NEKULTURNY

484 thoughts on “NEKULTURNY”

1. Happily on our side, the work doesn’t have to be particularly good to earn an audience — but the story we have for the telling is probably the second greatest ever told … and is semi-sequel to the greatest.

   If only we weren’t afraid of telling it.
   –

2. The thing about the Fascist Left Culture is that they keep pushing it too far. That, as I have pointed out, is built in. They are so afraid of being Bourgeois that they take their ‘tincture of bullshit’ Culture and push it until The Unwashed won’t take it anymore. Look at what is happening to Netflix just now. Something like 90% of their domestically produced content was all Left assumptions, but they just HAD to push the envelope on sexualizing children, and now cancellations are through the roof. Our gracious hostess has shown what’s happening in publishing, and that isn’t the only Cultural realm where the business has moved sideways. Look at Art; the Art World got taken over by Lefty in-jokes and games of Shock The Squares, and now the real collectors’ items are pieces of ‘Commercial art’ (the lower case ‘a’ is deliberate) like the work of LeRoy Neiman.

   1. In order to prove that you have “taste” it’s necessary to separate from the great unwashed masses. It’s the opposite of populism which values being part of those great unwashed masses. So you can pretend that you’re still the minority fighting the man, or you can keep pushing the fringes until you reach an area where you can see what no one else sees and accept what no one else accepts because you’re just that much smarter or more culturally aware or have that much more refined taste. It’s reactionary, of course. Because anyone can be horrified by child drag shows, and you don’t want to be like just anyone.

      1. I like the term, “oikophobia,” which is the fear and hatred of the things your culture values. In this case, the things culture used to value, the “square,” things. Opposite of xenophobia.

         1. And so the children of the revolution were faced with the age-old problem: it wasn’t that you had the wrong kind of government, which was obvious, but that you had the wrong kind of people.
            As soon as you saw people as things to be measured, they didn’t measure up.”
            ― Terry Pratchett, Night Watch

            1. “Our world is as we have made it.”
               “It is cramped and dull. It needs remaking.”
               — Jack Vance, Maske: Thaery

   2. As for art – even Victoriana like Waterhouse, or covers by Norman Rockwell, or sculptures by Frederick Hart. Anything but lefty sniggering and “shock the squares.”

   3. Yes, but that tends to be the preliminary skirmishes.

      True, they can lose — eugenics, anyone? — but pushing too far is generally just a set-back.

      1. Understatement.

      2. That’smwhy we need to reintroduce the idea of ‘vulgar’ to society. Soooooooo much of what the Left enshrines is vulgar drivel, and calling them on it, and insisting that you have the right to say so would puncture so MANY stuffed shirts…

3. We haven’t lost the war yet. If the president wins the opposition party will launch a spectacular popcorn worthy meltdown, If he looses then it I hope the opposition party (their name is not to be spoken) will show thier true colors and the American people react.

4. The point is that THESE PEOPLE AREN’T POLITICAL.

   My mental reaction went something like: well, yes, in the sense that our having three or more kids is “political,” or objecting when we’re called names is “political,” or someone wearing an Obama shirt isn’t political but my having a Bush 2004 sticker on the car was political—
   and then a hint of light hit:

   that’s the evil genius of the “get in their faces” thing. It doesn’t work all the way, it’s still malicious hacking manners, but it also makes being basically lefty into “not political” by raising the costs.

   It’s like the “silence is violence” while they also insist that words they don’t like are violence– it is an attempt to remove options that aren’t politically aligned to their goals.

   No wonder it’s breaking.

   1. The point is that THESE PEOPLE AREN’T POLITICAL.

      So if everything is political, then nothing is?

      There is a general tendency to underestimate just how politically charged ones own views are. The Left has taken it up to eleven. “The GOP is a partisan political party. The Democrats are an apolitical good-government organization espousing nothing but simple common sense.”

      1. So if everything is political, then nothing is?

         No, it’s a matter of gaslighting “neutral” or “nonpolitical”– which works if you’re persuasive and/or overwhelming enough, for a while, but once you start moving too fast…

         Even my Dem relatives are getting nervous because sure, the Democrats Are The Good Guys, but…what is “good guy” going to be tomorrow? Stuff they’ve been OK with for ages is suddenly bad…..

   2. That’s what happens when you use 1984 as an instruction manual.

   3. Yeah, so I’ve found that if you can speak the truth you gain in power when you get in lefty faces because its harder to argue with someone telling the truth. That means you have to understand your own truth, so its harder than you think, so sometimes I fall back to “I don’t think that’s true”.

      Recently on FB, my nephew’s fiance was whining about JK Rowling with some made up fact about her eating trans babies or some nonsense. I just said “I don’t think JKR actually eats babies, I think that’s a slander you got from someone else. Post links or it didn’t happen.” She looped in her trans friend, who repeated more slander, and stated “Trans Women are Women”. “That’s not true, and saying it over and over again doesn’t make it true. I can have sympathy and compassion for people with gender dysphoria, but I can also have good boundaries, and sports, medicine, prison and domestic violence shelters are probably places where sex may be more important than gender.”

      So speak the truth, and speak from compassion with appropriate boundaries.

      1. I have slightly better luck with “Hm, that sounds a bit off– source?” or similar variations– but part of that is that many of the folks I’m arguing with still picture a grade schooler when they think of me. (It is fun when I can “see” them flipping images in their head, because suddenly I turn into my grandmother. The lady reporter. 😀 Who was TERRIFYING.)

         A lot of the rest have simply misplaced their trust– two of those, I’ve managed to get looking into things on their own, and correcting others, which is REALLY nice. 😀

      2. Hey, I’m trans and I don’t hate J K Rowling. Except, maybe, for the last few books of Harry Potter. When I was in the gender community, there were a number of very angrily political transwomen; and the general faith of the community was “only Leftists are good, the Right wants to kill us”. (The belief came in different strengths, and save for a few people it was expressed in jokes I got tired of hearing.) I didn’t act like I believed that, and eventually decided to leave. It was getting uncomfortable. I’ve found life is easier that way.

         Whether I’m a woman or not — well, I don’t go around arguing about it. Different people have different opinions. Nobody has gotten insulting about it, and I don’t feel I’m dishonoring the gender. When parties split up — men to living room, women to kitchen — I usually ended up in the kitchen. That was true when I was a guy, and it’s true now as I’m a gal.

         And I don’t get laughed at for wearing flower prints.

         1. Meh. I’m a woman and I always end up with the guys, unless I have very good female friends in the group.
            Je suis qui je suis et je plais a qui je plais.
            I’ve never found much of a need to fit genre stereotypes one way or another.

            1. That’s funny, you don’t look like Popeye ….

         2. Sounds like you act like an adult.

            FWIW, it’s something that I greatly value in folks, and know if it was EASY then most everybody would do it. Both for folks I disagree with, and agree with; it makes it so that much higher levels of tolerance are possible.

            Tolerance, by definition, means allowing stuff you disagree with. It’s a lot easier to do the polite dance if you’re allowed to avoid the more obvious trouble points.
            😀

            1. I try to keep in mind that Ed Koch’s dictum doesn’t just apply to politics: ”If you agree with me on 9 out of 12 issues, vote for me. If you agree with me on 12 out of 12 issues, see a psychiatrist.”

               Of course, it is easier for me to be tolerant as not everybody has the great fortune to be a wallaby, so y’all just can’t help yourselves.

               While looking up the precise wording of that quote I also came upon this one, particularly useful in our present times: ”You punch me, I punch back. I do not believe it’s good for one’s self-respect to be a punching bag.”
               –

               1. *toothy grin* Yeah, just yesterday ran into a thing talking about how diners who were harassed by BLM thugs were “starting confrontations” by resisting.

                  Oh. Hell. No.

                  1. Right you are! Punching their lights out for such provocation should be legally justified.

                     I also say that shining blinding lights in people’s eyes is ASSAULT, and should be treated as such. Aside from the obvious risk of eye damage, some people can be affected neurologically by bright lights, especially the blinking lights I’ve seen used. And then there are the lasers that can LITERALLY permanently blind people.

                     If somebody points a gun at you, shooting them is self-defense. The same if they’re carrying a club, and get close enough to hit you with it. If the law says differently, the law is an idiot.
                     ———————————
                     Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!!

                     1. I also say that shining blinding lights in people’s eyes is ASSAULT, and should be treated as such.

                        It’s a standard tactic to make it so the target cannot see, thus making them vulnerable to attack.

                        Even if it’s a temporary disability– it is deliberately making someone vulnerable to attack. Which is aggressive action. Which should be treated as such. Similar to not requiring a punch to hit before you respond because you are being attacked.

                        1. I have an ultra powerful flashlight Dan gave me for when I travel alone. For self defense. But yeah, I get that.

   4. ” someone wearing an Obama shirt isn’t political but my having a Bush 2004 sticker on the car was political”

      ^^^^ This

   5. I’ve quietly decided to lay off most of the news for now, simply because I know it’s going to go insane once November hits. I expect things to get worse. People to die, and that nothing will happen, because that’s how it goes when Democrats are not the party in the White House. Every damn time.

      Trump had better win, but for the love of all that’s holy I wish someone on our side had a better grasp of technology and it’s implications and was also advising him. He may be the last President we get who is pro-America, because of his blind side on tech and freedom. (Just my opinion.) Not being trackable by anyone hunting you for your political opinion is a good thing, but that will be gone, if things go badly.

      On good news, son stood up at 8 months (with support) rather abruptly one night, and also sat up with the same sudden plunk onto his diapered butt sudden-ness and gummy grin. He now tries to shove his face into any meal I have, and gets upset if I don’t give him tastes. Well, both the littles are getting better at eating.

      1. ❤ ❤ ❤

5. I’m dreaming again (or at least remembering the dreams) and it means we are in interesting times. *sigh

   1. Sigh.

6. “It wasn’t that we had no culture. It was that those of us who worked in those fields had to pretend to be on the other side so that we could work at all.”

   That’s what the Dems have always done. They suppressed the culture of their Black “staff” and haven’t found a reason to change the tactic in four hundred years.

   When they don’t simply suppress a culture they imagine a wholly false culture and superimpose it, like an abusive spouse casting accusations of infidelity.
   –

   1. That’s what they do.

      And it shouldn’t surprise anyone that their illuminating lights are often themselves, abusive spouses.

7. “Raise your hands brothers and sisters, and say Amen.”

   *Cough* Shouldn’t that be Atran?
   –

   1. A bit of recovery…

      1. Thanks for sharing. Have the album but have never seen that video.

      2. I used to live uptown of the last stop on the A train.— 207th Street Station — and remember singing this with a bunch of my friends on the A train on the way down to Sugar Hill down in Harlem. There were a bunch of German tourists who didn’t know what to make of us. God only knows what they thought they were doing there in the first place.

         FYI and because I’m an NYC nerd, the A train is the longest line on the system going from 207th St in Manhattan to Far Rockaway in Queens.

         If there are any Jim Carroll of All the People Who Died fame here,. he lived on 207th Street just off Broadway. people in the neighborhood used to pick him up and take him home to his mother when he’d. … overindulged.

      3. Heh. I knew a lady (she was a fellow missionary with me back in 2002-2003, but unlike the rest of us young’ins was in her sixties) who in a former life had been a Vegas showgirl. And had once had dinner with Duke Ellington.

         I thought that was sooooo cool. And the young man in that same group who was a jazz musician (and the son of a jazz musician) almost expired on the spot from awed jealousy, lol.

      4. Thanks – glad to see planted bulbs take root. I’d no doubt somebody here would fade the pass.
         –

8. “They construct these straw men, and never actually seem to realize they’re completely wrong.”

   That’s because they aren’t – we are.

   We are guilty of not fitting into the costumes they’ve made for us, not following the scripts written for us, and not chewing the scenery they’ve constructed for us.

   We have failed to live up to their expectations and they are very disappointed in us.

   They’d cut off our allowances were they not dependent on us.
   –

9. i AM in a writers’ group, which has been a psychological goad and encouragement. I am libertarian, a second amendment supporter, atheist, a combat veteran… of course I run smack into other ideas and bents. But in the last few years I’ve noticed a worsening. Fully adult people who have so fully accepted leftist polylogisms that it is almost impossible to point out realities of economics or social behaviour.
   My recently published sci-fi, Longest Run, let me get in some ideas among the action. Of course some of those ideas are for fantasy’s sake, but writing about people and their interrelationships is probably the best current route for the advocacy of freedom.

10. “I’ve now for some time been getting the sense I should leave my beloved Denver. For, oh, a little over a year, now. At the same time events have conspired to make it impossible for us to leave under two years.”

    You’ve said before that when the Portugese leave a bad situation, it’s “too late”. Maybe you should consider that you’re from Portugal and two years might be “too late”.

    1. It’s already too late for Denver. It was too late before Sarah moved there. It’s totally not her fault.

       1. There’s no fault in it. Her timing is just probably off.

    2. I have considered, but I’d only drive myself insane. For reasons, both of commitments and monetary we CAN’T leave earlier.

       1. Have you forgotten your Heinlein? Get your immediate bug out plans in order, and pray for two more years. Be ready to exit, stage left, with your firearm(s) and all the ammo and food you can carry.

          1. Point of interest – there’s a Victorian priest named Heinlein who wrote a book on Purgatory. I have the urge to get a print copy of that and Job: A Comedy of Justice, sit them next to each other on a shelf, and see if they explode.

             1. For science, it must be done. *grin*

          2. That, always. And the cats, and a few things of personal significance. We live in fire country. We’re always ready to do that.
             I just don’t want to “run with clothes on my back” until there’s no other alternative.

             1. If nothing else you want something to cover the belt of Krugerrands around your midriff.

                Them’s the kind of love handles ladies like!
                –

11. Great article on Revolutionary Russia and it’s parallels with the current woes:

    https://www.firstthings.com/article/2020/10/suicide-of-the-liberals

    I notice that most accounts of the Bolshevik Revolution don’t mention the acts of terrorism and torture carried out by the noble Marxist revolutionaries. I wonder why?

    1. The winner’s write their history. They pick & choose how to not present it. Anyone on the losing side, isn’t there, or keeps out of the spotlight.

    2. That article explains a LOT. I had wondered what sort of diabolical psych-warfare geniuses had dreamed up the current plan for destroying America. But they didn’t have to dream it up. They’re just following the script of their own history, a century earlier. No geniuses necessary, just ordinary apparatchiks.

       Still doesn’t tell us how to change their script, but it tells us they probably can’t adapt if we do. Their plan is brittle.

       1. It is also why I have been warning that even though the current lot of Marxist revolutionaries are a minority, that their willingness to do anything with no limit, the tacit if not open support of institutions that have been taken over by the long march and the sclerotic nature of those who should be more active in opposing them makes the Marxists a much more dangerous threat than many give them credit for. And as predicted, the campus nonsense has spilled out rapidly into society at large, Mao’s Cultural Revolution style.

       2. That explains the Everlasting Gobst Hissyfit since election night four years ago – things went off script, HARD.

    3. An intelligent could not be a believer, which is another reason no one would have considered Tolstoy (let alone that conservative Dostoevsky) an intelligent. They accepted atheism on faith, were spiritually devoted to materialism, and proselytized determinism. They based these commitments on “science,” a word they used to mean not a disinterested process of discovery based on experiment and evidence, but—and here the reason became perfectly circular —a metaphysics of materialism and determinism.

       Still worse, intelligentsia “science” entailed an assertion that the world worked by blind, purposeless force and yet, as if guided by providence, was guaranteed to progress in human terms and reach moral perfection. (As people say today, the arc of history bends toward justice.)

       Christ. That’s pretty much a renewal of the same stuff from a century ago brought forward to today.

       1. It’s the ONLY playbook they have.

          1. And they call *us* unimaginative? ¬_¬

             1. Projection is their favorite tactic. even beating violence, because some have the minimal awareness that they could get punched back

                1. Minimal is right.

12. Just remember, they can’t help but undermine themselves. Consider the example of Posner.

13. c4c

14. I sit here in a mixture of sadness and anger.

    Sadness-most of the evergreen have died. Comic books? You either go indie or get beaten over the head with Social Justice messaging-not even well done social justice messaging. Hell, if they could Mean Girls Warren Ellis-Warren f(YAY!)king Ellis-out of the comic book industry over poor flirtation techniques of the ’90s and ’00s, using the language that every man is just a rapist waiting for the right change of winds, you start getting worried.

    TV? I can’t think of a show I want to watch, now or coming up soon. I’ve already burned my Netflix account. I would rather have a VPN and sail the high seas to watch “The Mandelorian” than give Disney a single dime. Even the “home improvement” shows are getting Woke to a terrible degree. And, CNN keeps trotting out their Anderson Cooper Vocaloid/poor ’90s vintage Max Headroom CGI doll to try and convince us that human beings can actually say these kinds of things.

    Movies? I wanted to see “Tenet,” but everything suggests that even Christopher Nolan has been infected by the Martian Brain Fungus. You can kill all the men and boys you want, but God help you if you even think of really harming a woman. Or a black man. Or especially a black woman. “No Time To Die” got a tone writer to avoid any #MeToo issues coming up-for James Bond. “Dune” has remapped half the characters and forgotten what “Dune” actually is-the “Venture Brothers” writ large. There is not a single MCU movie I want to see after “Endgame” (and, Jesus fucking wept was that a mess that was hidden by all the nostalgia of walking into a theater in ’06 and watching RDJ become fucking Iron Man and just blowing door after door after door off with the MCU.)

    Books? Outside of Baen Books-the only thing I can find that I want coming up soon in fiction is a Richard M. Morgan novel I might want to read. That’s it. That’s all. Okay, maybe the next “Dresden Files” novel, but that’s sad…

    Anime and Manga? Funmation got it’s fingers caught in the cookie jar for censoring a heavily fan-service show. What do they do? Change the ads and promo material to remove any anti-censorship stances. “Uzaki-Chan Wants To Hang Out” done well is free money for the taking. They cast for the dub a woman that sounds more like a screechy, whiny shrew. Manga and anime producers have been getting irritated in Japan about US censorship-enough that they might stop licensing materials and enforce copyright laws to prevent importation.

    Then, we get to the anger part. Every single person guilty of this was, not that long ago, screaming about “censorship” and “having their voice taken away” and demanding that we need to listen to everyone and give every voice at least one try.

    I am hopeful that this upcoming election will be yet another ringing of the bell of the Woke Left-that too many people have seen their masks coming off and we know what kind of monsters they are underneath. But, there are still far, far too many people that believe and they are going to share their pain when they discover just how clay the feet of their deity is.

    Stay safe. Stay sane. And shoot straight when you have to.

    1. Hey. I”ll be writing books. Indie. Probably releasing soon. Keep an eye out 😉

       1. I hope I won’t need to–that is, I don’t have particular confidence *you’ll* remember to tell us (neck-deep in the next story, with luck), RES is always pretty good about providing links in the comments 😉

          1. I do at least kind of wave at promo…. sometimes.

       2. Fingers, toes, and several adjectives crossed.

          And, good news! My first book has made…(checks KDP) enough money to buy one of my sister’s overdone coffee drinks at Starbucks. Happy, happy, joy, joy!

       3. Thank God for indie!

          1. with bells on. 😀

    2. Speaking of VPNs and “sailing the high seas” for shows, there’s an interesting little site called ulozto.net where one can, so to speak, sail some of those high seas for the likes of The Mandalorian.

    3. I keep pondering a higher gain TV antenna, but keep realizing at this point it’s purely a technical exercise rather than something that I would truly benefit from. As it is, I *almost* get one transmitter (two stations, one CBS, one Fox). Even if I got more… so what?

15. In the meantime Sargon is streaming. Title of the stream?

    “The Pressure is Rising”, with a screenshot of Bane.

    1. Link? I like the acadian one, but don’t want to go looking.

16. Straw Larry comes to mind.

    /audience_response “I hate that guy!”

    Other things come to mind, as well. For instance, at this time ultimate victory over the Left is a lot like ultimate victory over the Gadiantons in the Book of Mormon. It isn’t going to happen in this generation. I won’t bore the non-LDS here (i.e. most of you) with the details. The important part is this: no matter how soundly they’re defeated, they’ll spring back up in a generation. Ultimate victory is possible, but it’ll be a long slog, and won’t be in our lifetimes short of an act of The Author (and the event that marked their permanent demise was both an horrific tragedy quickly followed by – for the survivors – one of the most wonderful things ever).

    1. On the positive side, President Trump just issued an anti-critical race theory executive order. Here’s hoping it lasts past the end of January…

       1. And that leftist judges don’t overturn the order, which is why Trump winning and the Republicans holding the Senate is so vital (if Democrats get the Senate, even if Trump wins, expect a never ending string of leftist wish lists to be passed that Trump has to veto, weekly impeachments, and Senate inquisitions added to the House ones. They will not confirm a single Trump appointment and will do everything they can to bring the presidency to a screeching halt well beyond what they have done the past 4 years.

          1. This particular EO might be a bit difficult for a judge to order overturned – at least with a coherent argument. The Constitution grants Trump control over the entirety of the executive branch. And the EO includes some fairly grounded reasoning within it to justify the order. Sure, a rogue judge can block it. But the appeals should support the EO. I suspect that even an en banc in the notorious 9th Circuit would uphold it. And there’s no question that the Supreme Court as currently constituted (plus Ginsberg’s replacement) itself would have no problem with it.

             A president who took steps to undo Trump’s shift to the Supreme Court would rescind the EO long before it was appealed to that court.

    2. I keep joking to my family that this isn’t the part of the Book of Mormon I wanted to live through.

       1. Right???? I mean, Captain Moroni, etc and all was awesome…but I can’t imagine that actually LIVING through all of that was in any way enjoyable.

          (And this is me hoping fervently it’s THAT bit, and not the end bits from the books of Mormon and Moroni. I know that will turn up again at some point, but please can we not have THAT bit this soon?)

          1. I would think that the closer parallel would be late Helaman, or very early 3 Nephi.

             /shudder

             1. Ack, please no. That was the runup to the horrors at the end bits.

                (Though having just finished Ether again, LET’S NOT DO THAT EITHER.)

    3. I have found myself wondering recently if what we are seeing isn’t the Gadiantons of old making a comeback. You just KNOW those oaths and secrets were waiting somewhere, sigh.

       I’m taking a little comfort in the fact that Marxists are incompetent at everything, and so Marxists-as-Gadiantons really kind of suck. But yes, they ARE persistent weeds…

       1. I’m pretty sure those have been around again for a while.
          Underhanded dealings in smokey backrooms are nothing new; in business or politics. (Including assassinations.)
          Only the names and dates have changed.

       2. MS-13 (and similar orgs) might be a bit more appropriate for that kind of thinking.

          1. Hmmm. Yes, given the more…arcane practices embraced by MS-13 and the like, you are probably right. Still, I think a lot more people than we’d care to know about have likely sold their souls–possibly more than figuratively–for access to power…I doubt the Enemy operates out of only one playbook.

             ‘Course, he still won’t win in the end. He knows that, but he wants to drag as many down into misery with him as possible, sigh.

17. Unlike Sarah, I never had to be in the closet, politically. I was raised on the other side of the fence from the start. (My dad didn’t say much about politics, but he got material from the John Birch Society well into the 60’s. I don’t know that he was actually a member, or whether he let his membership lapse, but material stopped coming about when the society went off into the weeds,) And I, omnivorous reader than I am, absorbed it. And my school teachers, from rural Southeastern Arizona, were politically conservative. And my religious leaders were notably anti-Communist, and explained how and why Communism (and socialism as well) was a counterfeit of Christian charity. But yes, most of the media has been increasingly controlled by the leftists, and declining in quality …perhaps not coincidentally, though I haven’t studied the history of the media, yet… as long as I have been aware.

18. Yesterday husband said he really couldn’t even stand anything but rom coms. The first one he put up was SUCH a spectacular piece of lefty bullsh*t even he noticed. While I sat there horrified, for once actually watching, mouth agape at the non-stop bullshit, he was seemingly not reacting. And I know that though our political opinions are not that different, he’s by and large WAY more tolerant about this crap than I

    Crunchy Roll.

    It’s free with commercials, and I’m sure folks here can offer a TON of really cute series suggestions. If he tries it and likes it, I can send a “premium plus guest pass” for a two day trial of what it’s like for the paid service.

    There are a TON of just…relaxing, nonpolitical fluff, and some of them are even dubbed rather than subbed. (I can’t vouch for most of the dubs, I like subtitles, even if I end up watching second hand as well.)

    Example, though this one is maaaaassive cheese:
    https://www.crunchyroll.com/my-next-life-as-a-villainess-all-routes-lead-to-doom/episode-1-i-recalled-the-memories-of-my-past-life-795466?t=2

    A funny romantic comedy:
    MY love STORY!!
    (search for it; the title character is not the pretty boy)

    I prefer either Cells at Work (edutainment that is horribly funny and sweet) or the food shows, like Restaurant to Another World or the extremely amusingly explicit about food being like sex Food Wars.

    1. I second Cells at Work. RBC and WBC are so cute.

       Magi: Labyrinth of Magic is great if you want to get completely out of the real world. Also Gundam Build Divers Re:Rise.

       I’ve watched the first few eps of Fate/Grand Order: Absolute Demonic Front Babylonia, and will probably get through the rest of that as I have time, just for their take on Gilgamesh.

       I honestly think his speech here fits the theme of the day. 🙂

    2. Heck, point him at One Piece. That should provide enough for several lifetimes alone. And its funny.

       1. I’m not sure how much of One Piece assumes folks speak anime tropes, though.

          1. It doesn’t matter. You get more foreshadowing if you know the tropes, but they’re mostly lampshaded by having the character behave rationally given the circumstances.

             Except Zoro. You just have to remover that cannonically he has an infinite amount of blood. I personally think he’s actually that form of Oriental undead that’s motivated by sheer force of will, but I don’t think that’s ever actually been addressed.

             1. Not those tropes, the things like “of course there’s nothing odd about young teens running around like they’re early 20s” and, oh *looks at Inu Yasha* that is a dude, and … there can be a learning curve for “wait, WHAT?”

                1. You’re referring to Sesshōmaru as “that is a dude”, correct?

                   1. More likely Jakotsu of the Band Of Seven.

                   2. He wasn’t the first one I saw, so by the time I met him I’d figured out the “style.”

                      But this is a good excuse to post fan art I ran into:
                      

             2. I think I figured out a way to explain what I’m trying to explain– it would be like watching a musical for the first time without knowing that people will suddenly start singing and committing choreography.

       2. I watched -all- of Bleach. The whole thing. Took ages. Wasn’t bored.

          I hear there will maybe be more Bleach in 2021. I’m ready. ~:D

    3. There’s also the live-action Korean and Chinese stuff. Series from mainland China might put in some pro-China comments. But the Mandarin-language stuff from Taiwan and Singapore doesn’t care.

       The Korean stuff tends to be more popular.

       1. Oh my gosh, DAD OF LIGHT!

          ❤

          1. Yup!

             As an avid FFXIV player, I keep meaning to watch that. But it keeps slipping my mind. Sounds pretty heart-warming.

             1. Very catharsis. Much laugh and cry.

                …reality has a say, one of the actors passed away, so it will stay an 8 episode miniseries.

          2. That really makes me want to go chase a plot bunny. The problem is I really have no clue what decent reason the posthomous character built a sentient F-14 RIO into a VR flight sim.

             1. Because he can?

                Seriously, how long have you been here?

                😛

             2. …because it’s cool?

                1. I’m actually thinking it would be more along the tragic side of things. It would likely also need to be an anime/machina type series which would seriously raise the difficulty level.

                   The plot bunny scene is an animated sequence where a, sort of, tween girl who is helping go through the estate of a late old male relative. I’m thinking somewhat eccentric, withdrawn and distant (but I don’t know why yet). One of his, apparent passions was flight, and he had a VR simpit setup.

                   Out of sort of idle curiosity, she tries it and is dropped in the middle of where he last had it set. The visual style also switches to the hyper-realistic machinima style here (YouTube DCS F-14 videos) I’m thinking prepped for a carrier launch, and the RIO kicks it off by asking “him” (her) what are they waiting for, you gonna (do the thing that triggers the launch). (Cue dramatic busting through the cloud later visuals)

                   As things progress the AI RIO realizes that this isn’t his pilot, and it becomes apparent that he’s more than just a set of scripts.

                   I’m thinking what would progress from there would be a dual narrative, with, on the Gibli style animated world, she’s going through all the challenges of being a near teenager in a new school, after a significant family upheaval, while in the machinima world, she’s going through, likely, both the war time experiences that the late male relative was never fully able to come to terms with and the love of flight that those experiences had bent, and drawing on the lessons to become a more mature individual.

                   I can see shapes of it, but not most of it yet.

                2. Seriously. The (very good) video game ‘Independence War’ made a dead war hero your AI assistant in defiance of the existing technology within the setting (there are no other known examples of brain-scanning mentioned in any of the games; and the character in question makes it clear that he’s as clueless about why he’s an AI as everyone else is) so far as I can tell “because they could”.

       2. He used to watch tons of Korean soap operas and movies. Like me, he’s not an anime person.

          1. You could have him post his recommendations on the blog.

       3. I welcome specific recommendations for K-dramas, Bollywood movies, anime, and other stuff. The western film and television entertainment industry needs to spend forty years in the wilderness.

          1. And how. There have been a few bright spots–Stranger Things, the Mandalorian, even–on “mainstream” tv–the Rookie–but…

             Netflix is cancelled in my house. We might sail the high seas for sesason 4 of Stranger Things, but if that isn’t possible, we won’t be giving a penny to Netflix ever again even if it means no more Stranger Things.

             As to the Mandalorian…currently the trans-bullies are trying to cancel the actress playing the awesome mercenary. Because she (rather gently) mocked their insistence that EVERYONE had to have pronouns in their twitter handle. And then when they threw a fit about that, she told them they were a bunch of nasty little bullies and were causing far bigger problems for trans folk than anyone else ever could. So they are currently trying to get Disney to fire her. If Disney caves, I’ll be giving up on the Mandalorian. (I have fewer issues with the MCU than some, but they may yet screw that up…)

             (I’m less worried about the rumors that the Mandalorian actor threw a fit about having to keep wearing the helmet and quit/was fired. Frankly, it could be anyone under there, and so long as the voice actor sounds somewhat similar, I’m not sure anyone would care. Which of course might be the source of the temper tantrum, but…dude. You knew what was expected when you signed up, so grow up.)

             Lately, I’m content with watching older stuff on hulu. Burn Notice is proving fun, and doesn’t veer so hard into the “lefty garbage” as to be unwatchable.

             1. I won’t even watch Stranger Things.the actors on that show made it clear they don’t want my money.

                1. A lot of that (and I don’t generally seek out what actors have to say outside their shows/films) I do generally put down to “Has to stay this stuff just to survive.” I spent long enough in academia as a student to know how that goes. (And the most obnoxious one–the guy that plays the sheriff…well, he’s just one, and has largely shut up recently… Most of the rest of the cast are kids, and so…yeah.) There are a few out there, though, that have indicated not just that they drank the koolaid, but that they did so willingly and wish to force it on others, and THOSE I will definitely not give my money to.

                   (I was originally inclined to give the actress in live-action Mulan a little bit of a pass–if one is a Chinese actor in China, one must say/agree with certain things…but then I found out she’s actually an American. So yeah, no, no excuse there honey.)

                   1. I’m talking about the little speech at (iirc) the Emmys a few years ago.

                      1. Ah, well, I avoid awards shows like the plague–including news of them (except, on occasion, the photo lineups of what people wore, because amidst the “that’s a nice dress” there is so much “WTF WERE YOU THINKING”–so there you go. (I fail to see any interest in a bunch of spoiled celebrities virtue signaling at one another and patting themselves on the back so hard they sprain something.)

                         1. Award shows tend to exacerbate the worst industry flaws, especially now that the “Thank-you” speeches are used as opportunities to virtue signal. Ricky Gervais had it right when he told them

                            Apple roared into the TV game with The Morning Show, a superb drama about the importance of dignity and doing the right thing, made by a company that runs sweatshops in China. Well, you say you’re woke but the companies you work for in China — unbelievable. Apple, Amazon, Disney. If ISIS started a streaming service you’d call your agent, wouldn’t you?

                            So if you do win an award tonight, don’t use it as a platform to make a political speech. You’re in no position to lecture the public about anything. You know nothing about the real world. Most of you spent less time in school than Greta Thunberg.

                            So if you win, come up, accept your little award, thank your agent, and your God and f*** off, OK? It’s already three hours long.

                            Which is why Gervais isn’t doing any more award shows. He may be a prat and a jerk but he’s obviously sat in a pub watching people watch those shows.
                            –

                            1. Drat – that second inset (Which is why Gervais isn’t doing any more …) was supposed to END the blockquote, not initiate an additional one.

                               Dummkopf.
                               –

                            2. During the Epstein part:
                               

                            3. 

                            4. While I have no doubt that Ricky Gervais and I would see eye-to-eye on very few things…that speech (the bits I caught later–as I said, I don’t watch awards shows, lol) made him my hero on that front.

                               Even better: He *continues* to call them out on their howling hypocrisy. I do admire him for not cowering before the wrath of the cancel culture. 😀

                         2. Also, Foxfier: I also quite like Mr. Adam Driver after this. His evil grin was priceless!!!

                            1. It’s seriously “Oh. Yeah, thaaaaat’s the Marine.”

                   2. I do find myself impressed, however, by those who speak out knowing it will not help their careers. People like Clint Eastwood, David Mamet, Tom Selleck, Nick Searcy, Janine Turner, Dean Cain, Chris Pratt, Jim Caviezel and others. They value Truth above the “friendship” of their felloe professionals.

                      More importantly, they provide reassurance to those who fear for careers if they speak out (I doubt many make-up artists, sound tech, wardrobe workers or other craft areas feel secure in voicing dissident opinions.
                      –

                      1. Yeah. I’m a BIG fan of Jim Caviezel. Can’t wait until the movie he’s doing about the guy who started the Underground Railroad rescue group comes out. 😀

                         (Also a big fan of Adam Baldwin, though I haven’t seen him in much since Chuck ended. Admittedly, I haven’t been watching a ton either.)

                         1. He spent five (? Seems about right; maybe four, maybe six) as Ship’s EC on TBS’ SF series The Last Ship … where they did not give him enough to do, but it was okay if you didn’t think much about what they was doing.

                            If you haven’t caught his performance in My Bodyguard you owe yourself that.
                            –

                            1. Holy cow, is he ever young in that!!!! I’ll definitely add that to the watchlist.

                               He was a delightful riot in Chuck. He took what *might* have originally been intended as a parody of ‘conservative military type’ and changed it into something that, while still as much a send-up of various tropes as everything else about that show, was genuinely likeable. And his character had a great arc, starting out as “willing to kill the titular character on orders because he doesn’t care about anything but his duty anymore” to “family man with loving friends and a fantastic life built beyond the spy game.”

                               And apparently, he and the special forces guys he called in for a favor do an AMAZING job of last minute wedding decor 😀

                               I also greatly respect the fact that when asked what his job is, he responds “Parent. For money, I act.”

                      2. If film/TV is anything like theater, when I was doing that in the late 80s early 90s, those on the technical side will tend more conservative than the on-stage talent. Among each other anyways, when little ears, so to speak, aren’t listening; and for low values of conservative.

          2. I really enjoyed the Korean series Mr. Sunshine. Set in Korea (Joseon, at the time) at the start of the Twentieth Century, and Japan is slowly taking over the country. There’s an ahistorical American military mission on the Peninsula (though the battle at the start of the series was a real battle, and is pretty accurately depicted), and I’m pretty sure that some of the Japanese attitudes shown in the series are anachronistic, and came about well *after* the Russo-Japanese War (which occurs mid-way through the series), and partly as a result of it.

             There’s romance, but it’s definitely not a comedy (and repeatedly reminds you of this fact).

    4. Sword Art Online. Any season. You will stand up in front of your TV and scream encouragement as the characters kick the bad guys asses.

       Or maybe that’s just me. ~:D

       I also very highly recommend One Punch Man because it’s a laugh. Seriously, you’ll giggle.

       You want some nice squishy romance, “Is it Wrong To Try To Pick Up Girls In A Dungeon?”

       Then there’s Fire Force (“Enen No Shouboutai”) which is just fun and weird.

       And Hollywood has NOTHING that even comes close. Nothing. Screw Hollywood. Watch the anime. It’s fun.

       1. I’m fond of Reincarnated as a Slime, but that one is silly half-boiled mythology fun. ❤

          1. Still a good one, though. *chuckle*

    5. For something light and rather silly, but lots of fun, give ‘Ben-To’ a look. If that’s not silly enough for ya, try ‘Ramen Fighter Miki’.

       ‘The Devil Is A Part-Timer’ is another fun one.

       1. I forget the title, but I bought the DVDs when I was taking Japanese; but there’s a great Japanese live action show with a detective who solves crimes based off food.

    6. I like anime but I like it dubbed so Funimation going off the woke end really grinds my gears.

       1. Funimation is Sony so whaddya expect? Evil gotta evil.

          1. Like Google then.

    7. If you want a show that makes you feel good, “Flying Witch” is pure comfort with a nice solid layer of comedy. Once you run out of anime episodes, the manga are still wonderful.

       Likewise, “Laid Back Camp” is cute girls doing cute things, with great music and beautiful scenery.

       “Non Non Biyori” is the prime example of “shows that make you feel good.” A ten year old city girl moves to a tiny village in the boondocks in Japan.

       One show that most people missed is “Hozuki’s Coolheadedness,” a slice of life workplace comedy set in Japanese Hell. Yes, really. Lots of Japanese culture/religious jokes, but great characters.

       If you shift to manga-only, “Komi Can’t Communicate” is very funny and very charming (though it does have a bit of leftness, it’s mostly used for comedy, like the one character of indeterminate gender).

       1. Hozuki is awesome! Maybe not the show to watch on Sunday, and the episode with Satan visiting Yama is eh. But it gets weirder and better as it goes along, and does a good job explaining the Japanese and Chinese hells.

19. “All things pass. Some pass like a kidney stone.”

    I do not remember where I saw that quote, sorry.

    1. I recall someone describing a day/event as “I passed a kidney stone – and that was the LEAST painful part of my day.”

       1. Neither of my kidney stones was a pain to pass, although the first case I was anaesthetized and in the second, I had lithotripsy.

          On the other hand, I have said “When I woke up this morning, the cat was barfing on me. Things have gone downhill since then.”

20. Madame, would you kindly remove your boot from my backside? I’m writing as fast as I can!

    Actually, good news – we both are. As the docs predicted, as we close in on a year from Peter’s last heart attack, his body has adjusted to the new cocktail of meds, and he’s started writing again. Given I’m doing fairly well with the current asthma meds myself, I’m tempted to see if we can do a “research trip” along whatever path his western hero will be driving cattle next. You know, where he charts by old trails that have often become highways or tiny back roads, and I add stops for coffee shops and book stores, and we both happily agree on riding a steam train together…

    We’ll see! Now that I know I have to plan for a time when salt cedar is not polleniforously polluting the western air, this may yet be possible!

    1. I get a kick out of the State of Oregon’s take on Jesse Applegate. That he was only a so-so surveying engineer … ummm … most of I-5 follows the southern route he surveyed into Oregon. Not to mention the early route from the north along the west side of the valley (known as Territorial Road).

21. Yeah, I’ve gone optimistic again.

    In 2016 HRC pulled the Democrats crazy with her, and started trying for a civil war.

    Maybe covid was a new push on that. Floyd definitely was the start of a push.

    Which was meant to have consequences different from what it did have.

    Their fighters are clearly habitual criminals. They get convicted over and over again because they are not exactly the most disciplined, intelligent, or focused on the long term. They aren’t able to manage targeting and attacks to alienate the fewest people.

    The ‘hail fellow, well met’ reflexive supporters? It isn’t that they are stupid or ignorant, necessarily, but they don’t have the frame of mind to see what is going on for the exact same reasons they aren’t ready to fight a civil war. These are not fanatic and officer grade people; they don’t know what is going on, how to fight, or what is worth sacrificing for whatever goal.

    Okay, they have an advantage where e-mobs, journalism, and deep state federal law enforcement is concerned. Which they are ruining with incompetence because they are driven by insanity. The stage management is prepared for immediate responses that are violent, but has trouble not falling apart when people wait.

    Does that mean that the answer is always wait? No. But careful and narrow targeting matters.

    1. There is a push to get a street (re)named for George Floyd.
       If they do, I’d like to see a street that cross it get (re)named for Lloyd George.
       Not that I care much, really, but given the one, the intersection deserves to exist for the comedy that may ensue..

       1. In the Kansas City metro area, the numbered streets run east-west and named north-south. Except in Kansas City Kansas, where the numbered streets run north-south and the named east-west. The intersection of 48th and 48th is interesting …

          1. Where $SISTAUR used to live, I was once give directions that included, “Drive past $ThisStreet. Go about two block. NOW turn right onto $ThisStreet.” Why, yes, Minneapolis streets makes NO damn sense. GPS, for all its faults, is the best bet there.

             1. Ccourse, there was Boston where I was visiting a friend. I once walked a half a mile without turning, yet trod on at least three different streets.

                1. Houston has streets that aren’t apparently related with the same name and the same actual street has multiple names. I could travel down Bammel-North Houston, and Champion Forest, and then Bammel-North Houston again, and then North Houston-Rosslyn, and then Bingle and then Voss and then Hillcroft without making a turn.

                   And don’t get me started about “Post Oak”

             2. On my way to a craft fair in Charlotte, NC once, I passed the intersection of West, King, Queens, AND Queens street. That was a fun drive…

                1. Our cat doctor was at the intersection of Sharon and Sharon, after you passed Sharon. Don’t ask. First time we went there, we got so lost. I don’t know who Sharon was, but Charlotte, NC LOVES her.

                   1. Ugh. When I lived south of Denver and was part owner in a housecleaning business (NEVER AGAIN!!!) I *hated* anything that was in places like Highlands Ranch. So many street names were the same, just with “ave” or “blvd” or something after…and of course, they were cookie cutter houses to boot, with the same 4 bland approved colors…

                      1. See and raise you – I live in a small suburb in NE San Antonio where all the streets save one are Spring-something-or-other-no-street/avenue designation. Every variant of ‘Spring” save one called “Spring Roll”. (Yes, we checked the map.) I don’t know how many totally lost drivers we have assisted, before geo-location.
                         As an aside, we eventually noted that there were small springs and seeps everywhere, and a mostly-free running small seasonal creek. So – ahah! That’s howcome the name of the subdivision!

                         1. Almost definitely smaller, but was impressive enough to go to the Washington State Fair– some place called Pine Forest had all the roads named after Pine trees, AND had that horrible, wiggling road pattern that they seem to love for suburbs, but on top of a Washington forest canyon type foundation.

                            In the middle of a crud ton of trees.

                            *ALL* of the idiots had their “little cabins” (average+ size houses, but expensive rustic) snug up against the trees, because it was soooo preeeetttyyyyy……

                            They ended up in the middle of one of those big fires.

                            If I remember correctly, it was sheer luck and the passes being closed (vacation homes) that kept anybody from dying, but the place was a massive loss.

                            They actually got a warning in time for local fire fighters to try to show up adn fight…but the roads were so complicated and badly named, they COULDN’T FIND THEIR WAY TO TH FIRE.

                      2. I went to high school in Atlanta, where one of my buddies was a pizza driver. He claimed that, contrary to popular belief, there was only ONE Peachtree Street in the entire city. It was just that it followed him around…

                         1. Hehehe, sounds like the start of a good creepypasta. Or entry for the SCP…

                   2. Sharon? She was one of the Gorrah sisters, Sharon Beatrice, or as she usually signed it, Sharon B. Gorrah. They were a load of fun!

                      I confess, back before I completely gave up on NPR I used to hanker after sponsoring a March 17 in the name of Cher and B Gorrah.
                      –

             3. Back in the days when I was a supplier Quality engineer for GM, I was in a city in Indiana (they tended to blend together when you were in 3-4 cities a week) and there was a Street Road, and Boulevard Avenue. They didn’t meet, unfortunately.

                1. Long ago, when America was young, many villages and towns developed no more than a day’s good walk from on the other. Street names were commonly replicated, one town to another, taking after prominent area personages or geographical features, such as a creek.

                   Over time and as travel became more common, many of these villages and towns grew, eventually merging and, being somewhat lax, not reconciling replicated street names.

                   Alternatively, as Beloved Spouse speculates, some places figure if you cannot figure out the intersection of High Street, High Lane, High Way and High Drive – you don’t belong ’round here.
                   –

                   1. Seeing Like a State used street names and design as a prime example of “legible” or not social structures.

             4. When we wolves in the UK we lived on Middle Way, you got there by turning off The Street and if you hit The Lane you had gone too far.

                1. Bud & Lou are dying of envy.
                   –

                   1. 3rd base

       2. Meet me at George and George?

          1. And/or Lloyd & Floyd…

             “Floyd George? George Floyd? George Lloyd? Kentucky Froid? Sigmund, is that you?”

             1. Everything in Atlanta seems to have to do with peaches.

                1. Washington state– presidents, bad George Washington puns, and “did a cat run across the keyboard and you asked a toddler to read it for you?” names.

                   1. We lived in Richmond, NC. Everything was either Colonial Something or vaguely Pocahontas-related. (Except for Boulevard. Not any KIND of boulevard, just an entire street named Boulevard.) Some of it legit – as a Southerner of long standing, I was always amused by the existence of Powhite Parkway.

                      1. that would be Richmond, VA.

                         Boulevard has been renamed ‘Arthur Ashe Boulevard” as of last year.

                      2. There’s a Boulevard around here, too.

          2. There would need to be a classic British pub there, named The Dragon.

             Possibly one at each corner: The Dragon, The Flagon, The Chalice and The Palace.
             –

             1. There’s a pub in Sussex called The Mucky Duck. they have Real Ale.

             2. Then later, when The Chalice and The Palace are destroyed in a freak tornado, build The Vessel and The Pestle in their place.

             3. Does the flagon with the dragon hold the brew that is true?

22. I thought I had conservative friends. Apparently we’re all not talking about it online leaving only those who have always been outspoken (lib and not) and those saying positionally good statements. All smart people know…. All good people think…. It’s odd. Weirdly threatening. I make a point to contact via other channels, text or email because I have an irrational dislike of social media, and several are just not talking. Which is encouraging.

    I’ve been wondering if we could set up a tor type system to host blogs such as yours. Mitigate against single point failure or attack in the everyman level. Or perhaps start keeping backups of blogs that made me think in case they are shutdown. And then, IDK, bootleg blogs? “Psst, check out the stuff on this usb stick. You won’t believe it!”

    1. Samizdat blogs may become a thing.

       1. The mostly-Brit, mostly-libertarian blog Samizadata has been around roughly as long as Instapundit.

          1. I don’t think that’s what he means. 😉

       2. Something that spammers and scammers and search engine optimizers (but I repeat myself) have done for ages is put unrelated sites into the middle of other sites. You might, for example, find a young lady’s “personal” web page on a site that for a company that sells roofing materials.

    2. I view usenet, mailing lists, blogs, and forums as “social media.” But the modern meaning seems to require “corporate, single-point-of-control”.

       1. Harnessed pseudo-social media.

          1. Or, as someone said, “socialist media.”

    3. Stuff that never shows on any search. Sites that you can only get to if you know they exist, and even then, only if you know how to get in? Those things exist now.

       1. Search? I remember when the Web didn’t have any search engines. And all the years before the Web, when the closest thing to a search engine was gopher, except almost nobody used it.

    4. USB sticks. That’s how they do it in Cuba.

       1. That’s also how the NSA blew up the Iranian nuclear centrifuges a decade ago. I don’t want my WiFi to start broadcasting “Hey, Gestapo, come arrest me!” due to some malicious code embedded in the USB controller. (For example.) And there’s really no good way to prevent that sort of thing. (Yeah, sure, virtual machine, burner laptop, Faraday cage, etc — but most people aren’t consistently good at operational security. And Odds tend to be ADD and probably worse than average.)

23. American Culture, What American Culture?? I can remember that I was told when young that there WASN”T an American Culture. They we just took stuff from others, that we didn’t have a Culture.
    Of course NOW America has a Culture – Slavery, racism, homophobia, etc., everything bad.

    The type of thing that will start, not the hot civil war, the Commies going nuts is someone like Jake Gardner, the Bar owner who doesn’t kill himself but decides to take out those who HE BELIEVES destroyed his life. The Commies have had only one person they could point, to Kyle, as a Right-Winger shooter. They are trying hard to push it but the videos show he acted in self defense and the people he shot were and are BAD GUYS. Someone like Jake Gardner going off and targeting DAs, Politicians, News, etc. would be VERY different. None of us want that, none but the Commies do. But it is likely to happen. They do something to an old fart with nothing but a few years to loose, all the people who are alone and say **)&&*))&%$ it, it is time.
    Every day the Commies push and destroy more. Some poor guy who has just seen his store go up in smoke and KNOWS that he can’t rebuild and his wife died a couple of years ago. Gets out his rifle and starts shooting Rioter, looters, protesters, anybody out there HE thinks deserves it.

    Is ANYBODY else surprised that this has not happened? Is there anyone here who could really blame them if they were driven to do this?? It is a WONDER that the American people have put up with SO MUCH and not started striking back. I hope that this doesn’t happen because it would be BAD for the Country and BAD for the Cause.

    I just hope that Kyle is not killed in Jail and goes free. I hope that no one is driven beyond their breaking point. I don’t EXPECT my hopes to come true, doesn’t mean I don’t want them to.

    1. Kyle killed in Jail would be as good (bad?) a flashpoint as any other……

    2. As The Great LoE Corriea said, “Their side has a volume control; our side has an on-off switch. They best hope we never turn that switch on”.

       1. And that switch is DAMNED hard to turn on.
          BUT… it’s MUCH HARDER to turn off.

          Once upon a time I read a book on the Manhattan Project that included a likely apocryphal story about someone “in the know” but not fully cognizant of the difficulties and likely yields involved. Supposedly a conversation went about like this…

          “Say, could you whip up a SMALL one quick? We have some trouble on this island and-”

          “Sir, these things only come in two sizes. One is UNIMAGINABLY powerful.”

          “… … … and the other one?”

          “Is MUCH bigger.”

    3. As someone who acculturated, TRUST me America has a culture. A very powerful one.

24. A couple thoughts. First, the Left does not have the hard power at all. My read on the military is that a majority of the mid-grade and a plurality of the lower grade officer and enlisted are solidly on the Right. The numbers are much higher for the combat arms. General officers, now, are pretty split, but they don’t matter as much as the Left think they do. (The Left has gone out of their way to seduce the general officers, but don’t realize that that is the group who are 1) politically minded and 2) the ones who want to fit in with the elites. But the actual real power is in the majors, lieutenant colonels, and colonels and in the mid-grade NCOs.)

    Second, we are going to lose in the long run. If it isn’t the Left, it will be someone else who takes absolute power and grinds the world under their boot heel. But, just when it seems all hope is lost and That Hideous Strength has won a complete victory and will be in power forever, God will say, “Enough. I am in control and it’s time for me to shepherd the nations with a rod of iron.” And then we will be with Him forever. The end of the book is already written. They lose, He wins. We just have to be sure we’re on his side. I think we are and take comfort in that.

    1. A lot of the more political level folks who pass as Left have very solid “oh, F, no” bars.

       A lot of the Obama pushing was to try to hit those bars…..

    2. “And then we will be with Him forever.”
       This is what I am looking forward to.

       1. Yeah. (LDS note: I just started listening to a book called “The Triumph of Zion” and it is proving extremely comforting… 😀 )

25. “The night between Monday and Tuesday my profile disappeared from Facebook, and yesterday I had to log on to FB TWICE and change my password twice. Apparently this happened to a lot of people on what I’ll broadly call “our side.””

    “Sure, it might have been a technical glitch, but wait: I also had to log onto WordPress TWICE. The chances of having a glitch hit both companies the same day is….. uh. lower. Though I’ll give you that tech in general is capable of a lot of that.”

    Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, and thrice is enemy action. And I don’t believe in coincidence.

    1. This could be random breakage: all the big authentication systems interoperate, so it is entirely possible for an update or something to break multiple apparently separate sites.

       1. I’d be more likely to believe bot programs with “folks I want to annoy” email collections.

       2. Late last night I was posting to a website that is unrelated to politics, using a different handle/fake email, and had issues. Those seemed to resolve after a wait.

          Now, I think there had been a couple of drive by trolls at that website, probably paid to go around and adopt inflammatory lines regarding certain subjects. a) covid b) slavery, because it is a fiction website, and one of the author’s serials has slavery subplot, and we’ve had two different people stirring the pot in three updates. So I can’t say that the website has no evidence of being targeted.

          But, the website would not have any reason to be targeted, unless there really is a Chinese/Silicon Valley trolling campaign, and they’ve listed every piddling little website whose operators did not begin enthusiastically endorsing the trolling campaign for technical intervention later. The first is maybe likely, but I can’t see the second happening without it blowing up on them.

          So, independent technical problems seem plausible to me. It isn’t like the University of Houston’s Political Science department or anyone else appears to have a clue how to certifiably train managers of large complex programming projects that cover a wide range of domains. (I can buy apprenticeships where the master is careful in looking for students. Any bureaucracy that obeys diversity and inclusion/non discrimination stuff? Is going to have to be a little careless in selecting people to train, which will screw things up beyond the inherent difficulties in management and in programming.)

       3. Sure, but notice how many cases of people being banned from Youtube, Twitter, and Facebook within hours of each other.

          They talk. Or, perhaps from the legal standpoint, they conspire.

          1. Of course they do, that has been proven many times.

             But the existence of enemy action doesn’t mean all things are enemy action. Especially where skinnyjeans javashit programmers had something to do with the stack.

             1. I usually believe human negligence, slackitude, and dumbfeckery before enemy action. Human stupidity is universal.

       4. Well, and given that large chunks of the areas where these companies are based are on fire…

          (I’d be more suspicious if it weren’t for the fires.)

26. //font size=YUGE// THIS. //end font size.

    For Mr. Hoyt: Sherlock Hound, dubbed and completely legal on YouTube. Hayao Miazaki working with an Italian team.

27. I expect many here have seen this already, but how many have considered it as an indicator the increasing willingness to fight back against the Left’s Kulturkampf? The more individuals show they can fight back, the more emboldened others on the Right will become to stand against the Left.

    –

    1. The cops in Louisville did knock and were fired upon before they opened fire. The woman killed was evidently a human shield. Now the DA there is “skin folk” not “kin folk” because he didn’t lie to the grand jury.

       Every word they use is a lie including and and the.

       1. The cop in Louisville isn’t being charged for Taylor’s death. He’s being charged because some of his shots went into neighboring, occupied apartments.

          1. I know that and that cop didn’t shoot anyone, he lost control of his gun. BS but political. The riots are because the cops haven’t been charge with capital murder. The narrative was that it was no knock, lie. We were told she was asleep, lie. We were told the cops just opened up, lie. Nope They knocked, announced, the woman was being used as a human shield by her man who fired first. Everything was a lie and the white protestors just happened upon a uhaul filled with riot gear.

             Like Rittenhouse, lies, lies, lies. Everything they say is a lie.

             1. Vanity Fair (!) had a profile of Breonna Taylor. An hagiographic one, of course.

                1. Gave up on any pretense of it being anything other than Vanity UNFair years ago.

                   https://en.wikifur.com/wiki/Vanity_Fair

                   Short version: To experience Vanity Fair, have a big BM and inhale deeply.

                   1. Vanity Fair: where everyone is pursuing that which is not worth having.

                   2. See, I used to read mademoiselle, back when I cared about fashion. (And I really mostly read it for the fashion advice.) Then it went political. I’m still going “The fuck, what?”

                      1. Does that mean their politics became fashionable of their fashions political?

                         Whatever – they are equally rationally based.
                         –

             2. Yeah, I didn’t know until yesterday that in fact it was NOT a no-knock warrant, and that the police HAD announced themselves and the boyfriend began firing. HE should be the one charged with her (and the unborn child’s) death, because OF COURSE THE POLICE WILL SHOOT BACK. 😡

                Yet another reason that, from hereon out, I’m going to be automatically assuming ANY report on a police-involved shooting is 100% lies.

                1. And wasn’t an EMT, she was a former EMT.

                   And the “ex boyfriend” was receiving mail at her house via the US Post Office, as in “the warrant literally had as evidence his change of address to her house”.

                   And she was under investigation for drug running herself, just nowhere as near a high priority.

                   **********
                   Yet, this morning, the Des Moines region conservativeish talk radio guy was still spouting all the old, ignorant stuff.

                   …needless to say, not trusting his judgement. Same reason I gave up on Bryan Suits, weeks after Kenosha he was still rattling off debunked left wing talking points as facts.

                2. Yet another reason that, from hereon out, I’m going to be automatically assuming ANY report on a police-involved shooting is 100% lies.

                   I’m waiting for attempts on the Iowa one where the guy was avoiding the cops, ducked into a hotel, came out, was so high on meth that a ton of bean bag rounds didn’t even slow him, and was eventually shot with a total of two shots– via rifle, when he was going for the cops.

                   Imagine how freakin’ high you would have to be to ignore beanbag rounds.

                   1. I mean, giving the howling that the crazy (also hopped up on meth, I think?) dude who came at the cop WITH A BUTCHER KNIFE was actually “unarmed” and was “murdered” and wasn’t doing anything wrong, etc etc…when there is clear video evidence to the contrary.

                      Given that they are still clinging to the “Jacob Blake was an innocent man” when he was harassing a woman he allegedly RAPED and then tried to steal her car, and ignored clear instructions from the cops to STOP what he was doing…

                      Given that they’re still pushing the “Kyle Rittenhouse is a murderer” when the video evidence shows it was clear self defense–I mean, earlier this week I saw a fawning article about the “EMT” he shot in the arm and how “traumatized” that “poor” man is…

                      They don’t care. They’ll lie in the teeth of unshakeable evidence. And far too many people (including myself, briefly, with the Brionna Taylor story, and the George Floyd story, until I read about the autopsy results and saw some of the bodycam footage of the cops being so very patient) buy the first narrative at face value.

                      1. That guy in California, on video running around a corner, trying to break into a lady’s window, dodging around another corner and them coming back around at the cops and getting shot– who was reported as “shot outside his own back door.”

                         Uh…technically his grandparents’, and if you charge the cops like that htey’re going to expect you have a weapon. Which he may have, his hand was funny and if it was a brick….

                         Thing is, I haven’t seen any of that stuff pushed, after it was debunked, outside of the TruBeeleever folks.

                         1. Well, the problem is that many of the TruBeeleevers are in media jobs, and screaming it out as factual news…

                            1. To ever smaller audiences.

                      2. Thing is, criminals go to jail partly because they are bad at long term thinking about consequences and use of force situations.

                         Criminals and their sympathizers may simply be that incompetent in their thinking.

                3. In three weeks, we will be able to tie her to some unsolved disappearances.

                   I want to be joking.

                   1. Right?? Especially since, despite the media’s efforts to canonize her, and claim that it was only because some ex of hers was involved with the drug trade, it seems that they were in fact also investigating HER for possible drug selling activities.

                      (And oh yeah, FORMER EMT, not a current one. I do wonder if the ‘former’ part wasn’t down to “because drugs.” And they seem to be trying to claim–as with the guy shot in the arm by Rittenhouse–that all EMTs, current or former, are saints and can never be questioned or do bad behavior. Instead of, you know, often underpaid and overworked humans who–like cops–attract a wide range of types.)

                      1. I do wonder if the ‘former’ part wasn’t down to “because drugs.”

                         That is honestly the point where I went “ooooh” and none of the rest of the revelations were startling at all.

                         Old story– get into drugs, either using or selling/transporting, and get dragged out of decent life and into…well, the place where your drug-dealing ex has a change of address for your house, you’re dating a different drug dealer, and he’s the kind who stands behind you and shoots at the cops.

                         1. I would suspect that the gangs fid EMT-trained persons real useful.
                            –

                      2. *facepalms*

                         However, I _DID_ just realize that they probably did their common trick of “reporting” what the defense lawyer is claiming, as objective fact and without label.

                         1. Come now – you surely aren’t suggesting that a defense attorney is a less than reliable testifier of fact?
                            –

                            1. I’d never suggest such a thing, I either flatly state it or assume the other person is aware that if they say the sky is blue, look for what they offer as evidence.

                            2. Depends on the circumstances. That the defense lawyers in the Duke lacrosse rape hoax were willing to get up and say, “The DNA evidence will establish my client’s innocence,” before the test was in fact strong evidence since they were not leaving open a door for the consent defense.

                            3. Oh, I don’t mean to suggest defense attorneys is not truthful, but like a stopped clock you often cannot be sure when they’re accurate.

                               On a side note: stumbled across a series on the On Demand selection of our local cable, Manhunt: Deadly Games. Season two … starts with Richard Jewell and turns into the hunt for Eric Rudolph and, 40% of the way through (we’ve watched episodes 1-4 of 10) it has proven surprisingly good. It’s portrayal of the FBI (and AJC reporter Kathy Scruggs) is even more damning (yet sympathetic, as well) as Eastwood’s Richard Jewell. Talk about a useful defense attorney!

                               Season one, Manhunt: UNABOMBER, was about the hunt for Ted Kaczynski and seems to be available on Amazon Prime. Deadly Games is linked through Prime but appears to demand a CBS All Access subscription.
                               –

                   2. If those ‘protesters’ really wanted ‘justice for Breonna Taylor’ they would be demanding the death penalty for the drug pusher boyfriend that got her killed by shooting the police when they came looking for the other drug pusher boyfriend.

                      But, no, that would raise too many other questions. How many drug pusher boyfriends are enough? Isn’t the drug pusher boyfriend evil for having a gun? Why did a felon have a gun in the first place?
                      ———————————
                      “Too many questions…too many questions…” —The Riddler, after OD-ing on The Box

28. I’ve been pushed to recite a LOT more invocations of St. Michael, starting two weeks ago. Some things happened while I was sick – good things, small but good – that seem to be a reminder that The Editor has things under control. Normally I get three thumps in the rump instead of three pats on the head, but hey, I was sick and miserable, so He used what would get my attention. I’m slow on the uptake.

    1. Oh. I need to print those. I have a lousy memory. A novena to St. Michael might be in order too.

       1. EWTN if you get it has the chaplet of St,. Michael mornings at 7am I believe

          1. I don’t get it, but should be on the computer….

          2. And that’s when I get up to exercise.

          3. There are a wide variety of traditional identifications of the Antichrist/s. Member of the tribe of Dan is a popular one, as is “dude who rebuilds the Temple, only to turn it into a temple to himself.” But there are lots of Gentile ones too. As John warned us in his letters, there are tons of antichrists all over the place.

             1. And here we are, in between Rosh Hashana, when the Judgement is written in the Book, and Yom Kippur, when the Judgement is Sealed. But, Blessed be the Name, we are told that prayer and repentance can avert the Evil Decree. Working hard on both.

                1. Yes. I found Ginsburg’s date of death significant.
                   And #metoo.

29. As a Catholic who has had mystical experiences an therefore started reading on mystics, apparitions, etc, approved by the Church to figure out what was happening, 1) the USA is vital to God’s end time plan, from St Brendan the Navigator to the apparition of the Lady of All Nations to a present Irish mystic that says the US is going to lead/guide the World in spiritual evolution (that is why the Devil is doing everything in his power now to destroy it, not much time left) 2) Our Lady of America promised the US would be spared from end time upheaval if it did as she asked (husband thinks it impossible, I think everything is possible with prayer and penance), 3) due to the ongoing apparition in Medjugorje there is a community that was formed in the US (go to http://www.medjugorje.com) and they have been fasting, doing penance and prayer to save the US for at least 20 yrs, more people need to join their effort. I honestly think the antichrist, who I believe is already in the US as the Irish mystic said he would make his way to the US. In one of Our Lady’s apparitions, she said he would claim to be jewish, but would not really be (I know who I think fits that description, could be a family member though…)

    1. Us LDS folks have similar beliefs regarding America’s importance in God’s plans. Even so…man, it’s rough going. I’m kicking myself in the butt to relearn that HE is in charge, and however bad it seems things might get, HE is the one who will triumph. Not evil.

30. I keep noting, one’s gotta have a plan D.

    & I hear Leonard Cohen’s voice from The Hills;
    And she will be born
    To someone like you
    What I left undone
    She will certainly do

31. Early suggestions Louisville is going up, as cop in Breonna Taylor case charged with three counts of “wanton endangerment,” not murder. And that unparalleled paragon of virtue, Linda Sarsour (ok, my sarcasm needle just pegged), is calling for people in cities around the country to “rise up.”

    Horrible thought…was Taylor pregnant at the time of her death? Because if so, she could be that, “pregnant woman shot by police,” figure.

    1. Still not seeing the direct logical connection between “Bad Cops run Bad Raids, make Bad Shoot decisions” and “Break all the Glass! Loot the Walmart!”

       1. It’s purely a pretext for the Marxist revolutionaries to try and further their effort to overthrow the USA and replace it with their desired communist state. That is their goal. It has always been their goal. They can’t be bargained with, reasoned with. They don’t feel pity or remorse or regret. And they will not stop, EVER, until we are dead. (with due credit to The Terminator).

          1. THIS.

          2. So it’s either the hydraulic crusher thingee or molten metal, then?

             1. Which one of those is “strongly encourage enforcing the law, including against those weaponizing their refusal to enforce it”?

32. “I don’t think I’d trust any prognostications after 2016”

    I haven’t trusted any prognostications since 1980.

    First, the MSM lies. They always report the race i one of two ways: the Dem has a HUGE lead or the two candidates are neck-and-neck. They will never report the Republican is opening a big lead because then their viewership will wander away. They don’t mind viewers wandering away when they think the Dem is in control, they may even want that, but they don’t dare let that happen when the Republican is ahead, for the same reason the Dems were furious about Carter conceding before California polls closed. Republican voters will turn out even when they don’t expect to win, but Democrats much less so.

    Second, the MSM likes to poll and report before the race is even started, when the “registered voter” (10% or more of whom will not bother voting) is the metric and when the free media favors the Dem candidate.

    Third, it has historically been (at least since Lee Atwater if not before) the strategy of the GOP to “hold fire until you see the whites of their eyes.” Meaning they consider campaign advertising before October largely wasted. They like to spend big once voters are paying attention which historically has meant after the World Series. The MSM & pollsters (BIRM) ignore this and love reporting the Democrats’ batting practice as if the game were underway.

    These tendencies, as well as enhanced opportunities for fraud, underlie the Dems’ push for early voting. They can a) bank votes in advance of election day, b) they can hold their rallies (often at churches), getting voters all riled up then load them on buses and take them to the polls. (This is also a reason they’re so giddy for same-day registration.)

    All of these factors and more make prognostication unreliable.

    Besides, I vote to convey a message, win or lose, although I prefer to win it isn’t the reason I vote, therefore predictions are not a factor.
    –

33. It’s been a while since I’ve had the heart to draw a comic. Maybe I’ll try tonight. I never have the stick-to-it for a book, but maybe start with a few standalone strips… thank you for the passed-along kick

    1. It was… really, really nice to finish something. I don’t know if I have since the pirate plumbing mice. Thank you.

       https://www.deviantart.com/caitlinwonder-girl/art/Tasty-Tasty-Religion-856051221

       1. Older son teethed on my hard cover collection of Agatha Christie.
          I’ve forgiven him. Mostly.

       2. If I didn’t say it: It’s great!

       3. You made me giggle!

       4. LOL that is great!!!!

       5. Actually, writing Bible verses on paper/parchment/clay/bread and eating them was a traditional folk medicine/healing practice, at certain points.

          1. Yeah. I picked up that Colonial-era grimoire, “A Long Lost Friend” some years back on Kindle for research/entertainment purposes, and amidst the “Actually, that’s pretty good advice, we know that works now for ” and “WTF IS THE OBSESSION WITH URINE” and “Okay, that was just bizarre” there was quite a bit of that in many of the spells and cantrips. (Or reciting verses, or similar)

             We don’t realize, in our modern age (and in the US, at least), just how much folks of previous generations (even into the 20th century) still had the supernatural/magical as a HUGE part of their world. (There’s still a lot places that do, to some degree or another. Let me tell you, living in Eastern Europe was an eye-opener.)

             1. argh, forgot about coding. After “we know that works now for” should be ‘science reasons.’

             2. Sarathered,
                Not just in Eastern Europe. I’m a Catholic deacon (retired due to age/illness) and have been cursed by a variety of south of the boarder witches, brujas, and so forth. Finding a skinned rodent on your front door on your way to Mass on Sunday morning is not my idea of the proper way to start a morning. We have some “interesting” types here in south Texas.

                1. OH yeah. My last companion on my mission (which was in the aforementioned Eastern Europe) was a first generation American whose parents came up from Mexico. She had some HAIR raising stories about the stuff some her dad’s more…ahem…strange cousins (and her grandmother) got up to, and said she was really, *really* glad her parents immigrated, because her father’s side of the family in particular were crazy-creepy-evil and she wanted nothing to do with them.

                   And her father–who became the branch president (similar to a LDS bishop in job and duties, except to a much smaller congregation than a ward, and not required to be married) of one of the early Spanish-speaking branches in San Diego had had to deal with some…very interesting problems caused by folks who came to the US, joined the Church, but had not yet let go of some of the more problematic cultural practices they brought with them. (Note: the LDS Church is fine with any cultural practices that don’t involve things likely to inflict demons, poltergeists, or other nasty things on yourself or other people.)

                   1. (Note: the LDS Church is fine with any cultural practices that don’t involve things likely to inflict demons, poltergeists, or other nasty things on yourself or other people.)

                      “Killing, poisoning, setting on fire, torturing, skinning alive and similar practices are not included in the umbrella of ‘cultural practices’, those are objectionable for totally unrelated reasons.”

                      -.-

                      1. Not familiar with the quote?

                         But essentially, yeah. Though generally the Church feels THOSE fall under the heading of “so obvious that we shouldn’t have to explain it, and if you don’t get it, we need to have a Chat with whomever passed you through your baptismal interview*, because clearly they skipped some Very Important Things.” 😀

                         *Because we do *try* not to baptize people without them being fully aware of what promises/covenants they’re making with God, and make sure that they’re cognizant of the responsibilities on their side of things.

                         1. Paraphrasing of an actual argument I have had.

                            Repeatedly.

                            Never underestimate the power of stupidity and entitlement….

                            1. Ahhh, gotcha. Yeah, trying to reason with a moral relativist is crazymaking. Those people are…worrying, to put it mildly…

                            2. Not so hard – you just have to push them face first into the inherent contradictions of their thesis. For instance, if there are no absolute moral principles there’s nothing wrong with punching them in the nose* hitting the in the face with a cream pie.

                               *Further consideration presents the risk of breaking a knuckle.
                               .

34. “yes their “troops”are pathetic.”

    Are they, though? Were I intent on goading an enemy into open combat I would conceal my shock-troops and leave the play troops on parade. That’s a tactic as old as Hannibal.
    –

    1. True, but….

    2. They’re using a play-book. And it’s a play-book that has worked well in the past, in other places. We’ve seen it repeated over and over again.

       So chances are that these are the real SA-equivalent, to be used right up until the point in time (and this point in time is always reached) when it becomes expediant to liquidate them.

    3. The criminal class lack the discipline to be true shock troops. That’s where their “blooded” come from, most like. The major gangs have a few like that, but not many. It’s not shock troops that worry me.

       It’s a different sort of tactic that does. Not a subject I’m comfortable speaking of. Because who wants to give them ideas, right?

       What I will say is that I don’t want to see a shooting war inside American borders. Nobody with any sense does. Even those on the default or nominal left, those with a thimbleful have no desire for it. The far left cultists are few, but they have *many* unwilling and unknowing hostages. There are no winners in the sort of war that I dread. Only survivors.

       We are not at that point. That means the cartridge box stays shut save on range day, the little lists don’t get writ, and we all get to live another day.

       We are not mired in it yet. I refuse to succumb to despair. The black dog haunts enough as it is, he needs no help. Even if the worst is to come, and yes the one past *that* worst, a bit farther.

       In that dark future, there will be those like us. We don’t conform because we *can’t.* Fake it, sometimes, but we will never be the sort of normal that goes with the flow (and cue Solzhenitsyn). To that end, creators create, builders build, and so on. Our culture is freedom, and freedom is better than slavery. Carrying that idea and passing it on is worth it, despite all our troubles.

       1. the Provisional IRA never had more than 300 active volunteers and 450 support. They figure it had no more than 30-50 actual gunmen or bombers.

          Doesn’t take many to wreak havoc.

          1. True. And some may end up that way.

             The things that keep me up at night are that an American Socialist Revolutionary Army of similar scope might be a lesser of the evils.

             1. The Provisional IRA was an explicitly Marxist revolutionary party. They quickly turned in to just another street gang collecting protection money and cooperating with the other street gangs (e.g., UDA). When it suited them. The thing though about a civil war, that I’ve written here before, there are no neutrals and you don’t get to choose what side you’re on.

                One thing that gives me hope is that it’s hard to see the black community giving sanctuary to a bunch of rich, white revolutionaries and bourgeoise and academic class the revolutionaries come from are too soft to protect them in the face of real pressure.

                1. The left may be trying to provoke a response targeted as if black was a monolithic block.

                   The black community is not monolithic.

                   Potentially, an anti-black pogrom could motivate a willingness to hide nutjob white activists. Not at all sure it would work out that way.

                   Beyond that, sure, a small number of people can cause a lot of havoc. This looks like it could be our ordinary populations of criminals and activists. Who have impacts beyond their actual numbers, because they spend a lot of time and energy hurting others, and annoying others. One serial rapist, unopposed, can hurt a lot of women.

                   Traditional answers to criminals might well be effective on them, without any need to escalate to more military style counter terrorist activity.

                   1. I’m not sure how they could even LAUNCH an anti-black pogrom. The majority of the actual racists are openly on the left–*they* can’t do it, lest they be exposed. And that assumes that the “non-black” groups are monoliths too…Well, at least the left is consistently stupid with the ‘people are widgets’ viewpoint. So that’s a bit of comfort 😀

                      1. Provoke a backlash. That was apparently Manson’s plan – i.e. his murders would provoke a backlash against blacks in the US, who would be forced to band together and start a race war just to survive. And Manson deludedly thought that he would lead the blacks, of course.

                         Yes, that last bit was crazy. But so was the idea that his horrific murders would start an anti-black backlash.

                         1. Yeah, typical lefty insanity. THAT IS NOT HOW MOST PEOPLE WORK. At least, not independently minded people. They might get mobs here or there, but I just don’t see enough of us “five people in a room and six opinions” types falling into lockstep so far as to have an all out race war. Which is just a silly notion from beginning to end, anyway. It assumes that everyone of a certain shade all think alike–again, that whole ‘people are widgets’ insanity. The part where the left utterly fails to understand (most of) the right is that we just don’t care what color someone’s skin is. We care what they do. I give a lily white twenty-something wearing a beanie and glasses more dubious looks these days than I do any black person (and black folks are pretty rare in my state, because most of them are too sane to want to live in Wyoming).

                            I mean, I’m not denying that racism (the “traditional” kind, I mean) exists. The mixed-race couple that I go to church with has–I have heard–encountered some nastiness (or their incredibly-adorable kids have) in recent months…but I don’t know if it was actually IN PERSON, or if it was at school (which like all schools is infested on several levels with the “liberal”) or if it was via social media (in which case it could be anyone anywhere). Or it was from the older folks who WERE raised to dislike “colored” people (my grandmother is hella racist, though my mother is not).

                            I do find it deeply ironic that the people who think they can spark a race war with us right-leaning “white supremacists” are actually the ones who notice ALL the skin color and make it super important, and accuse anyone who says “I don’t care about skin color” of being racist….

                            1. You could classify the current riots as anti Black pogroms by the left. The number of rich, white, lefties, yes it’s redundant, who’ve been damaged is what, zero? it’s been black neighborhoods and black lives that have been damaged by a bunch a bunch of rich, white, lefties.

                            2. A backlash is possible. Our hostess has mentioned her fear that if the US gets into a low level civil war, people who don’t look like their neighbors (which would include her, as well as most mixed-race couples) would probably face additional suspicion.

                               On the other hand, if the Left does trigger such an event, it almost certainly won’t start the way that they expect.

                            3. I think it’s telling that our hostess lives in an area heavily populated with lefties, too. I mean, my mom had in her class (back when she was teaching here) a kid who had been raised by an actual, honest-to-goodness white supremacist/neo-Nazi dad…but she got quite a long way in deprogramming the kid, just by getting him to THINK. (And likewise her student whose only ambition was to go join one of the Hispanic gangs in Denver…is now a math teacher. 😀 I’m very proud of her for those two.)

                               But yeah, I’m finding it increasingly obvious that ‘scratch a lefty, find a racist’ far more often than amongst right-leaning folks. (And the “right wingers” who DO fall into that category seem to be, surprise surprise, of the wannabe tyrannical government types approaching the same stuff the lefties want just from the other direction…)

                            4. “… us ‘five people in a room and six opinions’ types”

                               Awright – which of youse guys are sleeping on the job? I’ve got three of your opinions right here and I’m working on a fourth. SOME people apparently didn’t bring their own opinions here and are free-loading!
                               –

                            5. Pikers. In the current freefall, Sam got seventy-five opinions from ten people

                         2. Americans aren’t nearly tribal enough en masse to react that way.

                      2. Didn’t you know?

                         Approving of capital punishment of rapists and murders, tolerating the imprisonment of drug addicts, or being an affirmative action skeptic means that you are much more racist than the folks on the left.

                         The dogwhistles mean that there is a silent majority of would be pogromists on the right. Who will start one after the correct ritual acts are staged.

                         1. Yeah…what passes for their “logic” and ideas about how people’s brains work always makes me do that confused-dog head tilt. “Huh…?”

                            It must be very, very crazy inside their heads.

                            1. They make a certain amount of sense to me.

    4. An analysis of the video of the murder of the Proud Boy supporter in Portland indicates that BLM-ifa has an “A” team. Looks like it was a sophisticated hit, though why him isn’t clear at all. So, not all are play troops.

       Adjusting my tin-foil hat, the Omaha bar owner was near Portland when he died. Suicide, or was he Epsteined?

       1. At a guess, the Portland hit was a practice run. Why him was just not wasting ammo.

          1. Then, the result was that the gunman ended up dead. True, before questioning, but dead.

       2. I have read supposition they thought the victim was a different higher-profile target from the opposition event based on clothing and rough biometrics.

       3. That wasn’t an “A” team.

          That was a known insane guy who started getting worse about four years ago, who his entire family knew was dangerously insane and for a wonder they WEREN’T the target, who fell in with an extremist political group that told him that shooting someone who supports the current president was not only acceptable, but praiseworthy.

          Who then thought he’d GET the praise he expected, who DID get praise– but then the police actually came for him. And not just a token run, but were actually going to arrest him after he tried to leave.

          They didn’t even let him run them over!

          Washington state is horrible for stuff like this– if you are seriously insane, they’ll keep indulging you until you kill someone. Then they’ll punish you, although probably half-heartedly, and turn you loose again. Until you kill the next person.

          1. …possible explanation for Washington state apparently having more than its share of serial killers…?

35. “…the left, in their idiotic way would decide that they meant something else completely different, and try to destroy your life with it. Or worse, they’d know exactly what it meant but accuse you of meaning something different so that they could destroy you.”

    I’ve been reading about Douglas Preston’s experiences in Italy, and that seems to describe perfectly the country’s mental state, especially their criminal justice system. Our left apparently think such crazy cakes is a good idea, yet disparage Qanon.

    1. Honestly, given their screaming about Qanon? Part of me wonders if there isn’t more truth in those conspiracies there than one might suppose, and THAT is why they are working overtime to discredit it, heh.

       1. You are not alone.
          I’ve never paid any attention to Qanon which is simply NOT reliable and most of the time sounds insane. BUT when they started screaming….
          And you know… 2020.
          Still hoping it’s just lefty insanity.

          1. I’m still of the opinion that the whole “child trafficking front via a vendor on Wayfair” thing has some credibility. I just don’t buy that all those industrial cabinets “happened” to have the names of missing kids on them…

             (Of course, it’s not like it isn’t easy to manipulate an internet image. I can do amazing things with Photoshop, and I’m still mostly an amateur. So still taking it with a grain of salt. But it was one of those conspiracies that…rang as “not improbable” to me…Now, the drinking/injecting the blood of babies was a bit bonkers, but on the other hand…::eyes Elisabet Bathory::)

       2. I loved the bit about how Qanon was to blame about the outcry over Cuties.

          1. Qanon?

             *snort* Right, ‘cus it’s got to be some boogieman to blame when the progressive activists do their usual “draft SoCons to destroy someone” trick, which will inevitably (after the threat is destroyed) lead to disavowal of any kind of liberal involvement, even though all the activist cousins were sharing stuff about child sex trafficking for weeks before the conservative folks all were suddenly on board. (Very much focused on kidnapping or in-country selling, not the actual primary source of illegals and coyotes)

             As soon as there’s no worry about people recognizing how nasty and destructive the hyper-sexualizing of kids is, they’ll go back to finding it hilarious or empowering to teach eight year olds pole dancing* and the story will be those horrible, hateful god-botherers destroyed the career of a minority immigrant woman telling the story of her childhood empowerment.

             *Actual example, went for years, NLT 2010 near McChord AFB they had a huge sign advertising the classes. One of the many times I was informed I was a horrible, oppressive prude was when I declined to sign our daughter up for them. Yes, that is when princess was no older than first grade….

             1. Oh, they’re already airing the “Look how you awful, awful people have RUINED the career of this minority immigrant woman because you just didn’t understand what she was trying to say!!” Said woman is herself touting this line.

                I bought it for about two seconds–at the start of it all, when it MIGHT have just been Netflix’s advertising. Then word came out that the movie was *worse* (and Netflix’s advertising was accurate). Oh, and that the whole story of “it’s actually about how sexualising children in this world is BAD” was a complete 180 from what was said at whatever film festival it won an award at. Then, it was “This is female empowering!” (Which makes me wonder if the apparent ending–where suddenly the main character decides “this is bad” and goes back to her traditional Muslim family–wasn’t added later…Though again, haven’t watched the movie, am going off what those who sacrificed themselves to see if it really WAS that bad have reported.)

                1. The write-up I saw from the lady, before the film got big, was that it was one of those “difficult to watch clash of cultures” thing. The usual “cold, harsh look” at (subject) that’s made for awards, unusual only in that the subjects started out younger and it didn’t come down on the boinking-is-always-best side.

                   It wasn’t supposed to be a morality play, it was supposed to be one of those “harsh reality no gloss truer than life” things where everybody sucks.

                   Mean Girls re-done for Dance Moms, but serious, focusing on the kids instead of “lol how funny look at all those fat, middle-aged women having their kids do what they wish they could”; instead of the public-vs-homeschooled-preacher-kid culture, it’s general-vs-immigrant culture.

                   I’ve been getting emails of every objectionable *****ed thing from the movie, and the single largest objection seems to be that folks don’t want to face that yes, this junk happens as part of normal public life, and it’s not funny, or cute, or empowering to be a sex object. It’s disgusting, and abusive, and nasty. Gosh, would’ve been nice if that had been an acceptable view when I was a kid– oh, wait, it’s still not an acceptable view, it’s just time to kill the messenger so people can go back to being happy for that ten year old boy dancing in drag clubs and tut-tutting at anyone who isn’t delighted.

                   I loath the ‘dark, gritty’ junk. The awareness raising tends to be insulting, obnoxious or lies.
                   I’m still standing here trying to figure out what we’re supposed to be outraged about *this* week, when it’s been inside of social norms to sign your prepubescent girl up for pole dancing classes, and mothers who hesitate at having their 13 year old girl dance the can-can are horrible prudes. (Not, y’know, basically historically literate and finding that a role model one would rather avoid.)

                   1. Well said, Foxfier. Well said, indeed. Thank you.

                      1. Many, many pixels being sacrificed as I try to explain things that really need hand gestures, yelling, and body language.

                   2. Yeah. Makes me not in the LEAST sorry that I left the dance world (ballet side of things) when I was six. (Well. And growing to nearly 6 feet in height would have also been problematic had I continued on…)

                      I do agree heartily with those pointing out that one can make a film about how bad the sexualization of children in the dance world is without, y’know, SEXUALIZING THE CHILDREN IN THE FILM.

                      (And as to all those twerps out there hollering “But where was the outrage at Toddlers & Tiaras or Dance Moms or child beauty pageants”, I say: “Oh, believe me, PLENTY of us are every bit as pissed about those, and been vocal, but no one was listening. Frankly, they’re STILL not listening.)

                      1. Frankly, they’re STILL not listening.

                         Which is why I refuse to jump on the bandwagon.
                         The flat-out hysteria I got from folks when I asked if they will now be objecting to Dance Moms was why I gave it a fish-eye in the first place.
                         That it just happened to be coming from the same folks who were outraged about child trafficking– and flipped out when I was supportive of it, and pointed out all the anti-illegal-immigrant resources that are aimed at stopping it– made it pretty clear that there’s overt manipulation going on, though it works about as well as the #metoo junk.

                         1. Supportive of their desire to stamp out child trafficking, I should say.

                      2. Doesn’t help that the one time I got to be the calm, supportive, understanding ear for my old homeschool group’s leader was when she was trying to reality check herself on if she was smothering her daughter… that’s where the cancan example came from.
                         This is after she’d already gotten a reputation for this in prior years, having vetoed stuff like copying Miley Syris’ infamous dance, not sure if they were going to include the twerking. ( *facepalm* And this is the most socially conservative dance class in the area.)
                         The teachers were pushing this stuff, and the other parents getting pissed she didn’t want her 9-13 year old doing it.

                         1. Yeesh. Should I ever be lucky enough to have a child….I will probably have to be the horrible oppressive parent and tell them (boy, girl, doesn’t matter) that dance and cheerleading are a no-go. And I’ll tell them precisely why, too…

                            I remember being appalled as a teenager in the 90s at what the cheerleaders and/or marching band flag corps in a lot of schools were doing. And this was in BUCKLE OF THE BIBLE BELT OKLAHOMA. (The school whose marching band decided to do a show centered around the 2nd Michael Keaton Batman movie comes to mind. Their flag corps all dressed up as Catwoman from that movie. And…did a number of things with their flag poles that I’m surprised didn’t get the school disqualified from *everything.* But…man, the “dance world” is messed up…)

                            1. *sympathy* I believe it.

                               Should you ever have kids, and be the killjoy parent– remember you’ll be getting pushback from the “cool parents,” especially those who think of themselves as “tough but fair.” Even worse if there’s a predator around, pricking their insecurities.

                            2. Fortunately, being a pathological introvert means I wouldn’t be having much to do with any parents of any stripe whenever I could possibly avoid it 😀

                               Also, I was raised by parents who had no problem raising the metaphorical middle finger to anyone sniping at them they weren’t “cool” or otherwise trying to horn in on how they chose to raise their kids. They aren’t perfect (what parents are?) but I feel they did the very best job they knew how to do.

                            3. Amen on the parents– not that I took my for granted, but between the non-parents so many of my classmates had (lots of third generation trustfund kids, I now understand) but some of the stories of what it could’ve been like from folks here… Jeeze, we got lucky.

                   3. The problem is — if she thought it’s so horrible, why did she do it herself?

                      1. Perhaps because she’s capable of seeing a difference between normalizing– shaming objections to!– stripper dancing in eight year olds, and hiring child actors?

                         Kind of like how there are movies about how kids should not be exposed to violence, where they have child actors exposed to and responding to violence.

                         Now do why Cuties is horrible, but Dance Moms is nothing.

                         1. Child actors who are unable to fully understand the significance of what they are doing, not just acting.

                            1. Not hurting my argument any, nor are you making your own case.

                               Since this is hitting a familiar pattern, I’ll only bother to respond when you actually bother to do so.

                            2. Your calling them “actors” does not change that they were actually doing what the movie claimed to be against.

                            3. The movie “claimed” to be about hyper-sexualization of children. Write up from back in January.

                               That its presentation of what is already so common as to pass without more than a sniff for decades now makes it clear how nasty that behavior is– well, that’s got nothing to do with what the film claimed.

                            4. Harping on what it claimed does not change what it DID.

                            5. What a creative response to having one’s assertion shown to be false.

                            6. What an uncreative attempt to claim to do what you have not done.

36. “I’m saying the nihilist Marxists had won the culture so completely by the time I was born, that we are a rearguard action, a regiment of the damned, the crazy Nekulturni bastages willing to take what they fling at us, willing to give up on the cocktail party circuit, or more importantly on acclaim, security, respectability, because we think Marxism is that bad, and that the future and civilization are that important.”

    I prefer thinking of us as a Forlorn Hope, storming the Citadel of the Foe or dying in the effort.

    Because submission to tyranny be damned.

    N.B. – I had no idea this band existed; apparently there’s a Sharpe’s Heavy Metal band.
    –

    1. Whaaaaaaat. I need to check these guys out NOW.

37. “Sometimes I think He delights in contrary plotting.”

    Ya think? Never read Gideon, eh? “That’s too many troops, Gideon, and not cowardly enough. Take them down to the stream to drink.”

    Two lessons: our flaws are no excuse for failing and With Him, all things are possible.

    Going hot before they attempt to steal the election is admission we lack faith in Americans. I am not yet there.

    After the election, however, they may well have provided an undeniable casus belli.
    –

38. “It could either mean that “we win they lose” and He’s moved on to incite warriors to win the culture fight. OR it could mean all is lost, and perhaps a fragment of a novel or two will be needed ten thousand years from now.”

    I’ve gotten the impression, over the years, that He has plans Alpha through Omega.

    And while He’s promised us a kingdom it is not of this Earth.
    –

39. Keep having scenes in my head today– different characters, doesn’t quite fit any of them–
    “Oh, for love of God. Please, don’t make me fight you. I’m not strong enough to beat you, so I’ll just have to kill you. I’d rather not.”

    1. Yep. That’s the way the weak fight- all out, no holds barred, complete aggression. Also the insane. Known a few of those, too.

       When we were young, we learned to pull out punches. Not too many kids these days had that sort of growing up that they could learn.

       1. I had just this conversation with my wife. We learned to discipline and limits by getting a good, quick punch in the face. We were also taught not to hit girls because we could really hurt them. Today, not one of these idiots has ever had a strong man hit them and the girls don’t have any idea what would happen into them if one did. Daddy, or teacher, or whomever has always been there to bail them out.

          Stupid, vicious children

          1. Darn few have ever broken a bone, thrown a punch and been punched back, had to go to work with the bruises after, or had a drink with the guy that just kicked their butts and laughed about it. Even fewer have had to work for something to know things are actually worth. Less still have paid taxes, I bet, and none have realized how much of their lives have been wasted so far, and how much of that every year goes to pay for things they don’t want, don’t use, and wouldn’t support if they had a choice.

             Justice is a word they have no real knowledge of, sadly.

          2. Yeah. They told me that violence never solved anything, when they tried to railroad #2 son because playground bint said he’d “touched a girl on the bottom” (I guess he did, through a circle of other kids. To get her attention. I’ll go bail that’s just where he happened to touch. he was EIGHT and Mr. hormone didn’t even know his address.) Girl was nonplused. Son was baffled. I told the school “If girl was upset she could have slapped him.”
             “Violence never solved anything.”
             “Tell it to Hitler.”
             BUT SERIOUSLY. I went to 5th and 6th grade in skivvy section of town, and the multiple-repeaters stayed in 6th till 18. And were thugs. I was fully developed by 5th, or at least to their eyes (Mrs. Hormone was nowhere in sight where the brain was concerned.)
             SO. Yep. First time I was touched, I kneed guy in balls. Second time almost broke his ankle. Third time took a chunk off his hand with my teeth.
             After that? I was “ugly” and they weren’t interested. Except for head case who ambushed me in art classroom after closing (My project to finish at home wasn’t in book bag. I think retarded monkey had stolen it, to make me go back. Classroom was empty and dark, and he jumped me. I berserked. Threw him against the wall. Rib fracture. He never told anyone it was me, because,well, I was half his size.)
             It solved things well enough.

             1. I hit my chief bully four straight rights to the jaw. The postman dragged me off him or it would have been more. Not long after, I discovered that a baseball bat was best used for the thrust, not the slash. I then went through the rest of them seriatim. It’s not that the bullies respected me, they thought it was nuts and stayed the hell away from me.

                In high school through college I did a lot of manual labor — my father was a great believer in work so I started at 14 — Working with hot tar or in a hot kitchen on a hot day concentrates the mind. Did me a world of good so I gave my children the same gift and made them start working at the first opportunity.

                As for our cosplay revolutionaries, I pity them. As you say, they’ve never accomplished anything or failed at anything. They’re feral children destined to be shot down whether they lose or they win.

                1. Speaking of baseball bats – you know those lovely souvenir bats they sell? About eighteen inches long, very lightweight yet durable. Useful things they are. Whether jabbing into a solar plexus or larynx, or for a brisk rap across a knee or elbow, they provide attackers reason to pause and reconsider their career goals.

                   Sure, smug baboons will mock the idea, but give me a minute alone with a miniature bat and any of them and I am confident I can persuade them of the usefulness of a miniature bat in a melee.
                   –

                   1. Well, I mean, when you get down to it, they’re not all that different to old-fashioned nightsticks/billy clubs…

             2. As pointed out in Star Ship Troopers, ask the city fathers of Troy, or Carthage, or Hiroshima about the permanence of violent solutions.

          3. This. I have been hit. I’m small and breakable. I avoid trouble as much as possible. Someone comes at me with intent, I can’t afford to fight fair. I’d die.

             What worries me is that the Left will finally push into a situation in which someone like me has no choice but to pull out the berserker and broken glass, because there’s no other way out.

             Gov. DeSantis has now made it a criminal charge to block vehicle traffic, “peaceful protest” or not. Among other mob-related charges. Let’s hope this starts hammering consequences home.

             1. What worries me is that the Left will finally push into a situation in which someone like me has no choice but to pull out the berserker and broken glass, because there’s no other way out.

                *points at Kenosha*

                1. Oh, agreed. But I was thinking of a situation involving not someone lucky enough to be armed, but grim and determined enough to do the job WITH broken glass.

                   …Which would give the Left the exact “oh you horrid barbarians!” image they’ve dreamed of. Ugh.

                   1. True.

                   2. Without putting too fine a point on it, I am never “lucky” enough to be armed. If I am not in the shower or in bed asleep, I have one or more firearms on me. Other than family, the only folks who have seen me unarmed in the last 40 years or so are those who have seen me in locations where it is illegal to be armed. Those places I avoid as much as possible.

          4. If you search on line there are a few videos of Chick Guevara’s getting smacked down.

             It requires a heart of stone to not laugh at the anguished astonished cries.
             –

             1. Moldylocks’ comeuppance is always good for a chuckle.

       2. “If you have to fight, fight like a cornered cat.” From The Cornered Cat, a web-site (and book) about women, self-defense, and firearms.

    2. ‘I come in peace. I didn’t bring artillery. But I’m pleading with you, with tears in my eyes: If you f**k with me, I’ll kill you all.

       -General James Mattis

40. @AuthorinCharge You can find great reads in the Sunday promos right here at ATH. And there are other author-blog connectamacations in various genres. For me, it all started right here at ATH, then following up on a name here, a blog there … many many wonderful authors are out there. It takes time, but it feels so good to read only indie.

    1. Also, there is a goodreads book group for Hoyt’s Huns.

    2. The Mad Genius Club is another good source, and the blogs of authors you like. Many of the MGC authors have their own blogs, and these can lead to some tasty reading. Larry Correia will have a book-bomb occasionally, or he’ll be in an anthology (which got me to buy it, *and* the mil-SF/Thriller series that is the basis of the anthology).

41. c4c

42. Like our Host, I too feared Civil War II if the 2016 election hadn’t turned out the way it did. Even told my spouse, “I think at most, we have a couple more years, I bet THEY try to incite a race war next go around…”

    You can call me Cassandra, but the writing had been on the wall for years.

    1. They want it.

       But…

       I’m hopeful that if we can stall them for just a little longer, then the bottom will fall out of their plans. They’ll try again. They always do. But it won’t be for at least a generation.

       1. Particularly if China crashes. That’s where money is coming from.

          1. When China crashes, you can only prop up your economy by tearing down buildings and replacing them so long.

             1. Millions of idiots are ‘investing’ in Alibaba and other Chinese companies. All that money goes straight to the Communist Party and the military. Where did you think they got all those shiny tanks and ballistic missile trucks?

                1. Which doesn’t help when a large part of their economy is essentially construction make work.

                   1. I’m waiting to see what happens to all those idiots when the commies decide they’ve milked that cow dry.

                      Talk about a schadenboner you can climb to geosynchronous orbit…
                      ———————————
                      Leo Bloom: “Well, if we assume you’re a dishonest person—“
                      Max Bialystock: “Assume, assume!”

                2. If those investors don’t see a return on their investment, then they’ll stop investing and the money will dry up.

                   Investors like returns. They’re greedy like that.

             2. And the mass decoupling that started when businesses realized that authoritarian dictatorships can and will lock down their factories and suppliers with no notice, for indefinite periods of time, after hiding problems…

                Businesses hate uncertainty. Adverse conditions they can work with, but they hate deliberate uncertainty due to withheld information and mercurial decree. China shot themselves in the foot, quite badly, and has vastly accelerated capital flight to other parts of Southeast Asia where the labour force is almost as cheap, the infrastructure is being built, and the governments are not prone to being able to suddenly lock down the population en masse.

                Their window of time to seize all of Asia by economic and military might is rapidly shrinking, before the legacy one-child policy ages out their military and starts seriously impacting their workforce.

                1. Saw a long thread on Twitter concerning the current India/China border conflict. It showed a video of alleged Cinese soldiers crying like little girls on a bus headed for the front. I rather think the thing was a hoax; but it’s also possible that a lot of only sons, possibly spoiled all their lives, might not make the best troops.

                   1. Well, a good boot camp is supposed to knock that out of them (particularly since the PLA has been trying to model itself after the modern US Army). And while the PRC has conscription, there are apparently enough PLA volunteers every year to avoid the need for any sort of draft. It’s possible that the PLA troops facing India are having a morale crisis. But I’d be skeptical. The PLA isn’t filled up with unwilling and unmotivated conscripts. While even volunteers can get a bit squirrelly when their supposedly peace-time military suddenly has an actual opponent to face, they do tend to be better motivated than those who get called up due to bad luck.

                      I am curious to know how they’re doing against the Indian Army up there, though. And I’m sure that I’m not the only one. This would be the first time in decades that the PLA had a notable military confrontation.

                      1. A lot of decades. And unless you count Tienmen Square, the one that comes to mind is the PLA’s 1979 invasion of Vietnam to “teach our socialist brothers a lesson” that bogged the PLA down into much pain for no gain, followed by a negotiated cease-fire and the PLA going home.

                   2. “… a lot of only sons, possibly spoiled all their lives, might not make the best troops.”

                      More than that: a lot of parents and grandparents might not appreciate their genetic contributios to the future become past.

                      Beware grandparents with nothing to lose.
                      –

                   3. They are also their parents’ only security for old age. That is not going to help with support from populace.

43. As a periodic Public Service Announcement regarding the intellectual property under the title “Starship Troopers “:

    GO READ THE BOOK.

    The movie has nothing much to do with the book along the same lines as Star Trek Discovery has nothing much to do with Star Trek. The studio bought the rights from the RAH estate and used basically some names, but shoved their puerile strutting international communist big hat military critique of children growing up NAZI story underneath.

    DO NOT JUDGE ANYTHING ABOUT “STARSHIP TROOPERS” BASED ON THE MOVIE. GO READ THE BOOK.

    We now return you to your previously selected comment thread already in progress.

    1. Read the original story in F&SF for free: https://archive.org/stream/Fantasy_Science_Fiction_v017n04_1959-10_PDF/Fantasy__Science_Fiction_v017n04_1959-10_PDF#page/n1/mode/2up

    2. IIRC, I’ve seen 30 seconds of the movie. Heard it was dreck, and when it came up while channel-surfing, I stayed long enough to get the info page.

    3. And the director, Paul Verhoeven, openly admitted to not even having read the book all the way through. Which is a sin against artistic integrity.

       1. As I understand it, he never read even one word of the book – his staff read it and started to give him a verbal pitch which he interrupted, so he never even got the full storyline as a verbal book report from his poor oppressed minion.

          Verhoven had been trying to get funding to make a movie from his original story about kids growing up in Nazi-dominated Europe, joining the German war effort and fighting the allies, for many many years, with no luck at all. So he convinced the RAH estate to sell him the movie rights with flash and promises of faithfulness, then basically sliced the bugs and the character names off the top and slid his own existing story about misguided youth under fascism in wartime underneath.

    4. When the movie came out, I re-read the novel and I was surprised at how thoughtful it was. I mean, it is based on the premise on a world where it was possible to prove, with mathematical logic, whether or not an action was moral or not.

44. On the other hand, we could do this…

    

45. Be of good cheer! The 169th Weaponized Autism Intelligence Gathering Brigade has cracked yet another mystery that the TLAs couldn’t:

    https://thedonald.win/p/HXtHalNO/get-in-here–holly-zoller-is-the/c/

    If you scroll down you will find that this person is also one of the claimed wounded from Charlottesville.

    1. Holly Zoller, eh? Good luck getting a job in future, Holly.

       1. Are you kidding? She’ll collect a free degree from one of the Woke colleges, a book contract from one of the Three, and a six-figure job offer from CNN or Netflix.

          Remember, she’s not a terrorist in their ideology, she’s “speaking truth to power.”

    2. Part of the leftist’s march through the institutions is about building the logistics tail represented by Holly Zoller and the Bail Project. It does no good in a hot civil war to have the most guns, if you don’t have the logistical support to keep them supplied. One more way that getting sucked in to the left’s fantasies would be a bad idea.

46. “But are you sure of your cell phone?”

    Yes. I am 100% sure that my cell phone is a tool of the enemy. So is my PC, so is any connected device.

    In the event of an “event”, shall we say, all that shit goes in a box.

47. “Because Someone refuses to join a writers’ group and is fond of convoluted plotting. “

    O.O

    I haven’t even written… err… finished that one yet, I promise!

48. Did you ever read “Anthem”, Billy?

    What do you think of that snake flag, Billy? Pretty cool, huh?

    What’s the “Freedom for All, From All” equivalent of tracing a fish in the dirt?

49. Random Thoughts:

    There’s the “derriere guarde” and organizations like the Art Renewal Center (artrenewal dot org).

    I’ve had second- and third-hand reports that it’s easier to come out as gay in the gun culture than as a gun owner in the gay culture.

    There’s been an inversion where the ‘hicks of flyover country’ are now the cosmopolitans and the urbanites are narrow-minded parochialists.

    I had a theory that SF fans were often strangely conservative because in their Golden age of Science Fiction (12-14 years old) they read lots of stuff from 50+ years ago. I’m not so sure it still applies.

    I’m willing to say “If it’s war you want, then war you shall have.” But I’m not gleeful about it. Some months back a Leftist asked (on another forum) why the Right hadn’t already kicked off a civil war, and my answer was that the Right knows that even if they win and win quickly, a civil war would still SUCK.

    I also see most of the face-making and saber-rattling as maneuvering for a Sun-Tzu-style supreme victory of winning without actually fighting any real battles.

    The ability to claim “They started it!” and make it stick is a huge advantage, not to be willingly abandoned. (See Fort Sumter, Pearl Harbor, et. al.)

    The Left must be defenestrated from the Overton Window. There is no other option. International socialists must be as badly discredited as national socialists were after WWII.

    The term “Liberal Fascist” is a powerful weapon. We should use it more often. (And whatever his faults are, credit to Jonah Goldberg for coining/popularizing the term.)

    I’m not relying on it by a long stretch, but I’m still hoping for a Trump victory in November breaking the Left rather than causing them to seek yet another stop to pull out. I can’t call it likely, but I can hope for a shift from Anger to Bargaining (and then Acceptance) on the part of the Left.

    1. “Some months back a Leftist asked (on another forum) why the Right hadn’t already kicked off a civil war…”

       That’s just f-ing typical, isn’t it? One of my Big Red Buttons right there.

       The short answer, as you say, is because “the Right” knows what such a thing would entail. Anyone with a brain and a drop of history knows you do not want to kick over -that- can of worms. Them there is sand worms, boi. They will not go back in the can peacefully.

       The slightly longer answer is that war is hell “and you Lefty assholes haven’t done anything bad enough yet that I should have to put up with Hell. But you’re working on it.”

       1. Why the assumption the Civil War would be kicked off by the Right? Does that acknowledge that until the Right reacts to the Left’s usurpations and abuses it isn’t a war?
          –

          1. “Why the assumption the Civil War would be kicked off by the Right?”

             The Lefties like to pretend that they’re the ones “pushing back” against “centuries of Righty oppression!” It makes them feel all righteous and stuff I guess. They are the good ones and we redneck beer swillers are the bad ones who make the world suck. That’s the story.

             What’s really going on is things like the latest Throne Speech from the Liberals here in Canada, where they say among other things that they’ll make a “Green Recovery!” from the WuFlu.

             That’s bafflegab for shutting down the oil industry in Western Canada. They’re going to drive half the country out of business to save the planet. That’s “social justice” you see, because mumblemumble The White Man! and Raping Gaia! and Solidarity! And Trans rights! Yeah! And #OrangeManBad! don’t forget that. Yeah, shut down the Canadian oil industry, that’ll show those damn Americans.

             That’s merely this week’s example of the program that’s been playing out since the 1960s.

             But they haven’t done anything worth unleashing Hell upon the earth yet. Shoot a few cops, burn a few stores, beat up a few old people, lock everybody in their homes for six months, we do not bring down War over that.

             But they do keep pushing. So I guess we shall see.

          2. Saw something today being emailed around along the lines of “split the country!” / “amicable divorce” and I resisted the temptation to observe that the last time the Democrat Party tried that EXACT SAME THING it didn’t go nearly as well as they expected.

             1. But that was because Lincoln refused to let them go and baited them into a war by keeping Union troops in Confederate territory. I don’t think Trump would start a civil war just to keep California from leaving.

                1. GPM,
                   Actually, the “War of the Northern Aggression” (I’m a Texan and there was nothing “CIVIL” about this war) was initiated by lower ranking CSA officers (majors, IIRC). Major Anderson, USA, and commander of Ft Sumter agreed to evacuate the fort due to a lack of supplies and set the hour for his evacuation. This was in response to an offer from the CSA commanding general, P.G.T. Beauregard. On the way back with the message, the couriers stopped at a CSA fort and authorized the start of the bombardment. Thus the war began. Much like “the shot heard ’round the world” in 1775, the gunfire was NOT on the orders of the responsible officers but rather was based on individual “initiative”. In tense situations, ill advised actions by one or a few individuals can have explosive consequences. Any odds on the ability of the participants in the current situation avoiding being a casus belli?

                   1. Discussion of that particular dispute is generally discouraged as a “tar baby” (see FAQ) but … a bit of discussion of nomenclature:

                      Aside from the lack of civility, it was not a civil war because it was not a conflict over who would be in control of the government. Calling it the War of Northern Aggression seems needlessly pejorative, given that the Southern States clearly provided sufficient casus belli not only at Sumter but declaring secession rather than initiating it as a legal assertion. They had sufficient presence and sympathizers in Congress that they might well have succeeded with a legislative motion to grant their independence (Lincoln’s certain veto would have improved their standing to secede without legal permission.)

                      I’ve long maintained that the most accurate title for the conflagration is the War of Southern Secession. It recognizes the central dispute without casting either side in the dispute as responsible.

                      I think we can all agree that both sides were irresponsible.
                      –

                      1. I consider it primarily a war between the Democrats and the Republicans.

                         Having learned nothing, the Democrats are trying to start another one.
                         ———————————
                         Those who do not remember history are doomed to repeat it. Those who do remember history are doomed to watch everybody else repeat it.

                      2. RES,
                         “Aside from the lack of civility, it was not a civil war because it was not a conflict over who would be in control of the government.’
                         Yep, you are absolutely correct. I also note that the Pres before Lincoln (James Buchanan (D) ) was a states rights supported and did NOTHING in response to the secession of the first states as he preferred to leave the problem to Lincoln. Could he have prevented the war? Unknown but for his entire term he did nothing to defuse the issues. From the beginning the democrats have been very good at starting problems and leaving it to others to solve the issues.
                         I am not a fan of compromises and, frankly, I think the “Great Compromisers” (Clay, Calhoun, and Webster) were a big part of the reason the war was as long and bloody as it was. Just like Neville Chamberlain made WW2 inevitable and worse by his compromises with Hitler (yes, I know his reasons and they made sense to many folks, it doesn’t change the facts). I’ve been called “rigid” and I guess I may be but I do NOT compromise on important issues.

                         1. I am of two minds about the compromise — on the one hand, it allowed the North’s advantages in manpower and industrial capacity to grow enough to become decisive (at least once the Union found generals willing to utilise them) but at the same time it tended to make the South’s firebrands more entrenched. People ted to ignore the significant anti-slavery sentiment in the post-Revolution South, even among slaveholders, but as s often the case Northern condemnation tended to cause many Southerners to cling to their tradition more strongly and to concoct ever stranger defenses of the practice.

                            As for Mr. Chamberlin, his Munich Agreement was a culmination of his making the war more certain; while not only was the time bought by his concessions insufficient for rearmament, the manner in which he promoted it tended to empower his antiwar supporters.
                            –

       2. They keep pushing, but they want you to take the first swing so they get bonus Aggreived Points.

    2. >> “defenestrated from the Overton Window”

       Consider that particular turn of phrase purloined.

    3. I’ve had second- and third-hand reports that it’s easier to come out as gay in the gun culture than as a gun owner in the gay culture.
       As a gay gun owner, I confirm this. Does that count as a first-hand report?

       1. A few years ago, we were all sitting around the fire by the barn, enjoying avoiding cleaning our weapons and imbibing adult beverages, when one of our guys took a break from no sh-t there I was stories, and said, “Ah, I need to tell you all something. I’m bi.”
          After about half a second, the response was, “So? What’s that got to do with anything?”
          and “Hey, want me to get ya anything while I’m getting up?”
          And “What, was that supposed to shock us?”
          and from me, “Yeah, I came out years ago, and they don’t care.”
          …then we went back to the EMT and the pediatric doc and the military medic all one-upping each other on stories, and the rest of us laughing.

          On the other hand, coming out conservative around some of my ex-girlfriends? Yeah, this particular comedy bit ain’t too far off.

       2. Should.

50. Re the post title, it seems to me that the objection to Trump by the non-Left all came down to “He’s nekulturny!”

    1. Yep. So are we. It’s time to claim it with pride.

       1. Oh, I do. When ask questions about my beliefs or what I think about the world I always preface my answer with a question; “Do you really want to know?” All my co-workers learned very quickly that they would NOT like the answer and I could back up my point of view and they couldn’t successfully defend their own viewpoint. I might have merit in heaven for instructing the ignorant if I didn’t get such malicious pleasure out of popping their leftest balloons.

51. On a slightly different but related note, as it shows how the Democratic Party governors who seized dictatorial power are going to continue expanding it, even when their own party controls the legislature, is what Fascist Dictator Newsome just did in California (link via Instapundit)

    https://www.foxla.com/news/california-governor-signs-executive-order-to-ban-gas-powered-cars-and-trucks

    Yes, he imposed an outright ban on gas powered cars via executive decree, without even waiting for the legislature controlled by his own party to pass a law allowing him to do so.

    Expect other Democratic Party states to follow, and if Harris wins in November, expect this to be imposed by decree, with the packed Supreme Court upholding the power grab.

    This is quite literally, a life and death election.

    1. I have a dream.

       I dream that some day soon, Honda, Toyota, Ford, Chrysler, Mercedes, BMW, and every other major and middling car company in the world stops complying with CARB regulations. They just say “No.” They stop shipping cars and parts to California. All on the same day. Dealerships load up their unsold stock and send it all out of state, then board up and wave bye bye.

       In my dream all the major gun and ammunition makers do the same, and refuse to ship so much as a firing pin spring or a box of .22LR to any address in California.

       I dream that the major trucking companies refuse to enter the state, and drop all trailers on the Arizona/Nevada border. No pickups. No deliveries. And the nuclear plant in Arizona opens the switch that sends power over the mountains to LA.

       It is my dream that anyone who has asked and pouted and stamped and screeched as much as Californians have, for as long as they have, should receive what they wanted. In detail.

       You asked for it, you got it. Toyota.

       1. And we take back the Colorado River!

          1. And tear down the damn wasteful windfarms in Wyoming that are supposedly supplying (a tiny trickle of) power to places like California.

       2. “I dream that the major trucking companies refuse to enter the state …”

          Not far off. There have already been reports of trucks refusing to enter cities that have defunded their police. It is a job that doesn’t pay nearly enough to get Reginald Dennyed.

          Funny how the clowns envisioning world peace, imagining there’s no heaven, never imagine no food deliveries, no corner grocery store (it’s easy if you try.)
          –

          1. They’ll call it a food dessert and blame racism.

             1. May that comfort them in their time of cannibalism.

    2. Why monkey around with such an indirect approach? Go straight to the source! If Governor Nuisance wants to stop Global Warming, just sign an executive order requiring the climate to return to what it was in the 1960’s and stay that way for the next hundred years. Problem solved!

       To paraphrase Londo Mollari: “Authority and stupidity, all in the same package. How efficient of you.”

       I’m working on a story, in which the main characters gain access to advanced technology. Figuring it out takes a long time, but eventually they offer to the world: The Solar Shield. A literal force shield between the Sun and Earth which can screen out a little of the Sun’s infrared light to directly counteract any desired amount of Global Warming. It can also filter out ultraviolet light to compensate for Ozone Layer Depletion. It can prevent an Ice Age by focusing just a tiny bit more sunlight on the planet.

       Permanently solving, all at one stroke, any climate-related problems we will ever have. As a bonus, it will shield the Earth and our expensive satellites from solar storms, solar flares, plasma ejections and any other nasty little surprises the Sun may spring on us.

       The Leftoids can’t decide whether to have a cow, or squeal like stuck pigs. Each of their objections is more insane than the last, because they don’t want a solution; they want a permanent crisis they can ride to absolute power.
       ———————————
       Dark Willow: “Bored now.”

    3. To be fair, Newsom did not need the COVID-bestowed dictatorial powers to enact that executive order. I’m frankly surprised he couldn’t get the legislature to pass a law requiring that and would guess it is even money he didn’t go for legislation because the state assembly would never have been willing to wait until 2035 for it to go into full effect.

       OTOH, if Harris-Biden wins you can be confident that not only will the Senate repeal the rule of the legislative filibuster, grant statehood to Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia, increase the Supreme Court bench by adding six judges who make Reinhardt look moderate and Posner seem wise, they’ll tap the Federal Treasury to pay off the accumulated deficits of California, New York, Illinois and any other states sending blue delegations.

       Then they’ll undertake the truly crazy policy agenda. They’ll reinterpret the 1st Amendment to ban “Hate” speech, the 2nd Amendment to effectively eliminate guns, the 4th Amendment to permit searches and seizures of contraband (copies of Atlas Shrugged, Animal Farm, Starship Troopers and Charlotte’s Web*), the 5th Amendment along the lies of the “Silence is Violence” and “Insufficient anti-racism is racism” arguments, and on up to rewriting the 22nd Amendment to allow Democrat presidents unlimited terms (to atone for past racism or something.)

       *Nothing wrong with the book, but many people love it and they need to show they can deny us nice things.
       –

       1. the 4th Amendment

          What’s that?

          1. No searching/seizing of property without a lawful warrant, if I recall right. I’m sure there’s more to it than that, but that’s the general gist. (It’s already being hugely abused via the asset forfeiture nonsense, in my opinion.)

             1. Nope, no such thing.

                It would be nice if we could put the 1A and 2A issues to rest once and for all, freeing up resources to institute something like that.

                1. Ah, well, I’m misremembering what it is in that case. And will look it up another time 😀

                   1. [serious-mode]

                      That is what the 4th is. But in practice the 4th has been repealed.

                      The worst abuses the 1st or 2nd have ever been subjected to are a drop in the bucket compared to everyday life for the 4th.

                      1. Ahhh, gotcha. (Sorry, brain is not firing on all cylinders today. Smoke from fires both local and elsewhere is making it difficult to function, heh.)

                         In that case, yeah, definitely agreed. The 4th is little more than words on paper at this point. (And it’s getting to the point where I have to be very picky about which police procedurals I watch–or be in the mood to utterly suspend my disbelief–or I end up yelling at the tv about “THAT IS SO ILLEGAL WHAT ARE YOU DOING” and rights being violated, sigh.)

52. I have a dream of going out as I came in: screaming and covered in someone else’s blood. (Naked at this point would be sad for everyone’s sense of aesthetics. And hopefully not prematurely.) At least if I don’t get the option to go quietly, at an advanced age, surrounded by my children, bio and adopted, including those adopted as adults (ever so useful. No diapers to change) and their tribe of children and grandchildren.

    A Rifleman’s Prayer

    Oh Lord, I would live my life in freedom, peace and happiness, enjoying the simple pleasures of hearth and home. I would die an old, old man in my own bed, preferably of sexual overexertion.

    But if that is not to be, Lord, if monsters such as this should find their way to my little corner of the world on my watch, then help me to sweep those bastards from the ramparts, because doing that is good, and right, and just.

    And if in this I should fall, let me be found atop a pile of brass, behind the wall I made of their corpses.

    – Geek With a .45

    1. Short form:

       Lord, let me die peacefully in my sleep like my grandfather, not screaming in terror like his enemies.

       1. “…not screaming in terror like his passengers.”

          — couldn’t resist.

       2. Heh. ríastrad.

    2. Slightly different version:

       Lord, make me fast and accurate. Let my aim be true and my hand faster than those who would seek to destroy me. Grant me victory over my foes and those that wish to do harm to me and mine. Let not my last thought be “If only I had my gun” and Lord, if today is truly the day that You call me home, let me die in a pile of brass.

       1. Thanks! Added to my list of quotes I carry around “for just such an occasion”.

53. I just cut ties with my daughter-in-law, and mother of my grandchild, two nights ago over “social” media bullshit. Apparently some melt-brain professor found a handful of slack-jawed meth-heads spouting white power bull$#ite on a sidewalk somewhere and posted the account to be shared by his fellow travelers.

    DiL decides to say some nonsense about “Trump supporters, these are your people” and some other nonsensical guilt-by-voting-correlation, to which a family member alerted me, since I haven’t logged on FB in months. I tried to caution her, to give her a way out, that painting with a broad brush and holding people responsible for the actions or words of idiots is not a game she wants to play.

    Of course, she doubled down. Then tripled.

    When finally confronted with opposition to which she has clearly never faced that forced her to confront her own ignorance and internal contradictions, she played the victim card. All utterly predictable. She then continued to make vile insinuations that impugned most of the family into which she married, I let her know privately that she and I were done because of her toxicity and pathological lack of self-awareness.

    I’m done being silent in the interests of peace.

    1. Good for you!

       Coddling idiots just makes them louder and crazier.

    2. As this undoubtedly forfeits access to your son and grandchild, I extend my condolences on your situation. You had no choice, appear to have extended every opportunity for her to climb off that limb, and turned more than the other cheek.

       That such a toxic woman will poison the minds of all around her is a reality you cannot affect. The break was clearly inevitable, she having othered you ad her husband’s family — a family for which she has no affection in spite of it providing the husband she wanted.

       I pray your son will maintain contact, however limited, and that you can keep him aware he is welcome back … and, should she repent, his wife as well.

       And that, boys & girls, is why I eschew Facebook as tool of Satan.
       –

54. China is the biggest demographic catastrophe since the Black Death. they don’t have enough babies and they don’t have enough women. The floods have wiped out the rice crop, the locusts ate the wheat crop,

    Much like.the democrats, if they were strong and secure they wouldn’t be acting this way.

55. *takes an extra step away from Sarah

56. Honesty, hanky codes would have been easier: yellow for slightly right of center, blue for old-fashioned so-con, purple for small l libertarian, psychedelic tie dye for the Libertarian party, black for Anarcho Capitalists, brown for OWL (Older, wiser Libertarians), pink for voluntarianists, chartreuse for “I’m just so tired of what pigs leftists are” and red for the blood of our heroes.

    Two rules are making new hanky codes, imaginary or otherwise.

    1. Don’t use yellow or brown…just don’t.
    2. Silver lame always has the same value regardless of the code.

    Also, when needed, left is for active/gives and right is for passive/receives. That means you may need two of a hanky (although I’ve heard tales of tying it in the center rear belt loop).

    Oh, and at events, put your phone down and actually cruise (insert rants about “what are they teaching young gay men these days”).

    1. They aren’t. 😀 Teaching.
       Yes, I know about yellow and brown. Forgive me, I am VERY tired and was even when I wrote this. No, not tired of you guys or the discussion. It’s just been a weird month even for this year.

       1. What they are should be obvious and…ick.

       2. And no, they aren’t teaching. I’ve watch straight women lecture leather men under 30 about what a cruise slip is, why they are on the tables along with pencils, and how to use them.

          Look, I’m not saying that gay male culture (leather and otherwise) with the free sex was 100% or even 80% good in terms of physical, mental, or emotional health. But it was a culture and an authentic one that celebrated the values and myths of its people.

          To see it lost to apps on tiny screens makes me sad, even if I wasn’t a part of it. Something is lost with its passing in that way, including the good things that it’s tragedy through AIDS inspired.

          1. I wasn’t snerking you. Lots of things aren’t being taught, and I fully believe the kink community has lost generational knowledge. At the same time, I found the complaint, so traditional in such a strange setting very amusing.

             1. I didn’t think you were snerking.

                And I just find it sad and it’s not even really my community, although they share sources.

                Another sad part is the people standing around trying to revive or explain this lost culture when the culture is still right there for them to embrace.

    2. Why even bother to go to events, when their reality is mostly centered around their phone?

       “So, did you go to the bash last night?”

       “Sure did. The video was awesome!”

       [pause] “What are we talking about?”

       1. Because that way you can have sex with strangers without having them into your space. That’s why they still go to the clubs.

          What is odd, in terms of violence and even to a degree disease risk the old culture took better care of its members, same as the kink world.

          Remember, AIDS started spreading in an environment when STDs were a badge of honor, not something to scare off people. So people knew who had what to a degree and you could get warned off the black clap even when the clap was cool and proof you were sticking it to the man.

          Grindr doesn’t have that cruise culture and old hands to warn you about who was crazy, who was rough and probably for the more experienced, and who was okay.

          1. I’ve been thinking on a possible guest post that talks to how risk taking tends to be obdurate, I’m a financial risk manager by profession. My examples were seat belts, cycle helmets and, of course masks *spit* but the literature talks to the reaction to AIDS and exactly what you were talking about here.

             In my risk taking taxonomy, the club culture you’re describing are individualists rather than collectivists. (the other categories are fatalists, hierarchists, and psychopaths.). The individualists are governed by freedom but will take the steps necessary to maintain a community versus the collectivists who are governed by fear and the precautionary principle who would shut the community down to be “safe.” To the surprise of all the other groups, the individualist order tends to be safer and more orderly than the others.

             1. Sounds fascinating. If you do do a guest post, whatever cites you can add would be appreciated.

                1. I can give you the first one, even if i never actually write it, story of my life that is. John Adams, Risk. Came out in 95 or so. There’s a free PDF out there on his web site. My formulation differs from his, particularly the psychopath piece, but his is one of those books that I’ve incorporated so much in my thinking that I plagiarize It unconsciously.

             2. I had an idea for a guest post a little parallel on agency and how everything from Twitter to the welfare office is trying to steal it.

57. Either by a natural bend of the mind, or whatever (and note that I always assumed it was my early experiences, but I’ve seen normal, American people fall into this too) we have a passionate interest in politics and forms of government, and in my case an utterly paradoxical (if you know what I do for a living) hunger and thirst for the truth.

    1776, both the year and the musical (which I watched on TV that year). I turned 10 in November of that year so it hit a sweet spot in my growth. In the next three years I read SST and Moon in the hazy memories of seeing the musical and…it just happened.

    1. you turned 10 in 1776?

       hmmm

       is this place holy ground?

       1. To the USAian religion? Duh!

          1. awwww

             *puts sword away

       2. Sorry…that came out wrong.

          1. I understood! Draven is being a snerk.

       3. That’s nothing! I knew this one gal, she routinely turned ten in a night. Twenty when the fleet was in!
          –

58. I’m saying the time is not yet.

    Here is the problem.

    It has never been time to fight back even when the fighting was not with weapons but with words. It was always time to rollover even when it was rolling over on tax increases for budget cuts for the second time or amnesty for illegals for the third (although a mild fighting back stopped it). It was always time to rollover when it was calling them what they were while accepting their exclusion of on individual one of us from their attacks (see Kemp accepting Gore’s “well, I know you’re not a racist” comment in the debates for the perfect example).

    It was never time to fight if we had the White House because they had the Congress. It was never time to fight when we had the Congress because they had they had the White House. When we had both it wasn’t time to fight because that might offend the moderates who, at first approximation are your “non-political people”.

    We’ve retreated and retreated and retreated without even fighting much of a rear guard. The Egyptians lost the Sinai twice, but at least they stood and fought and were defeated. After the first two they had a strategy to win the third time and did for long enough that the Israelis decided giving the Sinai back was worth it.

    And Sadat was able to sell that peace to both his own people and the Israelis (in that he could secure it from his side) because he had fought back with some success.

    So here we are, pushed across Suez with, as their Ben Gurian and even the most Orthodox rabbis arguing we have “compelled the Israelis to violate the Biblical injunction never to return to [Egypt].”

    They are opening burning, looting, beating, and shooting with no fear from the law. They openly endorse killing us. They are openly fixing an election so that if everyone voted GOP, even Democrats, they will win.

    And it is still not time to fight.

    We will have to agree to disagree. We are being herded in the Warsaw ghettos. We cannot win. But we can die with our boots on or we can continue to say “it’s night time to fight; these might honestly just be showers”.

    Or we can switch sides. Why not raise the fist and say, “Black lives matter”. Why fight the mob when it comes. If we fake it enough, maybe sell out our friends, it won’t be time to fight.

    Sure, the bullet will come even to those who do that, but it will come without warning and only after we’ve learned to love Big Brother. That is one promise the Inner Party kept to Winston. They’ll keep it to us.

    1. Thanks, herb. You’ve restated what I’ve become too depressed to argue.

       We’ve been gaslit at least as hard by our “friends and allies” as our enemies.

59. This is long. I apologize. Sarah’s post resonates strongly with me. So thought I’d share a bit. Maybe an encouragement?

    BTW, going to be away for a couple of weeks.

    “The tragically gifted”. I resemble that remark.

    The tragic part is, from something in one’s background or experience, having clarity about cold hard reality. The gifts are the vision and drive to secure the culture, to protect civilization from the barbarians. This refuge is a place to connect with similarly minded folks, share thoughts, grow, and encourage.

    I was a happy go lucky kid. Fondly remember spending my days climbing trees (to sit and read books), exploring creeks, playing with neighbor kids, lying on my bed reading.

    School turned me into a rebel. Absolutely hated school. Actually did all right in first grade. But after that I was bored so I would find things to do, which of course brought trouble. Lots of pain and grief for my longsuffering parents.

    The teachers from second grade on all passed me to get rid of me. Graduated high school with a C average. So, rebellion resulted in low wage tedious work.

    Hated the work but loved the people I worked with (mostly hard working minority folks with families). Honest. Fun. No guile. Appropriately realistic and cynical, especially about politicians and government “help”. Truly wonderful people.

    Crime was and is a very real problem in low income areas. I got to share. My transportation, fitting my wages, was a bicycle and later a motorcycle. Two bicycles in succession, both chained, were stolen. Then, later, a motorcycle. That leaves the options of taking a bus or walking – to work and everywere.

    Between my school experience and the contact with cold hard reality, this rebel became some sort of anti-establishment but pro-law-enforcement conservative. Don’t know what color hanky.

    Then there is the gifted part. Hated the work. Decided that, to do something more interesting and profitable, I needed to go to college. Community college takes everybody, even with a C average. Then grades and recommendations got me into university and then graduate school. Ph.D. from one of the best schools in the U.S. Worked the entire time to pay for it.

    Somewhat under the radar. One Marxist professor was on to me. Mocked me for my blue collar values. During hiring season for new Ph.D.s, he called friends at other universities to keep me from getting hired. Did get hired though. Taught at universities for 12 years or so. Got along fine with most colleagues. A tolerant bunch at that point. Not sure that would be true today. But university adminstrators – yech. You can have them all, presidents, provosts, diversity officers, residential education deans. I couldn’t stand the campus environment, always another memo another directive about multiculturalism, diversity, inequality, the leftist claptrap of the week or month.

    So on to other things. Somewhat sadly. But with great relief.

    I’m with Sarah, “Fight now. No matter the cost.” But going hot is a last last resort. There are lots of folks in positions of power who are looking for (and may invent) an excuse to round us all up.

    1. “BTW, going to be away for a couple of weeks.”

       For non-Bad reasons, we hope?

       Amen on Community College – the people there are usually paying their own way, not looking to waste time with nonsense and the teachers typically have the kind of practical experience not found in ivory towers.

       At any rate, have fun storming the castle.
       –

60. My husband and I were talking about this on our walk a couple evenings ago. Seems related: https://tempestinateardrop.com/2020/09/23/thinkings

61. Just a thought: Here in NC we’ve got a hard fought Senate race. In Colorado I gather the Senate race is tight. There seem to be other competitive Senate races elsewhere.

    That means Senate debates.

    I don’t know about here in NC, but I plan to look into how questions may be submitted for those debates. I think both candidates ought be asked about expanding the Supreme Court, eliminating the legislative filibuster, and defunding the police.

    Those seem like things about which they ought be on the record.
    –

62. “An Oklahoman bar owner”

    Sarah, you really need to change that to Omaha NE, where this bar owner actually lived and worked. Yes, I know, typos, but this one IS significant.

    1. Oh, dear Lord. No, Steve. That’s not a typo. That’s one of the things my brain scrambles, geography wise. ARGH.

    2. Argh at me, not you. Thanks for pointing it out.

63. Get back on GAB woman
    I’m tired of only having nazis to follow

    1. I can’t even figure out how to log in again. And I got sick of being disgusted. Same reason I never go to Tiwitter.
       Red or black fascists, it’s all the same.

       1. I nuked my twitter account last year, and have not missed it. One can view without an account if something Elon twitted is of interest, just no twitting. I don’t need any ability to contribute to that sewer.

          1. I made a Twitter account once, but I would have to go digging to find my username let alone log in.

             I recently experienced a temptation to say something about sunk costs and muppets, but it seemed like too much trouble, probably because it was.

64. Those who are granted admission into the socio-political elite (usually on the basis of Assumption Three) are usually all-in invested in their elite status – financially, professionally, politically, even in terms of reputation and their own self-esteem. They have built their ENTIRE lives around being perceived as the elite.

    That is why they hate Donald Trump.

    Trump doesn’t give even one rat’s patootie about maintaining that perceived value … and that threatens the value of their investment.

    He instead focuses on policies that expand on individual liberty. And every expansion of our liberty he brings about (in energy policy, in regulatory reform, in the judiciary, in the economy), calls into question the perceived value of their investment …

    … for it depends upon US needing THEM.

    1. Well, Trump does have things and people he cares about, but they largely don’t have the power to take those things and people away from him. And he’s got kind of a hard head, and he’s already been out of money before.

    2. Trump is a construction guy; he’s dealt with architects and engineers who couldn’t design a crapper if you gave them a 2ft by 3ft plank with a 9-inch diameter hole in the center and a five-gallon bucket … and with plumbers who can hardly keep their pants up but can not only design it but build it, plumb it, sand, paint and polish it while using the excess boardage to provide a foot rest, all while the degreed geniuses are budgeting the project in the thousands of dollars.
       –

65. This doesn’t help the existential depression and angst 2020 has brought to bear. I know there is no help for those who see the writing on the wall but hope they’re wrong. When the press has become a voluntary mouthpiece for everything Marxist and beyond, it’s too late to worry.
    You should get out of Denver. After watching cops stand by as tiny Michelle Malkin is attacked while promoting their blue lives, it’s clear Denver is well on the road to becoming Baltimore in the Rockies. My better half’s grandchildren reside there, but he’s become so angered by the easy arrogance and assumed superiority of their parents, he won’t be back any time soon. There is a county in Florida called “Flagler” where you would find a very good home.

66. The Gospel word for “be filled, be satisfied, be satiated” is chortasthenai, which comes from chortazo. It also means “to be fattened up” or even just “to be fed.” I think the implication is like when you give an animal a full feeding, so that it has a happy full belly – not too little, not too much. It shows up a lot in Eucharistic contexts, like the feeding of the five thousand, the manna, and the Syro-Phoenician woman asking for help.

    1. Oh, good. I should know you knew.
       Looks mournfully down. Well, the fattened up thing has been working 😀 Even if it’s not what it meant.

67. I think the implication is connected with the Messianic Banquet, which is pretty much the whole dealie with the beatitudes and woes. The Messiah feeds everybody with endless amounts of food and wine, and all kinds of good things happen, at the end of the world and the beginning of the new Creation.

    Of course, if you think you hunger and thirst for justice, but you are actually in it for revenge and mean girl cliques, I imagine it would not go well for you, and you might end up being served at the messianic banquet for the birds of the air, which is provided by the Lord’s enemies. (Insert your favorite Homer or Morrigan quotes here.)

68. I don’t know why all my comments are ending up in weird places….

    Anyway, the traditional Christian iconographic symbol of hope is an anchor. Even if it’s a storm anchor, your boat needs to have some hope on board.

    It’s the foolish who let themselves be tossed around by every wind and wave that changes, without any idea of where to go or when to stop. It’s the people who want to destroy all good things from the past who also destroy their hope for a future.

69. c4c

70. Sarah said: “Note these are the most popular genres because most people who read them only read to decompress. They don’t want their views challenged…”

    I’m a little less triggered today, so I finally processed that paragraph. The notion that “people don’t want their views challenged when they are trying to relax” makes perfect sense to me. It is reasonable that in a mystery or a romcon or a romance that the reader doesn’t want to suddenly become engaged with an “issue.” It is also reasonable that writing within the confines of “current year normal” will therefore be more popular. Because it isn’t challenging. They don’t have to think, they can just go along with the story and say “aww” at all the cute parts.

    Unfortunately this is one of those things where I’m a weirdo. That’s not why I read.

    I want to SEE SOMETHING goddammit! Show me a faster than light drive. Show me a space colony that isn’t Jean Jacques Rousseau in space. Show me a mighty conflict that isn’t #CapitalismBad. Show me a plucky hero who isn’t a drug-addicted thief. Take me to Middle Earth and let me join the Fellowship of the Ring to defeat evil.

    Or even just admit that evil exists and we should fight it, for f- sake. That’s where I am when I read.

    That’s where I am when I write, too. Find the evil. Chase it down. Nuke it. From orbit. Because it’s the only way to be -sure-.

    And then have a party. Because virtue should be rewarded.

    So I guess I’ll have to resign myself to never being Super Popular Author guy. Oh well. ~:D

    1. Yeah. I’m not saying this is why I read, either. Mostly I want to escape, which means I need something substantial to sink myself into.
       As for views challenged, I like to think.
       BUT I’m talking about the majority of people, what I think are called “casual readers.” They might read two books a year, unlike the rest of us, but because there’s so many of them that they make stuff bestsellers.
       If you’ve ever been stuck in the middle of nowhere and the only thing to read a selection of “summer reads” YOU KNOW I’m telling the truth.
       Did I say I like it No. Only that this is what happens.
       BUT Phantom, if you find your audience,there’s more than enough people like us to make you rich. Just not to make you a good property for trad pub looking to buy “summer reads.”

       1. “…if you find your audience,there’s more than enough people like us to make you rich.”

          Getting rich would be nice, I can’t lie. But mostly I’d like those characters out there tearing it up in people’s imagination. That’s a pretty big thing.

          To that end, I’ll get back to my cover making today. 😦

       2. I do not wish to cause you any contract “difficulties” but I have a question, if you are allowed to answer. (I know lawyer generated contracts are the work of the devil and don’t wish to cause issues.) I usually get your works from Amazon for my Kindle. I like the electronic formats as it allows me to read with less stain due to age and cataract issues. Is there a place to buy your work that gets more of the profit to you as opposed to the middle man. I’m not opposed to reasonable profits for the retailers but authors get short shift from almost everybody and I don’t want to contribute to the problem.

          1. er….. for my trad pub stuff, it makes no difference. For my other stuff, most of it is available only from Amazon.
             No contracts involved.

    2. You know what I’d like to see? Worlds that are Worlds, with variety and depth and geography and span, not just “the desert planet” and “the ice planet” and “the jungle planet” as proxies for specimen display setups in a local zoo.

       If this planet can have our range of cultures and environments and ecosystems, other planets can too. Show me that.

       1. I did that! With temperate and subtropical and coordination across time zones, and the dislocation of landing at a completely different time and temperature than you took off on a ballistic flight, several ecologies and stages of terraforming, and different trophic levels, and…

          And I got grumbled at because I didn’t include a map.

          I can’t win!

          1. (And I’ll keep doing it again as long as the story takes place over enough of a geographical span to make it worth mentioning, as long as the world isn’t an iceball still in the terraforming stages.

             But only because it’s not right in my head otherwise.

             And I still think I can make an ecological case for a desert planet – that would be Mars, immediately upon smacking a few icy comets and maybe a small moon or two down the gravity well to form some crater lakes and add mass enough to keep the water in atmo this time. Even so, it’d still have polar regions, and tropical.

             But then, I can make a case for desert regions and eternal frozen night on an eyeball planet (tidally locked), I just have to think about why people would find it worth coming down the gravity well to eke out an existence on the minimal, liminal habitable zone. Now there’s a ringworld!

71. The biggest problem for that Oklahoman bar owner killed himself? Not enough confidence in the righteousness of his actions.

    When you get to the point where they are trying to destroy you, and you have no other viable legal recourse left, then you do unleash the dogs of war. Anything goes to take out the destroyers. But you need that personal code. You need to know that it is right, and just; and to stick with it.

    General George Patton said it best. “The object of war is not to die for your country, but to make the other bastard die for his.” If you’re driven to suicide, you’re killing the wrong target.

    1. Mike, suicide is a strange thing that no one, no matter how empathic, who has not been there can understand. PTSD has probably killed more folks than any of the trauma they have endured. I use the Captain of the USS Indianapolis as an example. He killed himself 17 or so years after he lost his ship; his story is worth the read.
       I survived because my bride came home 15 minutes early and instead of suicide I helped her bring in the groceries. It took me a full 5 years to recover and I had a loving wife who helped me get over the effects.

       My point is simply to be gentle with your opinions about folks who are thinking of suicide. I wasn’t trying to kill anyone or anything. I was just trying to make the pain go away!

       1. My experiences with war aren’t the same as yours. You had to endure Vietnam. I had to deal with Desert Storm. Granted, I didn’t spend quite a year in the Middle East, but I came back with a bad case of clinical depression that took 6 months for them to identify and a year to work through. Cost me a suck ass performance rating in the process that while justified, also illustrated just how oblivious everyone around was to mental health. Of course during the same time we had a MSgt in our sister squadron commit suicide, getting everyone to run around like ants, with all kinds of “awareness training” that didn’t do anything to stop the next suicide.

          I could add in that depression runs in my wife’s family. She’s had a couple of aunts and uncles take their own lives. She’s occasionally had suicidal ideation; although the drugs and counseling seem to have that and her depression under control. And my autistic NOS trans child has enough poor judgement, depression and suicidal ideation that I figure he’ll be lucky to make it to 45.

          And yeah, that good wife with her own problems is the one who helped me through mine. But I neither beat her up, nor coddle her. I just listen, and give her a nudge every once in a while if she needs one.

          1. with all kinds of “awareness training” that didn’t do anything to stop the next suicide.

             Thing I kept noticing– the “awareness training” sure looked like plain old training, as in “this is a thing you can do, and how to do it successfully.”

          2. Agreed about a “good wife”. I’ve never hit or cheated on mine either – she is a MUCH better shot than I am and on perp targets always manages to put a few in the groin region. What IS it with ladies and rounds in the groin region. Every lady I’ve ever shot with put several rounds there.

             1. Two flavors I know of– over correction for kick, and knowledge that body armor generally doesn’t cover there, the perp will bleed out very quickly.

             2. MUCH better shot than I am and on perp targets always manages to put a few in the groin region

                –
                Well that is how we ladies should get away with putting one into the chest region. It’s not our fault when we’re aiming at the groin area with 3 shots & the 2nd & 3rd go into the chest because the perp sat down in pain. I mean really. Aren’t they suppose to stand there & take it like a man? Weren’t trying to kill the perp. That wasn’t what the triple tap was for …

72. No sane combat vet wants the fighting to start. My war was Viet Nam and I still have the nightmares. If you can watch the face of a man trying to hold his own guts in while he dies and still want a war you are insane and need treatment. I KNOW. Still I am medically retired from the Army and my oath still stands; I will defend the Constitution against ALL enemies, foreign or domestic. Which means left or right or center means nothing. What matters is the Constitution, the greatest written work since the Bible. I pray it will never come but the day I become convinced that there is no option other than violence, then the civil war starts for me. I will defend against any attack (the violent clowns should really stay out of Texas except for maybe Austin – it won’t go well for them) and I believe it is a much greater sin to use too little force than it is to use too much.

    As for the inclination to move, I learned a long time ago (about 49 years ago, actually) to trust that little “lizard brain” hiding in the back of my mind. Something told me to duck (I was flying a Huey) and although I knew I’d feel stupid I took violent, evasive maneuvers; the three antiaircraft rounds exploded where I would have been had I not ducked. I never question that lizard brain feeling anymore, it has saved my backside on more than one occasion. As I heard a sergeant ask a troop who was complaining that he’d never seen things so bad,” Are you getting shot at? Then it CAN get worse!” So, if you are feeling that you should move, the advice of an old soldier is to listen to that feeling. If you are wrong, you just get to see some new country (try Texas, it can be nice here) and if that feelings is correct, you live.

    Just my not so humble opinion of course. Oh, I really like your work.

    1. There was a day that the truck I was driving blew a hydraulic line and decided it didn’t want to go no more… in the middle of rush hour in Nashville, in a 4-lane access ramp. When I got it to the shoulder, knowing I was destroying the transmission to get there, I was a little overtorqued myself.

       My husband’s response when I called him?
       A very laid back, “Hey, at least you didn’t hit a landmine. Relax, love. It’s a good day. No one’s shooting at you.”

       He’s not exactly one to worry about things. So when he basically sniffed the political wind, and came to me and told me we needed to get West of the Mississippi, away from urban centers, and sooner was better… well, I can’t say I like Texas’s climate, geography, or abundance of spiky, stinging, and biting things in the ecology… but he’s happy, and the people are great. And a few years later, I’m looking at the news, and thinking his lizard brain had a point.

    2. OT, Captain Bart, but I really like your Gravatar image. 🙂

       1. Thanks,TXRed, seems to fit my personality.

73. On a different note, see the new CDC official 2019-ncov planning numbers at:

    https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/hcp/planning-scenarios.html

    Scroll down to table 1. Note the tininess of the fatality rate, no matter the assumptions. Also note this number is the Infection Fatality Ratio, so the denominator is infected people, not total population in each age cohort.

    Now why are we wearing these stupid masks again?

    1. Because, traditionally, the tyrants die after they start loosening restrictions?

    2. because our governors want to humiliate us.

    3. Because, akshully, the strawman social conservatives were right all along.

       We really can eliminate all rape, spread of STDs, and unwanted pregnancies simply by ordering people not to have sex except in cases of narrowly defined marriage.

       Legal abortion is purely a matter of entirely unnecessary state sponsored mass murder. The pregnancies stem from sex acts that some bureaucrat or statute some where gave permission for. If no permission is given, no unwanted pregnancies will occur.

       And if eugenicist madman don’t want the poor or minorities reproducing, they merely need to tell the poor or the minorities not to have sex.

       Only from this perspective does it make sense to treat the restrictions as meaningfully effective. No one who likes the idea of any of the covid measures ever supports sex ed, abortion, etc. for any but evil reasons.

       XD

74. Pingback: Donald Trump in “High Noon” | al fin next level

75. So, they believe that their ‘culture’ should be too ‘refined’ (or something) for all those dreadful commoners. By that measure, the fewer people their ‘art’ appeals to, the greater it must be, right? Making their ultimate goal the creation of ‘art’ that NOBODY likes.

    Which means the Puppies were wrong, and all those books nobody wants to read actually deserved to get Hugo Awards! 😛
    ———————————
    G’Kar: “Weep for the future, Na’Toth. Weep for us all.”

76. They know to scream for the police the instant it happens. Especially if they have been screaming for the police to be defunded.

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