It’s amazing how every time I post something telling people things are not quite as bad as they think, and defeat is not guaranteed, someone or other presumes to lecture me on how oh, no, it’s much much worse.
The prize this week goes to the gentleman who tried to tell me that a Romanian type of outcome was impossible because we can’t organize and march shoulder to shoulder without being arrested or something. Because, you know, the outcome in Romania was organized (it wasn’t. I have read extensively on it) and also they were much freer than we are now (I recommend said gentleman have a talk with say Monalisa Foster. Yes, yes, the iron curtain countries were falling, etc. None of this compares to as vast and untraceable as the US is, how relatively regime-uncorrupted our military is [I do say relatively] or how much dissent is still allowed. Seriously people: We’re more free than…. well, Canada, Australia, not to mention Europe, and those are beacons of freedom compared to Soviet Satellites, even as the wheels were coming off.)
Because my courage rises with every attempt to depress it — name that quote! — I decided this is the ideal time to point out that the doomers are full of sh*t. It’s not our wheels coming off.
Realizing this is such an unheard of perspective — and I can explain why, yes — I will point out that you shouldn’t from this assume that I mean everything is hunky dory, or that we’re not going to hurt at all, or even that we don’t still need to fight.
I’ve said before and I will repeat, because of how fast the institutions are collapsing, because of the terrible people the Left has in place (not just evil, but incompetent and bizarrely mentally inflexible) and how much power they have managed to amass, (before most of us were born) they are creating an amazing level of destruction which will bring a terrible amount of pain and suffering. We’re going to lose people, places and things we had no need to lose, because the left is like a bear with its paw in a steel trap, and it’s going to maul everyone it can before it goes down.
And it’s not all going to be cookies and cream on the other side, when we get there. There has been some real damage done to people and culture that will need to be repaired, and that’s never a load of fun.
BUT in the end, we really do win, and they really do lose. And the Gipper will be proved right, as will Trump, because communism and socialism, and all the top-down “Daddy government will kiss it and make it better” philosophies will at long last be confined to the dust bin of history to be things of horror unearthed by long-future archeologists digging through the fossilized midden of ideas. At which point they’ll scratch their heads and go “Uh…. how did they believe this?”
So, why do you think you’re losing?
Well, because the right always thinks its losing.
Part of it is set-in perception. If you’re the sort of kid who got beat all through elementary and middle school, even if you get a late growth spurt and become the sort of guy no one messes with, at the back of your mind, you’ll always expect to be beaten up and cringe when a guy with a sadistic smirk heads for you.
Throughout most of the twentieth century the lovers of freedom (right is a really bad word for this as in Europe it just means “blood, soil, and national religion”) lost ground incrementally until maybe the last decade.
This is because the communications technology of the 20th century was so concentrated and susceptible to gatekeeping that it was custom made for the left to get hold of and police, never letting anyone else get a look-in. So once the left captured it the right could not get a look in
And lies were told with panache and style. And “Leftism” became a positional good. Which meant people ascending the social ladder either were or pretended to be left. For one, it was the only way to get a job in the arts, communication, news, etc. etc. etc.
This in turn created a prospiracy that spewed a unified narrative, including outright lies, like FDR ending the great depression, which was taught as truth in public schools, and assumed in all news and entertainment.
This also created the feeling that communism was the future and would always win. Every time I say that some of you say “Not in the place/time I grew up.” It’s as may be. Sure, people were “anti-communist” from the lips out, but if you go and look at the books you read, including school books, they all assumed that top-down, planned economy and welfare and all the rest was the way to go. They claimed to be anti-communist, while mostly being anti-USSR, but still assuming that the socialist/communist/statist ways were the best. In fact, a lot of you who are older and haven’t really thought about it still assume a lot of this. It comes out when you say things about the good old days, which were the narrowly controlled times of FDR. When abuses were tolerated that would now have us up in arms, including intrusions at all levels of life and production, and good ol’ weapon licensing and control.
Because the left controlled the news media, too, they managed two things the right couldn’t do: When a program failed, they papered it over and invented a way that it had been meant all along, and served their purpose. This created, in the right’s minds, the idea of a never ending series of victories for the left.
Or as a friend said recently “They don’t mind waiting 100 years. It’s all a plan.” That’s arrant bullshit. The left is actually running on borrowed time, and the current generation doesn’t want to make any sacrifices, much less 100 years of sacrifice. They want their rewards, noooooowwwww. BUT in my friend’s defense, that’s the left’s propaganda and has been all our lives — we’re about of an age — and it’s impossible not to believe propaganda that has gone on that long and that pervasively your entire life. Particularly when you’re depressed, it’s very hard to see through the nonsense and see the counter evidence.
The other trick they have managed is to make the right disown their victories. Until recently — and it’s important to realize this has broken — they could attack someone on the right and get them disowned and turned into pariahs. They’re still managing this with the more timid commentariat and more hidebound right-pundits about Trump, but they have reason to suspect this is not reaching the masses, and it’s part of what’s driving them nuts.
The truth is that without the shell of unified propaganda, the Marxists are a paper tiger.
With all the help from the west, and making big scary noises to keep the help come, all the USSR ever managed was to lose population/wealth/ability to do things SLOWLY. As opposed to the “very fast” that would have happened otherwise.
Even in a country as controllable as Russia (for various reasons, including because of climate, highly concentrated population) the resistance was getting larger and larger, till 70 years later they were governing in name only. But they could still project — abroad — the idea they were totally in control. Which is why you don’t realize any of this.
As for China — China is China and therefore complex — but there’s reason to believe that most of the control has always been ‘for foreigner to see’ and to be honest the same with most prosperity. Aside a few potemkin cities, the average Chinese lives like a medieval peasant in Europe, but without the charm.
The other little communist “paradises” are mostly just kleptocracies in the style of the region, with added oppression and horror that come from benefiting from the still existing Marxist media in the west.
Things have not been going well for the Marxocrats since the Soviet Union collapsed. Which it did because Reagan refused to kowtow to it or treat it as a world power. It was always a paper tiger and couldn’t stand it when someone blew on it.
The Soviet Union was not only their hope, and what they hoped was the promise of a communist future, but it was also their source of financing, since a lot of what they got by pillaging and raping Africa and South America went to fund Marxists in the west.
They reorganized, sort of, after the fall, by throwing themselves into the watermelon green movements, racial movements, feminism, etc etc etc.
Under this guise they managed to do a lot of harm to the culture, including the introduction of “political correctness” which they hoped would create not only the inability to say forbidden things but even to think forbidden thoughts.
It didn’t work. Sure, it corrupted the language and it has destroyed the arts, but unfortunately — for them — the geeks undermined it all. Mind you, it would have happened without the internet, but it might have taken another two or three generations. You see, political correctness and all the noveau-Marxist thinking is even more disconnected from reality than the old Marxism. So sooner or later the counterculture (real one. Us) would have won by telling the truth. Because the truth works. However, the internet made it possible for people to communicate without the left gatekeepers. This made a lot of us both aware we were not alone, and started the true resistance to the leftist constructed reality.
“Racist” stopped working as an insult, since we’re aware the left are the true racists; cancelling is an ineffective tool when everyone knows it’s happening. It worked great for fifty years when it was in secret; imposing controls on speech doesn’t work when people can speak around the controls; carefully constructed narrative breaks apart when you try to tell it where counterexamples are in the public eye.
The last twenty years have been a roll of failed attempts to gaslight us. Occupy Wall Street was supposed to take the economic misery people were experiencing under Obama and blame the free market for it. It was supposed to turn into a vast movement of the dispossessed which gave Obama the power to act as a socialist dictator and take everything. Instead, it collected the mentally ill and some college students.
Summer of recovery one, two, etc. was supposed to convince us things were better under Obama.
H*ll and damnation, people, Obama was supposed to be the new FDR, taking us all the way into socialism.
In reality they can’t even pretend that he’s beloved or saved the country from anything. Heck, even racial minorities ain’t too fond of him. And what’s more they know it, because they know how much they had to fraud in 12.
BLM was supposed to spark a revolt of everyone against white people. Instead, it was the paid for psychos and a few crazy people and white college women. And not enough to terrorize the suburbs. In fact, the only place they really could terrorize was the cities they already controlled.
Oh, yeah, they also got to scare corporations and churches, which are already administered by their own. But that isn’t going so well when the lumpen proletariat realized it could boycott back. And also when the little leftist psychos wouldn’t say bought. (Quite possibly the most bizarre thing I’ve ever seen/heard was our last visit to our church in CO, which had just re-opened, and which got a fiery Marxist deacon to preach on the virtues of BLM and “anti-racism” while the church and its property was being vandalized nightly. It wasn’t just me sitting in the pew looking at the man like he was nuts. Because he was.)
2016. Trump winning gutted them. You see, the fraud was in place, but those d*mn people went and voted in numbers that made it irrelevant.
And then after four years of demonization and an unprecedented “Let’s put everyone under house arrest” initiative to control those dang peasants, they voted for Trump in such numbers that the fraud had to be ramped up at the last minute and now everyone knows.
And the epic shenanigans of 2022 have pissed people off at the local level various places.
What’s worse, the mood in the country keeps getting uglier, and despite some older people and more timid commentators still buying the “He’s evil bad, disown him” the majority of us are going “yeah, no.”
Kyle Rittenhouse was supposed to be condemned and abandoned by the right, then made a public spectacle, to show you couldn’t resist. That didn’t go well.
Yes, the January 6 prisoners are a horrible thing, and for them what happened is a disaster. But it too failed to work. It was supposed to be a Reichstag fire, which would cause the entire country to turn on anyone to the right of Lenin. Yes, the old and brainwashed have bought the leftist narrative. But most people haven’t. In fact, the “hearings” were a massive flop, and convinced more and more people that it was nothing and the left was just making it up. (Because it was.) And more signally it failed to “get Trump” which was its principal purpose.
So even though we lost people — well, not us, but the lovers of freedom in general. Our people were too wary to walk into that trap of a demonstration with no set purpose that made any sense — this also wasn’t a win for the left. Not saying that it’s not horrible what happened to them, but instead of turning the nation against the left, it mostly injured the FBI’s and the government’s credibility. The same with all the various “get Trump” schemes.
In fact, the fact that despite everything they’ve done, Trump remains the republican front runner, is terrifying the left. Their sphincters are so tight they couldn’t pass a bean.
Viral explosions of “Let’s go Brandon” didn’t help either. It’s not just the opposition to Biden, it’s the implied knowledge that the media lies.
Oh, they’ll continue trying. They have nothing better. Right now they’re sucking their thumbs and telling themselves it’s just Trump. He’s a sort of Svengali that has galvanized the right, and if they get rid of orange man bad their plan will go forward. It’s not true, of course. Trump is not our leader, so much as our ramrod. He’s not the movement, just a visible part of it. But they can’t admit that yet, because if they do it’s abandon ships. There is nothing else they can do to save themselves. Which is of course the reality.
They’ll also try to get rid of or replace Biden, which is going to be hilarious — stock on popcorn — as it will set their various factions into a fight, various groups of kleptocrats in a naked-claw fight for survival. Because if you think they can expose the Bidens misdeeds and not have everyone else — under the cover of the media domination all of them have gotten that dirty, the last 100 years or so — suspect they’re next, you’re way more naive than you should be. Yes, they’re going to try to get rid of Biden, but it will get everyone fighting everyone else, including such paragons as the Obamas and the Clintons. The resulting effluvium of misdeeds revealed will make Hercules’ cleaning the Augean stables seem like a light dusting of a clean room.
In the end the left only has a plan, the same one they’ve always had: Take control of communications and the army. Disarm the populace. Engineer a famine. Take complete control. It has the added Gramscian flip in our case (And the late 20th century case, in general) of “Open the borders to 3rd world peasants and replace the population with one that’s easier to terrorize.”
It’s not going well for them here. Despite all the propaganda, people refuse to give up their guns or embrace their new unwashed overlords. In fact, despite all the entertainment trying to make it sound like the incoming illegals are some kind of holy people, normal Americans aren’t buying it. And remain strongly against it. (I don’t have any proof — how would I get it? — but I suspect many of the illegals coming in — a lot of whom are rounded up and chased onto the caravans by various means, or recruited with promises of welfare — are turning around and going back home. The only reason I suspect this is the fact that unlike in 2007-8 Spanish publications aren’t becoming any more prevalent at checkout and 90% of the people I run into who are immigrants were born and raised here. The exceptions are people from Cuba and Venezuela, and I wouldn’t bet on those obeying the regime once they’re here.)
In fact it’s not going well for them IN EUROPE. Despite fraud, crooked voting systems (first past the post is very manipulatable) etc, scary “Right wing” parties keep winning, and emerging, and winning. And largely unreported or giving a “glorious communist revolution” when reported, a lot of Europe is in open revolt and fighting against the socialist overlords. Europe! Where by and large their media is still controlled and they still believe the “coming climate catastrophe” not to mention falling for the covidiocy hook line and sinker.
Here? Don’t make me laugh. Sure, they have the newly indoctrinated,i.e. young “educated” people. And they have the old, who watch TV a lot.
The rest? Ah. The rest are just getting more and more angry about all this nonsense.
Meanwhile the left continues trying to drive their plan of disarmament and famine.
It’s not going well for them. It’s not going to go well for them.
If they weren’t the people who bought the message that the future is inevitably communist; if they weren’t true believers, they could save themselves and save us a lot of strife by giving up now.
Instead, they’re going to use everything they control to punish us and make us bow to them and fall in with their plan.
It’s not going to go well.
In fact, if it were happening elsewhere, to people far away, it would be a great comedy.
As is, their fall and the replacement of the “FDR model” which swallowed our republic is going to hurt very badly and is going to cost us wealth and more importantly people.
But in the end, we win.
The harder they fight, the faster they fall.
Take no counsel of your fears. Make things tight and fast for you and those who depend on you. Multiple sources of income. Ways to survive days or weeks without the modern conveniences. Some rudimentary medical supplies. Ways to defend yourself. Take care of your health now, and get yourself in the best shape you can.
And then …. keep your head up. Don’t be afraid. It is our fate to live in interesting times. It is our very great privilege to fight for freedom on behalf of future generations as well as our own.
They can’t win, and we must. It is the cause of humanity.
Hearts on high.
According To Hoyt 
Sarah and Michael Malice really need to meet.
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That would be…. interesting.
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Tiny little bit. They’d either become instant besties, or there would be a thermonuclear detonation.
Or possibly both.
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First besties, then detonation?
The friendship that detonates together detonates best.
We probably have mutual friends.
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Detonation because reality can’t cope with you two being besties, perhaps. And I should think you do.
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I mean the moment Virginia Postrel and I found out we have a mutual friend….
My reaction was to tell him “You know Postrel? May I touch the hem of your cloak?”
Him: Funny, that’s what she said about my knowing you.
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Postrel, the last good editor of Reason, unfortunately.
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aye.
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Reason has jumped the shark
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Back in the early to mid oughts, yeah.
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“Part of it is set-in perception. If you’re the sort of kid who got beat all through elementary and middle school, even if you get a late growth spurt and become the sort of guy no one messes with, at the back of your mind, you’ll always expect to be beaten up and cringe when a guy with a sadistic smirk heads for you.”
SARAH! How the heck were you spying on me from Portugal when we were both growing up?
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Or the kid who was always chosen last for teams, ignored and sometimes worse because your peers thought you were “stuck up,” when what you really were was socially inept and brighter than average. And had authoritarian parents (who were also socially inept and brighter than average, G*d rest their souls) on top of it.
I’m the family pessimist. My beloved, the family optimist, has been one of Himself’s greatest gifts in my life.
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Indeed, although part of what helped was going to a private experimental high school where effectively everyone was an odd of some sort didn’t hurt. And I was never the big 6 ft tall guy, merely 5’7″ or so but built like one of Tolkiens Dwarves (and with a similar temperament due to Irish and Swede ancestry). Likely, Our Hostess is just very good at extrapolating not in any way clairvoyant (or at least not to that degree)
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That one did hit home.
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So I’m not so sure it is that the modern left is unwilling to admit Trump is not the source as it is they are unable to comprehend the idea of a bottom up movement. In their realm those cannot exist. It’s basically an out of frame event.
I hope marxism goes on the dust heap. I suspect something will replace it eventually; envy is a fundamental human motivation, so we can’t get rid of it from everyone without stopping being human. I think that’s the enduring appeal of something like the Marxist system: what happens is never your fault and you can indulge in as much envy as you want. Pure poison to functioning societies, but it has a strong appeal to some people.
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They’ll really can’t. You could see it when Pelosi just assumed the Tea Party was an astroturfed movement. Because that’s how her Party does it…which tells you everything you need to know about BLM/Antifa/Occupy Democrats.
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Plus, of course, it might raise the question of honest disagreement.
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IMO the Modern Left has/had the delusion that the People Naturally Would Support Them.
Thus when plenty of the People don’t support them, it’s the Fault of Some Great Evil convincing the People that the Left is Bad.
Trump is just the most recent “Great Evil” that draws the People away from the Glorious Left in their silly minds along with the Monstruous Christian Nationalists (just the renamed Religious Right) and the Terrible White Supremists (just the renamed Racists).
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White supremacy is the only racism they will acknowledge, the same way that “fascism” (or at least the cartoon version they have in their overheated heads) is now the only form of totalitarianism that ever has or will exist through all of space and time.
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Also, fascism has been declared to be the ideology of those who want a small government that stays out of people’s lives and does not centrally direct activity, i.e., the exact opposite of what fascism really is.
It is the same way that those who follow MLK’s dream of people being judged by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin are now deemed to be racists and white supremacists, even if the person so accused is not even close to being white (see the recent demonization and persecution of Asians who support the recent US Supreme Court ruling barring racial preferences in college admissions)
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Hell, see the demonization and persecution of black politicians who don’t have the ‘correct’ left-wing beliefs. Larry Elder, Candice Owens, Justice Clarence Thomas…
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Biden*: “If you’re Black and don’t vote for Democrats, you’re not Really Black”. :twisted:
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Imagine the REEEEEE-ing if a Republican had said something like that. But a rich old white Democrat can say it and nothing happens.
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Or as in the case of the lady in Georgia who just swapped parties, just hold one position not in line with the partyline. She is for School Choice. Out you go.
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The Left eats its own.
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The left is like Ouroboros, a snake wrapped upon itself. However, instead of biting its tail it has its head shoved up its cloaca. It’s pushing its head further and further and I suspect at some point it will push so far that POP it will just disappear. Well one can hope.
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I can only barely comprehend how people can go about hating DJT and MAGA and not smell the gangrenous stench of corruption from High Up. Do they think it’s perfume?
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Oh it is easy to comprehend if you realize that the Left has become (and likely always was) a cultic/religious system. All religions base themselves on 4 points Revelation (essentially the dogma or scripture of the faith), Tradition, Reason, and personal experience. Various religions/sub cultures focus on different parts of those 4 points. The Brahmandarin cult holds Personal experience to be the highest level blended to some degree with their dogma. Next is their tradition that comes out of the 60’s youth culture. They Do not hold reason to be a valid tool. In fact one of their dogma is that the “MAN/patriarchy/european culture” provided reason and it is one of the sources of their original sin and always suspect. Also one of their dogma/traditions is that their people are always correct even when data would say otherwise (think Doublethink from 1984). The Brahmandarins themselves manage the doublethink like O’Brien, their proletariot really don’t even see the other information only the filtered nonsense the Minitrue of the MSM provides. Trying to tackle it from our sides view that leans far moire heavily on Reason and a different set of postulates is only going to give you a headache …
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Hence the comments from the left after they lose an election along the lines of, “We just needed to get our message out more effectively.” No, numbskull, we heard your message. With (as noted by our hostess and others) the left’s predominance in the media and current culture, we can’t not hear it however much we might wish to. We just reject it.
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I think the answer is “Yes.” They both refuse to and can’t because it’s antithetical to how thye operate.
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They honestly do believe that it’s all about Trump. I’ve had this conversation a number of times with various people over the last year or two. The idea that Trump might be a spear head rather than a Great Leader is totally foreign. This is partially because “they” all want to be the Great Leader who can do no wrong, with throngs of bowing peasants adoring them.
They’re perfectly willing to turn us into North Korea, as long as they get to be at the top.
They can’t comprehend people who think otherwise. It’s just not part of their worldview.
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It is not that they do not comprehend the existence of those that believe otherwise. Rather that we are heretics/anathema to be eliminated. We can ONLY believe this because something is wrong with us. No “Right Thinking” person could believe that so we are clearly not “right thinking” and are outside the pale.
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The trick is to harness that envy, the way Adam Smith and others pointed out. Make self-benefit a way to generate society-benefit. Which requires internal control and hard work, both something the Left abhors.
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That said, the supply chain makes me very nervous. I really don’t know how many single point failures or choke points we have, or if our system is flexible enough to continue working through the breakdowns that are coming.
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Every month that passes the supply chain is getting better at plugging the gaps and / or has eliminated the previous vulnerabilities. And we have had a lot of months since early 2020.
That isn’t to say there won’t be more problems, but we are effectively adapted to uncertainty now.
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It’s getting better despite the best efforts of Mayor Pete.
:P
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The Free Market interprets supply chain gaps as bugs and routes around them.
I thought I heard something like that somewhere…
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I remember something about the Internet treating censorship as damage to route around or similar. Something from the early 90s, I think. Or when I ran across it, at least.
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Guess where I stole it from? }:o)
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The free market interprets those as opportunities and makes money out of them.
This happens more in highly regulated central command and control socialism, because when you start slapping Humans around they become malicious bastards who live for sticking it to the Man. >:D
That’s why in Socialism the free market is called the Black Market.
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Maybe so. However here in Alaska many items are often unavailable on the grocery shelves that were always plentiful in 2019.
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There are still gaps on the shelves even here in LA County. They’re not nearly as bad as they were, though. And stuff that’s missing usually (there’s a couple of items that I used to buy that disappeared and still haven’t come back) is there on a subsequent visit. The impression that I’m getting is that for the most part, the goods are arriving, but the supermarket isn’t getting as many of them as it used to.
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Always remember, anywhere in CA it may not be the supply chain, but how long since the last group of five finger discounters came through.
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If that were the issue, I’d see evidence of it. The stores I frequent might have minor issues with shoplifting, but there’s no sign of the mass stuff that’s going on in some places.
Besides, shoplifters have better things to do than repeatedly steal all of a certain label of bread.
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California basically screwed themselves over with their anti-trucking green think.
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Oddities, 5 or 6 times in a row now, trips to the grocery, no bologna on the shelves
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Pet food. Everywhere.
There does seem to be other shortages off and on still. Where we really saw it was on our trip. Which makes sense. The smaller rural national park gateway communities have the problem given where they are. Add on inability to get anything in quantity, it becomes obvious on the shelves. Couldn’t get any national brand of lunch meat, cheese, or bread. Had to get the deli packaged variety at every national park location. It is like the suppliers can’t get it in their heads that these communities of 8k – 10k residents swell to 100k, or more, during the summer. Still a small cities compared to a lot of locations.
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Jelly beans is the weird one for us.
There’s usually some variety of Jelly Belly, the Starburst weird things, and the sugar free kind are there, but Gimbal’s? Welche’s? The Brach’s tiny 24 flavor beans?
:POOF!:
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Saltwater Taffy, the good kind. Winco has bulk Saltwater Taffy, but hubby says it doesn’t have any flavor.
Luckily hubby likes the Starburst or Skittle Jelly Beans, but these have been out too. He does not like the President All Variety ones, and these are never out.
I can’t eat either. Huge trigger for the RH.
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A LOT of off brand (and even brand label) pet food was manufactured in whole or in part in China. If China intentionally released Wu Flu (rather than just being their usual incompetent selves) then they clearly shot themselves in the foot (or more likely further up the legs) because they totally screwed up the flow of materials. They depend on it for hard cash to pay debts and buy food, we depend on it for all sorts of low margin materials where the added cost of labor greatly inflates the price of the low margin items. Unfortunately for China we are slowly untying ourselves from that which makes them vulnerable as they’ve been spending money like the proverbial sailor on leave, loaning to 3rd world kleptrocracies who will screw them as willingly as they screw the first world.
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Pet food out of China was already on a cliff dive before the pandemic. Poisoning pets did that. Whether accidental contaminates from lack of control, or deliberate as screamed, I am not the only one who reads labels closely (even the pet food gotten for the feral colony clowder). Packaging in US or Canada screams not made in US or Canada. Product has to be explicitly stated to have been made in one of US states or Canadian provenances where there is contamination prevention controls and inspections in place. The alternative to that is use a local butcher that does raw mixes, and get appropriate additives if needed.
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Right. “Packaged in [location] for [Xcorp]” means the contents sure as hell weren’t made here.
Last Christmas, searching for cheap stocking stuffers, I came across a lot of foodstuff in the Walmart holiday aisle labeled that way. Since the origin of human food has to be labeled, I looked at the fine print…barbecue sauce, hot sauce, all sorts of stuff, made in China and bottled in Mexico or someplace in South America. Yikes. Red Flag City. I bought cheap foreign-made stuff anyway, but at least it was made and packaged in the western hemisphere. (Assuming accurate labeling, anyway.)
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Yes. I don’t even go any further. If I have to hunt for where it is made, I won’t like where it is made. I am doing this for Pet Food. Do the idiots not think I am going to do this for people food too? Oh. Right. Idiots.
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KITTEN food is really hard to find.
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Yes. Kitten food is hard to find. Noticed that too. We don’t need it currently.
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One that has had me wondering is not a missing item, per se, but a missing ingredient in an existing item. Shortly after COVID came along, Kroger’s Private Selection 12 Grain Bread disappeared, and what came back is now 11 Grain Bread, and I have no way of telling which grain is no longer there.
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A quest! A quest!
:jumps at the internet:
K, found 12 grain’s page:
Enriched flour (wheat flour, malted barley flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamine mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), water, sugar, sunflower seeds, cracked wheat, corn, yeast, vital wheat gluten. Contains 2% or less of: sesame seeds, barley, rye, triticale, brown rice, oats, millet, flaxmeal, buckwheat, soybean oil, salt, molasses, raisin juice concentrate, sodium stearoyl lactylate, calcium sulfate, ascorbic acid, ammonium sulfate, calcium propionate (preservative), vinegar. CONTAINS: WHEAT, SESAME.
Wheat, barley, sunflower, corn, sesame seeds, rye, triticale (wheat/rye hybrid), brown rice, oats, millet, flax, buckwheat.
And found 11 grain wide pan, which I think is the same niche.
Enriched flour (wheat flour, malted barley flour, niacin, reduced iron, thiamine mononitrate, riboflavin, folic acid), water, sugar, sunflower seeds, cracked wheat, corn, yeast, vital wheat gluten. Contains 2% or less of: barley, rye, triticale, brown rice, oats, millet, flaxmeal, buckwheat, soybean oil, salt, molasses, raisin juice concentrate, sodium stearoyl lactylate, ascorbic acid, ammonium sulfate, calcium propionate (preservative), vinegar. CONTAINS: WHEAT.
Wheat, barley, sunflower, corn, rye, triticale (wheat/rye hybrid), brown rice, oats, millet, flax, buckwheat.
No sesame seeds… wasn’t there just something about something related to sesame allergies, recently? A law that backfired?
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Per Google, Congress passed a law in 2021 that added sesame to the list of major food allergens effective Jan 1, 2023.
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SIGH
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I have been wondering why it has been so hard to get sesame candies like when I was a kid.
The ones I get now are ‘A product of Poland’ and while they are ok, they aren’t the ones I remember from the 50s
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Huh. Had no idea there might be a page specifically for the product itself. Thanks.
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I was actually expecting to find an advertisement or something, honestly.
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It didn’t break completely with everyone under house arrest. And changes have been made already. Be not afraid.
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Good to know.
We probably should go track down that range fed egg producer. Apparently you can get the eggs in bulk prewash too and store them European style. Catch is, the one we located was a rather long drive. Should start digging around to see if we can find someone a shorter drive away.
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In our old neighborhood in CO everyone is now keeping chickens, HOA be damned.
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My concern is less with a “breaking” but rather so much of it is still outsourced to the CCP giving it far too much power over our economy, even not considering the number of politicians who either are, or act like, they are on the CCP payroll. Dependency on the CCP for key raw materials which the Democrats won’t let be mined here, along with key pharmaceutical components and other stuff, sill being depending on the CCP, is a fundamental threat to USAians.
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Much less than was, and more is being pulled out of China every day. That’s all I can tell you. Its impossible to know for sure, because no one will tell us.
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The WSJ, which the Reader counts on to be a lagging indicator, has published 3 stories in the last 2 days about cracks in China’s economic facade. Free links since the Reader subscribes (the power of routine – the Reader has been reading the WSJ since high school). First link. https://www.wsj.com/articles/for-many-in-china-it-feels-like-a-recession-25ce4b68?st=cvndxm25baeadky&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
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Second link – https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinas-drop-in-exports-signals-deepening-slowdown-in-global-trade-df03bb29?st=984h4yfwkdeo3h3&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
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Third link – https://www.wsj.com/articles/xi-china-economy-capital-investment-3439d31a?st=she7lctijpzvuxd&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
Note that all of these still have a ‘glass half full’ tone.
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They’re firm believers in the, “China is a great economic powerhouse and could be even greater if they’d only rebalance their economy on providing consumer goods for their rising middle class,” theory.
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One thing I’ve noticed is a lot of products that used to come from China are now coming from other, usually Asian, countries, though South (and Southern Central) America seems to be in the mix.
I don’t know how much is coming back to the USA, though I’ve read that TSMC has built a fabrication plant in Phoenix that’s supposed to be online next year. Not exactly pulling out of “China”, but a hopeful sign nonetheless.
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I had to double check, but my New Balance shoes are manufactured in Indonesia.
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Yes. I have a pair of Red Wing steel toed shoes bought some years ago, and they were made in China. A couple of years ago, I bought the similar shoe without the steel toe, and they came from Vietnam. Slightly different fit, but that’s all too common when the source changes.
FWIW, at least some of the really good Red Wing work boots come from the US.
If it existed, I’d buy my footwear from Sasquatch Supply. One of my more unpleasant afterafflicts of knee surgery was having my foot stuck in a size 15 structure firefighter’s boot. Had to cut the damned thing off. My normal footwear is merely a 14EE, but the 15 used to be easy on-easy off. No longer true with thick socks some months after the festivities.
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Do you know of Hitchcock shoes( wideshoes.com) ? They specialize in wide mens (and womens although the wide womens shoes are servicable rather than stylish). They’re expensive but the quality is generally quite good and they carry EEE-EEEEEE widths up to size 15. Being a 10.5 to 11 EEEEE (hobbit feet my daughters say and yes they are hairy…) I’ve been shopping with them since I needed dress shoes in the early 80’s.
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New Balance also has shoes suitable for the office.
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Don’t think they are there anymore but in ’75 I paid for a custom pair of Whites, manufactured in Portland, Oregon (have no idea if they are still there). Could not get the recommended style because my feet are too small (used a blocky heel that had a wedge for digging into steep hillsides). I used those boots for years. My first season boots, Red Wings, barely lasted the first season. To be fair the boots weren’t field boots, but men’s hiking boots, size 2 (size 6 1/2W women). Summer ’75 couldn’t find women field boots off the shelf, at least locally.
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I wish someone would start it. My older son is 15 EEEE
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Definitely try Hitchcock (mentioned above) they go to that sizing.
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At the auto parts store where I work, I’ve been noticing a larger variety of countries sourcing our parts. Hard parts from Vietnam and the Philippines, batteries from Spain and Saudi Arabia (?), etc.. Still mostly from PRC, but inroads are being made.
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Interesting video here. I just started it, but about two and a half minutes in, it brings up a report posted that a very important foreign and domestic port in Shanghai has had a few days recently with zero ships docked. Sounds bad for China.
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Read somewhere that the biggest mistake China ever made was the one-child policy. As the current workforce ages out, there are few replacements. As a result their internal economy is in a down slope which will only accelerate. It’s difficult to become the worlds supplier when you’ve no one to do the manufacturing.
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They have advanced to accusing people of pedophobia.
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We were already puling out of China before Trump took office.
Trump accelerated that.
Then 2020 accelerated it more.
And since then China has been actively disconnecting from the rest of the world. Slow enough to be a constant pressure, but not so fast that it creates shocks.
We should be thankful to Xi for tuning his level of stupidity so well.
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Our supply chains are astoundingly flexible. This, however, reqires that smart folks utilize buffers.
Have buffers for your needs.
If you keep your gas tank full, a few days of no gas are less painful.
If you can get your doc to write an “Oh crap” script, that you can pay for, you now have up to 90 days of essentials. And sometimes they can give you samples to accomplish at least part of this.
Have some cash on hand and down power won’t prevent you from cash-paying folks for stuff. Note, have small bills for exact change and gifts.
Food.
Water.
Toiletries.
Etc.
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And then there’s overseas pharmacies- I got my ivermectin and HCQ from alldaychemist. Along with some other meds. They have a fairly wide selection.
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Meds were a deep issue 2020-2021. Many of the precursors used for manufacturing drugs came out of China and India and not much was moving . Albuterol (the emergency inhaler of choice) and many of the modern type 2 Diabetes treatments (wegovy, trulicity etc) got almost impossible to find. The Type 2 diabetes meds are STILL hard to get as they’ve become an off label treatment for weight loss but that is a separate issue.
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Blood Sugar testing strips. I am good now since I got the meter at Costco, who has two types of meters, and appropriate strips (all the stupid meters take proprietary strips). Fred Meyers and Walgreens still do not have any. They aren’t putting them behind the counter either because I’ve asked (did before I changed meters). Even Amazon often doesn’t have them in stock. Part of that was the pandemic. But it has morphed into diabetics using the continuous monitor CGN like Dexcom 6. They aren’t cheap.
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“But it has morphed into diabetics using the continuous monitor CGN like Dexcom 6.”
Part of that has to do with what doctors are prescribing (sensors are prescription items, and Amazon doesn’t carry them).
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I know.
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Yep. I’m forced to go mail order with them by my health plan and a three-month supply (six 14-day Freestyle Libre sensors) costs me $80. I shudder to think what they’d cost with no insurance. With insurance, though, it came out about the same as test strips and it’s a lot more convenient.
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One brand to look at is the OneTouch Verio system. I switched to it when the OT Ultra strips got really expensive, plus the Verio meter is easier to use. The ‘zon sells Verio strips (90 strips for $49 or so, a bit cheaper if you have Prime), and I’ve seen them at WalMart. Costco used to sell them, but stopped sometime after last July. (Meters have changed since I bought, but they still seem to be simple. Mine is bog simple, no Bluetooth and related apps…)
Shelf life for the strips seems to be about 8 months from purchase. 90 strips is a 6 month supply for me, so I’ll order a 90 pack when I start my last vial of 30.
I’ve heard (and just confirmed) rumors that if a doc prescribes them, the test strips (and meter) are covered under Medicare Part B. (And other insurance, looks like.) I have enough issues with my primary care doc that I’m not willing to go that way (prescription implies review, implies more dealing with the guy who tried to push me into the COVID-clotshot).
I looked into it, and OneTouch also has online sales of the strips. I don’t recall if it’s cheaper from them or Amazon.
And yeah, the lancets are OK, but you would have to take my Accu-chek lancets from my cold dead fingers. I’ve been using them since 1998 with occasional side trips to generic lancets.
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I’ve been using the Freestyle Libre continuous sensor for about 2 years now, it’s accurate enough to figure out trends and that’s all I’ve really needed plus I can scan it with my phone and show my doc my trends. Although now that I’m hooking up with Virta Health to go on a keto diet next week, I’ve started using their (provided free) meter and (provided free) strips. Their meter reads 30-45 points higher than my current sensor, every time.
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Must admit for the last 5 years I’ve been cheating. Pepper alerts when my BS is low, then I test and reward her. She beats the meter every time. She started the alerts naturally. Shaped them. Here we are. Not like I’m away from home a lot. Her biggest value is at night or when we are traveling and hiking when the normal routine is disrupted.
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I have Aceu-Check from Costco. $49/100 test strips. Another option the test strips are $98/100 (ouch). Since insurance isn’t paying for them, not on prescription.
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Well, apparently the EU is doing something to reduce demand.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/health/popular-diabetes-drugs-used-for-weight-loss-under-investigation-for-suicide-risk_5396436.html
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My doc tried like hell to get me on Wegovy, the drug that gets the most mention in that article. When we sent the prescription in, my insurer (Aetna) said hell no and it’s like $1400 for thirty days’ worth without insurance. So I never got on it. Apparently, that’s a good thing.
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“If you keep your gas tank full, a few days of no gas are less painful.”
Filling your tank when it hits half-empty is better for your fuel pump, too.
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I do think it will get a lot worse before getting better.
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um….. sure, but briefly.
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Elsewhere, some European as talking about some “Right Wing” European politician and made some comment about American MAGAs liking him.
Of course, the European never defined why the Right Wing European was “Bad” nor defined what’s so bad about American MAGAs. :lol:
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I recall both Nixon and Kissinger believed that Communism would eventually prevail, and their job was to make it a slower process…
They were, of course, wrong. Nixon’s election AND reelection while under the cloud of Watergate scared the left. Because despite his feelings that he was simply delaying the inevitable- Nixon was well known for being anti-Communist.
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The left for all their posturing are either liars who know the truth and are just giving lip service to the Commies. Or they are spoiled immature little Commie children. When faced with losing they will try to destroy as much as possible, in the end mostly destroying themselves. A lot of good people will get hurt in the process that is true. And make no mistake if it comes to violence, those in the press will be the first to feel its wrath, I pity them and will gladly spit on their graves. Who knows, when the infighting starts, they may just destroy themselves. That’s the one I am hoping for.
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So say we all.
May those who have grown the grapes of wrath, drink the bitter dregs of their labor.
But even if that best case scenario occurs, innocents will suffer.
We must be prepared to alleviate that, as best we can.
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“As is, their fall and the replacement of the “FDR model” which swallowed our republic is going to hurt very badly and is going to cost us wealth and more importantly people.”
This! The Reader fears that many pieces of our society (physical and cultural) are going to fail before we succeed at this. Knowing it can’t be stopped saddens his heart. We can only hope and pray that slaying the envy monster in this generation will keep it from being resurrected for many generations to come.
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OT, but highly amusing, two Native branches of the Abenaki Indian tribe, one in Vermont and one in Canada, are both claiming Ben and Jerry’s should compensate them for the, “stolen indigenous land,” B&J’s headquarters occupies in Burlington. One chief is named Stevens, the other O’Bomsawamin.
I find the situation delicious.
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LOL :lol:
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LOL
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The Vermont tribe reacted within a day or so of their silly tweet. Won’t really affect the two commie bastards. Unilever now owns the Biz and they are paid Reps though they might be able to crank a breach of contract hit to them.
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If Unilever gets annoyed by losses, that will be fine with me. A friend of ours works for Unilever and told us that instead of Unilever execs diluting B&J’s excesses, B&J’s people got promoted and spread the infection throughout Unilever. (She’s a northeastern liberal, but I don’t think she has much use for B&J’s posturing).
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I wobble back and forth on pessimism (my natural state) vs. optimism. During my bleaker moments, I look at everything that has happened, all the stupidity and gaslighting and thousand little cuts of oppression that we’ve been subject to, and I wonder, “what will it take? What will finally get people to get motivated and start stringing these bleepers up?” I mean, today I saw where Washington and Lee University is removing the plaque marking the grave of Robert E. Lee’s horse, Traveller. Y’know, Robert E. Lee, the guy who ran the university for the last four years of his life and the place is named after. They’re literally REMOVING THE GRAVESTONE OF A FREAKING HORSE BECAUSE ROBERT E. LEE BECAUSE EEK EEK EEK I’M OFFENDED SLAVERY EEK. That got me in a foul mood.
Well…there are victories. Half the states or so now have Constitutional carry (concealed with no permit required), most fairly recently. Here in NC our legislature, with a 3/5 Republican majority in both houses, has rammed at least five bills into law over our (D) governor’s veto just this year alone, including the removal of our old racist (and stupid) handgun purchase permit system. Most Democrats can’t draw anybody to a rally and Trump flooded Pickens, SC with tens of thousands of enthusiastic voters who’d crawl over broken glass to vote for him. The Bud Light backlash has literally run Dylan Mulvaney out of the country (bye, Felicia). Disney is crashing and burning (and hoo boy, I saw some stuff today about Snow White…that’s going to be a trainwreck that’ll make Little Mermaid look like a blockbuster).
I do think we win in the end. I suppose it’s a normal thing to hate waiting and just want to start seeing some progress in the whole “winning” concept. Because I think we all know they’re going to fraud so hard in 2024 that they’ll win and they don’t care how bloody obvious it is, because, what are you going to believe, our experts in DC or your lyin’ eyes? They’ll do it, and THAT may be what finally starts the ball rolling.
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–
Snow Black? :-P
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It’s not so much that Snow White is being played by a Hispanic actress, because she other than being several shades darker than Snow White, she has a good look for the role so I’m not ragging on her. It’s more that…it’s not the Seven Dwarves any more. It’s now One Dwarf and Six Magical Forest Creatures that look like they came out of the lowest-budget small-town Ren Faire you can imagine…
https://www.piratesandprincesses.net/disneys-new-snow-white-and-one-dwarf-with-six-diverse-magical-creatures-image-leaks/
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There were tweets the shots were fake, but apparently they aren’t. And yes, I thought Ren Faire, too.
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You know, you could actually do a Snow White variant where a girl runs away and joins a troupe that does Ren Faire. This does have the advantage of making those she takes refuge with all be the same. You can make them dwarves, robbers, forest knights, giants, dragons, or what you will, but they have it in common.
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That would be amazing, actually.
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Ren Faire rejects?
“Sample my FIST you community theatre reject!”
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Not Coal Black and Da Seben Dwarfs. Snow Latino, one dwarf, and six “magical” Portland hipsters
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Well, brown, anyway.
Because a character named specifically for the fairness of her skin should obviously be played by a Mexican.
I’m kind of scared to think what they’d do to her sister, Rose Red.
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A re-release of Coal Black and the Sebben Dwarves?
I doubt it, but at the rate they are going, it might as well be.
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Alright, now skimmed comments. Ox slow.
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It’s not like they had to get a European actress for the part. They could have gone Asian. China, Japan, and Korea are all about the whole “skin like snow, hair like night” aesthetic.
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The “Snow White” reboot/paint-job is a re-tread.
Look up “Coal Black and de Sebben Dwarfs” (an infamous WB flick from 1943)
Now, of course the new one won’t in any way be a racist embarassment…. Why I can hear Tweety Bird’s famous quote:
“Piwot to bom-badeer, bombs away.”
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Random white-pill-ish reactions:
As you say, complex. Or “yes, but no” or “no, but yes”. But the fact is, despite the scare-mongering on the right about how many boats the Chinese navy has, or whatever the scare du jour is, China’s facade rests on wet sand, and sooner or later things are going to come tumbling down.
The fact that the left resorted to the Charlie Manson playbook should be a shining example of how pathetic they’ve gotten.
As one Youtube channel or another has noted, even “far right” has been dropped, and the epithet of dismissal now is just “right”. Which they don’t seem to see how much of a confession that is.
Also to keep in mind, the protestors (the real ones who started it) were basically protesting that their credentials that were supposed to get them into the elite class, weren’t getting them there. It was, in fact, the young adult left protesting that the older left had lied to them.
Alas, no. Not even close to “everyone”. Andrew Klavan just today said that Trump lost because he’s a boor, not because of any kind of fraud. (Which just reaffirms my judgment that Klavan is to be ignored most of the time, because his smug self-assurance outweighs his ability to accurately analyze things outside of his limited expertise.) And he’s not the only one “on the right” who believes that.
Without an individual to focus around, however, things might fall apart and fade away, like the Tea Party movement did. I don’t see anyone who can reasonably take his place, though a few could step up and do at least part of the work, like Larry Elder or Vivek Ramaswamy.
That is, in fact, delicious.
Abel Ferrera’s King of New York is a brilliant gangster movie that seems to be mostly forgotten. It’s about a gangster who gets released from prison, and tries to retake control of his former empire which, despite having loyal and ruthless supporters, does not go well. Christopher Walken, who played the lead, once said in an interview that for his performance, he imagined a bird with a broken wing, who keeps trying to fly and doesn’t understand why it’s not working.
Which is as good a metaphor for the current left as anything.
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From more normal, not tuned into politics people, most didn’t really care whether there was fraud or not. They were just happy Trump was gone. And discovering that the new head is, frankly, a creep seems to have people reconsidering.
I suspect the only folks who really cared much about fraud were the conservatives. The Democrats always said that the ends justified the means.
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And the hilarious attempt to re-brand The Enemy as ‘ULTRA-MAGA’ and then having The Enemy (from Leftoids perspective) basically go, “Hey, great Superhero name!”
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The gales of laughter both confuse and enrage them, and it is glorious.
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Ultra Maga, Asseeeeeeemble!
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Ultra MAGA: Autobots, ROLL OUT!
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I’m generally optimistic because of my faith. When leaning black pill because of events I recall my paraphrase of Psalm 92:7: ‘when the wicked spring up like grass, God’s getting ready to mow’. :-)
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They have dug a pit and fell in it themselves….
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Dang it Sarah! I take 9 pills in the morning and 7 at night…
And about 6 are “white pills”…
However, I’m ready for the leftist autophagy to kick itself up to Frenzy and watch those unwilling to listen to reason blow up like the Martians listent to “Indian Love Call”…
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See, I’m stubborn. And sometimes, stubborn and depressed combine to make me mad. That’s when I get dangerously Odd.
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I like to talk about how pessimistic I am, but I’ve realized that I’m actually quite the optimist.
I took a fair few knocks as a boy being a late physical bloomer and being the only parochial school kid on a block full of publics. Then … well I’m 6’2 and spent most of my life at 225 and could do 1/2/3/4 plates (ask a weightlifter.). No one f-cks with me anymore. I’m a fat old boy now, alas at 60/260, but I still have the walk and the look. Considering that I’m actually soft as butter unless threatened, it’s amusing to me. Number two son is exactly the same though I was a bit bulkier, I was a rugby forward and he’s a back.
The thing about the black pill people is that they are exactly like the lefties. The very fact that they can openly post their views falsifies their statements that we are doomed. They could retort that they’re talking about the future, but … I’m an optimist and I still have faith I the decency and resolve of ordinary people.
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“They’ll also try to get rid of or replace Biden, which is going to be hilarious — stock on popcorn — as it will set their various factions into a fight,”
Not only that, I’ll be shocked if Biden goes along with it. Sure, he’s got handlers. But he’s at the “angry obstinate” stage of dementia. And he will not want to miss his second term. There might not be any real campaigning going on for him, but he’ll angrily insist that he’s running whenever the topic comes up. And then that raises the question of what to do with him at the convention…
And then, of course, there’s Harris, who also desperately wants to be president, can see it just within reach (since she’s VP), and is in complete denial about how utterly brainless and incompetent she is. Expect her to go berserk the moment it looks like she’s being pushed aside. And since she’s VP, she has a built-in audience.
Meanwhile, the DNC will be desperately trying to shut RFK Jr up, and do anything it can to block him (even moreso than they did with Gabbard).
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First they must take Kamala out, because nobody wants that cackling whore in charge. When that happens, won’t matter how angry Joe is, he’ll be removed. Might be via the 25th, might be by martyring him via a “lone right wing huwhite supremacist gun nut”.
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I doubt they’ll get rid of Kamala. Not because they don’t want to – I think they realized that they frakked up big time by giving her the Vice Presidency the first time she cackled on CNN – but because there are too many people vying to take her place, and none of them have enough money, friends, and/or influence (and are smart enough to realize that assassination would bring too much heat [looks at the Clintons]) to come out ahead.
I wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t make Angry Joe a martyr via UltraMAGA-White-Supremacist-Transphobic-Gun-Nut-With-An-AR-15 regardless, given how badly gun control’s been getting stomped flat by the courts since the Bruen Decision.
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Kamala was Joe’s insurance policy. She cannot win an election. She couldn’t even win one state in the dem primary. To get rid of Joe, they must first take out Kamala. Same as they had to remove Agnew to get at Nixon.
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Yup. But they could get rid of Agnew because they managed to find someone dull and inoffensive enough to get the overwhelming majority of Congress to confirm him. Dull and Inoffensive won’t fly this time around, and nobody who wants to replace her can secure enough votes to get the position, but none of the potential replacements will compromise and allow someone (anyone!) else to be nominated.
My personal theory (that I have no proof of, mind) is that they initially wanted Kamala to be POTUS, only she was so mind-bendingly unlikeable and unpopular that no amount of fraud would have gotten her into power (IIRC they kept monkeying with the debate and primary rules to keep her in while still keeping Tulsi Gabbard out, and even that couldn’t save her), so plan B was to keep Biden in office just long enough for Gabbard to have two terms plus the rest of Biden’s first, but she proved even more incoherent and incompetent than Biden, so now they’re stuck with her.
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Commie La Whorish, not Gabbard. (Typo) But yes as I said before, their blogs and magazines were acclaiming La whorish as the next president right after Trump’s win.
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WHOOP! You’re right: that should read “[…]so plan B was to keep Biden in office just long enough for KAMALA to have two terms plus […]”
There’s something deeply humorous about the Left deliberately sabotaging their ONE candidate who had a chance of winning honestly in favor of the most unlikable street walker to ever crawl out of a San Francisco gutter.
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well, Kamala tans. And the left are enormous racists.
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Before the Secret Service announced that they’ll never know whose baggie of coke was [near the WH|in the library|with the candlestick|in the cubby], there were a few media bits that claimed the coke was near where the VP’s limo was parked. I think that was a trial run to see if Kamala could be “the guilty party” and forced to resign.
I don’t know how much of Spiro Agnew’s legal problems were real, but there have been some tidbits that indicated Watergate had far too much connection with the CIA spooks, not only at the operational level, but also for the attempted coverup.
I’m still seeing columns by pundits (including some in Insty who should know better) who claim that “Trump lost because reasons, and It Wasn’t Fraud, You Peasant”. (I’m excluding Moran; not sure he knows better.) ConINC shares a lot of the same issues as the GOPe.
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Moran is like his name.
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I had to refrain from spelling his name with two ‘o’s.
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Me too. This is the guy who ROUTINELY introduced typos to my articles
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plan B was to keep Biden in office just long enough for Gabbard to have two terms plus the rest of Biden’s first
That was my initial theory, too.
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The biggest issue can be summed up as this-
What disaster will hit if Angry Joe gets sectioned before they get Kamela out of the VP’s office?
I’ve known a few people that were FOAFs of people around Kamela and she’s good at low gutter politics and figuring out how to screw people over to get what she wants (she started out as Willie Brown’s girlfriend, BTW), but she’s not very good at anything else.
The moment the E!Democratic Party gets someone in the VP slot that can do what they want, watch as Angry Joe gets sectioned. Not even DOCTOR!Jill will be able to prevent it. Depending on the timing and their internal polling, it’ll either be the 25th Amendment or getting him the Kennedy Martyr’s Crown.
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What, you mean apart from the Afghanistan withdrawal, the Ukraine war, and, well, everything going on right now? Because I’m pretty sure we’ve been witnessing it for a year or two.
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No, I meant that if Angry Joe gets kicked out of office/falls on a bullet and Kamela takes over.
Kamela is…not polished or willing to listen to people that might actually be able to moderate her. Hilarity would ensue if she took over, especially this close to the election.
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Yes, I got what you meant. My point is that they are doing Everything Possible to prevent her from taking over. Hence, Mumbly Joe is the bestest Prezdent Evah, until the Kamala situation can be attended to.
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Aieee!!! Oh, wait, that’s Hilarity. For a second there I thought you’d said Hilary.
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They could just remove the Turnip in Chief and let Kamala run in the primaries. She could get votes then, she won’t get votes in the primaries and even if she does get some the super delegate primary system would let the Demoncrats assign her to the waste bin. The one thing is theY don’t have a decent substitute. Newsome? He’s got a better chance than Kamala but only just. Whitmer? Would they run a Karen type? AOC or one of the nutter butters from her clique? They strove hard to avoid that with Bernie. And even their fraud machine couldn’t get one of them elected. They MAY just go with Biden HOPING he doesn’t do something Unrecoverable. Or fall over dead, the man seems to have moderately advanced dementia and often that is related to micro strokes, which usually end with a BIG stroke that will either leave him in a vegetative state (might be hard to tell) or needing to lie in state.
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Biden had two brain aneurysms before becoming VP.
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Man if that is so and the man has the immense temper as he is alleged to have were just a bit more taunting from said massive stroke/aneurysm. It is not right for me to root for that and yet part of me (the little guy in the devil suit) does. Unfortunately, that leaves us with Kamala who will be far less biddable by the controllers and far less competent than the current resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. We are so screwed… Author you are thought to have a fondness for this idiot country now would be a good time to show it.
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they got saddled with the cackling whore because of Joe’s stupid painting them into a corner. They saddled themselves with Joe because they figured there was no way they could fraud in the other old white guy who was the outright commie.
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Sorry, no, there are other black female Dems they could have chosen. Joe or someone with his interests in mind picked Kamala because she is so awful that nobody wants her in charge. Insurance policy, pure and simple.
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This!!! Joe was following what his boss Obumbles did choosing a VP so incompetent that know one in their right mind would want rid of the president. It was a hard search but Kamala hit the minority requirements and was ready and able to fill that spot. Probably one of her few talents…
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I think they wanted Whitless The Wonder Stasi, (they really wanted Gronholm, but lucky us, she’s a Canukistani import) and Joe pandering, said “Black Woman”, then ignored anything else, and went with the best/worst (depending on your outlook) the massively “popular” Kommie LaWhoreish, that yes was him selecting his perfect replacement (as you say, like Obama picked him, name recog for the ignorants oh yeah, he/she ran too, and no one wants them in power, so protection from removal) but he was also a long list of “Don’t want in power”, but they had to get behind someone to keep Bernie out, and Joe was the only one with close enough numbers
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I suspect that they’ve been low-key trying to get rid of Biden for quite a while now, but they haven’t been able to do it for several reasons.
Number One: Angry Joe won’t go quietly into the night. If half of what I’ve heard about his real personality and temperament is true, he’ll fight (probably literally) anyone who tries to push him aside. And if he doesn’t, dollars to donuts DOCTOR! Jill will.
Number Two: Biden, his handlers, and his lackeys and hangers-on know full well that the gravy train is going to jump the tracks the second he leaves office. Or if it doesn’t derail, at least slow to a crawl. POTUS is the peak of American politics, after that you’re done. Whatever influence Angry Joe has will be a pathetic shadow of the level of respect, influence, and gaft that he commands now. He and his gang want to keep the bribes and kickbacks flowing in for as long as they possibly can.
Number Three, and this is the big one: Kamala is next in line to replace him. My personal theory (with no proof to back it up, mind you) is that Plan A was for Commie LaWhorish to get the nomination for POTUS and when they couldn’t rig the debates and primaries enough to make the voters like her enough to win, Plan B became for Biden to serve out just barely more than two years of office, then he would either retire or be 25th Amendmented out and Commie LaWhorish would get ten years in the Oval Office. Only Commie LaWhorish proved to somehow manage to be even more blindingly incompetent and incoherent than Angry Joe. They would loose all credibility if she were to assume the presidency.
Which leads me to Number Four: much as they desperately want to remove Commie LaWhorish from the Vice Presidency, they have not been – and will never – be able to get rid of her because there is too much behind-the-scenes infighting over who will replace her. I’d put money on Pelosi (retirement be damned!), Hillary, Michelle and Barrack Obama (Twenty-Second Amendment be damned!), AOC, Adam Schiff, and who knows who else all vying for the VP slot, and neither of them have enough money, friends, and/or influence – and aren’t stupid enough to try something blatant like assassination – to come out on top.
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In support of your theory: they were wrting articles and posts about how Kamala would be the next president before 2018
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Harris could possibly destroy the Democratic party if they pushed her aside. I doubt it would be intentional (she’s not bright enough to engineer that sort of thing). But given her position and her minority privilege, if she starts to lash out at everyone else on the left, it’s impossible to predict exactly what she might end up wrecking (or, in fairness, failing to wreck; she is an incompetent idiot, after all).
No one’s going to fight over the VP spot at this point. The election is too close (less than a year and a half away). By the time the politicking and infighting was done, along with the Senate confirmation vote, the new VP would serve for all of a month or so (I might be engaging in some slight hyperbole there…). It’s not worth it.
Michelle might run for the top spot, but I’d have expected to hear something from that direction by now if that was the intent. Hillary will run if she senses an opening (to rub the right’s nose in her victory, if nothing else), though I’ve no idea how healthy she is these days. When she collapsed in 2016, I was somewhat skeptical whether she’d last this long.
Pelosi is physically frail these days, and her mental health has been slipping for a while now. While that didn’t stop Biden from getting elected, the Dems might be reluctant to go that route twice…
IIRC, Schiff has set his sights on Feinstein’s Senate seat, though I could be mistaken.
Newsome is the one that everyone keeps talking about. Speculation is that he’s the chosen one if Biden can be quietly shunted away. Of course, as I noted previously, Biden won’t go quietly. He likes to project an image of himself as a fighter (thus the stupid “Corn Pop” story, his comment about taking someone – Trump? – behind the wood shed, and bragging about his blatant threat to Ukraine to keep the money that had been promised their government if they didn’t fire the prosecutor investigating Hunter’s company). Plus his dementia has pushed him into “angry lash out” mode. The combination of the two means that anything or anyone that he perceives as a threat to his second term is going to be threatened publicly whenever he gets in front of a microphone.
Of course, Newsome has another problem. And that problem is the ticking time bomb known as California. Will it go off before or after the 2024 presidential election? No one knows right now.
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From what I’ve heard about Newsome is he is an exceptional flatterer. If he takes over from Biden it will because he convinced Biden that he will be Biden’s most mesmerized worshipper ever of all time.
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I noticed something yesterday. All the military bloggers and YouTubers are waving big red flags about the recall of newly ex military back to service. They related that this happened in the leadup to Iraq and they are worried that our guys will be sent to fight in Ukraine and they don’t want to be called up to go fight that corrupt war.
And if we do WWIII, they don’t have the forces and would need to draft, and that means that the lefts oh so precious Gen Z will be on the march to burn the Dem party to the ground. Because it’s one thing to spout platitudes about climate, and another to die in Europe so Biden and the left’s corrupt grifting can continue.
This is the beginning rumblings of Biden’s worst mistake ever (and that’s saying something).
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It’s definitely odd. It’s still too early to say for certain whether it’s a bad thing. But it’s definitely odd. I’ve seen speculation that it might be because they want some specialized types for OAR, and the current recruiting issues mean that they’re short-handed.
Though what sort of specialized types they’d need for an operation that’s not actually supposed to involve any combat on our part is something I can’t speculate on.
I’m currently giving this one two weeks for more information to circulate before I become alarmed over it.
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…whereas Leftroids panic first and gather information late, if ever.
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In re the specialty question, streiff at Red State has been told they are cybersecurity geeks.
https://redstate.com/streiff/2023/07/14/the-rhetoric-about-bidens-call-up-of-military-reservists-has-reached-a-new-level-of-stupid-and-misses-what-is-happening-n776330
“I hear from people who know that up to 40 percent of the people called up are involved in cybersecurity. The reason that they are being called up is because the military can’t retain cybersecurity professionals. It would be a strong bet that the current recruiting and retention crisis in the military has created significant shortages in critical sustainment specialties that can no longer be papered over.
At this stage, I can’t verify the statement, but in a few weeks, we will be able to see what skills are being called up.”
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Two things. One, if they are cybersecurity experts they can pretty much operate from anywhere, why would they need to deploy to Europe. Two, great now we’re gonna ramp up attacks on the military infrastructure of Russia, no risk of that escalating, nope, nosiree.
It’s highly likely that a nuclear attack on the us won’t be blowing up a city but rather a high altitude detonation to create a massive EMP attack.
The stupidest and most noxiously corrupt president in American history is playing with fire here.
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Two things. One, if they are cybersecurity experts they can pretty much operate from anywhere, why would they need to deploy to Europe. Two, great now we’re gonna ramp up attacks on the military infrastructure of Russia, no risk of that escalating, nope, nosiree.
It’s highly likely that a nuclear attack on the us won’t be blowing up a city but rather a high altitude detonation to create a massive EMP attack.
The stupidest and most noxiously corrupt president in American history is playing with fire here.
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“One, if they are cybersecurity experts they can pretty much operate from anywhere, why would they need to deploy to Europe.”
We don’t know that all 3000 are physically moving to Europe; they are simply tasked with a role focusing on Europe as opposed to Asia.
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:points up:
This.
“In support of” can even mean “fills a spot so someone else goes to Europe” or “work stateside on something that supports something that is related to whatever.”
Frequently, it’s a funding thing– you are “supporting” XYZ in any manner.
This isn’t actually as shady as it sounds, it’s “for want of a nail”– or the military version of “Well, yes, you guys shut down all inessential stuff. Oops, those things are required for the essential things.”
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The issue then is that they could actually say those things, but they don’t want to.
I think Biden really truly wants our troops fighting in Ukraine. His fortune is completely derived from his corruption in Ukraine (and China) and he is very willing to risk all our lives and the general peace of the world to keep his grift running.
I think he’s such a soulless monster (most pedos are that way) that he’d pile up mountains of bodies to protect himself and his corrupt family.
He’s pure fucking evil. There is no human I detest more.
We need to be careful, he’s willing to burn the world to keep himself in the money.
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“The issue then is that they could actually say those things, but they don’t want to.”
I think they did say them. In Militarese.
Their failure to translate it to Civilian (if there was one, and not just media spokesholes being media spokesholes) is an entirely separate problem.
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:points up:
Bingo.
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You’re ignoring a relevant point – We are pretty much constantly under cyber-attack by both the Russians and the Chinese. Assuming that we’re already doing the same things that they’ve been doing for the last decade (at least), it’s pretty much impossible to escalate things short of trying to use hacking to kill civilians.
I even vaguely recall a story about one of Ukraine’s power plants being hacked to interfere with operations in the middle of winter (i.e. when people need power for heating) back when the Russians had only “not-invaded” the separatist areas. The obvious suspect at the time was Russia.
This is not an escalation, and is not going to get us into a nuclear war. It’s more or less business as usual.
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During covid there was a pipeline hack.
Russian government claimed, sure, Russian actors, but unauthorized criminals.
Russian invasion of the Ukraine, plus a few other details, basically confirms it was Russian government in preparation for the Ukraine invasion or another European adventure.
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It’s quite likely that they at least authorized, if didn’t actually do, the retain for the requirements of the (service) route.
I got out in ’07 and had that as a possibility if they couldn’t get someone to fill my spot in the ship, and for the exact reason that they’re facing it now– the fleet I was in had such horrible morale that they had a much, much higher rate of folks not re-upping than was expected. (It was worse in specific commands.) I even knew people who got called back in after they’d been out for a while, because they needed qualified people who were already trained. (and one they tried to bully into coming back, until he pointed out his IRR time was up, and how much they’d have to pay to MAKE him come back. They found an alternative.)
About the only thing noteworthy is that they specifically listed the “hang out around Europe” operation.
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I can only barely comprehend how people can go about hating DJT and MAGA and not smell the gangrenous stench of corruption from High Up. Do they think it’s perfume?
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It’s a standard case of “Even worse!” reasoning. The people who hate DJT and MAGA smell the stench from High Up – and conclude that DJT and MAGA must – MUST! – be emitting chemical-weapon grade poison gases. Therefore DJT and MAGA are to be avoided at all costs, even the cost is embracing the gangrenous stench of corruption from High Up.
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I recommend said gentleman have a talk with say Monalisa Foster.
:scandalized:
Sarah! Suggesting suicide is a sin!
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Oh, she won’t kill him. Unless he dies of embarrassment.
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We’re less free than we should be and still more free than anyone else?
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yep. By miles.
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Occupy Wall Street was supposed to take the economic misery people were experiencing under Obama and blame the free market for it. It was supposed to turn into a vast movement of the dispossessed which gave Obama the power to act as a socialist dictator and take everything. Instead, it collected the mentally ill and some college students.
And became a punchline.
I’ve got some cheap stickers from Amazon that include an OCCUPY MARS sticker. ^.^
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1% of cats occupy 99% of laps. Occupy laps!
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Right now, Occupy Toilet Mat is a nightly occurrence. If it weren’t for white paws and my wariness, Athena T. Cat would have been stepped on more than once during the 2023 protest season.
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But for the fact I shuffle my feet before leaving the throne I would have stepped on my void cat hiccup many times.
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…the fact that Henry is the 1% is disturbing.
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c4c
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I haven’t posted here in a long time, so I thought I’d give an update. I quit my job with a defense contractor over a year ago and got hired by an employee-owned company in the Pacific Northwest far from any big cities, surrounded by wheat fields. My family and I joined a great church (the kind that “celebrates” “pride month” by encouraging everyone to fly Christian flags), and my kids are attending a private Christian school. I had to take a substantial pay cut, and we still haven’t been able to buy a house, but other than that life’s pretty good.
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Redmond is not far from big cities?
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Oh no, we’re a lot further inland.
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Noice! I know that company and place, and they’re pretty good ones to be in.
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If it makes you feel better, the market should collapse enough that families can afford to buy in the next couple years.
And there are a couple of very awkward lots for sale in town that could be built on.
Welcome to the area ^_^.
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Thanks. I hate to admit to it, but yeah I’m kind of hoping for a big dip in the market.
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So are younger son and his lovely fiance.
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A Romanian denouement will not happen in the USA. But “Unintended Consequences” are available and possible, if not inevitable
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This is only VERY tangentially related to Sarah’s post (SORRY!), but it occurs to me that I may have been remiss in telling a story that my fellow Huns might find amusing:
You see, just about 30 years ago, AMTRAK was experimenting with high-speed trainsets, an effort that would ultimately produce the Acela. They borrowed and imported two trainsets: a first-generation ICE from Germany and an X2000 from Sweden, and tested both of them along the Northeast Corridor (NEC) between Washington and New York City (it now extends all the way up to Boston, but IIRC the route wasn’t electrified north of New Haven, CT until the very late 1990s) .
At the time, I was a HUGE train buff (still am), and my grandmother was a travel agent, and we lived just outside Philadelphia, which is right smack in the (almost) middle of the NEC (at the time). And Mom-Mom (as I affectionally called her) was able to score tickets on an X2000 service between Baltimore and Philly for me, her and my mother. IIRC, this was late 1992, so I would have been 4 years old at the time.
Anyways, while riding the train I remember meeting an older gentleman (at least, my naïve toddler self took him to be a gentleman) who was also a train enthusiast, and we had a long, in-depth discussion (or at least as in-depth as a four year old can get) about bullet trains. Either my Mom or my Grandmother recognized the man and introduced me to him formally, but the name didn’t mean anything to me. We chatted for a while until a person travelling with him (I assume a secretary or assistant) told him that he had something else that he needed to do, so we said goodbye
Turns out it was then-Senator Joe Biden.
Unfortunately, Pedo Joe did not sniff my head or do anything else untoward towards me. How do I know this, and why do I say “unfortunately?” Because Mom-Mom was VERY protective of me, and VERY Italian. Which means that if Pedo Joe had tried anything funny, she would have thrown his ass off of that Swedish bullet train while it was still going 100+ MPH and spared this country a whole hell of a lot of trouble! Alas…
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We too had a 4 year old train enthusiast. We made sure to catch a train east of Fields, Alberta, as it hit the tunnel and looped over itself going east. Back then there was a wooden structure built that went all the way out to the tracks. Not only did one see the train making the run directly in front off/below the structure, but could see down the track to the entrance and then see up to the exit. The also had a docudrama model of both circles, the lower one visible from the platform, and the upper one on the other side of the highway, with the straight tunnel that goes over the highway after going through the lower tunnel. After seeing the docudrama, watching the train, our 4 year old proceeded to take over from the volunteer staff explaining how it all worked. Others, not just mom & dad, thought it was adorable (okay only the ones who agreed said anything, everyone else was smart enough to keep silent, and yes I have it on video). The site parking lot has been expanded a lot, and the docudrama exhibit is still there, but the platform is gone and they haven’t kept the trees from blocking the view.
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“It’s amazing how every time I post something telling people things are not quite as bad as they think, and defeat is not guaranteed, someone or other presumes to lecture me on how oh, no, it’s much much worse.”
Ah yes. The “Oh Noes!!!!” chorus.
I observe that the media, both Left and Right, is almost uniformly bad. Everything is a crisis, everything is coming to wreck and ruin, and They are coming for your children.
That’s a lot of work.
It must be hard to keep up this drumbeat of crisis and catastrophe week after month after year. Somebody somewhere really, REALLY wants the public in a panic and a lather, wants us worrying and fretting.
On that basis alone, I am very inclined to back up and take a look around, see what’s going on with my own lying eyes. Somebody is working that hard to make me run, I’m going to stand still and take a hard look around.
Looking out the window, I see that:
-there was fuel and parts for my Lawnmower Of Doom to cut the grass. (Tires, specifically.)
-it rained, so the Great Drought and Hottest Year EVARRRR!!!! turned out to be bullshit and that’s why I had to cut the grass. Just like every year, right?
-there’s food at the store.
-zero UFOs. (I’m a bit disappointed by that, if I’m honest. Aliens would be cool.)
-I note a distinct paucity of zombies, starving hordes, invading armies etc. I did see a rabbit, but that’s not a sign of the apocalypse.
In fact, I’ve got damn little to worry about other than personal finances and personal health concerns, whatever those might be for a nebulous Phantom.
Compare and contrast with “the News”. One of these things is not like the other.
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I’ve been seeing more rabbits recently as well. I am wondering when the coyotes are gonna start following them.
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We have those too. You just never see them, only hear them. Which is why I have a wire fence around my yard. Keeps the dog in, keeps the coyotes out.
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No foxes?
I have sighted rabbits much more frequently than foxes, sometimes several times a week for the former rather than years go by for the latter. But they’re there.
The time the fox decided that the shelter over the overhang from rain was worth the danger of my walking by was surreal, even though it did watch me as I left and as I returned. (It only gathered itself to run off as I left.)
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c4 c
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It’s a weird thing, but when I get down, I watch a SpaceX launch. Watching those rockets go up and then come back down to a perfect landing on a barge 500 miles out in the ocean always restores a little bit of my faith in humanity’s abilities. Not so much in humanity itself, but what we can do when we put our mind to peaceful pursuits.
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Yeah there is something beautiful about a rocket landing tail first as the Author and Heinlein intended that is just restorative. I look forward to the time when they land a Starship like that. Now for the lazy pukes at the FAA to get out of the way and let history proceed…
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For most of the second half of the 20th century the standard economics textbook has been Samuelson. Samuelson is somewhere on the spectrum between Marx and Keynes. This is what two generations of people were taught as economics. Hayek. Friedman. Schumpeter. Who dat?
Our Hostess is dead right about the degree to which the narrative was captured.
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Sure, people were “anti-communist” from the lips out, but if you go and look at the books you read, including school books, they all assumed that top-down, planned economy and welfare and all the rest was the way to go.
And today it’s the same with “Man-made Climate Change” and the phrase, “Gender assigned at birth” (as opposed to gender being OBSERVED at birth [or earlier]). Even people who should know better include those in their writing and speech, as an assumption that they are the way of things.
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That’s a Tic-Tac.
How could you possibly take only one? :-)
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