody on the group and around Denver who wants to play with assorted red dot sights and lasers as well as a suppressed bull pup is welcome to shoot mine anytime I’m in the area.

    1. Racial and dirty jokes are guilty pleasures, like a gourmet chief eating a Big Mac. Overt racism is, well, racism, touting one race as superior to another. Such behavior was long frowned upon, which was why our parents were careful to teach us to say “Negro” instead of the common racial term that shall no longer be named,* as “Colored” had fallen out of usage. Then “African American” replaced “Negro,” then “Black” replaced “African American.” Anyway, while the upper classes would never, ever ever espouse racist views, even among themselves, even if they were closet racists. But talking about it? It just wasn’t done.

      The upper class had – and still has – a classist view that’s stronger than racial leanings. They look down their noses at all races equally, whether we’re white or black or whatever. Some weren’t – and aren’t – racist at all, but boy, were they class conscious.

      2. Even the lower classes were less so than you’d think. Racial slurs abounded, but we tended to make distinctions between individuals. A black man who didn’t act like the stereotype was typically treated as an exception.

        My father once told a story (I no longer remember whether he claimed it to be true or not), about a road contractor who was impressed by Dr. King’s crusade, and decided to give coloreds a chance. So he hired a number of Negroes for his work crews.

        Some time later, an acquaintance happened by one of his work sites, and noticed the crews were all-white. He asked why, and was told the following:

        “Well, I tell you, I was disappointed. I hired all them Negroes, and they turned out to be just a bunch of n******!”

        1. Remember the MSM headsplosions when Robert Byrd, Senate parliamentarian par excellence, longest serving senator of all time, twelve years senate Democrat leader, four times President pro tempore, and – at the time of his death – third in the line of presidential succession …

          … uttered the phrase “white [n-word]” on a national broadcast? That was (sorta) the sense in which he was intending the phrase.

  21. The fact that the the left is so afraid of Trump should be a big lightbulb that maybe, just maybe, they might have let the president acquire too much power under Obama. A powerful president is only fun for the people he likes.

    2. The lightbulb may switch on, but there’s no one home.

      /mangling old sayings, my specialty!

  22. Trump’s election was not only a shock to the left, it was a shock to most of the right.

    Yep.

    Thus showing, once again, that doing the best you can even when it’s hopeless works.

    1. Well, it works often enough to be worth doing when there’s nothing better to do.

      There’s an old rule among bridge players. Sometimes the only way to make your contract (or break the opposing one) is if the cards are in a certain distribution, which they probably aren’t. In that case, you play as if the cards were distributed the way you need. If you try to play defensively to minimize your losses, you still lose. If you play for the possible win and the cards aren’t how you need them to be, it costs nothing; you were going to lose anyway. You can play all day and never have one of these gambles pay off, but when it does pay off it can make the difference between winning and losing for the day as a whole.

      (This – pardon me for blithering; I just need to remind myself – this is why I keep writing. It probably won’t pay my bills, but not writing is certain not to pay the bills. With my health and qualifications, I’m not exactly inundated with alternative career choices.)

        1. Or, as the gun nuts are fond of saying, “A .22 in the hand beats a .45 in the bedroom drawer across town.”

  23. Pingback: Culture wars | retiredmustang

  24. In the cold war, what prevented it going hot was Mutual Assured Destruction. Sure, the Soviets were fanatics, but they weren’t the sort of fanatics who want to make sure they die TOO. They wanted to win.

    Back in 1985 in college, I took a course in “Nuclear Policy and Strategy”, taught by a reliably pinko nuclear-freeze-supporting moral-equivalency-type professor. But he assigned us good books with a fairly broad set of viewpoints and approaches.

    The scariest thing I learned in the readings was that there was absolutely zero evidence from their own materials that the Soviets ever bought into the concept of MAD, or that they ever considered nuclear weapons as anything qualitatively different than just Really Big Artillery. Any and all assertions otherwise by western politicians and theorists were pure wishful thinking.

    If I recall correctly, the professor ignored that passage in the readings. Of course.

  25. What a great piece! I have two millennial daughters who need to read and absorb this message desperately. I’ll challenge then to do so but I don’t have faith I’d be successful, such is the power of the brainwash. I’m not a big reader of fiction but after reading all your contributions to Instapundit in the last few years I feel a moral duty to read some of your work. Keep up the good fight!

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