Then Farce

Posted on by accordingtohoyt

Someone said they wanted my take on Dork Brandon’s Power of the Shrill speech. I’d give it, I would, except other people have done it so monumentally better. Like, take the paper of Record, the Babylon Bee, and page down to the Biden Swallows Cyanide Capsule In Underground Bunker.

Practically everyone had a take on this, and even though Powerline tried to be its usual restrained self on it, even they sounded like it was really hard to type around their jaws which were hanging all the way to the floor. (This is very funny, though: The Week in Pictures: Leni Riefenstahl Edition)

So, what’s my take? Well… I’m still spending my nights awake, and it certainly wasn’t the clown show speech. (Okay, okay, clown show designed by Leni Riefenstahl, and probably with Brandon’s suit tailored by Hugo Boss. I wonder why Brandon won’t grow the mustache already? BUT still clown show.)

Most people looking at it are going: Was that supposed to be serious? A minority are going “Was that supposed to accomplish something?” And a considerable number are going “Was that the unleashing of the dogs of war?”

Yes, it was supposed to be serious. I’ll point out that these are the people who spent six months coming up with a slogan that would totally turn the nation against their opponents, and probably get everyone behind their program forever, and came up with… Ultra MAGA. I mean, if they’d been paid to come up with a cool name for the new Republicans they couldn’t have done better. I immediately started riffing on “Ultra Maga, Assemble! By our combined powers, we’ll take back our land” and I’m sure I wasn’t the only one.

These are also the people — through their proactive Moloch feeding branch, Planned Parenthood — who said it was okay that “Anti-Vaxxers” (I beg to differ. Having survived TB and small pox, I believe in vaccines) stole ‘my body my choice’ because we have a new slogan ‘Just Say Abortion'” Which might be more mentally deficient than “Just say Vagina” and that’s a lot.

To understand the complete insanity of this, you have to enter into the complete insanity of their beliefs. Which means you have to assume they are in fact a cult, whose beliefs are so powerful they can’t see reality with a periscope. Heck, they can’t find reality with two hands, a sonar and a seeing-eye dog. Even though reality is right in front of them.

And most of their beliefs are straight-up bizarro-insane. But they believe really powerfully.

Now, first I want you to note the reason I know their beliefs is that I was indoctrinated in them (most slid off my back like water off a duck, some stick around to pollute my thinking until I chase them down and disprove them) in Europe, in my exceedingly high-grade education. I also want you to note I turn sixty this year.

However, they’re all absolutely convinced that Marxism is the philosophy of the young and hip, and it is the future of mankind.

If you point out that all Marxism has failed, either fast, such as where it went hard, or slow, such as European socialism where it was “A mixed economy” ratcheting ever leftward, they shout at our and talk about the arrow of history, a peculiar belief that rests on various redacted histories that show a progression towards socialism/communism (note redacted.) and then use this to say… the future belongs to them. (They really need Hugo Boss’s ghost. Right now, most of them look like unmade beds.)

Because they’re the future, d*mn it. And if you oppose them, you must be old and ignorant.

My jaw dropping moment during SP was when they told us they were waiting for us to die. I was by far the oldest of that group (I could have legally babysat Brad, and Larry could be my kid) and I was… three years older than the youngest leading light on that side. Geesh, I hope they’re not waiting with sandwiches by the phone, particularly since my people tend to make really old bones and be lucid to within a week or so of death.

But it’s like that in reality too. They keep telling us they’re the party of youth, for instance. (Looks at Brandon, the Hairy one, and Kamala who is suffering from early senility probably starting at birth, mumbles “if you say so.”)

They’re also convinced their opponents are mired somewhere in TV land 50s. Honey. I’m now grandmother-age, and “Say vagina?” I have sworn like a sailor since my early 20s. And I heard much worse things since I was 10 or so, in 70s Europe. “Say abortion”? No, really. I’ve seen a ton of signs painted with “Abortion stops a beating heart.” This is not grandma born and raised in the 1800s you’re talking to. And even then, my grandmother, village all-purpose healer of man and beast would have choice words for you lunatics.

So, yeah, if you go with their assumptions, (And we won’t go into their economic and historical delusions, which are one part ignorance and ten parts spiteful wishful thinking) the Dark Brandon speech was brilliant. Shut up, Brilliant!

I suspect it will make great campaign ads for the GOP through 2024, and in the dimly lit interiors of their minds they know already that they stepped in it, hence the attempts to walk it back.

Does this mean he didn’t unleash the dogs of war?

Well, he tried. But frankly the attacks on GOP headquarters and life centers were already going on, and will continue, until people have had enough. If they try summer of 2020 cr*p they find out REALLY FAST how fast “people have had enough.” Because we’re not locked down. And WE’VE HAD ENOUGH.

So…. worrisome? Sure, mostly because it shows how insane they’ve gone. And once things get this crazy… well, they’re off their rocker, and the rocker is collapsing in unpredictable ways.

Is it fatal. Possibly. For them.

I’m still not sleeping. Rough waters ahead.

BUT the other side is insane and repulsive, so we’ll probably come through okay.

Be not afraid. In the end we win they lose.

However, keep your clothes and weapons where you can find them in the dark.

It’s only sensible.

335 thoughts on “Then Farce”

  1. One day they will make a Terrible Mistake. No, really, a Mistake even worse than ALL the others. And unleashed will be… The Carps of War – and they haven’t a snowball’s chance in Guam against the 1776th Hun CARPeteers.

    6. For a while due to a combination of over sights and unintended side effects carp were the most feared creature in Dwarf Fortress. A single one could easily decimate a fort.

      As I recall, they had the default DnD bite damage of 1d4. Most things had been downgraded to 1 point damage per bite. They fish, and at the time swimming improved athletics, so they all ended up with legendary athletics.

      Dwarves also had a tendency to try and grapple with enemies. They also were poor swimmers.

      So, the dwarf would see a carp, get dragged into the water and immediately start drowning while the carp plucked limbs off like petals. Both ridiculous and horrifying.

      1. Eh, magical carp. Whatcha gonna do?

        The aardvark lets it be known that all doors have barriers that prevent cross contamination.

      3. Dwarf Fortress is a very strange game. One of the greatest bugs ever was that after one update the cats would stroll into the Dwarf’s Beer Halls, start showing sings of inebriation, start throwing up and then die of alcohol poisoning. The author of the game Tarn Adams loved cats and he couldn’t initially understand what was happening. Cats would NOT drink beer in the game so they should not be experiencing this. Come to find out it was a mix of unintended emergent behavior with a good old fashion bug. What was happening that dwarfs would be in the bar having a beer (or three, the dwarfs in dwarf fortress need alcohol to be happy) when the player would give them a task the dwarf would literally drop its beer and head off to do the players bidding. Tarn being a details kind of guy would have the beer stay on the floor instead of things just disappearing. What was happening was the cats would stroll in and lie down (cats don’t you know) getting soaked in beer. Tarn had put in his cat behavior model a need to clean if they got dirty. So the cats would now clean. But again the beer didn’t just disappear the cats consumed it. And here is where the bug showed up. Each creature has an intoxication (and alcohol poisoning) threshold related to its mass and amount of alcohol consumed For the cats Tarn had messed up the number by at least an order of magnitude and perhaps 2. So even though the cats weren’t consuming that much beer it was enough to make them sick. That goves you a vague idea of how strange this game is.

  2. My personal suspicion is a mixture of the Old Guard realizing that if they don’t move now, they’ll never get the advantages and joys of being able to openly rule over the proletariat and the Young Turks that are hungry for the positions and powers that they had been promised, but the Old Guard is denying them.

    There are times that are more interesting than others. I don’t think I can handle more “interesting” times than what is going on-it’s all happening in the wrong direction, to the wrong people, and for the wrong reasons.

    But…time to rotate the stocks of canned food, make sure we’re up at least two cases of bottled water and two packs of TP, and make sure I know where everything is in the dark.

    1. Will note that recently the price for a case of 1k 9mm has fallen enough below $300 that the difference will just about cover shipping charges. In case anyone was thinking about doing some target shooting. Buying in bulk just makes economic sense.

      1. I’ve got a decent stash of the calibers I use the most. Carefully spread around the house, for proper weight distribution. “Decent stash” meaning “am not averse to getting more, now that the seasonal sales have started.”

  3. The current situation reminds me of playing chess. One the one side, we have this person using a cribbed up guide playing very aggressively saying he’s going to bury us. While we just sit here playing a blocking game and waiting for him to make a move that leads to his being checkmated.

    1. Yes, that’s a good way to handle a weaker player…Given a chance, they will destroy their own positions….

    2. Current DC crew suggests the “playing chess with pigeon” joke.

      If the pigeon was 1/2 emu, and fed much fiber.

    3. I don’t recall whether it was Sun Tzu, von Clausewitz or Napoleon who first said “Never interrupt an enemy when he’s making a mistake”, but it seems appropriate here and now. Mimicking Riefenstahl videos from the Third Reich certainly seems to qualify as a major “oopsie…

  4. My major “trouble sleeping because brain won’t shut up” reason was theoretically dealt with last night (vague explanation: when the person you know you need to convince to your POV says of the other people in the issue “this reads to me like a power play,” it’s reassuring that they’re on your side.)

    This did not, in fact, quell the spinny brain. Dang it. I really wish that people would keep the drama on the stage. (The steps being taken should stop the major issue going forward, but it sucks that we have to do them because those other people are being obnoxious.) (And it’s petty stuff, hyper-local.)

    1. History is rhyming like mad now, but I am no longer sure of what bits it is rhyming with. There are obvious parallels to 1930’s Germany, but they are SO ‘in-your-face’ that I am suspicious of them and wonder what is under that facade.

      And yes, I know, the answer to “They can’t possibly be that {blatant, obvious, stupid}” is “The HELL they can’t!”

      2. Yep rhymes with the ’30s, & a lot of witch hunting doing on, signs and portents seen and accepted, plagues manufactured as necessary, let them eat crickets, coal lines today, bread lines tomorrow.

        Why do I feel that ” Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,” and Buck Fiden is mis-doing a Micky Rooney Judy Garland, ‘hey kids, let’s put on a show!’ scene?

            1. Huh. Using a “closing” angle-bracket does that. And using one TWICE does THAT!

              Let’s try it the Old Fashioned Way (I am NOT drinking an Old Fashioned, but would not be averse..)

              GONG<

              2. I wonder…

                This is html <blockquote>.

                v.s.

                This is a line preceded by ‘>’.
                If they appear the same, it’d make life easier, especially when commenting from mobile.

                2. Important lesson:

                  Put a blank line between the ‘>’-initiated line and a line you don’t want included in the quote. Also:

                  First-level quote.

                  Second-level quote; does this work?
                  First level again, how does this show up?

  5. I’m willing to grant that no one thought about how the black shadows behind the FICUS might look, because you probably can’t see that until after dark, and no one wanted to do a “day before test run” since this was Philly and all the equipment would likely vanish before noon the next day. Got it. There’s no, zero, excuse for not asking a semi-neutral party “Hey, what does this look like to you? Here’s the sound track, sort of.”

    But then these are the linear offshoots of the people who used the columns and stuff for O’s Academy Awar— sorry, I meant nomination acceptance speech, the ones that had me going, “Dang, Mussolini would be proud.”

    1. I’m pretty sure that theatrical lighting designers for large events have… you know, planning software.

      I’m also fairly sure that they either hurried that guy/gal, or the person got demands in writing that prove it wasn’t his fault.

      1. Given the radical leftists in some of the tech companies my guess is that the person who ran the test of the lighting and optics was a true believer.

      2. The word is that the designer (such as it was) is Anita Dunn, who has all the right (excuse me, left</i)) qualifications to be a barista at a clone of Starbucks. She’s the one who has fully embraced the ChiCom koolaid, and has been pretty open about it.

        “Who needs talent when you have enthusiasm?”, said many a producer of a huge flop.

        2. Ahh the designer is an admirer of Leni Riefenstahl clearly, I like Cardshark’s explanation, but a conservative in the arts is almost as likely as a 2′ snowfall in New Orleans in August.

          1. More common than you think, just most of them are veewy veewy quiet, and i got tired of being quiet

      3. Word is, it was supposed to be a red/white/blue lit backdrop. Problems occurred when the principal was winding up to his Bidenstag speech and the white light on him ended up being too bright and made him looked washed out. They darkened things a bit, which gave you the shadows. The standard aspect ratio cameras stayed focused on the principle, which they should, but the blue and white accents were washed out.

        Add to that the low angle of the shot and the marines in the background, and you get what we saw the other day.

        If all of that is true, it goes to your latter statement. Yeah, they probably hurried things or something like.

        But to get that along with the content of the speech, well… We could just call that a coincidence, perhaps. Or a chance alignment of the universe mocking they guy. We could. Really.

        I don’t think the average person that sees the pic of Biden standing with his fists raised and an angry expression on his face, his background a bloody red and shadowy black is going to think anything but that it looks like a villain demanding that somebody get the Hobbits before they make it to Mount Doom.

        1. But a SANE design would have RED on one side, BLUE on the other, and WHITE in the middle… RED-WHITE-BLUE. Someone is either WAY slower than even ox, OR… is BRILLIANT infiltrator.

          1. Agreed, that would have been much better. Saner. And more practical, because lowering the intensity of white light doesn’t create the same sort of issues.

            As to the latter, I have wondered that as well. There have been many… coincidences? Suspicious events? Something like that. Things that seem to cleave too close to the truth for your average political mind to come up with.

          2. White would have been too bright. Frankly, I think that none of the three colors would have worked well for a night time speech with the way that they had the lights arranged. The blue that I saw in some of the wide shots looked too dark, as well. However, they managed to pick the worst of the three colors to use as their backdrop. Using the white or blue would have gotten them some well-deserved criticism. But neither of those colors would have looked sinister, as happened with the red that they picked.

        2. Or under the theme of so stupid one has to laugh: Elmer Fund standing there saying “It Rabbit Season. Get the Rabbit!” and Bugs popping in saying “That’s All Folks!”

          (Yes. I am Old.)

    2. It’s certain that this was planned by professionals. After all, that’s what the politicians do, especially at the national level. So it wasn’t an oversight. It fits well with the intention to have a mood of looming catastrophe caused by “Ultra Maga.” So this has been in the works for months.

      1. I gather “professional”, but not necessarily at stagecraft. See Anita Dunn comment above.

        Now I know; it turns out she was the brainiac (for values of single digit synapse counts) behind the Ultra MAGA “slur”.

    3. I made snarky comments asking where Obama’s Jaffa legions were.

      “Jaffa, KREE!”
      (“You heard me! I said KREE!”)

        2. The Democrats aren’t possessed by snake-like symbiotes. They choose to be the way they are… I think.

              1. Didn’t one of the Team HarrisBiden staffers put something out that showed Biden with glowing eyes?

        1. I’m remembering with some fondness the RM Nixon campaign. That used the Committee to Reelect the President, acronymized (totally a word) as CREEP. OTOH, I’m not sure who came up with the acronym. Still, if you lead with your chin, expect a punch.

      3. Aside. You know that “Patriot Front” group that the progs claim are “really” Ultra MAGA types?

        There’re a variety of reasons why I severely doubt that. Their resemblance to goon squads from various anime/comic series is one big one…

  6. Meanwhile, I try to cultivate calm and serenity, enjoying the good things in my day, while doing what I can politically and keeping things where I can find them in the dark…. Interesting Times….

    1. It was supposed to be Jan 6 2021, but that didn’t work out. My guess is there’s gonna be a hamfisted attempt at something on election day, or possibly right before so the elections (note: plural) can be “postponed until the safety and security of our sacred electoral process can be ensured.

      1. They aren’t going to postpone elections that they think their shenanigans are enough to enable them to steal the elections. What they are doing is setting up a contingency the same way that the Russia collusion hoax cabal created their “insurance policy”. Their plan is to try to prevent enough winners of elections from being seated for Democrats to retain power.

        The “enemies of the state” speech was intended to facilitate that effort, in conjunction with the J6 show trial and FBI raids of people who questioned the 2020 election, so that they declare winning Republican candidates to be “insurrectionists”, “traitors” and “criminals” not entitled to be seated, with the standard arrests of political opponents that were common by those whose imagery they borrowed for the Triumph of the Shrill speech.

        Can’t happen here? Well, they have already crossed the Rubicon with their raid on Trump’s home and the seizure of a Congressional leader’s phone the next day. The fact that it might get very ugly and people will fight back against it is not going to deter them in their quest for absolute power. Hatred is a powerful motivator and they truly hate those who disagree with them. Combine this with their idiocy and it is a toxic mix.

        1. “The fact that it might get very ugly and people will fight back against it is not going to deter them”

          They have absolutely no reason to believe anyone will. 50 years of warnings while they got away with it means they’ve decided to call the bluff.

          1. ONE gram of pure U-235 is Mostly Harmless.
            TWO grams of pure U-235 are Mostly Harmless.
            THREE grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            FOUR grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            FIVE grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            SIX grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            SEVEN grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            EIGHT grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            NINE grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            TEN grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            ELEVEN grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            TWELVE grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            THIRTEEN grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            FOURTEEN grams of pure U-23 are Mostly Harmless.
            .
            .
            .
            “OH SHEEP!!!!!!”

            1. If we find a few grams of U-23 (as opposed to U-235) we’ve entered a realm of very strange physics.

      2. My money is on a self-important federal agent making demands of local/state law enforcement, going ape-sh*t when the locals tell him to pound sand … and reacting violently. That will be the Bleeding Kansas/Harper’s Ferry/Fort Sumpter moment.

        1. Right now I’m looking at an emergency declaration when the European collapse starts to bite over here. October is traditional.

          It’s a race between Europe and China to see who will collapse first. Gonna be a cold winter in Europe and the protests are already under way

          1. I think I need more.. uh,.. EVERYTHING… except, poverty , inflation, debt, doubt, Democrats, and other dastards. Canned goods, boxed goods, propane, kerosene, candles, mandles, brandles, dandles (and I am not sure what those last three even ARE, but they way things seem to be headed, why take chances?)

                    2. As you know, I have partaken of the Port willingly given, AND have also given you at least a bottle of scotch whisk(e)y. Now as to how to interpret the Malort… I do understand that for some it is “a fyne gyft” and for others it might be “an acte of warr.”

          2. I’m told Germany is planning to impose martial law starting October 1.

            I’m not entirely sure why one would announce something like that in advance…

          1. Well, I’m in Texas, which has maintained a kind of stiff-necked independence, ever since being an independent republic. We are also, or could be oil-independent. I believe that Texas and Florida having mostly sane governors would be looked at by the Feds as the nail that must be pounded down firmly, as an example for the others. I can very well picture a federal body – be it the FBI, the EPA, or someone else – demanding that Texas do something that the governor and state powers refuse to do … and the Feds getting pissy and reacting badly.

    2. November elections, is my guess. There are actually threats being made against election workers, some of them likely from the “right” if you account for Larry Niven’s Law regarding fuggheads.

      Between that, and Brandon authorizing himself to declare illegitimate any election dispute decision made by “extreme ultra-MAGA Republican” secretaries of state, you have both the Reichstag fire and response: Congress refuses to seat members elected “illegitimately” (because it’ll become okay again to question elections) or adhering to dangerous ideologies.

      I’m probably wrong. I really hope so, at least.

      1. Oh, and if you come across anyone actually threatening election workers, don’t merely mock the post for glowing in the dark. Report it—not just to the FBI (who probably posted it in the first place) but to local law enforcement. The republic you save may be your own.

                1. In other words, we’re only likely to see the drunk leprechauns.

                  Sober ones are busy doing other things and aren’t leaving their territory. 😉

                  1. squints

                    Seems like you’re makin’ an awful lot of assumptions there, Draco… you try fixin’ shoes for the ráth all bloody day because they keep wearin’ them out dancin’ an’ sich, and then when ye come come home because ye can’t see straight, some fear mór catches ye and demands to have yer gold. Jayzus. Small wonder me cousins need a break now and again!

                    1. Well, Little Wee Irishman, I only see leprechauns when they are attempting to come uninvited into my cave so they Must Be Drunk To Sneak Into A Dragon’s Lair.

                      And of course, plenty of “leprechaun gold” was originally Dragon Gold. [Very Very Big Dragon Grin]

                    3. I always pay my debts.

                      But I don’t owe money to leprechauns. It’s mostly them owing money to me.

                      Of course, it’s not my fault if some leprechauns shouldn’t be playing poker with me or other dragons. 😈

      2. Thing is, inherent nature of alleging insurrection on January 6. 2021, implies that Democrats from the 117th Congress qualify under the 14th amendment to be refused seating in the 118th Congress.

        We are looking at a long process of repair no matter what.

        1. The new Congress takes their seats on January 3 before presidential inauguration on January 20. Thus it was the 118th Congress that was seated on the day of the J6 protest.

          1. There were two sets of votes for Pelosi as Speaker, covering crimes alleged by members of one congress to have occurred.

            Capitol Police did things at her direction prior to January 3rd, 2021, that were related to the Democrat conspiracy on January 6th, 2021, and she had the formal power to command the Capitol Police prior to Jan. 3, 2021, because of the vote during the 116th congress in January of 2019.

            Then during the 117th congress, many of those same Democrats voted for Pelosi, and joined her in claiming that there was an insurrection on January 6th 2021.

          1. First, insurrection has a very clear implication under the constitution.

            President can not be fomenting an insurrection so long as they are seeing that the laws are duly enforced. Presidents can authorize unorganized militia to suppress insurrection, and see that laws are duly enforced.

            This is pretty core precedent here. Lincoln’s legal theory of the ACW was that he was having the militia suppress a criminal conspiracy that the courts were not sufficient to address, and doing so under the organization of the Department of War.

            The only facts that would make it improper for armed forces under executive authority to suppress congress would be if congress were not engaged in violent insurrection, and this were clear to everyone involved. The problem Congress has is that the fact pattern around that day, despite Congress’s own confidence, does not conclusively clear them.

            The facts of the preceding matter are that the fraud of covid was used as an excuse to see that the election laws were not duly enforced, and some number of judges implicated themselves in that lack of due enforcement.

            The claims that Trump should have simply accepted the procedural irregularities are based on custom, and on a vacated consent decree that was always of probably improper basis. The custom was not a reciprocal custom, lawyers within the DoJ Civil Rights unit had long been filing suits on behalf of the Democratic Party.

            The fact pattern preceding that day, which implicates someone, is security on and around the Capitol site. In particular, the scaffolding prepared that would have provided outside access to the offices of at least one prominent Republican. Someone making decisions for the capitol site security was attempting to collaborate with unknown would be rioters to potentially harm a Republican. But, this was not an executive official, those security decisions are the Capitol Police that was and is under the authority and oversight of the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi.

            If there was a violent insurrection that day, Nancy Pelosi had directed inside involvement during her previous term as Speaker of the House. (Per wiki, this would be the 116th congress.) Then, a majority of Democrats in the current congress took part in that violent insurrection by voting to confirm her for her current term of being Speaker. Per wiki, the January 3rd 2021 to January 3rd 2023 congress is the current one, the 117th, and responsible for that vote.

            If the congressmen in the 117th qualify under the 14th amendment, they can be barred. The qualification includes ‘ shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof.’ Which expressly includes the act of rebelling against the constitution, and therefore other language of the constitution is controlling.

            There are four models, and the fact patterns are not so clear that we actually have a real public consensus. 1. Basically, everyone is innocent of insurrection. 2. Dems are guilty. 3. Trump did some things, but chose a minimal ‘speech only’ level of intervention, and did not even try to use the executive power to suppress a real or fake insurrection. He is not guilty of insurrection. 4. Trump did activate some level of his executive power.

            Problem for the Democrats on four, what if such power activation was legitimate, or was widely believed to be legitimate? You don’t need very many millions of people persuaded that the current Democrats are a criminal conspiracy, that orders from Biden are not binding, and that said millions were authorized by Trump to suppress said criminal rebellion by force, to make American politics suck for a long time. You could persuade people that four was true, and that Trump was wrong, if and only if the American baseline was genuinely and entirely skeptical of Trump’s claims about the irregularities of 2020. The problem is, that the Democrats made it seem more plausible that there were irregularities, and that Biden is a criminal motivated by malice against Americans. Trump could be reluctant to escalate, and the Democrats could persuade Trump’s supporters that Trump[‘s supporters need to escalated.

            We are basically in almost the suckiest possible circumstances for a legal dispute, we are litigating in the court of public opinion, because the formal processes are potentially corrupted.

            The simplest answer is that there was no insurrection that day, and nobody qualifies for being barred.

            But, many of these same Democrats are on record, by way of voting, as claiming that there was an act of insurrection.

            If as they claim, there was such a crime, they are obviously complicit. Therefore, they should not be seated during the 118th congress.

            1. Now that I’ve followed your logic, I’m conflicted. On one hand, I’m pretty sure your legal reasoning is complete bogosity. On the other hand, I would be grimly delighted to see Democrats needing to defend against this nonsense.

              1. Head cold, /and/ I’m pretty sure that I would be embarrassed if my ‘legal reasoning’ were found to closely resemble the legal reasoning considered suitable to the formal legal system.

                There was a letter dated January 12, 2021, signed by heads of law schools, that I am still extremely irate about.

                Basically, until such time as I see some apologies and resignations for that letter, I’m not inclined to treat the formal legal system as having resolved any disputes.

                The letter makes expansive claims about the ability of the law schools to prevent cases from being brought before the courts. It also claims that this is something that the law schools should do. My view is that this is possibly beyond the ability of a professional monopoly, that this is not something a professional monopoly should seek to do, and that this opens up room to argue that decades of recent jurisprudence was improperly and unethically decided.
                The letter seems to invent a novel theory of professional liability, which is applied in a deliberately narrow way. It does not explain why this theory of liability should not be applied to the likes of Marilyn Mosby, or to many defense attorneys of the past several decades.
                The letter purports to be bipartisan, and such things as omitting the mention of Marilyn Mosby makes it clear that the letter is not in any way shape or form anything other than a partisan hit piece.

                It is possible that many legal faculty believe that this letter was appropriate, and causes no harm to the legal professions. In this case, I am actually more expert on this than they are.

                Normally, one tries to select engineers who are obsessed with measurements and calculations, instead of engineers who realize how easily they could lie to you without your easy detection. Likewise with lawyers, they ruin specific work less when they don’t realize that the most fundamental thing they need to do with the formal legal system is convince the public to buy into it. CRT has been super poison to the legal faculty, and they figure that their crap is necessary, and not more actively harmful than the older status quo.

                Law faculty will tell you that litigation, mediation, and arbitration are methods of resolving disputes. They leave out stabbing, which does have a number of demerits. Force alone cannot compel Americans to ignore stabbing as an option, there must be moral persuasion in favor of such things as the formal legal systems and negotiation.

                I would not have foundation for litigating public opinion, if it were not for a bunch of people doing very stupid things.

                In a sane world, we would not have people in positions of official respect determined to make me look reasonable by way of being many times crazier than I am.

                  1. I identify as being a professional Anti-Lawyer. At least as a hobby.

                    A lawyer you have a discussion with, and they tell you how to minimize your problems with the formal legal system.

                    The advice of an Anti-Lawyer is more about the costs you incur by following a course of action.

                    It may consider a maximum trouble path, or something else that you would be insane to spend lawyer money on.

                    When conventional lawyers are determined to destroy the whole profession, ‘how would you finish the job’ and ‘what happens next’ can be Anti-LAwyer questions.

                    The answers are that the ruin of the legal professions, and of the formal legal system, is a very bad thing. It would be nice to avoid it if possible.

                    But the blindness and overconfidence of legal faculty make avoiding that ruin substantially more difficult than would be desirable.

                    1. Interesting. The Reader’s son is a lawyer (not sure where the Reader erred in son’s upbringing but…) and he practices in pretty much that fashion. He makes sure clients understand the costs of a path of action in the legal system.

  8. It all comes down this fall, certainly by the first of next year.
    Most of Europe will be on short rations if not facing starvation due to WEF imposed phuckery with farmers’ crops and livestock.
    And actions already in play by both Biden and Putin there will be many in Europe facing a very cold winter indeed.
    And that’s all going to spill over on us to add a bit of spice on top of the damage the Biden administration has done and will continue to do as best they can until it all comes to a screeching halt or blows up into protests and riots.
    And anyone who did not read the tea leaves and flee any large blue city long before, now is your best opportunity. You wait until things get really ugly and you just might find that some state or federal agency tells you that you can’t. Illegal? Unconstitutional? Absolutely! But when has that ever stopped them so far? Being right will not make you any less dead from a random bullet fired by a newly weaponized IRS agent outraged and panicked by resistance by some lowly peon who does not know their proper place.
    Consider that the good, honest, responsible law enforcement folks are quitting in droves to either retire or go private. It’s not a coincidence that one of the screening questions asked during interviews for some of these new Federal jobs is “are you willing to carry a weapon and use lethal force if required?”

    1. and of course, the europhiles here are going to blame our gas consumption for Europe freezing to death, just like they did when Europe was baking a few summers ago

          1. Back when, a fellow I knew on IRC moved to Sweden for all the progressive things… and then moved back because “I was working as hard, but keeping less and getting less for it.” And where did he move back to? Canada.

            1. back when, animator friend moved to Canada… and then couldnt get a job in animation because he wasn’t a ‘canadian resident’ and they couldnt get the tax credit for him. Yes, that’s why all the major vfx shops have Vancouver offices now…

      2. Our (U.S.) Consumption of Gasoline has as much to do with the EU’s freezing its butt off this winter as fish have use of bicycles (or wind power). Their Gas comes almost solely from Russia a fact of which they were warned by Trump but they chose to ignore. When you say “Here are the chains to manacle our hands and necks” to someone who has delusions of grandeur/adequacy you have no one to blame but yourself. Our buying oil DOES drive world inflation (the oil we buy can become diesel or gasoline to move food and products around in the rest of the world but that you can place at the roots of the turnip in chief and his handlers as the US had returned to being a NET producer of oil for the first time since I was in grammar school. Europe panic shutting down its Nuclear plants after Fukashima to appeas its idiot Greens (but I repeat myself) and trying to live on the unicorn farts that are wind and solar power didn’t help. We aren’t any brighter the last Nuke plant built in the us is a gen 2.5 BWR about 25 miles north of me in Seabrook. It finished about the time I graduated from college (next year will be my classes 40th anniversary) . A similar plant in Waterford CT was finished at Millstone a couple years before. This madness was because of Three Mile Island where the largest dosage was about 1/2 a chest x-ray and most public dosages would be BDL (Below Detection Level) and most people in the Northeast get more exposure from Radon in their cellar from decay of granite in the surrounding stone. Having the China Syndrome with its crap science and Jane Fonda show up about that time certainly was not helpful. If it weren’t that we’re going to ultimately suffer the same fate as the EU if we don’t change governments I would be happy to say that the EU is welcome to get it gooder and harder.

        1. IIRC, there was a story told out of school about how the NYT decided to cover 3 Mile Island:

          “Ok, who has seen China Syndrome? Right, you go cover it”

  11. Gee, I forget, when was the last time a national leader got up and named one group of people as scapegoats for all the country’s problems? Whenever and wherever that was, I suspect it didn’t end well.
    ———————————
    Candidate Joe Biden, August 2020: “We have assembled the most extensive, comprehensive and inclusive voter fraud organization in the history of American politics.”

    Minutes later: “What do you mean, I wasn’t supposed to say that?”

  12. I gather some left-leaning types are now editing the red out of the photos, printing wide-angle shots (to show the wings of Independence Hall were lit in blue) and otherwise trying to say, “It wasn’t like that at all!”
    And desperately trying to pretend the speech wasn’t really aimed at all Republican/Trump voters, oh, no! And if you think so, you must have a bad conscience! And so on.
    Meanwhile, the Press Secretary proudly announced the Administration has created “10,000 million new jobs…”

    1. Yep. My eyes keep rolling out and under the couch. Really getting tired of having to look for them.
      …………………….
      #PedoHitler – New hashtag for Fiden.

            1. Pardon my french but screw wookies, they’re loud and smell of yak hair. I want several brigades of Dorsai and a few division of MI as well as as many Gray Lensman as you can rustle up.

              1. The way these guys are going, I’m ready to call Monster Hunters International.

                And maybe Wolf Squadron.

        2. Factcheckers, hell, anybody who can take two seconds to look at the “job listing” and note that the suddenly popped up everywhere story was linking to the law enforcement division of the IRS, even though USAJobs would be where a job listing can be found.

          And it is there.
          One.
          It’s basically upkeep, because nobody wants to work for hte IRS so they have to recruit all the time. The phrase “minimum 50 hour work week,” 24/70 on call and 75% travel is also, ah, “fun.”

          Vs a ton of specific ads begging for people, part time, full time, whatever…because Nobody wants to work for the IRS!

              1. 300 openings is not going to take down ‘half the country’, and the opening has been up since last February; 300 people is attempted upkeep for purposes like “we can have at least one guy who can represent the IRS on fraud warrants.” (Organized crime uses tax fraud a lot, both identity theft versions and the more normal physical violence extortion versions. Think like how the FBI raid at MAL didn’t have someone qualified to identify actually sensitive documents. That’s why the listing is specifically criminal investigations.)

                For a sense of proportion, they have 4,225 openings on the listing for “contact representative (English/Spanish)”. (That one’s been up since March.)
                415 of those are in Memphis, Tennessee, which isn’t even the largest shortfall of the 22 listed for that job.

                You can look at the jobs right here:
                https://www.usajobs.gov/Search/Results?a=TR93&wt=15317&s=startdate&sd=desc&p=1

                Current top one (sorted by posting date descending) is a GS15 position, Management & Program Analyst, Temp, NTE, MBE, MBP, where they’re trying to hire former gov’t employees.

                A lot of similar openings, too, and 34 listings for “IRS Agents”.

                1. GS15 !?! Yowza thats like a division head or something. Usually requires at least a masters often a PH.D of some sort.

                  As for armed IRS agents I know one. Does forensic computer accounting work to my understanding goes on raids to help secure the hardware and as the raids can be dangerous he is armed as are all the folks doing the raid. Decent guy not the classic idea of an IRS agent .

                  1. Yeah, the starting pay of what, 135k/year I think it said?

                    Contrast with the criminal investigation agents, who start at 50k/year.

                    Does forensic computer accounting work to my understanding goes on raids to help secure the hardware and as the raids can be dangerous he is armed as are all the folks doing the raid.

                    Yeah, it’s technically possible to have someone who’s unarmed serve a warrant– I know a fed who’s not allowed to pack a gun and has gone a few times because they needed more bodies– but they don’t like it, they’re very limited in what they can do before things are secured, and it’s frankly a tactically horrible idea.

                    1. I think he initially just did the forensics afterwards but I think as things got more computer and less paper oriented there were concerns to protect the data and to clearly make the chain of custody solid. So he started going, and as you noted tactically having someone unarmed in that kind of operation is a danger to themselves and to the people he is working with so he got the training.

          2. I’ve worked jobs with 50 hr/week minimums and 24/7 on call, with frequent travel. Those paid very well, on average, because you had to be away from your family so much that usually only single guys showed up to do the job. They were also the kind of job that had a high turnover rate, because of the nature of the job itself.

            That tells me a lot about the kind of person likely to take that job for the IRS. I know the kind of person that does that. They’re not often the kind of person one would want in that position.

    3. CNN was adjusted the background color during the live broadcast. There’s a clip floating around that’s about thirty seconds or so of the CNN broadcast. When you first watch it, you don’t notice anything unusual. But if you rewatch it, the moment that the broadcast restarts you realize that the red at the start of the clip is noticeably darker than the red at the end of the clip.

  13. I must confess that I did not watch the speech. I wasn’t really all that curious about what lies I was supposed to believe next. After hearing reports that he was fulminating against Trump voters, blaming them for all the nations problems (How Dare You Disrespect My Greatness and Vote for the Other Fellow), and that he walked it back the next day, I’m not even sure about which lies I am supposed to believe. Is this a case of political schizophrenia, advanced senility, or gaslighting? “Threat, bluster, threat, bluster, you must have misunderstood me, I have nothing but good intentions, threat, bluster, threat…”

      2. See Chris Bray’s latest substack on psychopaths in positions of power.

        See also this essay from Dr. Robert Yoho, “Guess Who Passes the Psychopath Test?”

        Psychopathic lying is successful because normal people do not believe that anyone lies as a routine. Debates with sociopaths are useless. No matter what we say, no matter how much evidence is given, it has no meaning for them. Their sole goal is to fool us into classifying them as normal so they can continue to deceive, control, and use us….

        When major positions of power in business, government, industry, and society are filled by sociopaths, a downward spiral begins. The normal people eventually recognize what their leaders are and devise survival strategies.

        We’re there, though it’s hard to place “there” on a map. We can see that a significant share of power and status — in politics, in economics, and in culture — belongs to people who have no perception of social rules or moral limits at all. And we see that some lines need to be reimposed, urgently and firmly.

        After a few years of, “but these are the experts, right?” it feels like the beginning of the phase in which everybody finally knows the game and the stakes. In this version of the story, the little boy points out that the naked emperor has no soul, and the people begin to notice. And then?

        https://chrisbray.substack.com/p/life-as-an-empty-box

        1. Also from Bray’s post: “For the first time in the history of the country, the current President of the United States has delivered a bizarre, blood-lit rant about half the country being monsters.”

          Given his prologue —
          (“The company founded by Walt Disney has a new show for children about a middle school girl who has an awkward dilemma: She’s the Antichrist (as her mom reveals to her one day, after a weird day at school), and her Cool Dad is Satan, who has lots of funny lines about what a wild guy he is.”)
          — this seems like the appropriate illustration.

          From Margot Cleveland – “Biden never said which side he was on in the fight for the soul of a nation.”

          1. Went and looked it up– it’s not a kid’s show in any way, shape or form.

            “Little Demon” is rated TV-MA, and is classified as a horror comedy sitcom.

            The article has been updated since then, but that’s a pretty big research failure. That the dad is voiced by Danny DeVito would’ve made me at least spend a little time looking, instead of making a rather massive claim without even verifying it. Anyone reading that article should have been able to reasonably assume the author wasn’t pulling it out of his presumptions.

    2. They’re emotionally immature and very stupid people. They do what feels good and then try to retract when it blows up in their face.

    3. You are to believe all the lies, of course, and forget the ones you believed yesterday. We have always been at war with Eastasia!!

      Somewhere, George Orwell is shaking his fist hollering “Animal Farm and 1984 were supposed to be warnings, not how-to manuals!”
      ———————————
      People can make stupid mistakes, but only the government can force everybody to make the SAME stupid mistakes.

    4. Not many people actually watched the broadcast. Even CBS and ABC didn’t bother to show it. The universal reaction to the stills the next morning was, “Why’d someone put up some sort of cartoony background for Biden’s speech last night?” And then the realization kicked in that what we were all seeing was the actual background.

      1. I have to admit that my reaction on seeing the stills was: They couldn’t have created a better impression that the speech was coming from the mouth of hell if they had been trying.

        1. Sorry but that’s an insult to Vandal Savage.

          Vandel may be evil but is smart (not smart enough to start straight but is smart).

          Biden* was never that smart.

  14. You and I know the zombie war will be a thing. We both know they’re literally insane. But did you know that is literally the beginning of God’s wrath on a Nation that worship what He created instead of worshiping Him? See Romans 1:18-32 for context.

    Romans 1:22 tells us that “professing themselves wise, they became fools.”

    I’m not saying you must believe this; but it’s a pretty stark coincidence when one looks at America before and after they kicked the 10 Commandments and prayer out of public schools.

    1. Weeeeell, the problem is that, historically, the Ten Commandments and prayer in school were generally used to try to convert Catholics, Jews, and so on, into a specific Protestant denomination of local choice. Which was cruising close to the federal government establishing churches, which was a no-no from the earliest days (or the state or local government establishing churches, which initially was constitutional in states or localities because they ran on different lines; but which people didn’t like if it wasn’t their Protestant church).

      This is also why a lot of states once tried to outlaw parochial schools or any private religious schools, even though they had no problem with expensive private boarding schools. Specifically for anti-Catholic reasons, usually, although sometimes other denominations/faiths were targets.

      OTOH, things in public schools quickly went from “Let’s not force a specific religion on anybody” to “Let’s force the religious not to do anything religious anywhere” and then to “Let’s force everybody to follow the woke religion but not call it that.”

      1. Blaine Amendment – Almost passed Congress in the 1920s, and was picked up in a number of states (OK, TX) in the later 1920s. Some states have gotten rid of them, but Texas has not. The teachers’ unions like “no support for private or parochial schools.”

      2. The last bit is what I mean. I might disagree with the first because I never saw it; but I grew up in a small, nominally conservative (at the time) town in California and others might have seen Democrats oppressing “others” in other towns. Oh dear. That’s not very eloquent, is it?

        Anyway, the tide changed rather rapidly, one might almost say rabidly.

  15. I’m chewing away mentally at an essaylet, but it is not that important as a concept.

    The opposition’s current insanity makes more sense than I would have thought possible a week ago. (I was busy napping a week ago.)

    Anyway, right now it looks like the opposition forecast might be insanity of the purely stupid, wasteful, and pointless varieties.

    3. And then there is the Bee’s take on Amazon’s woke perversion of Tolkien, The Rings of Power:

      3. That’s a tour de force. She lost the words a couple times, but just pushed on with total professionalism (“And that was jazz, right, so I meant to do that!”).

        I don’t know whether she just got overcome with emotion, or what was going on. But that’s a lesson in how to just keep rolling.

        If you just keep going, you give your audience full value. If you stop or get flustered, you don’t. If you lose your tone a little, you just attack it again. Just keep rolling, and a mistake is conquered by art.

        2. The losing the words and the emotion are understandable given that she was singing it shortly after JFK’s assassination (the Judy Garland video that is)

  18. The Biden walkback is rather interesting to me. It’s clear the speech was scripted. So it would appear that the response to the question the next day was ad lib and possible that FICUS simply couldn’t remember what he read off the tele-prompter a few hours before. In other words, the intention was to target MAGA Republicans (ULTRA MAGA unite!). I’m not sure who’s running the show over there, but they’re either horrible at this, or more likely counting on the fraud to cover the difference in the election.

    1. As I have noted, the contempt that they have repeatedly shown for the broad opposition to their policies bespeaks a cabal that things their staying in power is assured; i.e. they believe the fix is already in, and are already planning to target and persecute those who question their latest round of election fraud shenanigans and to double down on crushing dissent.

      After all, any lawsuits to challenge election fraud or refusal to seat new members of Congress to replace Democrats who lose notwithstanding the fraud will take time during which they will use even brief control of Congress to pack the Supreme Court and guarantee that it will rule in their favor.

      This is why they just brought Podesta in as a close advisor; he has a long track record as engineering just this kind of stuff.

        1. And when have Democrats actually cared about constitutional limits; after all; just look at their pattern of conduct. Cancellation of debt by degree, political prisoners being held without trial for well over year and being tortured, etc.

          Again, it would likely eventually be found improper, but since Pelosi controls the unionized capital police, and they have shown a clear willingness to use the military to enforce their will since even before HarrisBiden’s installation, they could very well seek to do it. Again, by the time it gets up to the Supreme Court, they will have packed the Court so it rules in their favor.

          Just think Venezuela. That’s their plan. Whether they can pull it off is another thing, But don’t be surprised when they try.

          1. Pelosi won’t control the Capitol Police and they won’t be able to pack the Court until they seat the Republicans. Your grimdark fantasy is just that, a fantasy.

        2. “Each House shall be the Judge of the Elections, Returns and Qualifications of its own Members, ”

          Article 1, Sec 5 says differently.

          1. I also suggest that people look at the litigation from when Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., of NY was denied his seat by the House after winning election. That case went all the way to the Supreme Court. I stand by my comments regarding Democratic Party election shenanigans and their counting on it to be tied up in the courts long enough for them to pack the Supreme Court and thus ensure that their usurpation is upheld by the courts.

          2. No, it doesn’t. When the 117th Congress adjourns there won’t be a Congress until the 118th Congress convenes. That’s the Congress that will determine the qualifications of its members.

                1. Since you haven’t’ offered any evidence of my ignorance other than assertion, Mr Kettle….

                  1. I have, but I understand that your ego needs you to ignore that. I’d recommend that you look into what the first few votes in each new Congress cover, but that you force you to confront your own stupidity and we know you won’t do that.

                  2. The Federal Contested Elections Act is the controlling rule for the House. According to the Act, the time table moves like this –

                    Election is held
                    State certifies the results
                    A loser has thirty days to submit a challenge to House under the FCEA.
                    The winner has thirty days to respond.

                    So you’ve got three time periods to look at. The first is how long it takes the state to certify the results. This is going to vary on a state by state basis, of course. The second is how long it takes the petitioner to submit the challenge to the House. And finally, the third time period is how long it takes the winner to respond to the challenger.

                    If everyone involved – state, challenger, and winner – moves at blazing fast speed, then the challenge might reach the House before Congress breaks for the Holidays. Otherwise the next Congress is involved.

                    The controlling legal authority is Powell v. McCormack. That ruling (7-1; and the dissenter didn’t actively vote against it so much as note that events had made the ruling moot before the Court heard the case. Abe Fortas is the missing vote, which should tell you why it was a missing vote.) essentially holds that so long as a candidate meets the conditions laid out in the Constitution, you can’t block his or her candidacy. Aside from that, the Court generally stays out of such debates, viewing them as internal to the House or Senate.

                    1. Meant to post this Monday night, but lightning took out my internet…

                      OK, Junior, now we have something to work with.

                      The FCEA is not and never has been, even recently, the only way of bringing or resolving a challenge.

                      https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF11734

                      “Non-FCEA Contests and Other Disputes
                      Since Congress enacted the FCEA in 1969, this method
                      appears to be the most common for contesting House
                      election results. There are, however, other options, separate
                      from the FCEA, to bring contests within the House (in
                      addition to litigation or state processes). In particular, a
                      Member-elect may challenge the right of another to be
                      sworn in, usually when the House convenes for a new
                      Congress. The most prominent such example in recent
                      history concerned the 1984 election in Indiana’s 8th District.
                      This contest, between candidates McCloskey and McIntyre,
                      was perhaps the most contentious in modern House history.
                      The Indiana Secretary of State certified Mr. McIntyre as
                      Representative-elect after a recount reversed incumbent
                      McCloskey’s 72-vote election day lead. Neither candidate
                      was sworn in, pending an investigation of the contest.”

                      At that point, Mr. Gauch’s blanket assertion about the unique applicability of FCEA is disposed of, and 5 minutes of DDG search would have possibly stopped him from making it. It also disposes of your “The controlling legal authority is Powell v. McCormack.” Multiple precedents showing otherwise are in the court dockets. The controlling legal authority is whatever the Congress decides it is. Given the zealous respect for precedents and norms shown by the Disloyal Opposition, I think we can count on those “Other options” being brought into play.

                      Even the FCEA litigation admits that the courts are reluctant to take up
                      cases like these.

                      Same article: “Under the Constitution, each house of Congress has the
                      express authority to be the final judge of the ‘Elections,
                      Returns and Qualifications’ of its Members(Art. I, § 5, cl.
                      1). The Supreme Court has held that, in so judging these
                      elections, Congress’s determination of the right to a seat is
                      ‘a nonjusticiable political question,’ resulting in ‘an
                      unconditional and final judgment’ (Roudebush v. Hartke,
                      405 U.S. 15, 19 (1972)).”

                      This “non-justiciable political question” was PRECISELY the reasoning given by Judge Taney Jr for having SCOTUS refuse to take up the case brought by Texas et al to contest the obviously fraudulent election of 2020.

                      Speaking of the courts: Over the last 30 years, we have seen too many examples to list of laws being ignored, selectively enforced, “process as punishment”, etc. as long as they benefit the Ruling Class. Now we’re at the point where mobs and assassins are outside the Justices’ homes. They are a warning shot…. that the next assassin just might make it through the government provided security if the right detail is rotated into place.

                      And #3 is really the point. I am continually amazed by people who think that we still have “rule of law” in this country, and chant it with their ears covered and eyes tight shut. Hopefully, the last 6 years have put a large dent in that across the country.

                    2. Man, you a particularly special flavor of stupid. You dismiss an argument that I never made by citing an example that proves my point. It was the 99th Congress – the one elected in 1984 – that delayed seating McCloskey until it’s recount was completed. Likewise, it will be the 118th Congress, not the current one, that will determine who will be seated next year.

                      And of course we still have rule of law, strained as it may be. Otherwise the Democrats wouldn’t faff around with search warrants and prime-time speeches, they’d just have FICUS declare himself a dictator and throw Trump in jail (or a shallow grave). I’m sorry that reality doesn’t conform to your perverse desires, but that’s what happens when your dumb.

    2. ….am I the only one seeing the Japanese hero teams in bright colored spandex doing kung fu poses EVERY TIME they read “ULTRA MAGA!!!”?

        1. Looks like I’m going to have to charge up my Mystical Wristbands of Power. Couple of moon-lit nights of deep meditation and immersion in a pool of Holy Water should do it.

          1. Isn’t there just some quaint cantrip to say? Something like “In brightest day, in blackest night, no evil shall escape my sight. Let those who worship evil’s might, beware my power, Green Lantern’s light!”

              2. Oddly Sinestro leads the Yellow Lantern core whose base emotion is fear. Odd how that works for our SJW/Tranzi people…

      3. If so, we’re still missing the cute Japanese actress in a ridiculous outfit playing the evil would-be world conqueror. Is she suddenly going to appear, turn Biden 500 feet tall, and send him rampaging through our cities?

        😛

          1. Nah. Sentai Prism Rangers (name borrowed from the sentai team that turns up in the Disgaea games) have their own 500 foot tall combiner mecha that they use to fight the evil would-be world conqueror’s giant 500 foot tall destructive monsters.

      4. Didn’t someone use the phrase ‘Dark MAGA’ at some point?

        I think I’ll join up with that division. Dark MAGA Knights arise! Black ninja armored robes, with metallic burgundy edging (granted, a different shade of red than normal, but still) sounds more my style. Some sort of protective helmet too, if I have any say in the matter.

          1. I might honestly have to ask at this point, Foxfier… Are you me from the future? Because it kinda seems like it…

            Satin for the top layer, definitely. The closest thing to mithril I can get for the under-tunic and breeches/greaves. (Some kind of protection value is needed, as well as looking cool.) Probably a black woven cloak made of some polyester blend (matte black, as opposed to the satin sheen) for the times when you actually want to blend in with the darkness, rather than just look awesome.

            1. Worse, I’m helping to make the future!
              :gestures around at mass of various sizes of rug-rat:
              Seriously, though, I’ve noticed that satin trim on baby blankets are amazingly long lasting, and easily made metallic. 😀

              1. Ah, interesting. For me, it’s satin pillowcases (does better with my mom’s type of hair, and thus my own) and pajamas. Have you ever tried a satin pajama set? Button-down shirt and pants? They feel amazing, and look even better in my opinion.

                  1. Here’s a link! Come to think of it, just take one of the links to Amazon off this site (giving our Honored Hostess her cut of the profits) and search “Satin Pajamas Set Women.” If you’ve got the fun money on hand any time soon, (about $30 a set, I believe), I’d highly recommend them.

          1. Okay, if that guy is the Hiring Manager, I might just sign on. Not to mention that in this scene, it looks like the Bad Guys are an awful lot more ethical when it comes to Child Soldiers than the Good Guys.

            2. The Japanese have been at some of these genres for so long that they’ve got just as many parody series running as serious series. One of the animated sentai series right now (Love After World Domination; based on a manga by the same name) is the basic Sentai formula… except that the leader of the Sentai team and the latest evil princess of the evil world conqueror group are in love with each other, and trying to date on the sly without their respective teammates finding out (and before you ask, they both know who the other is).

        1. No. They were too goody-goody. I really liked Voltron (lions), even if some of the nods towards Christianity were a little off kilter (but that’s Japanese-anime-interpretation-of-Christianity for you.) I wanted to pilot either the black or red lion.

    3. It turns out it was a bogus “walk-back” given that the Democrats were out in force on Sunday doubling down on Biden’s Triumph of the Shrill speech and his own official Twitter account sent out messages that doubled down on it. Now they are calling the very policies that make up the Make America Great Platform, such as a secure border, not being victimized by unfair trade, rule of law, downsizing government, are themselves “extreme” as are anyone who supports those polices.

      In other words anyone who opposes the statist agenda of an ever-larger and powerful central government is a fascist. They keep using the word fascist even though it doesn’t mean what they think it does. Indeed it is the Democratic Party’s ideology and policies that embody the core of fascism as proclaimed by the first ruling fascist, Mussolini “all within The State, nothing outside The State, nothing against The State”. In true Orwellian fashion, Democrats believe that people who oppose this are the fascists.

      Of course the necessary implication is that policies and people that “extreme” are outside the bounds of political discourse and participation and must be stopped and destroyed “by any means necessary”.

      They have already shown previews of what they intend with the lockdowns, the IRS targeting of Tea Party groups, Operation Chokepoint, the Russia collusion hoax , the open support for violence against political opponents, and the other abuses of power that they have perpetrated. Having faced no meaningful punishment for many of these abuses, they intend to turn the abuses up to 11.

      Just like their totalitarian forbears, the one thing that drives them is the will to power.

  19. Never underestimate Biden’s ability to eff things up. For -his- side this applies. From his side came the quip.

    If you think you regret prezzy 46, wait to hear the gnashing of Lefty teeth in January 2025. “Oh if only….”

  20. TXRed wrote “I’m willing to grant that no one thought about how the black shadows behind the FICUS might look, because you probably can’t see that until after dark, and no one wanted to do a “day before test run” since this was Philly and all the equipment would likely vanish before noon the next day.”

    It seems likely to me that the grimdark red lighting optics were likely largely unintended. “Kam Fong as Chin Ho” posting on https://instapundit.com/540534/ uploaded a pair of images, one still image from a video showing the red-for-ridiculous marines-as-props ordinarily-cropped image was legit as opposed to some photoshop confection, and the other image (with a much wider field, from some off center viewpoint) showing that on a larger scale they doing some ridiculous red-white-and-blue theme. Either way it seems less like an intentional invocation of Hitler and Mussolini by way of V for Vendetta than it seems like “doesn’t anyone here know how to play this game?”

    But there are other over-the-top crude sinister threatening things that don’t seem explainable by “oh gosh we didn’t see how that would look”…

    Consider the Marines, which others have commented about more knowledgeably than I.

    Consider also “clear and present danger”.

    Here are left-ish and right-ish reports:

    https://www.cnbc.com/2022/09/01/biden-warns-trumps-extreme-maga-republicans-are-a-danger-to-us-democracy.html

    https://ricochet.com/1307446/biden-warns-that-maga-republicans-pose-clear-and-present-danger-to-nation/

    As Ricochet points out, it’s the speech suppression standard of Wilson-era presidential-candidate-imprisoning Supreme Court First Amendment jurisprudence. It seems unlikely that they just happened upon that combination of words independently in some tossed word salad.

    It’s also grimly hilarious that an article from an outlet that earnestly finds right-wing “dog whistles” can’t bring itself to notice the appearance of this legal standard. (For my “earnestly finds” claim, I have not chased into the links, but Google “msnbc dog whistle” gave me ” Facing racist dog whistles in the Senate – MSNBC News” and “‘Racist dog whistle’ underpins Trump attack on election results” at the head of half a dozen plausible-looking hits.) It’s not that it’s surprising, it’s that by now it’s so predictable…

    (MSNBC cropping their images to miss Marines is a nice professional touch too.)

    1. Someone has CNN adjusting the color trying to get the red out. It goes from the Dark menace to the flag’s red looking pinkishpurple as they lighten the colors and try improving the optics.

    3. Its also been admitted by Team HarrisBiden and confirmed by the evidence that the state lawsuits against the tech companies and HarrisBiden, that there is active coordination to silence the speech of those with whom Team HarrisBiden disagree. One purpose of the Biden rant was to manufacture yet another reason for that censorship, by enabling the tech oligarchs to rely on the speech in censoring anyone who expresses dissent from leftist ideology as being “violent extremist threats to democracy”.

      I expect massive censorship and outright banning by the tech oligarchs and establishment media in the coming weeks of Republican candidates and anyone else who is challenging the Democrats in the upcoming election. When their useful idiots call Biden’s rant “a declaration of war” “against “extremist threats to democracy”, take them at their word that they intend to wage war against their domestic political opponents

        1. According to the latest Democratic Party line, criticism of the FBI is now “incitement”. There is no limit to the lengths they will go to in their pursuit of power.

  21. No matter how much they try and walk this back, never forget what was Saud. That was their truth. They meant it.

  22. (Insert a picture of the Left poking a Pepe the frog wearing a MAGA hat with a stick and saying “DO Something!”)

    If the folks in North Texas didn’t go ballistic on Drag Queens Pedos and ANTIFA last weekend, then the right isn’t going to overreact to the “Dictator Time with Satanic Lighting”.

    There seems to be a collective wisdom that is allowing a lot of this nonsense play out until something that actually shocks and red-pills more of the normals happens. Until then, it’s just collecting more evidence for Judgement Day and making more silly memes mocking the idiots.

    And I’m not going to laugh at all the self inflicted chaos that will be happening in Germany/Europe this winter when all you have to do to destroy the US is turn off EBT/SNAP for three days and then watch the cities be burn down by the Democratic plantation “pets”.

      1. Aye. And the ones who will hurt from it will be the ones actually in need. The deadbeat mooches would come into the convenience store and whinge that it didn’t take EBT when the one in $BigCity did. BUT… they’d put the “necessities” (Why get those at an overpriced convenience store when the grocery store has them cheaper and will take EBT?) AND then just ‘magically’ have plenty of CASH for beer, cigarettes, and lotto.

          1. Even now, the charity of Americans lives on. We’re the most giving nation in the world, and it’s not even a close contest. On average, even more so, when you consider that it’s not just a few rich wierdos. The average citizen, especially if religious, is far more likely to donate to charity here than in any other country in the world.

            Completely voluntarily.

            1. “You have almost nothing at all. And yet.. you share that meager bit with us. Why?”

              “Almost nothing is still something. You truly had NOTHING. It would be wrong to be so selfish as let you starve or whatever. Also, when I go to sleep, I do NOT wish to kept awake by thoughts of ‘could you have’… Now maybe you are a rascal and no good will come of this. But for all I know, you might be the One to do Some Great Thing and I just saved millions with nothing more than a meager sandwich and a paltry bowl of thin soup. I am willing to take that chance.”

        2. In many cities, the deadbeats will just shoplift what they need. It’ll be a misdemeanor at worst, and the cops won’t respond because of the local Soros DA.

          1. Happening already. They can even get away with assault and outright attempted murder with pretty much impunity at this point. It’s Mad Max without the neat cars.

              1. Backlash already happening.

                Someone tried the “Knockout Game” against an armed individual in Chicago. Ended up dead. I wonder how much effort the CPD will expend to investigate this act of littering.

  24. My money is on a self-important federal agent making demands of local/state law enforcement, going ape-sh*t when the locals tell him to pound sand … and reacting violently. That will be the Bleeding Kansas/Harper’s Ferry/Fort Sumpter moment.

  25. Try new Ultra-Maga! It whitens better than Tide!

    “Marxism… the philosophy of the young and hip…” except that today they’re young and dumb. If only Che Guevera hadn’t been ‘hot,’ there’s be a lot less commie gurlz and boyz.

    “Because they’re the future, d*mn it…” Damn right! And that why the last book I wrote is called, ESCAPE From the Future (and Other Stories). By the way, I got a couple of my siblings to watch Idiocracy with me the other night. Even the democrat had to laugh… and he didn’t pontificate after it was over. He knew the movie was on point and there was ‘no point.’

    Speaking of, “… “Say vagina?” Did you hear the one about the old codger who asked the old gal to dance at the Senior Center hop? While he was moving her about on the floor he said to her, “I heard you had acute angina.” She slapped him in the face and walked off.

    “However, keep your clothes and weapons where you can find them in the dark.” This is sage advice. Having served with the 4th Infantry Division in the Central Highlands of Vietnam, we never undressed to sleep. But we always had our M-16 within arm’s reach.
    Nice post!

    1. It whitens better than Tide! 😀

      As for Marxism being the philosophy of the young and hip, 25 years ago, when I went back to college as a young married man, it sure was — at least, that’s what all my 50-something-year-old humanities professors assured me.

    2. (Singing, loudly…)

      I used to date a beauty queen.
      But now I date my M-16.

      Woe oh …. woe-oh
      Woe oh, we gotta go….

  26. Did anyone else notice that the red lighting makes his face, in the video, look green? Anyway, a second-rate Mussolini. And you’re right: history repeating as farce.

  27. In part I think it’s a case of low expectations. They assume the American people are stupid, thus they reach for the visual vernacular of comic books to communicate with them. Without, of course, reading said comic books.

    It does fit with all the Hollywood movies in which thieves, drug dealers and con artists are the heroes. We’re supposed to see them as the underdogs, and cheer on their violent actions agains their oppressors. (one of the reasons I don’t watch many Hollywood movies.)

    They kinda missed that the Nazi imagery is unequivocally the imagery of the villain, for everyone. Maybe they’re so out of touch that they thought they were reaching out to the Republicans, who (they think) are white supremacist fans of Nazi ideology. Unfortunately for them, only in their fever dreams…

      1. The truly dangerous thing is that they are compounding their delusions.

        Russia hoax: I believe they set that up because they believed Republicans have a knee-jerk hatred and mistrust of Russians. (During the Cold War, it was people like Cambridge (MA) Democrats who were making junkets to the Soviet Union, returning to tell us the Soviets were harmless. ) But the thought that DJT was a Russian collaborator was bizarre, and not convincing. Thus, the years of “Russia Russia Russia” hype on tame news outlets served to drive Democratic paranoia through the roof, but did not sway normal Republican voters.

        So they concluded it was a cult of personality. They entirely missed the grievances of their fellow citizens who identified with the deplorable label. DJT did not lead the dissatisfaction. He is a symptom, not the cause.

        Again, I blame Hollywood. For decades now, they’ve cast Nazis as the villains, especially in action blockbusters. In the real world, anyone who’s willing to be a Nazi is and has been a pitiful loser. Calling anyone a Nazi is an insult, but being serious about the insult is a sign of delusion.

        It’s as if I were to call someone a Roundhead or a Cavalier. It doesn’t make sense today, in this country. Would I be insulted if someone called me a Roundhead? No. But I would avoid talking with that person, as I’m old enough to know that some frames of reference are too skewed for communication. I think this silence is not only practiced by “our” side, but also by Democrats who do not share in the delusion.

        So, all this talk of civil war… I don’t think so. We aren’t in the same frame of reference. If we were the monsters they claim we are, maybe…but we aren’t. (note the use of the subjunctive there. “condition contrary to fact.”) It seems to be wishful thinking on the side of those disconnected from reality.

        The most effective thing to do is to vote. I would be very wary of anyone on the internet trying to discourage anyone from voting. Voting is the most effective thing to do.

        1. Yes. Absolutely this. In fact, this is close to my post on the matter.
          I’m not sure voting still works, but we definitely need to vote like our lives depend on it this November and then again in 24. Because our lives MIGHT.

        2. The problem is, our enemies are the monsters they claim we are. Every accusation Biden leveled against ‘MAGA Republicans’ is something the Democrats have been doing for years.

          Vote, of course, but I don’t think voting gets us out of this. Not after 2020. The election fraud was blatant, but Trump was an ‘insurrectionist’ for pointing that out, and going through the legal procedures laid out in the Constitution for contesting a questionable election. They impeached him for it! We were ‘traitors’ for trying to take election fraud cases to court!

          The Democrats have weaponized the entire federal government against their political opponents. Stormtroopers raid people’s homes in the middle of the night. Political prisoners are held in solitary confinement for two years without trials on charges of trespassing. They’re adding 87,000 armed tax collectors to persecute dissenters.

          Mobs intimidate judges and juries, and riot when a court returns the ‘wrong’ verdict anyway. Robbery, looting, arson, assault, rape and murder are no longer crimes if committed by ‘oppressed minorities’ — but defending yourself is a crime. Terrorist organizations are openly sponsored by Big Business in league with Big Government.
          ———————————
          The U.S. Capitol is OUR house. Congresscritters are just the help.

  28. And today on Twitter a compilation of tweets from left-wing blue checks mulling over, “What can we do with these horrible people?” And actually invoking the Germans as “having a solution.”
    But we’re the fascists. Right.

    1. They also claim that they are the law abiding ones while chucking all sorts of laws into the shredder. The latest; Team HarrisBiden is going to turn VA Hospitals into abortion clinics, even though federal law not only expressly prohibits using federal funds to perform abortions, but also specifically and expressly prohibits VA Hospitals from being used for abortions.

      Just treat what Democrats say as projection and you won’t be wrong.

  30. The nazi or facist presentation here was not an accident, it was a fundamental reflection of left norms.

    From observation, the left can defined in terms of some very specific flavors of false statement. One flavor is the arrow of history stuff, which they inherited from Marx. Another is that tremendous fear they have of being caught out of lockstep with the current Party Truth, this is the one that clearly shows that all modern leftists have inherited the avoidant behavior of Stalin’s victims. Third is “real communism hasn’t been tried”, and all the other ways they have of saying ‘those guys were not real leftists’.

    Leftism is a religion, basically an animism of ‘scholarly’ ‘theory’. They mostly aren’t scholars, and don’t have the mental tools to test their theory, and see that it is garbage.

    Rigorous testing is a skill they do not develop, generally, because it queers the mystical experience of their preferred interaction with theory. They sit in a circle with their fellow worshipers, talk theory or have emotional experiences, and obtain comfort from their confidence that their theory predicts their success, and is super reliable, etc.

    They are also a cult of power. Their theory of social power basically implies that it has a physical reality, and will magically alter reality if they properly tap into it.

    Anyway, they need a theoretical explanation of why they do not have a inexorable track record of failure. So, true leftist is an ever moving definition, and they have ‘no enemies to the left’ because they define current enemies as being right wing.

    The predictive problem, if Stalin hijacked the revolution, and left is purely heirs of Stalin’s victims, then every socialist, communist, and leftist is a right winger, and the revolution is forever doomed to be stolen.

    Culture, religion, and mental health are fundamentally related. Old standard sane was only ever a function of certain religious/magical practices, and the cultures shaped by them.

    Different cultures have different variations on mental health issues, see wendigo and fox possession.

    There are two possibilities with regard to the new social religion, and mental health issues. One is, they have generic religion issues, not specifically Christian flavored issues, and we would expect what Christians and Jews might consider to be demonic possession. The second, that socialists experience a specific unusual flavor of mental aberration, that shows up most when socialists violate socialist behavioral norms and taboos.

    Also, cultures under stress carry out ‘ghost dances’, or revitalization movements, where they try to do things that they thought worked before, but harder and more extremely. If they get worried because magic ritual B is suddenly not giving results, maybe they did B wrong, and need to do it again, but harder.

    So, step one for them was getting dischanted because the terorrism of the 1960s and 1970s was getting them nothing, so they set out to infiltrate and corrupt the system.

    Step two, get tired of waiting on corrupting the system, for fear of mortality. Time to pull off the secret master plan.

    Step three, “Why isn’t the secret master plan working, it is supposed to work?” By this point, they are deep into ghost dancing, and would have selected themselves out of the enterprise much earlier if they were prone to considering if the theory is wrong.

    These people fundamentally believe that they can lie or magic their way into power. But, some lies and magic are more attractive to them, they try those options first. Other lies and magic are not their first option, maybe it doesn’t flatter their egos enough, or something.

    One, facism is fairly pure will to power. Nazi and Facist symbols are symbols selected for efficacy of ‘power magic’, and socialists beleive that the magic is real far more strongly than they believe that it is important for them to chide opponents for having too much of the symbolism. The latter is for them purely a critique based on expedience.

    Two, having moved down on their lists of preferred magical workings, those leftists may now believe that they have violated left norms.

    The left are not in their traditional mental place after seizing power, American power is still much too dispersed for their taste. They aren’t ready to murder all of the communists who aren’t terrified of stepping wrong, the communists with self confidence still haven’t been enough to get them eternal power.

    The left are not in their traditional mental place after being foiled again in their powergrap by some secret bastion of conservatism somewhere in America, that they need to destroy next time. (Again, this is their thinking, I’m describing delusions, not the actual truth with an explanation of how they misperceive it.)

    They don’t have a secret sufficiently large army of shooters hidden away somewhere. They don’t have a secret super effective surveillance system buried somewhere. Their information manipulation folks remain the same old sorts who were not up to the job before.

    They are ghost dancing on the ‘rituals’ of power magic. They are going to go harder on the trappings of facism, not less, because they have nothing else to do.

    2. tl;dr

      The famous ‘who goes Nazi’ essay captures a part of things, but not the whole. It is a true essay, the folks who always chase the winds of political convenience will chase facist winds as well.

      But, the missing element is ‘who finds facism so convenient that they are compelled to invent it, supposing that it isn’t already available for imitation?’

      Socialists.

      Socialists who have been socialist long enough to be utterly sold on the idea of obtaining power by the magical process of political shenanigans, and have grown disenchanted with what conventional socialism has to offer.

      So, maybe parts of socialism are unnecessary and inefficient, and ‘this time for sure’ if they just figure out the fix.

      Facism is what you get when you get frustrated with the intellectual nonsense with no real world application, drop it, and roll your own from naked will to power.

      1. Bennie was a disillusioned (and defrocked) Marxist who took Marxist Socialism/Communism, dropped all the Marx (intellectual nonsense) bits he didn’t like or thought could not work (and keep him in charge), and ignored all the bits he was keeping and claimed he was making a better way.

    3. Not exactly related and yet…
      A few days ago I was looking around the web at stuff regarding candles and tripped over a lot of crazy-woo (BIRM…) about ‘candle magick’. The corker was a bit about how to interpret black smoke from a candle. A lot of silliness. What does black smoke from a candle REALLY mean? It means you need to trim the wick so it stops sooting!

  32. The Left has no idea of what fascism is. They think it has something to do with individualism. Because masses of people saluting in unison while chanting slogans is clearly an example of individualism run amok. “Fascism” for them is the opposite of communism. If you aren’t a communist, you must be a fascist. Because there’s infinity+++ genders, but the only possible political choices are two nearly-identical flavors of totalitarianism. And don’t try to slip away by trying to say you oppose both fascism and communism, no. There is no non-binary politics, comrade. And because they have no idea what they’re doing, they are all the more likely to stumble their way into becoming real fascists.

    It would almost be hilarious, if it weren’t so tragic.

    2. Au contraire, they know exactly what fascism is. Everybody that disagrees with them is a fascist. QED.
      ———————————
      Leo Bloom: “Well, if we assume you’re a dishonest person—“
      Max Bialystock: “Assume, assume!”

      1. “The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies “something not desirable”… In the case of a word like democracy, not only is there no agreed definition, but the attempt to make one is resisted from all sides. It is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it: consequently the defenders of every kind of regime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using the word if it were tied down to any one meaning.”

        ― George Orwell

    3. To the Communist, that which opposes Communism is Fascism.

      Which explains the Left using that word, and meaning it.

  34. Ultra MAGA. I mean, if they’d been paid to come up with a cool name for the new Republicans they couldn’t have done better. I immediately started riffing on “Ultra Maga, Assemble! By our combined powers, we’ll take back our land” and I’m sure I wasn’t the only one.

    Maybe this explains some of the old super hero group names.

    Like, “The Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.”

    …it still sounds kinda BA. 😀

    1. The speech with a name and a group name changed:
      There’s no question that the Republic today is dominated, driven, intimidated by Yoda and the Jedi Order. And that is a threat to this Empire. The Jedi Order have made their choice. They embrace anger. They thrive on chaos. They live not in the light of truth, but in the shadow of lies. Together, we can choose a…. different path.
      oo much of what’s happening in our galaxy today is not normal… Yoda and the Jedi Order represent an extremism that threatens the very foundations of our Empire.
      Yes, it’s from the speech.

        1. Given that Critical Race Theory has the same element of determining people’s worth based on racial identity, and given that the brand of socialism Democrats are pushing is based on CRT’s racial spoils system, is it any wonder that the term Communazi so aptly identifies their ideology and policies.

          Let’s start with the fact, just like the Nazis they despise Jews. There is a reason Team HarrisBiden has so many open Jew haters in its rank, including senior positions. CRT simply expands the Protocols of the Elders of Zion treatment from Jews to all whites, in Nation of Islam “white people are the devil” fashion. They very clearly have the racial identity group hierarchy and scapegoating that was a core component of Nazi ideology and policy.

          They clearly are globalists who seek to make the totalitarian socialism the worldwide system of society, thus pursuing the long time communist goal. However, they are willing to do so using classical fascist means, by substituting state outright ownership of everything to an economic structure where large nominally private companies work with the government and serve as its instruments to implement The Party’s policy and to persecute and punish political opponents in Mussolini fascist-style.

          Thus, their agenda without the racial identity element is commufascism; fascist structure and methods to achieve communist goals. Add in the racial element and communazism perfectly sums them up.

      2. Got a compliment on my Keep America Great hat yesterday.

        There’s still good people out there. You just have to be seen for them to poke their heads out.

  36. Tonight’s magic trick – I got here from a link on PowerLine’s Picks!
    Which of the PLB writers put it up? I’m guessing Steven Hayward.

  38. Are there any Marines (note I didn’t say “ex-“, fellas:-) )here?

    What is the pose affected by the guys in Marine uniforms? The white-gloved -clasped-hands-in-front pose? The legs are at the correct shoulder width stance, but parade rest has the lower arms and hands behind the lower back. Is this something unique to the Marines, created for embassy guard duty, or is it something choreographed by Biden’s staff for visual effect?

    It looks like standard bodyguard position.

    2. At some points they looked like they had their hands apart– near the side of their belt buckles, for a basic idea.

      But I did find pictures of Marines in the pose they’re in for the closer photos, linked it yesterday; there’s a photo of Marines standing in formation waiting to do Honors at Arlington Cemetery, same pose.

      Sep 30, 2016
      Arlington, Va. – Marine Corps Body Bearers from Bravo Company, Marine Barracks Washington, D.C., await the arrival of the casket during a full honors funeral at Arlington National Cemetery, Va., Sept. 23, 2016. Bravo Company is home to the Marine Corps Body Bearers, those Marines who carry the caskets for all Marine Corps funerals within the National Capitol Region and other set locations. (Official Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Andrianna Daly/Released)

      1. On the three marines in front in the picture

        From Left to right

        Left Marine
        Corporal
        The hash stripe on the bottom of his sleeves denotes 4 years of service.
        Ribbon:
        Navy Meritorious Unit Commendation
        Medals:
        Marine Corps Good Conduct Medal
        National Defense Service Medal
        Global War on Terrorism Service Medal

        Center Marine
        Lance Corporal
        Ribbon:
        Navy Sea Service Deployment Ribbon
        Medals:
        National Defense Service Medal
        Global War on Terrorism Service Medal
        Korean Defense Service Medal

        Right Marine
        Lance Corporal
        Medals:
        National Defense Service Medal
        Global War on Terrorism Service Medal

        1. For folks not familiar, Marine Barracks is seriously cool.

          MISSION
          Marine Barracks Washington, D.C., also known as “8th & I,” is the oldest active post in the Marine Corps. It was founded by President Thomas Jefferson and Lt. Col. William Ward Burrows, the second commandant of the Marine Corps, in 1801.

          Located on the corners of 8th & I Streets in southeast Washington, D.C., the Barracks supports both ceremonial and security missions in the nation’s capital.

          The Barracks is home to many nationally recognized units, including the Marine Corps Silent Drill Platoon, the Marine Drum and Bugle Corps, the Marine Band, the official Marine Corps Color Guard, and the Marine Corps Body Bearers. It is also the site of the Home of the Commandants, which, along with the Barracks, is a registered national historic landmark.

          The Body Bearers (some pictured above) are pretty specific, too:
          https://www.barracks.marines.mil/Units/Company-B/Body-Bearers/
          Below is a list of minimum requirements potential candidates must meet before being considered for this somber and sacred duty:

          Be a Marine of unquestionable character, maturity, self-discipline, and resolve.
          Active Duty 70 to 76 inches tall (72-76 preferable).
          Must be within Marine Corps Height/Weight standards, possess both a 1st Class PFT and CFT, and possess outstanding physical characteristics to include, but not limited to: strength, cardiovascular and muscular endurance, and flexibility.
          Grade of Corporal or below. (Sergeants may be considered on a case-by-case basis)
          Must be pending no legal action. (Prior negative actions will be considered on a case-by-case basis)
          Meets minimum obligated service of 30 months upon check-in to CDS.
          Must be able to pass the Initial Strength Test by performing a minimum of 10 repetitions for the following exercises (although it is recommended that one is well beyond this minimum threshold before attending CDS):
          225lbs Bench Press (must touch your chest)
          135lbs Behind-the-Neck Military Press (barbell must be even with the ears at the bottom position of the rep)
          115lbs Strict Straight Barbell Curl (barbell must come above the nipple line at the top of the rep)
          315lbs Barbell Squat (hips must be parallel (or below parallel) with the deck at the bottom of the rep)
          For additional guidance on the proper execution of these lifts, please refer to our Initial Strength Test video located on our YouTube page here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lOZeF-xRKs
          If a Body Bearer cannot witness an Initial Strength Test in person, these lifts should be filmed and sent to the Body Bearer Recruiting Coordinator for assessment.

          For obvious reasons on most of these, since they’re hauling caskets and those aren’t light.

            1. Yep! And the upper-body strength requirement would be the real weed-out element. Most women I’ve met who are that tall are not muscular.

  39. Thinking of the Brandon speech with all the red lighting, it seems they are trying to reclaim the color red! Sorry CNN you messed up with that red and blue originally a while ago and now all you do to hide the truth is make the screen purple. Lol

  40. I knew a psychopathic liar. She spent a summer telling our SCA chapter she was hiding from her abusive husband, with details. Then at Pennsic she had the group on alert because the monster was there and she needed protection. Then we met the monster: a perfectly ordinary, decent guy
    who was shocked to learn what she’d been saying about him.
    In her case, you really did know she was lying because her mouth was moving. And she had custody of the kids, God have mercy.
    (For Balzac, WPDE)

    1. We all try to paint ourselves as better than we probably are. That’s pretty much human nature. It’s when that exaggeration veers into fabrications that cause harm to others and the person themselves that it becomes pathological. That’s what I see as a significant difference between the Trumpian GOP and the Democrats. Trump isn’t about hurting anyone except those causing harm. The Democrats don’t have any problem with hurting everyone except their chosen elite.

      1. Trump has his flaws – praising someone as a good hire then vilifying them when he perceives disloyalty is one of them – but he did his best. And I remain angrier than I should at the folks whose personal integrity and uprightness prevented them from voting for such an unworthy person.

        1. Aye. There was plenty to legitimately criticize Trump about, but that was ignored and utter bilge claimed instead. And the HELL I will listen to some damned bilge-spewing idiot. If they lie about the OBVIOUS, after all…

  41. For some reason, when I think of the Biden administration, I alway imagine that the administration is full of lazy women who have CCP lovers. I think the CCP handlers are the ones actually doing the work, and they are completely tone death to American cultural norms and symbology.

      1. There is a reason I went into Physics. I’m good at math and pretty bad at communicating verbally or in writing. Though I still have ‘write a fantasy trilogy’ on my bucket list. Love you too. 😉

        1. You sound like my younger son. He can write correctly (and fluently) most of the time, but words are not his friend. And in speech he says the most appalling things, without meaning to.

  42. Who knew The Who were writing and singing about the future President of the United States?

    “Behind Blue Eyes”

    No one knows what it’s like
    To be the bad man
    To be the sad man
    Behind blue eyes

    No one knows what it’s like
    To be hated
    To be fated
    To telling only lies

    But my dreams
    They aren’t as empty
    As my conscience seems to be

    I have hours, only lonely
    My love is vengeance
    That’s never free

    No one knows what it’s like
    To feel these feelings
    Like I do
    And I blame you

    No one bites back as hard
    On their anger
    None of my pain and woe
    Can show through

    But my dreams
    They aren’t as empty
    As my conscience seems to be

    I have hours, only lonely
    My love is vengeance
    That’s never free

    When my fist clenches, crack it open
    Before I use it and lose my cool
    When I smile, tell me some bad news
    Before I laugh and act like a fool

    And if I swallow anything evil
    Put your finger down my throat
    And if I shiver, please give me a blanket
    Keep me warm, let me wear your coat

    No one knows what it’s like
    To be the bad man
    To be the sad man
    Behind blue eyes

  43. Roger Kimball has this take from American Greatness:

    https://amgreatness.com/2022/09/03/biden-puts-the-total-in-totalitarianism/

    Some quotes of note:

    “The visual similarity between Joe Biden’s event and some nighttime events at Nuremberg are just too striking to be coincidental”

    “Having watched Biden’s Justice Department morph into an American Stasi with the FBI conducting predawn raids against various Trump supporters, arresting former aides and confiscating the mobile phones and other property of his lawyers, I now think that the tactics of intimidation are part of a larger strategy.”, and

    “they are all deliberate scare tactics, warnings to us all of what can happen to those who dissent. ”

    As they say on Insty, much more at the link.

  44. “Ultra MAGA”… Like UHF?

    Ultra Low MAGA
    Extremely Low MAGA
    Very Low MAGA
    Low MAGA
    MAGA
    High MAGA
    Very (High) MAGA
    Ultra (High) MAGA
    Super (High) MAGA
    Extremely (High) MAGA

    Then there is Progressive:
    Aryan Pure Sooper-Dooper-Pooper-Scooper Progressive.

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