The Broken Dispenser

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

I don’t like behaviorism as an explanation for all human behaviors. I’ve always believed in humans being able — if not always willing — to think and reason and make decisions, instead of just acting on habit and impulse.

(As for who wrote “Every time a dog salivates, a Pavlovian rings a bell”- Robert A. Heinlein on the blackboard before psychology class, I know nothing. It was an impulse. Also, I’m fairly sure the statute of limitations has expired.)

But there’s no point at all saying that a lot of the stuff we do every day isn’t in great measure made easier by our trained in habits.

Like, for instance, do you think every time you walk? Do you carefully balance? Unless you’re a certain age and your knees have started going, or you’re a toddler, still establishing the habit, you probably don’t. And you don’t think how to write, you just write. (Well, I do. I mean form the letters. Shush you, in the peanut gallery.) So–

You can see how doing a lot of things by rote and habit is useful to us as individuals and as a species. It saves brain power and attention and applying yourself to every little thing.

Thing is, the busier you are, and the older you are, the more things you do by rote, even things that should — technically — be impossible.

I was told recently by an artist that, yeah, you can do it while half asleep, if you’ve trained for decades.

And you know…. Enid Blyton, when she started losing her mind to Alzheimers continued writing. Apparently one of the final novels was a slightely reworked version of another novel, but she was writing.

The thing is, the older you get the more and more things you do by rote and habit. You’ve done them so often.

And it tends to ossify your behaviors. It leaves you curiously unable to adapt when circumstances change. (This by the way is why it’s good to not have been massively successful — though I swear it wouldn’t spoil me) but always scraping at the edges to survive. It builds fewer habits of complacency. Though I won’t say it doesn’t build some non-productive habits, like an inability to relax.)

Cultures can get this too, of course. “But it always worked.” I suspect that’s the problem with the truly contra-productive behaviors like, oh, off the top of my head relative marriage or harems.

Anyway, looking at the spectacle of the democrats in congress holding up stupid little signs during Trump’s speech, or in fact all the incredibly stupid things they’ve been doing since last November I kept thinking of ingrained habits and older people, since most of them are geriatric. (And the young…. well, their younger generation seems either dumb or intellectually lazy.)

They keep doing things like those stunts with signs, or talking about how “the people” are angry or talking about how the right is for “millionaires and billionaires” and it’s like they forget all the times that didn’t work, in the last decade. They keep doing this stuff as though they didn’t have to cheat massively in 2020.

They keep crying on TV, going for the celebs, telling us we’re stupid and uneducated….

All their strategies, including the demonizing of Jan 6, say, would have worked perfectly 30 years ago. Heck, they almost succeeded in making Obama a “great president” as they did with FDR, in the press and school books.

But the information ecology has changed completely. And they can’t adapt. They keep falling on habit, because habit worked so well before.

It’s a bizarre spectacle, like watching people doing stupid things, convinced there is a curtain in front of them, hiding what they’re doing. And unable to realize what there is is an entire crowd watching them.

It’s like watching a mouse that was trained to touch a button and get a pellet, and who keeps doing it even though no treat is coming.

And all we can do is watch and learn, and try to stay mentally flexible.

In a time of high change.

221 thoughts on “The Broken Dispenser”

  2. I found the sullen mood of the Democrats amazing. Less amazing was their lock step behavior.

    Trump is right, at this point there is nothing he can do to win them over. My favorite line on that though was his stating that the tax cuts needed their support or they wouldn’t be there after the midterms. I wish / hope that is true.

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    1. Someone took the videos the Dems posted to X, all reading from the same script, and synced them up into one video where they’re reading more or less in unison. I haven’t watched it yet, but those who have say it’s kind of eerie — and it certainly makes the point that the Democrats are all playing from the same script. And they wonder why we mock them and call them NPCs…

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        1. dreiundzwanzig Idioten!

          Far more than that really, but that was the number of videos last I looked. When the first 3 or 4 did it perhaps they had some hope no one would notice. But when you’re say number 18 of 23 WTAF are you thinking. The mocking started at about the 4th one, your staff clearly know this is out there unless they are totally blinkered. And yet still they persist ( :-) ). It’s like the old “If All your friends jumped off the Brooklyn Bridge would you?” chestnut my mother would pull out (mocking is the anglo equivalent of hauling out the Chancla). It appears that at least half the democrat members of the senate would, now can we just get one of them to head for a bridge…

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          1. Every time I hear that one it reminds me of the XKCD strip:

            “If all your friends jumped off a bridge, would you jump too?”

            “Probably.”

            “WTF,O?”

            “If all my friends — most of whom are sensible people and some of them afraid of heights — jumped off a bridge, I’d assume they had a good reason. Like maybe the bridge was on fire.”

            Or this one:

            Ma Lemming: “If all your friends jumped off a cliff into the sea, would you… oh…um…nevermind.”

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              1. There was an “I’m with her” strip in the 2016 election season. Pretty sure it was the last time it was in my comics bookmarks. Not that many, now, Daybydaycartoon (decidedly NSFW), Far Side archives, Freefall, and Sluggy Freelance. I stopped reading the dead-tree comics when the news content of the local paper dropped to zip. Didn’t help that they tried shrinking Prince Valiant so small the text blobbed out. Way to go, guys.

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                1. Yeah, my web comic list has shrunk over the years as one by one they stopped updating.

                  Pretty much just Mega Tokyo (rare), Girl Genius, Slight Freelance and Order of the Stick left from my pile.

                  I think Girl Genius is the only one that’s kept a consistent schedule the entire time.

                  Though OotS that was because he was in a car wreck that tore up his thumb pretty bad, and there were questions of whether he would even be able to draw.

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                  1. I still compulsively read FreeFall three times a week, and it has been amazingly regular, despite the author dealing with many personal issues over the years.

                    I was pointed to it by Level Head and then realized Dr. Pournelle also followed it.

                    http://freefall.purrsia.com

                    Note: It has an interesting cross section of fans and while PG in general might not be appropriate for work.

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                    1. I saw Jerry mentioning the strip in his blog, and went back to #1 and read to the current level. Sluggy Freelance was via a cross-link with the User Friendly strip. Got bored with UF after I stopped doing computers professionally, but Sluggy is interesting. Hints mentioned that don’t come to fruition/resolution for 20 years (real time, not comic time) makes it interesting, and that’s in a good way.

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                  2. There are still some consistent ones out there. “Gunnerkrigg Court” never misses, and “Questionable Content” (which is lefty as hell but still consistently funny) rarely does.

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            2. Still read XKCD; Girl Genius and Freefall are regulars; Vexxarr is good, even if Hunter can’t (or refuses to) use a calendar.

              DaybyDay has evolved in both drawing style and content, and I read that. Current content is indeed regularly NSFW.

              Still following Order of the Stick.

              Miss Erfworldl; don’t really think the awful-awful that cut that off is any of my business. But I liked Parson’s twisty mind.

              The Whiteboard is usually fun; he had a paintball game day that ran for over two years realtime, and the current time travel arc has been running since July 31, 2023.

              And I still read Peanuts re-runs; I used to read Calvin and Hobbes re-runs but they got too familiar so I’m taking a long break. Even though I don’t agree with some of his expressed politics, I read Non Sequitur, followed by Mallard Fillmore.

              Pickles is gentle and rather like my family; I clipped some strips and framed the set, and gave it to my parents for their 50th anniversary (almost 30 years ago!). Read that daily.

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          2. I wonder if we got out news reels from the 1980s from different parts of the country and compared them if we would see the same thing?

            I mean, just using the script makes a certain amount of sense if it will only be shown to your own constituants and no one else. Not a lot of sense, but a certain amount. Especially if you aren’t in politics for what you can do for your constituants, but for what you can get from politics, it would be the easy way to make sure you don’t rock your gravey boat.

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              1. (after hoisting jaw off floor)

                Are you sure it wasn’t the other way around? Could the Portuguese Communists have been Bidening Carter’s speeches? I’m not doubting your word … um, not as such. It’s just tougher to imagine a White House speechwriting staff digging up Portuguese speeches to plagiarize than it is the Portuguese brazenly ripping off something likelier to get wide distribution.

                Neither possibility, of course, is flattering to either Carter or the Portuguese Communists.

                Republica restituendae, et, Hamas delenda est.

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                1. Well, time line…. I heard the speech in Portugal then two weeks later in the US.
                  I don’t think they plagiarized from the Portuguese — that would make no sense. I think they got the same speech from Soviet Agit prop, however rinsed in Carter’s case.
                  My host family refused to believe me.
                  I don’t think Carter would KNOWINGLY plagiarize Portuguese, and the commies in Portugal would think Carter was dangerously right wing.
                  So…. I don’t know. What I want to know is who the puppet masters were.

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                  1. Ok that is seriously weird. The odds that Carter or any of his people would be following (and plagerize) a Portuguese speech is effectively 0. No offense to your homeland but unless you lived near areas with large fishing populations like New Bedford, Gloucester in MA, New Britain/New Haven in CT, and some sections of RI Portugal was just a little country hanging off the end of the Iberian Penninsula that you knew existed but beyond that nothing in 1980’s America. It sounds like there is some ur text that both Carter’s people and those Portuguese politicians were pulling from and your source is about the only thing that makes sense.

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                    2. Indeed it makes no sense that Carter’s people would have plagerized from a Portuguese speech. That possibility is ludicrous beyond belief in the depths of the Cold War. Textually that any two folks would come up with the same speech in two different languages is on a similar order to monkeys typing a Shakespeare play. The only even vaguely plausible explanation is that they worked from the same original source. In the modern world it might be possible to find some part of the original or a further copy of the text. The State Dept and other departments had clear penetrations demonstrated by the Venona Decodes. Looks like some of that may have survived well into the late 70’s. Heck the number of admirers on the democrat side of the aisle is huge, E.G. Bernie Sanders with the USSR And Tim Walz with the CCP who are unashamed apologists.

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                  2. Alien slugs from outside the solar system, of course. Their base on Titan was just an advance outpost. :-P

                    If the Democrats were under the control of alien slugs, how would we know?

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                    1. I was going to say, before I read your last, “How would it be any different?” Go read Puppet Masters and tell me the answer, please. I’d like to believe it would be different.

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                    2. Oh and for G*ds sake DO NOT have a joint session of Congress under schedule Sunshine. NO ONE needs (or wants) to see that…

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      2. That doesn’t surprise me at all. My most excruciatingly awful radio shift ever was the ACA “debate.” It was painful because each and every speaker was reading the same script for or against, saying the exact same things in the same order, just so their “local” news could get a soundbite of THEM saying it.

        There were, I think, all of two unique speakers, both of which were refreshing for their novelty.

        And I had to LISTEN, because we still had to stick ads in and the opportunities were unpredictable. There was at least five hours of this and I hated it so much.

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  3. The Reader believes that last night provided grist for the next 4 years of Republican campaign ads.

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    1. What a great point, the optics were great from a republic side. I also want to see the ads contrasting all of the pink dresses vs their votes against supporting women’s only sports.

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        1. IIRC, it was on the most recent open thread on InstaPundit – someone changed all of their signs to “I am retarded.” Except for one, who held up a whiteboard with “I didn’t get my retarded sign.”

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        2. Every time I saw one of them holding up one of those paddle-signs, I kept thinking of the old Bill Engvall bit “Here’s Your Sign”.

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  5. It’s worked for them so far…

    The Dems are like my neighbor that votes for them. She is widowed with the maxium benefits that a luckier Boomer lifestyle gave her, easy union job with sweet pension, great windfall from spouse’s benefits and multiple property sales to fund her retirement. She has listened to MSM and voted blue her entire life. Why wouldn’t she continue to do so? It’s worked well for her.

    There are other groups of people that are the same. Many of the them are or were government employees or contractors. Or are DEI hires. Or more fortunate tech bros that think success in math and science means competence across all fields. Or Trust Fundies. Or the plain ignorant that will not elevate themselves beyond NPC status.

    There’s no questioning or retrospection of past and current events. None of these folks follow the money or see the web of relationships between the entities that keep them caged. They are the enthralled and the house negroes living off the work/taxes of the field hands. All they know is the plantation.

    But Sherman is coming and the field hands want their damn money back.

    Liked by 2 people

    2. I have quite a few friends on the blue side. And they believe the optics. Today I saw the quote about “if the US were a Christian country, it would support [xyz].” And it’s not worth arguing at this point. They’re not seeing the economic impossibility of supporting all of those things at a federal level. They’ve never made the connection that the monies used are the same ones that straiten their paychecks.

      At some point, I may pull out the $54.39 number. That’s the 2024 US budget (without debt service) payment per person per day. (Take the 6.75 trillion of the budget, divide by 340 million of estimated US population, divide by 365.) $380.73 per week.

      So how big is your paycheck? And how many babies or hospice patients are making that amount?

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    3. I guess I’m either one of the rare ones, or an idiot.

      I support cutting massive numbers of government programs, including ones that benefit me, where the benefits are not EARNED. That doesn’t mean I won’t apply for those services or money if eligible, but that I recognize that they are in fact funded with money stolen from taxpayers, and it would be to the benefit of the entire country if those programs never existed.

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  6. One of the small matter-of-habit things that I note is the continuance of glossy political fliers, mailed out to support candidates in every election, large and small. The cost of printing and mailing the darned things – which go straight into the trash – must be considerable. But why do they keep on getting generated and distributed? I assume that it’s because it’s always been done, as part of a political campaign, and that’s what campaign advisors recommend because … well, flyers in the mail is the expected thing.

    A matter of ingrained habit. Never mind that they just fill up the recycle bin.

    Liked by 2 people

    1. I noticed the RINOs in Texas sent out 10 to 20 times more fliers than the American First candidates in the last election cycle. Gets the names out there to voters that don’t want to do much research.

      Which isn’t suprising since both parties are corrupt in Texas. See the Texas House and the Governor that doesn’t stand for much except re-election…. Still too much Bush era thinking.

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    2. I use those flyers as fire starters. Some of them make pretty colored flames. Some of them go up with a woosh like they’ve got some kind of really neat accelerant coating them. The quality of some of them is execrable, especially considering the cost of printing and mailing. Those things aren’t cheap when you start talking about hundreds to tens of thousands.

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        1. I accepted a shiny flier (mainly to get him off my doorstep) that a progressive candidate pressed on me, commenting that it should be printed on softer paper (aka bumwipe).

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    3. If you want to know why something continues which obviously doesn’t work or is unnecessary, “Cui bono?” is always a good place to start. Specifically, who is paid to print them and who that person is related to. In a similar way, you can bet that the reason for 8-10 (or more) traffic lights over every intersection of two 4-lane roads is that some politico’s B/S/A/U/BIL/SIL/MIL/FIL makes and/or installs them.

      Always follow the money.

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      2. OR: When there wasn’t a separate stop light for every lane, some idiot ran a red light, caused a crash, and then sued the city for ‘inadequate signals’.

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        1. Lights or Round About.

          Bets are being made as to when that will happen at Beacon and River Road. There have been two big (a 14 year old passenger killed) accidents over the last month (ish). People are screaming “It’s 35 MPH through there, enforce the speed!” Reeeeee

          Um. No. If, big IF, the definition of when the speed changes, it is 35 MPH from the intersection south on River Road. It is 55 MPH (i.e. 60+ MPH) north of there to just east of where River Road enters Junction City. Here is a hint. If turning onto River Road from stop on Beacon, regardless of direction, or crossing River Road, do not pull out if you see a vehicle or headlights. Do Not. The physics are not on your side. They are not. We lived off E. Beacon for a little over 3 years before buying our current house. We regularly crossed River Road at that intersection.

          Yes, there has been more development since we moved out, but they are safer taking Spring Creek or River Loop 1 or 2, at the lights further south, to access River Road, or be a lot more cautious because those cars traveling north and south are moving a lot faster than you think.

          Now some are screaming for either a light or a round about to slow traffic down. There are jurisdictional problems between Eugene (northern growth boundary), County, and Junction City (southern growth boundary).

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          1. They’re too stupid to figure out a red light. You don’t even want to think about what they’d do to a roundabout.

            The city spent…I don’t know how $much, but probably a lot to convert two small intersections near my house to roundabouts. Traffic has not improved.

            Just because the British and French do something, does not mean it’s a good idea.

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            1. Right now it is a very dark intersection with only two stop signs (Beacon has the stop signs).

              Oh. I know about roundabouts. There are some in Eugene. Some interesting (as in “what the H*?) ones constructed in Springfield. Sister’s (I’d say “don’t blink you’d miss it” but going through town is so slow because of pedestrians that you cannot miss it), has three (3) roundabouts, two on the west side, and one on the east side. Not to mention the new ones as you are entering Bend from the west, and more as the highway heads east toward Burns. Where one is really, really, needed (about July) is a roundabout at the Sister’s Rodeo grounds.

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              1. Oh, we loved roundabouts in Ireland. Not.

                Not horrible if there were a mound or other physical barrier in the center, to orient on. But several were just painted on the pavement, and those were not even round or even, so far as I could determine, regular.

                Should have heard Google Maps giving instructions for those.

                And they had them about every 3 kilometers on some roads.

                Irish freeways (sometimes tollways) are nice. Only got forced off a roundabout onto a freeway once, the first day – yes, I was driving. On balance, my wife was much better driving in Ireland than I was.

                I think I’ve been on one or two of those Springfield r-as, and even Billings MT has them.

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                1. All the roundabouts I’ve been on locally had something in the center. And one even made possible what had been an impossible left turn.

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                  1. I forgot to mention the new roundabouts as you come out of Tetons NP north of Jackson WY on the highway. Very new. Slows down traffic. They were not there Spring 2023. They were there Fall 2024. No center piece, yet. Pretty sure center piece is coming. Would not surprise me to see more roundabouts in a number of places along the highway, or even in the park itself on the main park road. Just to slow down traffic to the recommended 35 MPH daytime, and 25 MPH at night.

                    You do NOT want to hit a bison or a grizzly. The former is very bad for your vehicle and your physical health, and the likelihood the bison walks away is high (not 100%, but high). Hit a grizzly, go into witness protection (all but), even if the accident doesn’t happen in the park itself (see 399’s death).

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            2. Flyover Falls put one in at a rather fraught intersection. From W, the main feed from town. S is the only hospital (and medical complex) in the county. E is a decent sized college. N doesn’t get/generate much traffic, but it’s also part of the medical junta.

              When classes were changing, it could be right funky getting from the med complex back to town. (Yeah, there’s a back way, but 80-90% of the people around don’t know it.) The roundabout has a nice bypass lane to the hospital, and the roundabout acts as a chicane for those going to/from the college.

              ODOT put in one on SR 140 a few miles east of SR-62, near White City. They threw in a headlight requirement along with a greatly reduced speed limit (IIRC, it’s 35 leading to the roundabout, and 55 past the fun). That was literally a killer intersection. I’ve only had to use it as a chicane (25mph strongly suggested), and it works.

              Back when JFK was Prez, Dad took us to visit family in New Hampshire. We got to experience the multi-lane traffic circles in Baaaston. Dad didn’t swear, but one could “see” smoke coming from his ears. And he was fairly well used to metro midwest cities. AFAIK, Boston drivers richly deserved “worst in American cities” in that era.

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          2. Big roundabouts, where there’s room to put a full mound in the center, are actually lovely. We’ve had a few put in to our east, in the semi-rural area where there used to be 2×2 stop signs and tons of accidents, and they’re big and with lanes angled on entry such that you’d really have to work to use them wrong. There’s also a road & small highway junction just in the foothills that takes something that used to be fraught and turned it into just another intersection.

            However, some lovely idiot designer decided to stick some in downtown Sacramento, in places where they simply don’t fit. The mound in the center is mountable because delivery vans can’t take the turns. Telephone poles on the sides show rub marks. That kind of roundabout I can’t stand.

            For Beacon and River Road, I think, of the choices, a stoplight would be safer. They’d have to have flashing lights at the proper distance back, though, to get people driving in fog to realize that a stoplight is coming up NOW. I don’t think they have the space to put in a completely safe roundabout without taking out a lot of orchard.

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            1. Actually the orchard is gone at that corner (still exists, I think, further back. OTOH it is an old filbert orchard, which maybe defunct due to the blight that hit the old filbert orchards (?).)

              New (sprang out of nowhere, I swear) facility where the orchard was on the NE corner. NW corner is the wedding venue. SE corner is a yard fence, IDK if it is set back far enough. SW corner are large Douglas Fir trees, up against yard fence, again IDK if it is set back far enough.

              Liked by 1 person

  7. “their younger generation seems either dumb or intellectually lazy”

    Embrace the power of and.

    As you have pointed out yourself, the younger leftist are selected for positions of power because they are politically reliable, as they used to say in the USSR. They are chosen because they parrot the leftist ideological shibboleths and kiss the nomenklatura’s behind.

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    1. They have been relentlessly taught by left-wing ‘Educators’ not to think, and consistently rewarded for not thinking. By the time they graduate from high school, unable to read or do simple arithmetic, it might be too late for them to learn.

      There’s a Yoo-Toober with a series of videos asking college students — COLLEGE STUDENTS — such intellectually challenging questions as:

      How many minutes in a quarter of an hour?

      Name 3 countries outside of North America

      If you were born 7 years ago, how old would you be now?

      When was the War Of 1812?

      When is Independence Day?

      How many stripes and stars on the American flag?

      What is 3 cubed? He also asks “What is 3 times 3 times 3? What is 9 plus 9 plus 9?” I saw 2 correct answers out of more than 20 students. He’s trying to help them and they still can’t figure it out.

      I keep wanting to reach through the screen and, as Sarah said, bitch-slap the idiots. 2,000 years of accumulated knowledge available IN THEIR POCKETS and they’re more ignorant than medieval peasants.

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  8. Our local dems were out at the school budget meeting fighting hard to pay more in property taxes. For no good reason! It feels like it’s all rote and automatic reactions. They’re against even keeping the taxes almost the same because it’s those horrid conservatives are pushing for it. And of course “it’s for the children”. No thought involved.

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    1. They are the Good People. Everything they believe is correct and proper. That’s why they never compromise: since they are inevitably correct on every item, to compromise is to deliberately choose to do wrong, and they can’t do that.

      They behave very like religious fanatics and, since their belief blinds them to the notion they might be wrong, they refuse to consider it. So if they only persevere in the faith, surely they must triumph in the end.

      I think that covers at least some of it.

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      1. City passed a “Fire Tax”. I do not have a say in this, because not city. What I found interesting is there are groups out gathering signatures to put this on the ballot. Okay, great. The problem is they are in the neighborhoods that are not part of the city. Granted patch work city/not city, in the urban growth area. But there are maps available. Note, the petition people have no clue. Me thinks someone is expecting them to be gathering proof that “no one will sign the petition” and getting signatures from households that will be invalidated because not in the city. Unfortunately for that someone the petition people are being told “Would love to. But this address is not city. The entire neighborhood not city. You need to go to these blocks ….” Not the first time the city has pulled this.

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          1. Supposedly funding for the Eugene Fire Department part of the Springfield/Eugene/Santa Clara Fire Department. The actual fire houses and working trucks/personnel are specific to their areas. It is the administrative functions that are combined (one fire chief, etc.). But this “Fire Tax”, just means (or perception) that the city council can take money otherwise budgeted for fire department and fun areas where actually short. I.e. if pulled, threatening the Library, Kidsports, etc.

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              1. Apparently.

                Not following it that close. Except at the beginning. And the hilarious petition door to door in the wrong neighborhoods.

                Followed at the beginning because EWEB is going to collect the money. We are forced to use EWEB (no other choice). My attitude is “Wait! We don’t get any say. Not with the issue (no one has yet). Not with the city council!” Online insured me that it only applies to those in the incorporated portion of the city, not the ones in the urban growth boundary that are not in the city (yet*).

                (*) Again. Eugene has been failing to incorporate these homes at least 62 years, that I know of (since 12/1963 when we moved into the house mom & dad built, that mom still lives in).

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  9. Our local dems were out at the school budget meeting fighting hard to pay more in property taxes. For no good reason! It feels like it’s all rote and automatic reactions. They’re against even keeping the taxes almost the same because it’s those horrid conservatives are pushing for it. And of course “it’s for the children”. No thought involved.

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  10. I’m catching up on the Grand Speech last night–it’s a time of moving, therefore high stress, so I had to take a hot bath and read a tea shop murder mystery instead.

    Watching Mister Speaker throw out Alvin the Annoying was glorious, a lovely way to wake up!

    Sarah, this is so spot on. I’m moving from UltraMAGA back to deep blue communist/ossified Pacific NW–the libraries proclaiming DEI OR DIE, the politics, the wealthy women who do nothing but wear their “resistance” hats and crap on the working class. And it makes me laugh, at the same time I’m remembering how to behave so I don’t get routinely attacked at the grocery store. I can hardly wait to wear my camouflage jacket to Whole Foods. :)

    Maybe more important for me is that I’m starting the last third of life (planning to live a hundred years, we’ll see…). So much of my present/future relies on retaining/regaining that abandon with which I’ve pursued everything when I was younger. There was no thought of “this better work!” There’s an edge to things because of finances, but man, tons of people are short on funds. It’s a time to shine in ways I’ve not done before.

    This is such a high stress, hopeful time.

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    1. I was BORN HERE and I’m taking my stand. The family lands have been ours for three-quarters of a century now.

      I no longer patronize nor donate to the Timberland Repugnant Libraries, due to their w0ke-inspired purge of their holdings. (Imagine, if you will, a library SYSTEM without a single biography of Robert E. Lee. Not a one. They were not checked out, nor lost, nor out for repair, there just WEREN’T any. That has now been remedied, but it was at the height of the Purge.)

      Be of good cheer. Aside from the deep-blue cesspits around the Sound, there are a LOT of red counties in the Northwest.

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        1. How great that you are moving HOME. And raising the collective IQ there too.

          I wonder if it is the start of a trend of people who moved from their beloved homes because they could no longer live under the oppression, but now a new day has dawned and they go home to liberate the place and people they love.

          THAT would be a job worth doing.

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          1. For sure. And this is so completely divinely inspired and fueled, I have to be heading home for a good reason. Himself has a hand in it all, and this is truly a golden age.

            Liked by 1 person

    2. Moving to a Blue area doesn’t have to be dreadful. No matter where you go, you will find some people who are in tune with your beliefs.

      I moved from Red SC (an urban/suburban area, so heavily influenced by the Blue) to OH. The city I located in, Lorain, is a Deep Blue area.

      However, just a couple of miles down the road are Trump signs galore. And, even in my DINK neighborhood, we have some Trump supporters.

      Liked by 1 person

      1. I grew up in Ohio (eastern suburbs of Cleveland). It’s mostly the inner cities that are blue. Lorain, because it had a Ford plant for almost 50 years has a lot of old union folk who still vote Dem, and the nearby presence of far left Oberlin college doesn’t help matters. But it’s a smallish blue pocket among a sea of red, and a lot of the blue isn’t the hard progressive type.

        Liked by 1 person

      2. Same with WA State, and honestly, it’s glorious. Most of the blue-blue is restricted to the city cores. My little town I’m moving to is among the rural red’ish.

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        1. Have you seen the Greater Idaho meme yet? I’d post it but FB and those don’t post well. Washington is greater Seattle circle, down I-5 to include Olympia, max. Oregon is greater Portland, down I-5 to include Eugene, max (darn it). All the rest, including most the coast is included in Greater Idaho. With the caption “This will be about right.” One of the comments said Greater California should just take the coast side of Oregon and Washington. A commenter on that one stated “Brookings say NO!”

          Liked by 2 people

          1. I have my doubts about Deschutes county. They seem to track Portland in statewide elections. I don’t have any reasons to go there, so if I’m going to visit a blue area, Medford is closer to purple. Since my retina guy is there, it’s an easy call.

            Liked by 1 person

          2. OTOH someone posted an item from Reddit on Twitter on their view of the US in the 2030s, after we have gotten our just punishment from our righteous neighbors to the north and south. California was the only area they did not have either under Canadian or Mexican occupation forces, or actually incorporated as provinces.

            People with this fantasy have got to be assuming the masses will rise in their righteous wrath against the capitalist oppressors and welcome the benficent socialist rule of our betters. I don’t think so.

            Liked by 1 person

            2. Do they know that Canadian’s had their guns taken away?

              Do they know that the cartels are only succeeding in blue zones? And are being taken out by the feds (matter of knowing where they are)? Pretty sure Texan’s will have something to “say” about Mexico “eating” Texas.

              “masses will rise in their righteous wrath against the capitalist oppressors and welcome the benficent socialist rule of our betters. I don’t think so.“

              –

              “I don’t think so” is a bit of an understatement. Just a tsunami worth of understatement.

              Liked by 1 person

            3. More like the Real Americans will rise up in our righteous wrath and wipe out the commie invaders with those 600+ million guns we’ve been buying for the last 60 years.

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          3. I haven’t yet seen it but it sounds hilarious!

            The thing about the red part of Oregon wanting to hook up with Idaho is that they will totally destroy any hopes Boise has of being even more commie/left than they already are.

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            1. State of Jefferson died a few years ago in our part of Oregon. (S central Oregon, just east of the Cascades.) Greater Idaho seems to be catching all the attention, and I think it has a (slender, but nonzero) chance of happening. Far higher than SoJ had.

              I’ve tried to ignore California politics, so long as they let me. (See Klamath River dam issues…)

              Like

          5. I keep looking at those proposed maps and griping ‘No, move the leftoid border a bit north of Creswell, please …’

            Liked by 1 person

            1. How do you think I feel? I’m stuck no matter what, being just north of Eugene. Pretty sure get laughed at if state “just south of Salem, please! Let Eugene go to greater Idaho!”

              Maybe carve out Junction City and the northern part of Eugene growth boundary, say to Beltline?

              Liked by 1 person

    3. The last third of my life. I like that.
      Honestly, if it weren’t for the altitude I’d have moved back to CO by now. SO homesick.
      BUT I can’t, so we’ll see what the future brings.

      Liked by 2 people

          1. I have it on good authority that you have at least a chance of making it to 300+; a good chance of making it to 150. The SSA says so, and they must be correct.😉😜😜😜

            Liked by 1 person

            2. One of Trump’s jabs was pointing at the number of 150-plus folks getting Social Security, looking at RFK and saying, “I guess Americans are healthier than we thought.”

              Liked by 1 person

          2. I have no idea what my life expectancy is or should be. I’m 19 years older than when Dad had his last heart attack, and 27 years younger than Mom. $OLDEST_BROTHER will be 80 shortly, and $OLDER_BROTHER is 76. At his weight, Lord only knows. (He makes me look tiny. Wow!)

            I’ll take the days, months and years as they come. The more, the merrier.

            Liked by 1 person

          3. Or, hyperactive immune allows us to survive Andromeda Strain /Captain Tripps / “oops, that was not intended”.

            (grin)

            Like

      2. I’m blessed that my body hates elevation, and that home is downhill. That sort of homesickness never really quits.

        Liked by 1 person

          2. Yep, you get it.

            It used to be every time I’d fly back home for a visit, when I saw Mount Rainier I’d start crying.

            The other day I imagined the first time I’m going to throw a hoochie skirt lure into Puget Sound and it made me cry.

            Liked by 1 person

        1. Baton? Nah; that’s seen as a weapon. A quality 5-foot ironwood or hickory walking stick with a brass cap; Brazos makes some really nice ones. Or an unweighted cane (weighted ones are also seen as weapons in some venues). Remember the general rule: thrust to the soft, cut to the hard.😉

          Liked by 1 person

            1. That would be the same 2A that the cops and prosecutors in blue heavens like Austin, Boston, Chicago, etc. ignore when they arrest you for self-defense.

              “The process is the punishment.”

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              1. Pretty much nailed it. In places like CA, MA, NJ, MD, etc., being seen as having an actual weapon, especially after you remove some dirtball from the gene pool, will cause you large problems. If it’s not seen by TPTB as an actual weapon, you might still have problems, but they probably won’t be nearly as bad.

                Always try to fly under the radar if in LeftyLand; Teddy’s “speak” vs. “carry” advice at a personal level.

                Liked by 1 person

                1. Then it’s about 200 years past time we start using said weapons against said powers that be, at least in these blue state/city tyrannies. Some letting them decide which game and field they’re going to crucify you on. There’s a reason why the Legend of Billy Jack resonates.

                  First step is a massive media and writing campaign about how the courts and law are corrupt and just dead wrong.

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                  1. Can’t argue, but you’re preaching to the choir here. And hopefully that’s beginning; I’m getting vibes of “I’m not locked in here with you; you’re locked in here with me!”

                    Liked by 1 person

                    1. Like the story when a car stops to pickup a hitchhiker.

                      Hitchhiker gets in the car and asks “aren’t you afraid you’ll pickup a serial killer?”

                      Driver replies “Naw. What are the chances of two serial killers being on this lonely road?”

                      Analogy breaks down since we the drivers aren’t the serial killers. The other side OTOH their policies too often are.

                      Liked by 1 person

          1. A hatchet’s OK, especially if it’s not one of the “tactical” ones. But for looking completely innocuous, keep a bat (wood preferred) and, for camouflage, a cheap fielder’s glove and a baseball, in the car.

            (“Well of course, officer; I love baseball, and I play whenever I can! It was just handy when the [mugger, rioter, carjacker] tried to attack me.”😉)

            Liked by 1 person

      2. LOL, YES. Even better, because I don’t own a MAGA hat, wear nothing but a red ball cap. It enrages people twice because when you turn and smile at them, it’s just a red hat.

        I’m researching non-lethal weapons to carry, like… I forget, it’s a chemical thing you shoot at people like mace or bear spray.

        Like

          1. I thought non-lethal, and have a hard time putting aqua regia in that category. I had a classmate in HS who had a small bottle of HF for extreme circumstances. Knowing the stuff and the afficts*, he’d have had a hard time claiming self defense. (The immediate area was conservative, but metro was pretty damned blue.)

            ((*)) In the mid ’70s, one or two fab operators “accidentally” got splashed with HF on a Friday hoping to enjoy Monday off. Monday off, yes. Enjoyable, not hardly. Copycats were nil after the first round.

            (Muses a bit about the 30% acetic acid vinegar at the independent grocery store.)

            (Recalls the deer spray we used before growing deer-repellent veggies. That stuff would gag a maggot, but probably counts as non-lethal. Best used with good running shoes.)

            Like

          2. Not sure, Mike. It’s marketed by some company whose name starts with an “R”. It may be.

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            1. Kimber used to sell pepper-spray in what looked like a Derringer. Far easier to aim and conceal than Ye Cann of Mace. BUT, that might also lead to other problems. (I don’t know if they still sell them or not.)

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          1. I’ll have to check to see if that’s an illegal use of wasp spray. Seems pretty good to me.

            Bear spray is legal to use against people in WA, though we’re cautioned to be very sure we’re actually under attack….

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            1. It would be illegal, were someone to press the point. Improper use of an agricultural poison.

              Besides, wasp spray isn’t real effective vs humans; SABRE pepper spray site says

              “The amount of active ingredients in the spray (according to the label) are 0.04% to 0.06%; the compound is typically ‘pyrethrin or pyrethroids, which come from a species of chrysanthemum plant,’ explains Extension.org. This active ingredient is meant to disrupt a wasp’s nervous system.

              “On the other hand, human pepper sprays target a human’s eyes and respiratory system. Think of the biology and size differences between wasps and humans!”

              Liked by 1 person

              2. Wasp spray is a neurotoxin iirc. Which means a clever lawyer could get you charged with use of a weapon of mass destruction and crime against humanity.

                Like

            2. Bear Spray is a mild pepper spray (oleo capsicum) usually about 2%. Human pepper spray is about 5%. Some anti-riot sprays are up to 10%.

              Like

        3. One of my neighbors is from a farm/ranch family with property down in the Rio Grande Valley – he has a red ball cap with “Make Cotton Great Again” embroidered in white letters in the same font as the MAGA caps.

          Liked by 1 person

          1. Great neighbor. :)

            The only other ball cap I’d really like is the green one the corn guys wear to their convention, with the crossed cobs on the bill.

            Liked by 1 person

        4. See if there’s a locally popular sports team (from high school up to professional) that has fans that wear a red cap with the team logo.

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            1. Extra bonus if it’s an old-school Washington Redskins logo hat! :)

              (I am a Redskins fan. I refuse to call them the “Commanders” or “Commies.” They were, are, and will always be the Redskins.)

              Liked by 2 people

                1. Unknown.

                  But I’ve heard that they’re very tough to fight.

                  The Monster Hunters would need Bigger Guns. 😉

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                  1. Worse than Agent Franks? (waggles hand…)

                    And we could all use Bigger Guns, but Barrett .50 semiautos are too pricey for me.😒

                    And miniguns as personal weapons (a la “Predator”) are Right Out.😉

                    Like

                    2. I’m kind of surprised that Larry doesn’t have the feds with an entire set of replacement parts always available for Franks instead of just picking up pieces along the way. But then the military aren’t quite as stupid as the MCB.

                      Like

  11. Speaking of authors who kept writing even after developing Alzheimer’s, Terry Pratchett’s last few books aren’t nearly as good as when he was at the peak of his game… but it’s not really noticeable if you’re not already familiar with his work. I found Unseen Academicals (2007) to be weak, I Shall Wear Midnight (2010) to be decent, and then Snuff (2011) to be extremely loose. And then Raising Steam (2013) was so loose the stuffing was coming out the seams all over the place. By contrast, Making Money (also 2007) was quite tight and well-plotted, which is why I often call it Pratchett’s last good book. (Though I should re-read I Shall Wear Midnight to see if it qualifies instead). Other people I’ve talked to quite liked Snuff and Raising Steam, but I just can’t bring myself to read them a second time. There are some Pratchettisms left, but it’s just not Terry Pratchett writing them any more, and it shows.

    Liked by 2 people

    1. Raising Steam was less a novel and more a series of loosely connected events about characters we were already familiar with. It was very sad for me, as it highlighted how much the Alzheimers had taken hold. I too need to reread I Shall Wear Midnight, but I don’t remember it being nearly as melancholic for me to read.

      Liked by 1 person

    2. Honestly, of the three I find Unseen Academicals to be the weakest. Decent writing, yes, but the point of the plot was… the spirit of [British] football? It didn’t quite jell at the end.

      The thing I noticed about Snuff was Lady Sybil swearing. That’s something I couldn’t quite tell if it was the Alzheimer’s or the relaxed attitude in publishing. Not quite out of character, but a bit jarring.

      But anyway. Pratchett at his worst is still better than a lot of other writers.

      Liked by 1 person

    4. I really, really wanted to enjoy Making Money and Raising Steam, but there were issues of…sloppiness…that were dragging me down and around when reading both books.

      (And I hate the fact that Pratchett couldn’t do one more Susan book, as I would have loved to have seen how she did after Thief Of Time.)

      Liked by 1 person

      1. I enjoyed making money in a horrified sort of way. It’s actually one of my favorites, probably because I have a pretty good idea what he’s going on about some of what he wrote about was just plain wrong, but Pratchett was right, where Trump is wrong, about the penny. The physical economic model with the tubes and all is a real thing called the Phillips Machine.

        where I really differ is in the Golem Standard for money. Already ducking from the coming fusillade of abuse from gold bugs, you don’t need Golems, or anything else really, to back a currency. It’s all about belief. Credit. Always has been, I fact. Gold is belief too.

        Liked by 2 people

            2. Where you stand depends on where you sit. For me it’s mostly good because conditions like this tend to be where ai make my money, I’m an options trader and a hedger in these conditions. For others, not so good. Bidenflation has put the market in the bottom 15% of my models expectations for short and medium term returns and worst ever for long term returns —- that includes 1929 and 1999 — I’m not calling for a depression or crash but things are very expensive. in the positive side, we might see some earnings and dividends, which would help a lot and if you don’t hold a lot of the “magnificent seven”, you’re likely more or less OK. It’s a very concentrated market.

              Never market advice, just telling what I’m thinking. Your mileage and risk tolerance will differ.

              Like

          1. Pratchett actually captured it all very well. I’ve known actual people like the Lavishes and i have a friend who works in a “family office”::he’s paid very well, but not well enough to put up with the baloney he does.

            When I try to describe how money actually works, people refuse to believe me. It’s sometimes frightening. Then again, I don’t really like it myself. There’s no there there and hasn’t been for 50 years.

            Liked by 1 person

        3. Yes, gold is belief… but it’s a little bit harder to produce more gold by fiat. Someone has to actually find it, dig it out of the ground, and refine it before you can deflate the currency.

          Of course, throw in a working Starship and a few easy-(now)-to-reach asteroids, and the whole equation changes…

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          1. “Refine” might be the wrong word when it comes to gold. Let’s say “sift out”. Still requires serious effort, so the point about not being able to deflate the currency with a mouse click still stands, even if I used the wrong word to describe the process of turning a handful of gold+sand/gravel into just gold.

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          2. don’t actually disagree but it could be anything reasonably scarce. Trouble is, as always, with politicians who debase everything eventually

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        4. Well, you can’t even make a decent airplane out of “paper” bills these days. At least you can produce something of value (even if just pretty) with gold and silver.

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        1. Moist never felt like a replacement, more like “I need a new character to tell more grounded stories, as the mythological era of the Disk is coming to an end, rolling into a more ‘grounded’ Victorian-era type place.”
          The grand-daughter of DEATH was going to have problems filling that place.

          Liked by 1 person

            2. I suspected after Going Postal; I was nearly certain after Making Money.

              Vetinari was going to keep throwing Moist at one piece of crumbling city infrastructure after another. By the time he was done, the city would work better, Moist would understand how to keep it running, and Vetinari wouldn’t even have to formally retire. He’d eventually point out to Moist that Moist was the one actually running the show and had been for some time.

              Like

        2. I do wish Susan had had her story closed out. Since I’m married to this world’s personification of helpfulness it would be nice to see how the disk world’s version got on. I do like Moist too and think they tell very different stories.

          Liked by 1 person

    5. I Shall Wear Midnight violates the great law of series to me: thou shalt not undermine the happy ending of the book before. Especially not by presenting that as a fiat accompli at the beginning.

      Like

  13. They used to be able to redefine words on the fly and make it stick, and they still think they can do that even though it no longer works.

    Example: The Behar shrieking harpy on The View got body checked back by their lefty guest yesterday when she was slinging some of that good old “I can make words mean whatever I want them to mean” hash on the word “mandate”:

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/video/tvshowbiz/video-3386431/VIDEO-Stephen-Smith-says-Trumps-win-mandate-View.html

    Liked by 1 person

  15. The biggest thing is this-

    For decades, the Democrats have, through one way or another, had control over the national discourse. Not quite as solid as in Europe or Asia, but most “conservative” pundits were blue-dog Democrats at best.

    Then you started to get the vacuum polarization, especially as many media outlets required you to play politics or have a rabbi of some kind to just get started, let alone make any progress in the field. Publishing, for example, became the providence of hyper-liberal, college-educated Manhattan (or at least urban) female Democrats who sold their books to buyers who were at least hyper-liberal and college-educated female Democrats because they all thought that was their audience. Hollywood became the providence of the hyper-feminist because they controlled many of the gateways and made allies of the money people (who I swear use TV and movie productions for money laundering, and if they make a profit, wonderful…).

    The problem is the Internet. Even more than Talk Radio (where the first cracks started to appear), the Internet is showing that they’re all naked (and ugly naked, too). With the exception of Baen Books, I don’t think there is a mainstream publisher out there that publishes what I want to read. And most of the indie authors…have started to get a little desperate to play politics. But their stories are still enjoyable, unlike the current slop.

    YouTube has become my source of news, along with some blogs, because I can trust them. The stories make sense and are often better sourced than most media outlets. And they are pointing out exactly how naked the current environment is.

    And the people inside have to be seeing the actual numbers. But they can’t pull back, because there are enough hungry and desperate zombies below them that will eat them alive if they try to stop.

    Something is going to break. I just hope it isn’t fatal.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. I saw something along those same ”we are the audience we are looking for” lines the other day about Disney properties, Marvel and Lucasfilm was the specific topic.

      One commentator identified the problem as “theater kids making stuff for theater kids”.

      Now I have no problem with theater kids per se, but perhaps putting them in charge of all decision making is a mistake.

      If one assumes they have taken over the building up through all creative, accounting and production levels as well as up through the C-suite, have then decided they are the authoritative reference for good and evil as well as the definition of the universal “right thinking” audience for all their content, what we’ve seen from The House of The Mouse of late, certainly from Star Wars (and the last Indiana Jones for that matter) to Marvel to Pixar to pure Disney stuff makes perfect sense.

      Liked by 1 person

      2. …yea, they are theater kids.
        In all the BAD ways that they could be theater kids. Back in the bad old days, theater kids were in the lowest tier of social groupings. There were groups of nerds with higher “status” than theater kids (with the exception of the girls and a few of the boys that put out).
        And looking back at the last decade or so of productions, I can definitely see the fingerprints of the angry theater kids, who want to make what THEY want to make and are angry they have to please anybody but themselves.

        Liked by 1 person

  16. Three woolly mice…three woolly mice….their genes have been spliced, their genes have been spliced…..they came from under the geneticists knife….three woolly mice

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      1. When this first broke yesterday, that was pretty much everyones question. I mean if Europa Sparks can do it, why cant we?

        Mimmoths from Girl Genius

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          1. If you insist, but if you continue with writing so we can shower more money on you, the geneticists will make real tusked mice because demand is so high…..and also real Mimmoths

            Like

  17. I think the old politicians would still have young interns to make sure the printer has ink and run the X account. They don’t have the same excuse.

    I’m thrilled that the “same script, different person/place” thing is finally obvious. It’s been going on for years (decades?), but it has gone from “same theme” to “exact same words” and become ridiculous.

    Like

    1. From the comments

      “This is actually what the man is feeling in the original song. Dolly Parton is just begging this creature to give her back her lover, who has been added to the worshippers. Jolene humors the woman and goes to see her in the form of the redheaded and emerald eyed woman we hear of in the original.”

      XD

      Liked by 1 person

          1. A better one would have been “whatever Trump wants 2026”. Implying they are putting themselves out of a job as republicans take a super majority, or enough independents come in taking out the idiots.

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  24. Reference:

    “”Thing is, the busier you are, and the older you are, the more things you do by rote, even things that should — technically — be impossible.

    I was told recently by an artist that, yeah, you can do it while half asleep, if you’ve trained for decades.””

    Find any physician who completed their Internship and first year of Residency prior to about 1992, and ask them how they managed to maintain standards of care while working 36 hours on, 12 off, 12 on and 12 off for roughly 50 weeks of the year.

    Depending on the specialty rotation they may have been on, then they were obligated to make rounds on weekend days, even if they were purported ‘off’ that day!

    I’ll let you do the addition!

    hint: it was closer to 6,000 duty hours than 2,000!

    You get REALLY GOOD at functioning in a fatigued fugue state under those conditions, or you were moved into a different, non-clinical track ASAP!

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      1. At the very least, the training hours have been limited to 80 total per week, with at least one 24 hour period entirely off duty.

        That cuts the contact time to ‘learn the variations of normal human anatomy and physiology, and be able to recognize when the person in front of you does NOT fit those parameters’ – something that is incredibly important to be a good diagnostician – by a minimum of 1/3rd compared to my time in that hot seat.

        Adding to the restrictions on learning while fatigued, there is now a far greater reliance on technical means, instead of using any knowledge of normal variations to figure out what is most likely going on.

        I’ll note that, despite several stays in either ICU or PCU, it has been incredibly rare to see ANY physician more than in the morning. All problems after that time are relayed to the Interns and Residents, who then give orders to the nurses, sight unseen.

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        1. I know that. I just admire your trust in the institutions in thinking it’s being followed. It’s more, after a certain time the resident is staying on voluntarily, because he’s so dedicated and– Yeah.

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          1. Actually, no. I spent several days in the tender care of the VA in Columbia, MO, and had a chance to speak with two of the interns, several residents, and two attendings.

            The limits are being strictly kept, there are separate day (heavy – three entire teams – one intern, two or three residents, a fellow, and an attending team leader, as well as the specialty consultant) and night – at least one intern and one upper-level resident across all three teams – with close contact to either the Chief Resident, the Fellow (board certified physician picking up extra skills) or the Attending. And yes, they are required to take at least one full 24-hour period outside of the hospital and totally off duty.

            And if Mizzou Med and the VA are doing that, it’s a high percentage bet that most, if not virtually all, of the other qualified medical post graduate training programs are following suit, just to keep their programs certified.

            (and no, it’s not that Mizzou Med and Truman VAMC are bottom of the barrel, it’s that the others need to keep up to those same standards.)

            ck

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  25. Some of the behavior is so much like the behavior of inbred royal families that I’m wondering if actual inbreeding could account for some of us. Not that they’re marrying their siblings, but the American Left is now in its 8th or 9th generation of “don’t go off the reservation” intermarriage, and their reservation is pretty small.

    Liked by 1 person

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