Stuck In The Middle With You

Posted on by Sarah A. Hoyt

Lately there’s been a lot of talk about how we’re all “so divided” and we need to be in the center, and how America’s true political orientation is independent and how– BROTHER!

This was brought home — this was brought OFFICE — to me while I was at work two days ago, and Dan was listening to Joe Rogan. He often listens to podcasts while he’s working, because his work is numbers, so hearing words doesn’t disturb him. My work, unless I’m working on covers, well…. So normally I slap noise cancelling headphones on.

The headphones were out of charge, so covers it was, but after a while he told me he couldn’t listen because I kept arguing.

Look, Joe Rogan, normally, doesn’t disturb me that much. I’ll snort giggle at some of his stuff, but it rolls over me, and doesn’t take a bite…

But this… He was with Joe Manchin at some “independent” conference, and just about everything he said was distilled stupid. And everything Manchin said was self-serving pretending-to-be-stupid. And I was fit to be tied.

Now, I don’t do media critique, and Rogan is Rogan, or as someone put it a barbarian who evolved yesterday and came in search of fire and legends of other people. (Honestly, that’s half of his schtick.)

BUT this slotted into all the talk about how “we’re so divided” and “The biggest political affiliation is independent.”

Let’s dispose of that last one first: bullshit. People register as independent because the left are foaming-at-the-mouth rabid weasels who will cancel anyone they even SUSPECT of being on the other side. I was registered independent all the years that I was working for trad pub, because being found to be “one of those evil people on the right” would end my career, and baby needed shoes (and eventually college textbooks.) There are other reasons, but usually the strongest is “I’m on the right and I don’t want to be cancelled.” Very few independents are actually independent. Right now my husband is independent because he didn’t want to say GOP to the blue haired young lady registering him. (I OTOH did, and she said, “Oh, thank heavens. I wasn’t sure, coming from Colorado.” Which goes to show you.)

At any rate, is that everyone? Doubt it. You can be very embarrassed of associating with either party, without being a centrist or independent. Sometimes it’s all about which party you hate more when you vote, but you don’t want to say “I’m with them” because they’re a bunch of bozos, and you know it.

Second, even if “independent” were the biggest self-identification group, it doesn’t mean there’s a great hunger for the center or for reconciliation. Perhaps all the independents are people who want something else. Say, a true constitutionalist government, which, alas, isn’t on offer. It’s as likely as that they’re all “centrist” or that these “centrists” all agree on the same thing.

What made the program infuriating and brought out my political tourettes is that all the solutions they “offered” were bullshit that has been tried, a lot of which is responsible for turning California into a one-party rule, such as open primaries and first-past-the-post elections. Seriously. I could dissect the mechanism by which this “delivers us bound to our foes” but I don’t need to. Look over at California. Do you want that? No? Your ideas will get that. To pretend that this has never been tried is either dumb or malicious.

On the dumb side, Rogan was doing his caveman impression “Tell me about these things I never heard of!” But Manchin? Manchin is malicious. Why do I say that? Well, he pretended not to know why we stopped using coal for electricity generation. It’s apparently a deep mystery and not the green obsession of presidents he supported, like Obama. Bah. Yeah, he kind of distanced himself from the Democrats in the later Biden years, but not wanting to trans kids doesn’t make you a centrist. It makes you a moderately sane, non kinky human being, for crying in bed.

Then there is “term limits”. Term limits, in the year of our Lord 2026 when we know how deep and how evil the evil deep state is! For the love of little children and the apples they steal! No, seriously. Sure, let’s have an ever-rotating wheel of incumbents who don’t know what they’re doing so the deep state can march on unimpeded. Heck, the only reason we have presidential term limits is that evil bastard FDR whom Joe Manchin still adores.

And then came the, of course, Joe Manchin would like to be president. When Rogan asked about that, I could taste the hunger for power in the creature’s voice. (Waves arms.) GAH. I guess I hadn’t got that out of my system yet.

Do I like the two party system? Well. I’m not in love with it. On the other hand I experienced the “as many parties as want to be” system in Portugal and this is the problem: Honest human beings will divide into parties on the slightest excuse:

“I am from the party of free economy, marry whoever you want provided he/she is an adult, but no welfare.”

“I am from the party of free economy, marry whoever you want provided he/she/them are adults, but no welfare.”

“I am from the party of free economy, marry whoever you want provided he/she/them are adults, welfare for widows and orphans.”

“I am from the party of free economy, marry whoever you want provided he/she/them are adults, welfare for widows and orphans provided they’re legal residents.”

Etc. etc. You end up with fifty parties where the disagreement between them is very small. But you know who doesn’t divide that way? Socialists. Communists. I mean usually they divide from each other, though honestly, as with penguins, only they know the difference. (And no, it’s not the same as the theoretical difference. Crying out loud, I studied this in school. I know the text book definitions. BUT in practicality the only difference is the socialists going “I want that too, but slower so we don’t scare the rubes.” No? Well, ask yourself what the USSR stood for tovarish.) So in the end, the left wins. Because they’re not as worried about carefully defining anything, and they LIKE to march lockstep. (Also in their minds, when they win, it’s the other guys in the mass graves. Spoiler: it’s always them in the mass graves.)

Meanwhile the two party system has the drawback that any change — real change — is slow. Very slow. Because you have to take over one of the existing parties from within. This can be bad — we’re taking forever — but also, what? You want the DSA to take over the dems FASTER?

So do I like the two party system? As opposed to what? If the choice is cake or death, I’ll take cake, thank you, with chocolate sprinkles. But the choice is never between cake and death. It is at best between syphilis and gonorrhea, and you pick the one for which you have antibiotics handy.

And this is ultimately the issue. “Independent” isn’t a political movement because people who are “independent” are not a group. they don’t all agree on what they believe. They mostly aren’t sure which side will make them hold their nose LESS or, hear me out, they are on the right and afraid to declare it. And don’t underestimate the second group. For years, it’s been known if a public personality doesn’t ever mention politics? They’re on the right. Because only one side actually tries to punish your dissent. (Now this is known, so not speaking brings about retaliation, too. We’re almost a publish and be damned o’clock. I’m just glad I’m out of it.)

Second, “We’re all so divided.”

Yes. As opposed to? No seriously, think about it. We’ve always been divided. It’s just that while we were bound by mass media, which the left utterly controlled, people didn’t know that there were more dissidents from what appeared to be the only widespread opinion.

Even my priest at mass was lamenting, you can’t be in a hobby group without the hobby being political. Oh, yeah? And who made it so? I don’t mean the poor man, who is very young and seems to be unexamined college-left. I mean, the left has insisted that everything be political since I joined adult society, lo, over 40 years ago. THE ONLY DIFFERENCE NOW IS THAT WE’RE FIGHTING BACK.

I want to do this skit where people are having dinner while using other people as furniture, and it’s this idealized family dinner, and quiet and everyone is smiling. And then someone frees the “furniture” and a brawl breaks out and the former diners are going “Stop, stop. everything was so peaceful! How did this happen?”

It’s like “economic” (or any other kind) inequality. It’s not actually evil, unless it persists for centuries WITH THE SAME PEOPLE AT THE TOP AND BOTTOM. In which case the society is in deep trouble, as it is in much of Latin America. BUT not in as much trouble as societies in which almost everyone is equal, because the only way to do that is totalitarian, rigid control over people and the economy.

“Politics are so divisive” is nonsense. People don’t form political parties or join the political process to work on the things we all agree on. “We should wear hats on our heads, not on our left foot” is not a political position because most people agree with that, and the ones that don’t are locked up for their own good. (They keep slipping on that hat.)

Politics are supposed to be divisive. And a good brawl is how you know you’re still free. And I’m tired of the soft heads that pretend otherwise.

Let’s hope we can continue to fight back and stay free.

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

113 thoughts on “Stuck In The Middle With You”

  1. Good post, I was one of those Independents that leans heavily to the right in the past. Simply avoided talking politics with some people just to avoid the hassle and BS I knew would follow. After a while I got tired of it and started to become far more outspoken. But it didn’t mean I would blindly tolerate whatever some supposedly “Right wing” types did. Too many were RINOs and not to be trusted.

    Didn’t mean I was going to throw away my vote on some Independent who had no chance of getting elected either. After Perot I knew that was a losing game. The people who do that simply help the other side (the serious enemies of freedom) win. The RINOs are usually just in the game for the graft, more and more the dems seem intent on totally destroying the country.

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    1. In defense of (some) RINOs, there are some bright enough to understand that their grift can only continue if the USA remains relatively stable and sane, thus recognizable. Alas, the majority of RINOs seem too stupid to pour whizz out of a boot with instructions written on the heel, thus they see no practical end to their grift if the Barking Moonbat Left gains control.

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  2. Back in the 90s in Illinois, I knew several people in my (small, rural, childhood) social circle who were told to change their voter registration if they wanted the job/promotion.

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    1. “…told to change their voter registration if they wanted the job/promotion.”

      Small towns can be interesting that way. Like the local hardware store has a lock on the construction industry in that area, and if you want to build you be nice to #MrHardwareGuy. Then some dude starts a new hardware store on the other side of town, and things get interesting.

      There’s a reason Illinois is messed up, and this is it.

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      1. When the Marion Co. FL Dem party head visited my newly-moved, registered-that-day paternal grandparents during WWII, with the humorous remark that he wanted to see what a Republican looked like, he knew that they were the first of many coming to Ocala to work for the Army Air Force (my grandpa was a civilian flight instructor).

        If they had not had that unspoken backing, the unspoken pressure might have been stronger.

        It all worked out and there have always been Republicans in the county since then, but their yearly Lincoln dinner is more of a big thing than it is around here.

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    3. Sounds like some employers needed to have their homes burned down.

      Repeatedly.

      There’s a good reason why so many Tories were “encouraged” to move back to British controlled Canada, or Bermuda after the War for Independence.

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  3. I would note that in theory I could be very kinky, without wanting to trans kids.

    Theory and practice can be different, but the general problem of theoretically forecasting those differences is hard.

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  4. In Canada this week the media is ‘viewing with alarm’ the Canadian public. Because while their darling #OliviaChowChowChow won the mayor’s race in Toronto (which I consider “interesting”) the #NDPee LOST in British Columbia. They lost hard. They were rejected.

    The leader of the #NDPee quit in disgrace. Little bro lost, and now he is banished to the outer darkness.

    Clearly the public cannot be trusted to vote for the right people, sayeth the media. “We TOLD them what to do! We told them and told them! But then they went and voted for the Enemy of Life!”

    So I feel that while there are clear divisions in the political world, mostly those are in the minds of propagandists and projected on the rest of us. We, the voters, seem to go with whoever has the best haircut. Except sometimes the one with the best haircut is so appalling that the voters are angry and reject them.

    I’d be depressed about this except that ALL the alternatives are much, much worse.

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      1. I think, given Toronto, that there has to be fraud. But they’re still super sneaky about it, because we do have those pesky paper ballots that get counted right out in the open where everyone can see. Not like in the USA where the “mail-in ballots” turn up right on time when the count starts to go off.

        But maybe there’s not, because people in Toronto do seem to be really good at walking around druggies dying on the sidewalk, without noticing. Just part of the city, they say.

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    2. There was also the leadership change in Quebec. Admittedly Quebec has always been, well, Quebec. But reportedly, Palmondon had a more friendly call with Trump (Trump made a congratulatory call two weeks after the election) than he did with PM Carney. That’s not to say that I expect “51st State” talk to start up for Quebec. But it’s worth noting that the election went in a way that was apparently worse for Ottowa.

      Someone also linked a new Internet Hitler video in which Carney (Hitler) finds out that the EU will only grant him associate member status (click View on X) –

      Shaughn.SGT(ret) (@PrairieVeteran) ·

      But Sir, it's literally your resume. 😆😆😆

      This is the best one in a long time.

      It made me spit out my coffee. Ya…. it did. 🤭😆 pic.twitter.com/yrAVycikyQ

      View on X

      And even that’s no longer the case, as the associate member status has been blocked.

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    3. Especially if the best haircut is a 400$ one that is given on the tarmac of a busy airport tying up all flights for 2 hours.

      Those haircuts rately enthuse the voters.

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  5. Then there is “term limits”. Term limits, in the year of our Lord 2026 when we know how deep and how evil the evil deep state is… Sure, let’s have an ever-rotating wheel of incumbents who don’t know what they’re doing so the deep state can march on unimpeded.

    Yes. So much yes. Every time I see someone bring up term limits on AOSHQ or in person, it drives me crazy. What we need are term limits for congressional staff and anyone in an unelected position of authority in the bureaucracies. The fact that an Anthony Fauci could kill people both during AIDS in the eighties and during COVID forty years later is utterly insane.

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    3. There are certain positions the different governmental offices can demand resignations from, from the oval office down through senate and congressional. Hear about it for presidential, but rarely congress or senate. My take? The resignations do not go deep enough. Departments need gutting.

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    4. Yeah, we were an early adopter of Term Limits here in California. IMO, it’s made things worse because people know that the voters can’t hold them accountable for more than one (I think) reelection campaign.

      We also adopted non-partisan redistricting. The Democrats promptly took it over.

      I’m ashamed to say that I voted for both.

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      1. The loophole is that since term limits are per position, they just revolving-door to another thing – the local dim bulb county board of supes guy termed out, and instead of enjoying well deserved obscurity, he is now drawing a paycheck as our local dim bulb state senator, because the Party decided to slot him up and set up the ballot choices so he’d win.

        It should be term limits per person on any gov job, and either elected or appointed to keep them from clumping up in the powerful state boards and commissions.

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    5. “What we need are term limits for congressional staff and anyone in an unelected position of authority in the bureaucracies.”

      That is a novel and interesting re-arrangement of the deck chairs on the Titanic.

      What you do if you want the unelected bureaucrats well and truly done is a tax cut. The slow death of ten thousand cuts. Let their budgets bleed slowly away over 20 years, and they will all find something else to do.

      But I’d sooner see it all happen at once, a sledge hammer party of destruction in the china shop of federal bureaucracy. BREAK EVERYTHING. No sacred cow left un-gored.

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    6. We also need to scale back their bloated salaries and eliminate government employee unions. Bureaucrats are paid far more than comparable workers doing real jobs, and they are almost impossible to fire no matter how bad their job performance. ‘Educators’ (which includes useless overpaid school bureaucrats) convicted of molesting students are almost impossible to fire! 😡

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  6. On the “minor differences” between the parties in “greater than two parties systems”, according to one European (on another site) the “major difference” between the socialist parties and the fascist parties is that the fascists love Putin. [Sarcastic Grin]

    Mind you, I think the “loves Putin” really means “they don’t hate Putin hard enough”. [Evil Grin]

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    1. Some of the “Love Putin” types may in fact just be people who don’t want Putin to suicide Russia.

      We once used China to counterbalance Russia. I think Trump and some analysts have hoped to keep Russia in a state to counterbalance China.

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  8. I don’t understand how Rogan is as popular as he is. If someone came to me 25 years ago and told me that the guy getting 7th billing on NBC’s Newsradio would become one of the most popular podcasters in the country, I’d ask them what they were smoking. And then there are people like Theon Von, for when Rogan is too…intellectual.

    He lost me completely when he had Gad Saad on and he seriously guessed that there were 500 million Jews in the world.

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    1. The secret of his success is reportedly (I’ve only seen one or two of his interviews) that he’s an even-handed interviewer who shows interest in what his interviewee is talking about no matter how outlandish the subject is.

      That’s it.

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  9. Socialists have always had the “no enemies on the left” until they get power. Then it’s eliminate all our allies quickly, so they can’t do what we just did. See Lenin and his so-called Bolsheviks.

    Also last century, “independents” running for president gave us two of our worst presidents ever. Teddy Roosevelt and his Bullmoose party gave us the despicable racist Woodrow Wilson. Ross Perot and his hatred for the Bush family saddled us with Bill Clinton. To be fair though, third party candidates also gave us Abraham Lincoln in 1860.

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    1. Indeed as soon as things get even sort of consolidated, the Bolsheviks reach for the Ice Picks, and the Mensheviks find they have fatal migraines. One thing the current crop of Bolsheviks don’t realize is that their erstwhile Islamic Allies are a step ahead of them in reaching for the pointy objects. If it weren’t going to screw our country up totally, it might almost be amusing to let the wanna be Aristoi get their just deserts.

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        1. Pretty sure the Soviet handlers of the Persian commies were telling them they could liquidate the clerics no problem as soon as they solidified power, right up until the clerics had them arrested and murdered all at once. As I understand the rumors, the escape from Iran for the KGB guys got pretty sporty there.

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  10. As to party affiliation, we were at the house of some of our artist Con friends, watching their moldy videotape of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, when one of them said something disparaging about Republicans. My wife, never shy, said, “We’re Republicans.” That brought out the astonished exclamation from the distaff side of the couple, “But you’re such nice people!”

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    1. That happened to a friend of mine several years ago. She was immediately made to feel unwelcome and they never spoke to her again.

      For some people, seeing others as human beings is conditioned on not ever expressing “non-human” thoughts.

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  11. Previous to the current lurching ever more leftward single party overlordship here in the Formerly Golden State, there was a significant fraction of those registered as “Independent” (specifically “No Party Preference” voters) who were disgusted with the Dems because they were not communist enough. We also had “Peace and Freedom” (really communist) and a couple other tiny parties keeping the big-L Libertarian Party company down-ballot, but you only got to vote for your party’s candidates in the primary so they didn’t get to play in the pond selecting the people who actually could get elected.

    The current rules are complicated – the overlord party passed fully open primaries, but IIRC there was a court case, so now the rules as summarized by the DuckDuckGo clanker don’t let anyone not registered for the GOP vote for their choice from the Republican primary slate:

    In California, independent voters (No Party Preference voters) can vote for candidates in the presidential primaries of the American Independent Party, Democratic Party, and Libertarian Party, provided they request the appropriate ballot. If they do not request a party ballot, they will receive a nonpartisan ballot that does not include presidential candidates.

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    1. Note this matters less here than in Free America due to the withered vestigial nature of the CA GOP, but it does prevent “primary poisoning” strategies, especially in smaller rightish districts, where other parties flood the GOP primary with votes for spoiler candidates.

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      1. This year in Massachusetts ballot question 3 is a push for essentially the California Style jungle primary. I’m hoping it won’t pass. Amazingly, many of the unions are coming out against it. As the jungle primaries favor a dominant party, and presently the Democrats are the dominant party and usually beloved by the unions, I’m wondering what the heck is going on.

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        1. The Reader concludes that a jungle primary reduces the power of the unions to dictate / control the nominee. One of the Democrats running won’t be beholden to the unions.

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  12. Here in rural northern Nevada, a lot of people register Independent because the Dems are lunatics and the Republicans keep stabbing us in the back.

    I registered Libertarian in 1989, the day that Bush the First stood in a drizzle, surrounded by armed cops and machinegun-toting personal bodyguards, and told the world that Americans don’t need Scary-Looking Guns(tm) and full-capacity magazines, and can’t be trusted with them. I had worked with one of the largest county committees in the Republican Party, and had helped California’s greatest governor become one of America’s greatest presidents, but when Lee Atwater (Party chairman) laughed and said he wasn’t worried, because “gun owners have nowhere else to go,” I cut up my voter registration card and FedExed it to him, with a photocopy of my new registration form. His response? “You’ll be back by the next election.”

    Never went back. Nearly 40 years, in 6 states. I will sometimes vote for WORTHY Republicans — or sometimes to block the more frootloop Dems — but for all of these years, candidates have had to WORK to get my vote, and work HARDER to get it a second time.

    In 2016, I didn’t vote FOR Trump, I voted AGAINST the Hildebeast. In 2020 and 2024, Trump EARNED my votes. But at lower levels, I don’t throw away my vote by giving it to Republicans who have proven to be scumbags (and that’s about half of them, including my current governor). If I have to be led by people who can’t be trusted, it might as well be Dems, because they are the experts in the field.

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    1. Please don’t. The democrats can and will destroy us from the legislature. I’ll vote for a scumbag GOP to put the Dem party in its grave, and communism with it.
      After that, with what emerges, I can be a swing voter. I don’t think you owe the GOP your vote, no. I think you owe the Red Green Alliance your active, fiery hate though.
      We are so close to a Heinlein future, but two things can stop us: Communism and Islam.
      And they’re allied. In the Democrats.

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      1. Like I said, I will vote against the more frootloop Dems (such as the Hildebeast).

        WHICH Heinlein future? “Beyond This Horizon”? “Starship Troopers”? There are elements of each that I strongly favor, but I’m not sure that I would want to be completely in one or the other. I really DON’T want “Revolt in 2100” or “Farnham’s Freehold” . . .and, yes, I can hear you winding up to remind me that the Dem/Islam/envirowhacko Axis of Weevils are working hard to impose such a future.

        The Democrats (like THRUSH) ( IYKYK) believe in the two-party system — the masters and the slaves, with themselves as the masters.

        But at the same time, we have to beat down the tentacles of the Cthuloid RP establishment, and the only way to do that is to not keep supporting their designated candidates. Publicly support the good ones, publicly shame the bad ones (even if you end up having to vote for them).

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        2. Keep voting for commie Demokrats and you’ll be living in ‘Caliphate’. ☹️

          You might feel vindicated, but I don’t want the country to go down the crapper for your lofty principles.

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        3. “…vote against the more frootloop Dems…”

          See, the thing is, if you don’t vote against all the Dems to keep them in the minority, you are handing the frootloop Dems committee chairs and rulemaking power as the “moderate, slightly more sane” Dems trade horses to keep that thin majority.

          Drawing that “crazy” red line somewhere inside the donk party ranks ignores that they are busy being fully crazy captured.

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      2. Even if somehow a Democrat turned out to be a responsible, Constitution-honoring, uncorrupted public servant, his seat in the legislature would give his party power in assigning committee seats and might throw control entirely over to the DSAmocrat leadership.

        It ain’t (just) the man###critter. It’s his seat.

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    2. Kaze, RINO season is the primaries. Take as many heads as possible.

      In the General election, vote for the Republican. Democrats are ALWAYS worse.

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            1. Regarding judges, I was raised in the justice system — my dad was a detective, my mom a court reporter, HER dad was a detective, and we had a hanai uncle who was TWICE asked by Reagan if he would consider becoming a justice, first on the California court, then on the US court (his health didn’t permit accepting the second offer).

              They ALL told me to NEVER vote for a judge, unless I knew their record.

              Keeping the Senate in Republican hands is a Good Thing, even if so many of them are members of the Cthuloid Wing of the Republican Party, especially to get judges.

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          1. But Pence is an UNprincipled jackass. One can learn, the other refuses to.

            That’s the problem, the Dems DO have exceptions which prove the rule. Way too FEW of them, but every once in a while . . .if Fetterman were in a primary against either of the two fruitcakes that Nevada has now (Rosen and Masto), I would temporarily register Dem to give him my vote. Or if he were running against Pence.

            I want the Republicans to know that I am likely to vote for Trump’s choice of successor — and NOT likely to vote for another McCain, Dole or Romney. Romney especially annoys me, because he and Reid together embarrassed my church.

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              1. But individuals LEAD parties. Without such elites as Cheesy Chuck Schemer, AOC, Schiff, etc, the Democrat Party would be far more close to sanity. Who ever thought that we would MISS the Dem Congressional leadership of 1980 — or that the Congressional Red Army would take over so firmly?

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          2. And also remember it was not Fetterman or Pence, it was Fetterman or Dr. Oz, who would have been fine and buttressed the Senate majority.

            The fact that post-recovery Fetterman is not full crazy donk is gravy, but he still caucuses with the donks.

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            2. I was looking at the wider political landscape. I can think of few doctrines that Fetterman espouses that I would agree with, but he at least THINKS, and is willing to step all over Dem party line in public. I see him as the Dem counterpart to Trump, shaking the palm trees to make the monkeys chatter.

              Pence is just a jackass Establishment drone, who could be equally at home in either party. We’re not smart enough to know what’s good for us, the Party is mother, the Party is father.

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                1. I actually had some specific people in mind. Until recently, my day job was to deliver medical gases, and you wouldn’t believe how many of the staff at care homes would be sitting outside, smoking away, not thinking about how their patients got there in the first place.

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      3. This, right here. Primary the absolute sheet out of them and if there’s no good other option, either run yourself or guilt some righteous angryman into doing it for you. Then whatever one wins, vote that guy while holding your nose. The next few years are for canvassing for replacements and loading up all the dirty stuff to give your guy on the idiot.

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  13. that any change — real change — is slow. Very slow. You get substantive societal change in two ways” Slow and (relatively) peaceful, or fast and bloody. I’ll take slow thank you very much.

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    1. I dunno, Trump has gone with “fast and bloody,” because he knows he doesn’t have enough time to really steer things where they need to go. Watch how he works, it’s like Penn & Teller: Make a lot of noise and motion over here, while the real work is being done where nobody’s looking. As Jerry Doyle put it, the media is getting people to focus on The Grapefruit — the whole Greenland thing is a perfect example. Trump made an off-the-wall comment that got everyone yowling and analyzing The Grapefruit, then when everyone just assumed it was more Trump hyperbole, he springs the new agreement with Denmark on them. They had been so focused on The Grapefruit that they didn’t get a chance to screw up what he was actually getting done.

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  14. We are from sterner stuff in The West than we want to admit.  It has gone out of fashion. – John Stark, who ran the gauntlet, took away his captor’s club, and won his freedom. – The “Plymouth Pilgrims” of the 85th New York who survived Andersonville Prison and returned home.

    There are millions of similar if less publicized stories–maybe even about you. Be of good courage.  Trust in the LORD.

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  15. In a country where “Far Left” (Mao? Lenin?) and “Far Right” (Hitler? Mussolini?) both describe shades of Socialism, we can’t really use those terms meaningfully. Ayn Rand’s terminology comes closer, though not of course as the Libertarians have applied it. There are additional considerations, including religious affections (per Jonathan Edwards et al) which are seldom even, er, considered.

    Most of us fall between the extremes, but whether that’s a square à la the “smallest political quiz,” a disk, or a sphere, what it is least of all is a line. I see the American political landscape as a cloud of points, with a few thicker and a lot of thinner areas, sort of a nebula, and gravitational physics plays a role.

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      2. I liked who they chose for the Press Secretary. Expected to see in small print: “Line up for a trip to the Train Station.” Cue the sinister music.

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        1. Yes, and Arthur’s father-in-law in Excalibur. Also appeared in a number of Shakespeare stage plays.

          One story circulating around today is that he wanted to play the title character in ‘Othello’, but he didn’t want to wear blackface. So he was the only white character in the entire stage play cast.

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    3. RIP Captain.

      Excellence in acting in diverse roles across many decades. Regarding his contributions outside acting I defer comment in respect for his passing.

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  18. We’ve had disagreements since before we were founded, the main one led to the civil war.
    I don’t have to agree with your adult decisions; to agree you have the Right to make those decisions as an adult. I don’t need to be on your side to agree that you have a Right to be on the side you choose. Those on the left can’t agree with that, if they did they wouldn’t be shooting people, doxing people, or trying to ruin their lives. We Are Not The Same, We Are Not Equal and you are F*cking Evil.

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      1. Yeah. Fiber Arts. I used to have a grand old time competing in Nerd Wars on Ravelry. And the Olympic Games contests. Gender insanity killed them.

        Gender Wars. I hates ’em. I hates ’em.

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  20. Once again, I point to The Ballad of the White Horse:

    “What though they come with scroll and pen,
    And grave as a shaven clerk,
    By this sign you shall know them,
    That they ruin and make dark;

    …

    “By terror and the cruel tales
    Of curse in bone and kin,
    By weird and weakness winning,
    Accursed from the beginning,
    By detail of the sinning
    And denial of the sin;

    “By thought a crawling ruin,
    By life a leaping mire,
    By a broken heart in the breast of the world,
    And the end of the world’s desire;

    “By God and man dishonoured,
    By death and life made vain,
    Know ye the old barbarian,
    The barbarian come again —

    It’s a long poem and uneven, but there are beautiful places, and places where Chesterton just nails it. This is an old evil, a crawling ruin, with “new” make-up just now going stale.

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  21. The difficult problem with Wind Farms & Solar Farms lies in the twin realities of Power from the wind varies as the CUBE of the wind speed, and Power from the Sun varies with the 4 Seasons and your Latitude Number.

    The Solar Power available North of Latitude 60 is rapidly decreasing, with places north of the Arctic Circle soon burning Diesel Fuel to spin their Alternators.

    The Wind Farms suffer from icing, from Hoarfrost, and from the need for heating their lubricating oil in their Nacelle, high above the ground drift blizzards.

    I live in Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada, roughly at 50 Degrees North Latitude, roughly at 3000 feet above sea level. There are a great many Wind Farms west of us, due to the powerful Chinook Winds. Unfortunately the Wind Farms have to shut down during the most powerful Chinooks, to avoid over speeding and throwing their blades away. The silliness of shutting down coal-fired Power Stations, to “depend” on Renewable wind & sun power is possible only using Green Math.

    Yes, we have quite a few Hydropower Dams, but they are not enough, and are also subject to the 4 Seasons realities on stream flow.

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  23. Pingback: Instapundit » Blog Archive » THERE IS NO VIRTUE IN BEING “INDEPENDENT” IF YOU LET THE COMMIES WIN:  Stuck In The Middle With Yo

  24. I just received another FINAL NOTICE from The State complaining that they still have not received the fraud-by-mail ballot:

    This is your FINAL NOTICE before voter participation data is updated and made public.

    And on the back is a great big DON’T PUT YOUR VOTING RECORD AT RISK in 32 point bold type. At least it wasn’t in parentheses, and quotated. 😁

    Like my voting record is any of their damn business, or I should be the least bit concerned about what they think of it.

    All those government busybodies can fuck off, eat shit, and drop dead. 😡

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