Shock: Hypothetical Commander-in-Thief Biden Would Keep Deep State Democrat Operator Christopher Wray as FBI Head, Should He Successfully Steal the Election
The guy who parrots Biden's pro-antifa propaganda that antifa is "just an idea" and therefore can't be the subject of a law enforcement investigation is going to be kept on by Commander in Thief Biden, should he succeed in Stealing America.
But President Trump, who has had a contentious relationship with Wray throughout his tenure at the FBI, could still fire him at any point before he leaves office on Jan. 20.
Two senior White House officials told Fox News in October that Trump was considering removing Wray from his post should he win reelection.
"Advisers have consistently told POTUS to wait until after the election if he wants to replace Wray," one official told Fox News in October.
Time's Up -- the #MeToo Organization Which Raised Money, Supposedly to Pay the Legal Expenses of Women Making Accusations -- Spent Almost No Money on Their Legal Fund But Spent a Lot of Money on Salaries for Themselves
You don't say. You don't say. You don't say. You don't say. You don't say. You don't say. You don't say. You don't say you don't say you don't say you don't say you don't say you don't say you don't say you don't say you don't say.
Time's Up, the anti-sexual harassment organization created by Hollywood celebrities in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal, has spent big bucks on executive salaries but has skimped on helping actual victims, according to a new report.
The group raised an impressive $3,670,219 during its founding year of 2018, but spent $1,407,032 on salaries and just $312,001 on the Time’s Up Legal Defense Fund for victims of sexual harassment, the New York Post reported, citing tax filings.
In addition, the group reportedly spent tens of thousands of dollars on advertising, and $940,328 on "legal" costs, with the bulk of that figure going to Arnold & Porter Kaye Scholer, the multinational law firm.
Tina Tchen, who served as an assistant to former President Obama and chief of staff for Michelle Obama, is currently Time's Up president and chief executive officer. She is also co-founder of the Time's Up Legal Defense Fund.
She's also the corrupt apparatchik who dialed up Kim Foxx to let her know that, as a Friend of Michelle Obama's, she would sure appreciate it if Foxx went easy on Jussie Smollett for his criminal race hoax.
The charity-rating watchdog Charity Navigator has a rule of thumb that a good charity -- not a scam organization -- should spend 75% of its donations on its actual mission, and only 25% on administration and salaries.
Time's Up spent 38% of donations on salaries alone. That doesn't include their big-spending on travel for their pampered graft-queens.
Democrats have a saying to excuse their graft: "We're doing well by doing good." That is, we're doing financially well for ourselves by doing political good for... whoever they're supposedly helping these days.
Democrat politicians really supercharged their thirst for lucre under Clinton -- my, how large the Clintons lived -- and now again since the Obamas.
The grift must end.
All of the DC grifter class must be destroyed. The perpetual welfare queens sucking the teat off the generosity, and credulousness, of people outside the DC grifter class must be forced out of their sinecures and actually work for the living for once, just to get some sense of what life is like in non-DC-Welfare-Queen America.
From Time's Up to National Review to Heritage: The endless grift must end.
President Trump's 2016 campaign associate Carter Page claims in a new lawsuit that an FBI agent used a fake name during interviews -- another potential breach of protocol in the FBI's Russia investigation.
..
Page says FBI agent Stephen Somma introduced himself as Steve Holt during five interviews.
Former FBI agent James Gagliano, who worked 25 years at the bureau, including in supervisory roles, told The Daily Caller that he had "never heard of an FBI agent going undercover as a different FBI agent" and "I'd never have authorized it."
The FBI did not immediately respond to The Post’s request for comment.
"Steve Holt!" was a character name and catchphrase on Arrested Development.
Was this Steven Somma's idea of an... inside joke? Conducting an interview in a criminal investigation in the guise of a side-character on Arrested Development?
What the fuck is going on with this corrupt clownshow?
Below, Viva Frei's analysis of the lawsuit.
Not only does it seem like a slam-dunk on its face, but Viva Frei notes that the government will feel great pressure to settle, to avoid discovery.
If there's one thing the corrupt FBI and DOJ cannot permit, it's transparency.
I wonder if the government will then pay the judgement against Comey et al., and I also wonder what justification they would offer for using taxpayer money to pay the judgment of disgraced, corrupt former employees.
I wonder how this unexpected situation might have randomly come to pass.
Over the past two months, Minneapolis police have logged more than 125 carjackings in the city, a troubling surge that authorities had largely linked to small groups of marauding teens. But an increasing number of adults have been arrested in recent weeks for the same crime.
Within a one-hour period Saturday morning, police reported three separate carjackings in southeast Minneapolis, including one where an elderly woman was struck on the head. Such attacks are up 537% this month when compared with last November.
"The numbers are staggering," said police spokesman John Elder. "It defies all civility and any shred of common human decency."
Police say suspects tend to approach victims on the street, sidewalk or parking lot -- often while they’re distracted with routine tasks. A significant number of armed stickups have targeted seniors and unaccompanied women at their vehicles on Minneapolis' South Side.
Minneapolis didn't even keep track of carjackings as a separate category until recently because the crime was so rare as to not be deserving of its own column. But now there are so many carjackings they've gone back and noted which armed robberies were in fact carjackings.
Well, he says that he thinks "defund the police" is a bad political slogan. It's bad for messaging purposes.
Not that it's a bad policy.
He suggests the left go back to using euphemisms to disguise how extremists their actual agenda is. He wants them to stop saying "defund the police" and go back to using the euphemism "police reform."
"The Squad" is disputing Obama. And I have to admit, at least they're more honest about their extremist agenda than the mercenary grifter Obama is.
We lose people in the hands of police. It’s not a slogan but a policy demand. And centering the demand for equitable investments and budgets for communities across the country gets us progress and safety. https://t.co/Vu6inw4ms7
The murders of generations of unarmed Black folks by police have been horrific. Lives are at stake daily so I’m out of patience with critiques of the language of activists.
Whatever a grieving family says is their truth.
And I’ll never stop fighting for their justice & healing.
With all due respect, Mr. President—let’s talk about losing people. We lost Michael Brown Jr. We lost Breonna Taylor. We’re losing our loved ones to police violence.
It’s not a slogan. It’s a mandate for keeping our people alive. Defund the police. https://t.co/Wsxp1Y1bBi
Columbia Law Hires James Comey as a "Leader-in-Residence"
—Ace
One by one every institution with prestige sets its legacy on fire because Orange Man Bad.
Former FBI Director James Comey will begin teaching at Columbia Law School next year.
The school announced on Tuesday that Comey will be a senior research scholar and part of the Reuben Mark Initiative for Organizational Character and Leadership beginning in January. He will also lead a seminar called "Lawyers and Leaders," according to its website.
Comey will take on a role as one of two "Leaders-in-Residence" through the Mark Initiative's Leader-in-Residence Program, which invites executives from government agencies, corporations and top law firms to teach classes at Columbia and share their professional experience with students through advising and engaging in other programing at the school.
These institutions abandoned everything that gave them prestige originally, but demand that you still treat them as if they had that prestige.
They seem to have a real problem with things having definite, non-negotiable, unchangeable properties, properties that define it for what it is. In other words, a thing is a thing, and if a thing is one thing, it is not another thing.
This is why progressives like the 'blank slate' view of human nature. Because for them, there is really no such thing as intrinsic human nature. They want human nature to be whatever they want, and not what it objectively is.
And it also why they play stupid games with gender identities, because why should biological reality dictate your gender? They've been reduced to calling women "vulva owners" now. Which implies if you don't like your vulva, you can take it back to the store for a refund and get something else. Presuming it's still under warranty, of course.
Progressives are in open revolt against God's created order (or nature, if you prefer) and the idea of having to submit to the limitations of an external reality imposed on them outside their control and regardless of their feelings is something they find deeply offensive.
I remember a few years ago when Lena Dunham got pissy on social media because she had met the then-NY Giants wide receiver Odell Beckham at a party and he didn't come on to her.
Lena lives in a world where she is off-the-charts sexy, rather than a spoiled, unhappy, overweight woman approaching middle age whose continual pursuit of self-indulgence has brought her no long-term satisfaction or contentment, and resents having the untruth of her beliefs shoved in her face by something as innocuous as a stray interaction at a social gathering. And so why wouldn't an alpha male like Beckham be immediately drawn to her? It's just not FAIR, she thinks to herself. And ao another bit of bitterness, another pellet of resentment is added to her the huge pile she has already accumulated.
The same sort of thing can be seen in the classic interview of Jordan Peterson byBBC bint Cathy Newman. She seemed genuinely offended that his lectures and Youtube videos had attracted an audience of young males. Because many of the males are white, she suggested that he was some sort of racist, which is a patently absurd accusation. And if the young men are better men after listening to Peterson, why is she complaining? Then I thought, it has to be because Peterson's work as a clinical psychologist is based on the principle of objective reality, i.e. young men, being young men, and not young women (or young lobsters), must of necessity have certain needs and requirements in order to function well.
It's sort of like a car. Jordan Peterson's book says that cars must have gas and oil in order to function as they were intended (ah, there it is again) but Ms. Newman throws a fit and says, that's wrong, I ought to be able to use peanut butter instead of oil and put sugar water in the gas tank and if that doesn't work, if the car breaks down, there's something WRONG, not with the car, but with society and we'll have to reorganize EVERYTHING, from top to bottom, in order to fix this. And simply using gas and oil is bad because it doesn't address the deeper issues of social inequality.
And it's racist to boot.
Better to seek out and discover our limitations and learn how best to live with them than pretend we don't have any and get to the point where he come to believe that the 'BRIDGE OUT' sign we just passed on the road doesn't apply to us.
One last thing: this is why it is pretty much impossible to talk to progressives. Because it's not that we disagree on abortion, or socialism, or pronouns, but ultimately, on the nature of reality itself.
(if you know of any aggregators or worthy news sites not on this list, please comment or e-mail me. Also, if you think some site shouldn't be on this list, please also let me know, and your reasons why, and I'll check it out for myself.)
Harsh, But Fair:
Meanwhile, In Delaware:
AoSHQ Weekly Prayer List
Please submit any prayer requests to “Annie’s Stew” at apaslo atsign hotmail dot com.
Prayer Requests:
10/7 – Lee Also requests prayers for her good friend who needs a lung transplant. He’s been on the list for a while, but it’s getting to the point where he needs it sooner than later. She also would like prayers for the family of the person whose untimely death will give life to her friend. They have lost someone they love. But their generosity will help her friend.
11/18 Update – Her friend has moved closer to the hospital, which means he’s up higher on the list. He’s getting rehab in preparation for the transplant, so keep praying for him, please. And prayers also for the family who lost a loved on and allowed their loved one’s organs to give new life to people like her friend.
10/28 – redc1c4 said Resident 3vil lost her job a week ago. She’s been hoping to retire in the near future, and this puts a hold on those plans. Prayers are requested for gainful employment soon so she can finally retire and enjoy the fruits of her years of hard work.
11/17 Update – She got a new job last Friday. The downside is it’s 290 miles away. The upside may allow for a transition to partial retirement as a consultant. Prayers of thanks for a possible way forward!
11/1 – Hrothgar requested prayers for his elderly sister-in-law, who suffered a head injury in a fall. Thanks to the Lord that the injury wasn’t too severe, requiring only stitches, but she tested positive for Covid at the hospital, and her family will need to quarantine. Prayers are requested that it all turns out okay for everyone.
11/10 - Doof requests prayers for Donna&&&&&V, who is depressed to the point of being suicidal.
11/11 – Central Scrutinizer requests prayers for his buddy Don, who was just admitted to the hospital with Covid. He is 74 years old, and his wife is freaking out.
11/16 – Adriane the Critic requests prayers for her friend “D”. He is fighting a very aggressive brain cancer and the doctors’ prognosis is horrifically short. Prayers are also requested for his exhausted wife and young children, and strength for his sister and family, who are doing a great deal of travel to try and be with him in the little visits they are allowed.
11/17 – redc1c4 has an aunt, Anisa, with bone cancer, and she wants him to be her patient advocate. Redc1c4 asks for prayers for strength and healing for her, and insight for her doctors, and safe travels for him, as she lives at the bottom of California, and over 100 miles from the treatment facility.
11/18 – OurCountryisScrewed asks for prayers for his mom, who passed away very early in the morning of Nov. 11. Please pray for the repose of her soul. Also, a prayer for his father and siblings as they adjust to the loss of the heart and soul of their family. He’d also like a prayer of thanksgiving for the nursing staff at a certain upstate NY hospital who were absolutely fantastic caring for all of them.
For Healing:
9/23 – Dr_No requests continued prayers for his daughter Megan. She had surgery for cancer earlier, and now has had the 2nd of 12 FOLFOX chemo treatments for her Stage III-C cancer. It’s been rough – fatigue, weight loss, cold sensitivity, jaw pain. She’s losing an average of 6.5 pounds per week now and has lost approximately 25 pounds since her surgery and beginning chemo. Her attitude is terrific despite what she’s going through, but it’ll be a rough slog between now and January.
10/8 Update – Megan was admitted to the hospital for bi-lateral pulmonary embolisms. Luckily, the embolisms responded to treatment. Dr_No says thanks again for sending words up for Megan!
11/18 Update – Megan has had the 6th of 12 chemo treatments. She is still having the symptoms above and reactions to the FOLFOX series. Her mom bought her a pair of Neuropathy gloves, and those seem to help reduce the pain and tingling in her hands. She is still losing 3-5 pounds per week. Dr_No thanks the Horde for the prayers for her.
10/24 – Kerncon requests prayers for his wife. His wife is currently in the ICU following a massive kidney infection, which resulted in the removal of one of them. She is currently stable and slowly recovering. They hope to be able to get her out of ICU in the next few days. Her remaining kidney hasn’t resumed functioning, and it could take weeks to recover, if at all. Please keep them in your prayers for a swift recovery, and for regaining full function to her remaining kidney.
11/24 Update – Kerncon says his wife will be leaving inpatient care on Sunday, and her remaining kidney function is near normal. Please keep praying for healing and strength as they transition from hospital/rehab to home care. She especially needs healing for her right foot now, as there is some muscle damage which could lead to a big quality of life impact if it doesn’t return.
10/27 – Caiwyn requests prayers for his father, who has been battling pancreatic cancer for 3 years. His chemotherapy treatments are no longer effective enough to justify continuing with them, and they are being discontinued. Prayers for him, and for whatever more time God could possibly give him with his family.
11/16 – Hrothgar received a very recent and completely unexpected diagnosis of a non-trivial (and rather rare) cancer. He is in the very initial phase of surgery, tests, diagnoses, and evaluation of treatment options, so at this stage, he knows just enough to be concerned, but right now has no idea how this will roll out. He would greatly appreciate prayers from the Horde for skilled doctors/staff and recovery if that is in God’s plan.
11/18 – Agamemnon requests prayers for a colleague who has Wuhan19 and is hospitalized on oxygen. The staff is having trouble controlling her fever and she has some co-morbidities that exacerbate her condition.
11/25 Update – Agamemnon reports that his colleague is now home, and though she is still on O2, she is able to ambulate, take solids, and liquids, and is feeling much better. Thanks to all for their prayers!
11/29 – Pennsyltucky asks for prayers for complete healing from Covid.
11/30 – IronMikeGolf has had a hard time with Covid and was in the hospital. Prayers are needed for healing.
11/30 – AnnaPuma had a heart attack and a stent was put in. Prayers are requested for complete healing, and that the Veterans paperwork would go through smoothly.
11/30 – mpfs was having an 8-hour infusion to help with her MS. Prayers are asked for, that the symptoms would be much lessened.
For submission guidelines and other relevant info, please contact Annie's Stew, who is managing the prayer list. You can contact her at apaslo at-sign hotmail dot com.
If you see a prayer request posted in a thread comment, feel free to copy and paste it and e-mail it to Annie's Stew. She tries to keep up with the requests in the threads, but she's not here all of the time, so she may not see it unless you e-mail it to her.
Please note: Prayer requests are generally removed after five weeks or so unless we receive an update.
Please remember the Prayer of St. Francis:
http://www.prayerguide.org.uk/stfrancis.htm
Monday Who Dis: Another Hollywood couple, Anna Paquin and Stephen Moyer have been married since 2010 and have two children. They were both in HBO's sparkly vampire series True Blood.
Today's Edition Of The Morning Rant Is Brought To You By Pan Seared Filet Mignon With Red Wine Sauce:
Good morning, kids. Midweek and the beat goes on in this nightmare. From the unconfirmed, wild stories involving CIA director Gina Haspel and a supposed raid in Germany where Dominion/Smarttmatic computers and servers were seized to the direct testimony of witnesses claiming hundreds of thousands of phony ballots were driven across state lines to Pennsylvania and the other mass ballot dump sites, confirmation and corroborating evidence to the greatest crime in American history - the theft of a national presidential election - is mounting. On a somewhat related note, legal eagle and Constitutional maven extraordinaire Mark Levin makes the salient point regarding evidence that since this is a civil case and not a criminal proceeding (so far), much of the hard evidence that people like Tucker Carlson and others were slamming Sidney Powell about comes out in a discovery process over time (again, correct my phraseology if as I suspect I'm mangling this point).
Aside from the huge question mark we spoke of yesterday, those who will ultimately adjudicate this actually living up to their sworn duty to strike down this travesty and restore President Trump's victory to him and the American people, this brings up the time factor. It's running out, and fast. Team Trump has until December 8th to finish its legal challenges while the Electoral College convenes to cast its vote on December 14th. I will assume there are no Dominion voting machines or Mail-In ballots being trucked in across state lines. And I'm not being sarcastic. Somebody somewhere has got to pull the emergency brake and stop the crazy train from hurtling us off a cliff.
Pro-Trump lawmakers have asked the Supreme Court of the United States to nullify Pennsylvania's certification of President-Elect Joe Biden's victory in the state, Bloomberg reported Tuesday evening.
The effort, led by pro-Trump Republican Pennsylvania Rep. Mike Kelly, maintains that the Pennsylvania General Assembly illegally adjusted mail-in ballot laws ahead of the 2020 election. Kelly's argument is the same one that the Pennsylvania Supreme Court rejected on Saturday. The decision now rests with Justice Samuel Alito, who handles emergency requests relating to Pennsylvania...
... Kelly's request is the second new pro-Trump legal action to be undertaken Tuesday. Trump's campaign also filed another lawsuit in Wisconsin seeking the invalidation of more than 220,000 votes, saying the state had improperly counted mail-in ballots.
Trump's legal challenges have been thrown out or withdrawn in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan and Nevada, and his remaining challenges are dwindling.
While I commend Mike Kelly and other Congressmen from his state and in the others that were fleeced, I think his time would have been better spent on traveling to Harrisburg, getting his colleagues in the state legislature together and reminding them that they have the power, the Constitutional authority and the moral obligation to assign their electors to President Trump. Article II is absolutely clear. I mean, if Kelly et al believe their state's election was stolen, corrupted, fraudulent etc., they have the means right here and now to set things right. Going to Samuel Alito, who I have no doubt actually sees this thing the same way Kelly does given the criminal contempt shown for him - twice - when he issued his injunctions against the election officials, to me is looking more and more like a cheap attempt at political cover for him and his state-level chums to avoid stepping up and doing the right thing. And then of course placing the blame on the Supreme Court after claiming they did all they could. Don't make me vomit.
Six Senate and House Republicans are expected this week to engage with elected Democrats and amnesty advocates, from corporate donors to the open borders lobby, on "building bipartisanship on immigration reform."
Thursday, Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL), Thom Tillis (R-NC), Susan Collins (R-ME), and John Cornyn (R-TX) and Representatives Mario Diaz-Balart (R-FL) and Will Hurd (R-TX) are to participate in a discussion with Senators Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Dick Durbin (D-IL), Robert Menendez (D-NJ), and Chris Coons (D-DE) about striking a deal on amnesty for illegal aliens in some form.
The event is being hosted by the pro-amnesty, pro-mass immigration American Business Immigration Coalition which is made up of a series of business donors such as the United States Chamber of Commerce and the open borders lobby like the George Soros-funded United We Dream organization.
I have no words to describe my absolute visceral loathing for the GOP. America is days away from drawing its last breath and these criminals are consorting with the worst enemy in this nation's 244-year and soon to end history - The Democrat Party - to seal our fate. Forget Donald Trump; every Republican who ever overcame the Democrats' electoral fraud to accidentally win a pre-rigged election has been met with hatred, vitriol, obstruction and every effort to undermine their agendas for their entire terms by every elected Democrat politician from county dog catcher on up. Yet our side always knuckles under and accepts their narrative insofar as opposing only the cost and speed at which our nation turns into a socialist shit hole. This latest move, along with the past four years now capped off with the calls for Trump to accept losing and move on just underscores what we have known all along: the GOP is a wholly owned subsidiary of The Enemy. I mean, seriously; if these fucking traitors are already parlaying to erase our borders if, G-d forbid, they get away with stealing the election, what really is the point of the two Georgia senate seats going to Perdue and Loeffler?
"According to the Amistad Project -- which is part of the Thomas More Society -- the whistleblower affidavits are being used as evidence in litigation to ensure election integrity and the upholding of election laws in key battleground states, including Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin." Whistleblowers Allege Up To 300,000 COMPLETED BALLOTS Crossed State Lines In October
"If the Election Day shenanigans amount to a clear subversion of the results, Trump has a path to a remedy through the state legislatures of the relevant states." How Trump Gets Justice for Election Irregularities
"Fortunately, the Constitution has a way out of this insanity, without asking the Supreme Court to issue a ruling to reverse the election results, as it did in 2000 in Bush vs. Gore. Article 2 specifically says that legislatures have the ultimate power to specify the electors of their respective states." The Five Legislatures That Must Do Their Constitutional Duty to Confirm Trump's Reelection
"The officials certifying have made no effort to find out the truth, which to me, gives the state legislature the perfect reason to take over the conduct of this election because it's being conducted irresponsibly and unfairly," Giuliani said on Monday. Certified or Certifiable? Arizona Election Results Called Into Serious Question
WISCONSIN:
"Today's suit includes four cases with clear evidence of unlawfulness, such as illegally altering absentee ballot envelopes, counting ballots that had no required application, overlooking unlawful claims of indefinite confinement, and holding illegal voting events called Democracy in the Park. These unlawful actions affected no less than approximately 221,000 ballots out of over the three million ballots cast in Wisconsin." Trump Campaign Files Suit Over 221,000 Ballots In Wisconsin
"... the 'fugees from California, Washington, Texas, Colorado, Illinois, Oregon, Minnesota, Nevada, Florida, and Utah, in that order, fled to the state with Cactus League baseball, more conservative politics, the Grand Canyon, and the Red Rocks of Sedona. And then they approved legal pot, the state's highest tax increase ever, and put Democrats in the highest offices -- the Senate and White House -- to ensure their new home will be every bit as expensive and over-regulated as the one from which they fled. Toke up, 'Zonies!" Just As We Feared -- California's Economic Refugees Ruined Arizona in the 2020 Election
CIVIL WAR 2.0: POST-ELECTION RIOTING, LEFTIST REIGN OF TERROR, WAR ON POLICE
"Averting our gaze from political hyperbole and violence empowers the mob." Lies and Violence
CHINESE CORONAVIRUS FICTIONS, FACTS AND AMERICA IMPRISONED
"The virus here is government -- or at least the incompetents who advise our rulers and cannot admit the legitimacy of dissension. Absent intervention, this virus may eventually kill the host organism." David Mamet Rips Experts Pushing Lockdowns
"[I] no longer see masks as simply a symbol of ignorance. I now see masks as a symbol of oppression, and the willingness of Americans to submit to that oppression, without a whimper. In fact, the mask [will] prevent anyone from really hearing that whimper. It tells everyone you are willing to be silenced and subjugated, like a dog." The Muzzle of Oppression
"So far in the USA, Ticketmaster is the only company that has come out and said you'll need proof of a vaccine or you are going to have to jump through testing hoops to be allowed into a venue. President Trump has never given any indication that he would ever force anyone to get the vaccine and so far Joe Biden has remained silent. However, liberal surrogates are already out there saying, Americans are 'not going to have much of a choice.'" Governments Are Planning on Letting Big Business Do Their Dirty Work to Enforce Chinese COVID Vaccine
"The pandemic revealed strikingly different outlooks on the balance between safety and freedom." A Red/Blue Risk Divide
* * * * *
"At the time of the dinner, such an outing would have been illegal in Breed's city of San Francisco, which had banned dining indoors or outdoors in a group larger than six people and with more than one household present. Three days after her French Laundry dinner, Breed banned indoor dining across her city." San Francisco Mayor Attended Ritzy Dinner Three Days Before Banning Indoor Dining
"The bill -- about a third of what Democrats passed in the House and less than half of what Donald Trump said he would agree to -- would provide extended unemployment benefits, more small business loans, and money for state and local governments." Bipartisan Group of Lawmakers Unveils $908 Billion Pandemic Relief Bill
"No statistic or scientific data can convince this governor he's done a thing wrong. Don't be shocked if he lands another 'yay me' book before this second wave hits its peak." Angel-of-Death Cuomo's Latest Audacious Hypocrisy
"Neal Katyal, the progressive lawyer who led the legal fight against the president's travel ban and urged the public to take an unforgiving stance toward those involved with child separation at the U.S. border, appeared in the Supreme Court on Tuesday to defend two corporations accused of abetting child slavery."
Anti-Trump Resistance Hero Neal Katyal Reps Corporation Accused of Child Slavery in Supreme Court
OFFICIAL DEMOCRAT PARTY-ENDORSED ANTI-SEMITISM, ANTI-CHRISTIANITY
Robert Spencer: "Once this is done, America will no longer be the racist, xenophobic place it has been during the Trump years, or since 1619, or whatever the Left is saying with smug intellectual certainty and moral superiority these days, and will once again rejoin the family of nations and resume performing its critical role of welcoming violent criminals from other lands." Biden's Immigration Plans Will Inundate Us with National Security Risks
FIRST AMENDMENT, CENSORSHIP, FAKE NEWS, MEDIA, BIG BROTHER TECH
"After the way Americans have been censored, gaslighted, and lied to, no one is obligated to accept anyone's narrative anymore." Five Quick Things: No, You Are Not Crazy
"New book challenges Silicon Valley bros' view of themselves as tech gods leading us into a digital promised land." Big Tech's Big Utopian Lies
Stoltenberg stated, "China is investing massively in new weapons. It is coming closer to us, from the Arctic to Africa... It does not respect fundamental human rights and tries to intimidate other countries." He said of Russia that it "is deploying more forces in our neighborhood, from the High North to Syria and Libya" and "as a result of the crises in Belarus and Nagorno-Karabakh." NATO Chief: China, Russia Upping Threat To West
PDT: "Section 230, which is a liability shielding gift from the U.S. to 'Big Tech' (the only companies in America that have it - corporate welfare!), is a serious threat to our National Security & Election Integrity. Our Country can never be safe & secure if we allow it to stand." Trump Threatens To Veto Defense Authorization Act Unless It Fully Terminates Section 230
"In addition to Joe Biden's physical weakness, he has the manifest moral weakness necessary to be the establishment's man: cupidity, agreeableness, and dishonesty." Back to Your Regularly Scheduled Wars
Lloyd Billingsley: "The terrorist massacre in San Bernardino five years ago foreshadows what we might expect under the 'Harris Administration' Kamala has been touting." Kamala and the Killers
"The Chinese government continually cracks down on 'Western values' in the classroom by sending state-sponsored inspectors to monitor teachers -- particularly in higher education -- for 'improper' remarks." (pfft, US academia's been cracking down on western values for decades! - jjs) Biden Education Lead: Chinese Communist Party Has Done "Magical Work"
ACTUAL SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY
Our intrepid science reporter with news of the Chi-Coms spreading yellow peril on green cheese: "We do however await real confirmation that the landing was a soft one. If it was successful, they will then move to collect samples for return
to Earth." Chang'e-5 Lands on Moon
FEMINAZISM, TRANSGENDER PSYCHOSIS, HOMOSEXUALIZATION, WAR ON MASCULINITY/NORMALCY
The new rules "would require most Nasdaq-listed companies to have, or explain why they do not have, at least two diverse directors, including one who self-identifies as female and one who self-identifies as either an underrepresented minority or LGBTQ+." Nasdaq Wants the Government to Force Woke LGBT Diversity on Corporate Boards
"The Deplorable Prof's new novel is an Orwellian allegory for the [Chinese] coronavirus era." Thought Criminal
HITHER & YON
"The country singer's million-dollar Chinese Covid-vaccine donation is of a piece with her decades of philanthropic giving." Dolly Parton's Masterpiece
"'Barry and Harry' defended those principles valiantly 60 years ago, in words that ring just as true today." With Liberty and Justice for All
"The death of Tony Hsieh is the loss of an urban pioneer." Desert Visionary
NOTE: The opinions expressed in some links may or may not reflect my own. I include them because of their relevance to the discussion of a particular issue.
ALSO: The Morning Report is cross-posted at CutJibNewsletter.com if you want to continue the conversation all day.
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. CS Lewis
Quote II
“I believe we are laying the groundwork to make systemic and lasting changes to policing,”Seattle Mayor Jenny Durkan
Quote III
“Don’t fall for the fear-driven narratives,” Omar said. “We can craft a justice system that prioritizes people’s basic needs like mental health + violence prevention, & allow the city to put public safety first.” Rep. Ilhan Omar Nuhr (D-Little Somalia MN)
Quote IV
“With places of worship allowed to open in all tiers we thought fuck it lets start a religion! Can’t be that hard can it! ‘The Church of the 400 Rabbits’ launching as soon as we get the green light!” UK bar owner James Aspell
Quote V
Every single raindrop that falls from the sky relieves the parched ground. What if every single one of us was a raindrop, and if every single one of us cared? Prince Harry
"It is four members of the general assembly. ... I guess they have a right to go and file anything they want to, but we are going to stay focused on what we have to do,” Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R-OH)
An anti-gay Hungarian politician has resigned after being caught by the police fleeing a 25-man orgy through a window
An anti-gay Hungarian politician has resigned after being caught by the police fleeing a 25-man orgy through a window
Jozsef Szajer resigned as a member of the European Parliament on Sunday. Getty
An ally of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban resigned from the European Parliament after attending what was described as a 25-man orgy in Brussels.
Jozsef Szajer quit as an MEP on Sunday and later said he was present at a "private party."
The police found Szajer and 24 other naked men at the gathering, including diplomats, local reports said.
Szajer played a key role in the Orban government's crackdown on LGBTQ rights in Hungary.
Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.
A member of the European Parliament representing Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban's Fidesz party has resigned from his position in Brussels after he was caught leaving what reports described as a 25-man orgy on Friday.
Jozsef Szajer resigned on Sunday after he admitted to breaching Belgium's strict lockdown rules to attend a sex party, Politico reported on Tuesday. The police found 25 naked men at the gathering, including Szajer and some diplomats, the Belgian newspaper La Dernière Heure reported. The newspaper quoted a local police source as saying, "We interrupted a gang bang."
Orban's Hungarian government has curtailed LGBTQ rights since he was elected prime minister in 2010. Szajer, who fronted Fidesz in the European Parliament, helped rewrite Hungary's constitution to "protect the institution of marriage as the union of a man and a woman," The Times of London reported.
We may be a society (understandably) prone to skepticism and negativity right now, but fear not: Help is on the way, in the form of a restructured boneless pork patty covered in sauce and served with pickles and onions on an oval-shaped bun. That’s right—the McRib has made its triumphant return to McDonald’s. And this year, it won’t be one of those “at participating locations only” situations. For the first time in nearly 10 years, the beloved meat sandwich will be available at all 14,400 McDonald’s restaurants in the United States—and you can get one for free, if you are willing to work for it.
Yes, as if the McRib’s Brigadoon-like reemergence from the McMists wasn’t cause enough for celebration by McRib enthusiasts, the chain is also giving away 10,000 free sandwiches tomorrow for its official rollout. Also, facial hair is involved. Here’s how to get your soon-to-be-sauce-covered hands on one of these iconic fast food items for free.
Last month, the Australian Army fired 13 servicemen in connection with a redacted version of the Brereton Report – a comprehensive, four-year investigation into alleged war crimes perpetrated by Australian troops in Afghanistan.
The Guardian Australia has revealed a photo of an alleged Australian special forces soldier drinking beer out of the prosthetic leg of a dead Taliban soldier in a bar in Afghanistan.
The soldier purportedly depicted in the photo is still in the military, according to The Guardian. The scene is taking place at the bar Fat Lady’s Arms - an unofficial pub set up inside Australia’s special forces base in Tarin Kowt in 2009.
When will the Democrats start using a score board? USSR was good when Reagan had the White House. When Trump had the White House, Russia bad. When Democrats had the White House Russia was good. I'm so confused.
A resurfaced image reveals Jen Psaki, who would serve as Press Secretary for Joe Biden, smiling in a hammer and sickle hat next to two Russian government officials.
Psaki, an alum of the Obama State Department, was “gifted the pink shapka, or fur hat, by her then-counterpart, spokesperson Maria Zakharova, in Russia.” Prominently displayed in the middle of the hat is a communist hammer and sickle.
Biden's Pick to Head Economic Advisors Seen as Sympathetic to Loan Borrowers
While President-elect Biden’s choice to chair his Council of Economic Advisors, Cecilia Rouse, didn’t call for canceling student debt, she expressed awareness of the impact debt has on borrowers in a 2007 research paper.
Rouse, in a paper co-authored with Jesse Rothstein, now a public policy and economics professor at the University of California, Berkeley, found that holding student debt made it more likely for students to choose high-paying careers and eschew lower-paying ones like teaching.
In the study, Rothstein and Rouse, who is now dean of Princeton University’s School of Public and International Affairs, examined students at an anonymous university that had stopped giving out loans and only gave students financial aid through grants.
They found that every $10,000 in debt reduces by 5 to 6 percent the chances that a student at the university would take a job at a nonprofit, in the government or in education.
PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — Oregon officials are seeking a wide variety of people to make recommendations about how the state should regulate psilocybin — a psychoactive compound found in so-called “magic” mushrooms.
Voters approved Measure 109 earlier this month, legalizing the use of psilocybin for therapeutic purposes in licensed facilities. But that doesn’t mean hallucinogenic mushrooms are legal right now. There’s currently no process for become a licensed facilitator, which is where the Oregon Health Authority (OHA) comes in.
Measure 109 instructs the OHA to develop an advisory board, and iron out best practices, ethics and regulations for psilocybin therapy, all within a two year timeframe. Prior to the election, KOIN 6 News spoke with doctors who said they’d never seen a precedent for tasking the OHA with developing a framework for implementing a program like that.
***
The Hodge Twins discuss Vanderbilt proud.............
San Diego was supposed to be the site this year of a major drone project intended to show off the civilian capabilities of military-grade technology for monitoring things like wildfires and infrastructure. The players involved in the test flight obscured its other purpose: catching drivers who speed.
Records obtained by Voice of San Diego show that the city’s Office of Homeland Security had been supportive of General Atomics, a local defense contractor, in its attempt to open the skies above San Diego to new forms of surveillance. They wound up talking last year about how police might benefit from putting a massive vehicle with a camera above the metro.
The SkyGuardian is not an ordinary drone. It weighs upwards of 12,500 pounds, with a wingspan of 79 feet. Its predecessors were developed to help the war on terror, and the company has marketed it as a “persistent eye in the sky” that governments can incorporate into their public planning and emergency response efforts.
In San Diego, officials kicked around the possibility of using the drone for vehicle enforcement on the freeway — but asked General Atomics to withhold that information publicly, omitting one of the reasons they were interested in the test flight.
It is more clever than leaving branches overgrown obstructing speed limit signs.
A 40-year-old man who broke into his estranged girlfriend's home and attacked her was beaten with a golf club and stabbed to death by her mother and sister, police say.
South Pasadena officers responded to a home on Five Oaks Drive around 10am after receiving a call about a domestic violence incident.
When authorities arrived, they found a shattered front window and heard screaming coming from inside the home, where they found Justin Goss suffering from stab wounds.
Cancer does not necessarily mean death for a pregnant mother or her unborn baby.
Thanks to modern medical advances, many women who are diagnosed during their pregnancies are being treated and giving birth to healthy babies. Christian News Network recently reported about a mother in Italy who refused to abort her unborn daughter after she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
In March, Consiglia Varriale said she discovered a lump in her breast while she was pregnant with her second daughter, and her doctors immediately recommended an abortion.
“They all told me that I had to give up the baby if I wanted to continue living,” she told the news outlet Riformista.
Varriale, however, sought another opinion at the Pascale Institute in Naples, according to the report. There, Dr. Michelino de Laurentiis told her that they could treat her cancer and save her baby’s life – a huge relief to the expecting mother.
“I was too happy at the thought of that pregnancy. I would never, ever have decided to interrupt it,” she said.
In April, her doctors performed surgery to remove the lump, and Varriale began chemotherapy a month later, the report states. She gave birth to her daughter in September, and both mother and child are reportedly doing well, it continues.
***
Tonight's ONT has been brought to you by Christmas Decorations.
Notice: Posted with permission by the Ace Media Empire and AceCorp, LLC. All this Cob wants for Christmas is peace, love, understanding and a small dental plan deductible.
Project Veritas Has Been Recording All of Jeff Zucker's Morning Political Bias Strategy Meetings With CNN News Heads, and James O'Keefe Is Set to Start Releasing Them, Starting Tonight CNN Says It's Called the Cops!
CNN, which has published secretly-recorded audio of Melania Trump, is now claiming that it was a crime for James O'Keefe to listen in on Jeff Zucker's conference calls.
Hope you're joking/being sarcastic Bill...one needs to look no further than the child custody system and the way it is so easily manipulated to see misandry in action 😔
No, I’m not joking. I have been told by several that Misandry doesn’t exist because it’s not systemic. The unicorn comment is their example- the word unicorn is in the dictionary too but they don’t exist. Yet sheer hatred of men seems alive and well in many women. 🤷🏼♂️ https://t.co/1mHVQPjMy9
He notes that just last week he referred to someone who appeared to be a woman as a "her," and then this person claimed she was actually a he, and then the SJW trans extremists went mental.
And then he gets attacked for having not handled the deeply mentally ill more gingerly.
Everything about this tweet is disappointing. Maybe just apologize and move on instead of explaining why the other person was wrong for you misgendering them and them being upset by it. Misgendering happens, we’re human. But you could’ve handled this better here.
Maybe it’s the fact that you are whining about even being required to answer for being a transphobe/homophobe that’s the problem here. It’s a bit difficult to take an insincere “apology” seriously.
He misgendered someone and then proceeded to give a non apology followed by whining about it. This is just the latest in a long history of repulsive behavior by Mr. Shatner.
I used the word “her” when it was a him in calling out a person on their behavior. That’s my entire crime yet the fact the person was a troll is getting covered up by the PC crowd because apparently you crime (to them) was much worse. You can see the histrionics here.👇🏻 https://t.co/DRMkAChbEf
Several whistleblowers on Tuesday cast new uncertainty on the 2020 election process, claiming up to 288,000 ballots disappeared, another 100,000 were improperly backdated, and mail promoting President Trump was junked while mail for Joe Biden was delivered.
In the most extraordinary report, a U.S. Postal Service contractor said his trailer full of 144,000-288,000 completed mail-in ballots, which he drove between New York and Pennsylvania, disappeared after he delivered it to a Lancaster, Pennsylvania, depot.
Another claimed that ballots were backdated by postal workers, and in Traverse City, Michigan, Trump campaign mail was put in bins labeled “Undeliverable Bulk Business Mail” while the same type of mail for Joe Biden was ordered to be delivered on time.
And a third raised new issues about the integrity of Dominion voting machines.
The claims were unveiled by the Amistad Project of the Thomas More Society, which has mounted an independent investigation of voting and voter registration in several key battleground states. It recently made headlines by revealing that the FBI has requested the findings of its Voter Integrity Project.
Witness at #MichiganHearing says all military ballots she saw looked like "xerox copies" of each other, none were registered Michigan voters and all were for Biden pic.twitter.com/nU6OMG7M88
Hope everybody is watching @OANN right now. Other media afraid to show. People are coming forward like never before. Large truck carrying hundreds of thousands of fraudulent (FAKE) ballots to a voting center? TERRIBLE - SAVE AMERICA!
Corporate-sponsored Democrat webzine National Review is calling for a surrender to voter fraud, because, well, they're aligned with the party that defrauded the election, and increasingly funded by that party:
Welp, you guys, I guess keep your eyes peeled for flying pigs.
Fox's daytime viewership dropped 32 percent from the two weeks prior to Election Day to the two weeks after, the Nielsen company said.
The post-election, weekday average daytime viewership of 1.63 million was roughly equivalent to that of CNN (1.68 million) and MSNBC (1.71 million). CNN was up 33% and MSNBC up 9% during that time period, Nielsen said.
It's not unusual for a cable news network popular with fans of a certain candidate to see its audience to drop off when that candidate loses; MSNBC's ratings briefly collapsed four years ago when Trump defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton.
The difference here is that Trump has been actively encouraging his followers to abandon Fox and hasn't actually conceded. Newsmax, the conservative network that Trump has been touting, saw its daytime average viewership jump from 88,000 the two weeks prior to the election to 474,000 the two weeks after, Nielsen said.
That ratings gain by Newsmax is a bit less than the ratings lost by Fox.
So conservatives are still engaged with the news -- they're just disengaging from Fox.
Meanwhile, a repost. I posted this on Thanksgiving. Some might have missed it.
They're also branding their own viewers, and former viewers, "fringe," "far right," and "radicalized."
CNN link. I wouldn't click. This article is by CNN's Chief Deplatforming Officer Tater, with additional reporting by their Senior Deplatforming Associate Oliver Darcy. It claims that all of Newsmax's gains are due to "conspiracy theories," because, of course.
Anything Tater doesn't like is a "conspiracy theory."
Except Russia Collusion, of course!
Fox News is taking action to stave off newfound competition from Newsmax TV.
Producers on some Fox programs have been told to monitor Newsmax's guest bookings and throw some sand in Newsmax's gears by encouraging guests who appear on both channels to stop saying yes to the upstart.
According to Fox sources, producers were told to avoid some regular guests if they kept showing up on Newsmax after being encouraged to stop. Management's goal: to remind guests who's boss in the right-wing media world.
Fox News denies this. But they're lying.
Memo to Fox: When you threaten people, they tend to talk about it.
To everyone.
...
Fox hosts and producers are on edge about the ratings race, a number of staffers told CNN Business. The staffers also said that the competitive dynamic is having an impact on some of Fox's programming choices.
...
Sources at Fox derided Newsmax as "far-right" and "fringe" and they singled out Kelly for particular criticism. But there has been a noticeable shift in the way they talk about Newsmax.
Conservatives who attempt to delegitimize other conservatives as "far right" and "fringe" are not conservatives. They are liberals.
...
If history is any guide, the audience will gradually "come home," in the words of one Fox executive, who pointed out that the network remains dominant among conservative viewers.
I mentioned a source telling me that that was what Fox was telling itself.
Now they call their own audience "radicalized."
...
"Our audience has absolutely been radicalized," one longtime on-air staffer at Fox said.
"Far right." "Fringe."
"Radicalized."
How is the way that Fox talks about its audience any different from how CNN talks about Fox's audience?
Now comes Fox's pitiful attempts to appease its "radicalized," "far right," "fringe" audience:
Multiple staffers pointed to programming adjustments, like the airing of Mark Levin's right-wing talk show on both Saturday and Sunday nights, that are meant to appeal to the Fox base. Levin's show used to air just on Sundays. Last Saturday, however, Fox aired a six-day-old episode of the show, full of out-of-date claims about Trump's legal challenges.
The staffers said the frequent re-airing of clips from "Tucker Carlson Tonight" during the day was another noticeable attempt to appease viewers.
They're airing Tucker Carlson tips during the day to Con the Rubes so that neoliberals and plain old liberals Paul Ryan, Chris Wallace, Chris Stirewalt, and Bill Sammon can keep their jobs.
By the way, the Fox staffers who talked to Tater savaged Maria Bartiromo as a lunatic conspiracy theorists.
Barr Elevates John Durham to Special Counsel, Instructing Him to Continue Investigating the Russiagate Op Even Under Another President
—Ace
Normally, this would mean that Biden would have political difficulty firing Durham, as Trump was warned he would have if he fired Mueller.
You can fire special counsels. The conventional wisdom is that you'd face too much political backlash if you did, though.
But I think we all know that the leftwing propaganda media is going to start demanding that Durham be fired, giving cover to a new Saturday Night Massacre.
Update: Durham was appointed special counsel, without publicity, on October 19th.
News: Here is a copy of the order from Barr appointing John Durham as special counsel of the investigation into the origins of the Russia probe pic.twitter.com/rUFbDO6Amj
Relatedly: A commenter said Barr had shot down any notion of election fraud.
That's not exactly true. He actually said that as far as one of the several types of election fraud under discussion -- that of a computer program systematically changing Trump votes to Biden -- they'd found no substantiation of that.
He did say that they had not found evidence of fraud big enough to swing the election.
Which is, yes, unhelpful. And also bullshit.
Barr to AP: There’s been one assertion that would be systemic fraud and that would be the claim that machines were programmed essentially to skew the election results. And the DHS and DOJ have looked into that, and so far, we haven’t seen anything to substantiate that#NexstarDC
Obnoxiously Leftwing Former Actress Ellen Page Decides She's Not Getting Enough Attention or Work Lately, Decides She's a Transgender Now
—Ace
Leftwing lunatic and aging former child actor Ellen Page has had a history with "coming out" as whatever sexual minority was trendiest and "hottest" at the time.
Previously, she decided she was a lesbian when being a lesbian was The New Black.
Ellen Page is transgender and will now go by the name Elliot Page, he announced on social media Tuesday.
"I feel lucky to be writing this. To be here. To have arrived at this place in my life," he wrote. "I feel overwhelming gratitude for the incredible people who have supported me along this journey. I can’t begin to express how remarkable it feels to finally love who I am enough to pursue my authentic self."
Page, 33, said he will use he/they pronouns.
The "he/they pronouns." Um, "he" is a subject pronoun, "him" is an object pronoun.
So you'd say: I gave the ball to him. Object.
"He" now says his object pronoun is "they," so if you're writing about "Elliot" Page now, you are required to say:
"He demands that you call they by his proper pronouns."
We're no longer just rewriting the rules of grammar to let the plural "they" be a singular person's pronoun.
Now we're rewriting grammar to make the subject pronoun "they" an object pronoun, too.
This is even more moronically mentally ill than the usual moronically mentally ill bullshit.
Hey, let's further debase and deform the language by permitting Jared-Loughler-level mental cases to make up a new Lunatic Grammar for us, huh?
Remember, the Oscars now have quota rules for transexuals. Also remember that "Elliot" Page hasn't worked very much for years.
Now: Imagine that these two seemingly-unconnected facts are perhaps very connected indeed.
You can't change your race to become a privileged minority.
But with a single Tweet, you can change your "gender identity" to a privileged minority, deserving of quota positions and minority set-asides.
There is nothing funny about they. He is a normal person. You should show respect to they.
Say the Gay Away: Commenters point out that with one simple declaration -- "I'm a dude now or whatever" -- Ellen has converted herself from a lesbian female into a heterosexual male.
Glad to have another one on Team Hetero!
Welcome aboard! There will be no flan.
"Tranglish:" So vmom dubs this bizarre new nongrammatical pidgin language.
ShainS. tells me not to forget about "Transplaining."
It's like they're taunting us: "You don't have the guts."
Who else but star reporter Bill Melugin to break this story:
"FOX 11 received multiple tips that shortly after her vote on Tuesday, Kuehl was seen dining outside at Il Forno Trattoria in Santa Monica, an Italian restaurant near her house that she has previously described as one of her 'favorite' restaurants.
"When FOX 11 investigative reporter Bill Melugin stopped by the restaurant to ask about Kuehl's visit, managers told him they "didn't want to get involved", and they have no comment."
"They have no comment" is code for, I fear fines and retaliation.
EXCLUSIVE: Just hours after L.A. County Supervisor @SheilaKuehl voted to ban all outdoor dining last Tuesday, which she described as “a most dangerous situation”, we’ve learned that she dined outdoors at Il Forno Trattoria in Santa Monica. https://t.co/8IOtAcpV50@FOXLA
Alleged Devout Catholic Joe Biden Tries to Pronounce "Psalm" Multiple Times, Keeps Saying "Palm"
—Ace
Actually the word he's trying to say is "Psalmist," a writer of the psalms. Instead of saying "Salmist" -- silent "p" -- he keeps saying "palmist," with a silent "s."
A defender, like his cheering section at the Democrat Corporatist grift National Review, could claim that "but of course he stumbled over an uncommon word."
But the "uncommon word" defense requires that not only had he not written his own prepared speech -- of course he didn't -- but that the first time he even saw was when his puppet-handlers were beaming it into his dying eyeballs via TelePrompTer.
As of press time, the flub has received precisely no coverage from Big Media, only in conservative media. Forgetting which letter in "psalmist" is silent isn't the biggest deal in the world. But it provides an excellent example of how corrupted our media have been for the last four years.
That's because during the 2016 campaign, Donald Trump gave a speech at Liberty University where he referred to St. Paul’s second epistle to the Corinthians as "2 Corinthians." It's usually, but by no means always, said as "Second" Corinthians. Scottish Christians, such as Trump's mother, say it the way he did. The media immediately pounced on the alleged flub, and kept pouncing until as recently as four days ago.
The abject failure of the Republican Party (both the inside-the-beltway whore variety and even the more ideologically rational segments) to communicate its philosophical basis and its basic, readily acceptable platform is a travesty. How difficult would it be to hammer home a few simple points about the preservation of our republic through a robust and secure voting system?
We are a technologically advanced country; many -- perhaps most -- Americans conduct their financial transactions through a vast and complex system that is amazingly safe. Imagine if we had to tolerate a failure rate in our credit card and ATM and other banking systems that was even close to the catastrophe that is voting in America!
But for reasons that are opaque at best and stunningly vile at worst, our political representatives have accepted the status quo, which is so obviously tilted in favor of the Left, whose natural constituency is unfamiliar with the concept of freedom for the individual coupled with love of country, and very comfortable with communitarian approaches to government action. That's fancy talk for "socialists."
So if the challenges to the 2020 election fail, the primary function (really the only function) of the Republican Party and conservative organizations to its right is to educate the American people about the sanctity of the individual's vote and how it is the foundation of everything we have built in this country.
The technical issues are trivial. Any bank or technology-dependent corporation can design a voting system that will eliminate all but the most dedicated and sophisticated cheating.
The challenge is to convince the American people that it is not an option. Is the Republican party up to the task?
Good morning, kids. Tuesday, and the first day of the last month of a year from Hell, which we are still going through and no doubt will persist into the next one for a host of reasons. On a positive note, it looks as if three more House seats will go our way with incumbents Lee Zeldin in NY and Mike Garcia in CA officially winning re-election and Claudia Tenney, also in NY, holding on by just 13 votes in what I believe is the final recount. Funny how Republicans were supposed to have been wiped out in a so-called Blue Wave while up and down the ticket it's the Democrats that got crushed. At least everywhere where they couldn't steal the election.
That of course segues into the presidential election where even as more evidence of the initial plot as well as the last minute, six-state smash and grab massive ballot dumping is exposed, the rush to cover it all up and just declare Polident-Elect Joey Shin-Splint the winner is in full force. Sadly, tragically, the GOP is aiding and abetting this farce when every last Congressman, Senator, all the way on down to local Dog Catcher should be screaming bloody murder in unison. Moreover, it's the state legislators who can remedy this situation immediately by assigning their electors to Donald Trump. It never ceases to amaze me that no matter how obvious, open and outrageous the infamy perpetrated on the American people, the more blind to it that those on our side become, as well as indignant at us for pointing it out to them. The myth that the Democrat Party and its Greek chorus media propaganda wing - The Enemy - are the "loyal opposition" was exploded long ago, along with the illusion that our political system is operating under anything even remotely resembling regular order. That should've been obvious after Dick Durbin's friend James Hodgkinson shot up Steve Scalise and several others, or when Rand Paul's neighbor speared him in the back and on and on and on. But still they persisted... in saying and doing nothing.
We now have strong evidence of massive electoral fraud. Crimes were committed. There is a limited amount of time to correct the matter. State legislatures are holding hearings and might save the republic by awarding electors to the candidate who in fact did get the most votes in their respective states.
Whether they do or not, the question remains: can the courts restrict themselves to the narrowest interpretation of the law, without regard for the consequences -- the consequences of permitting the presidency to be occupied by the favored candidate of a massive criminal enterprise? Can they ignore the strong likelihood that a Biden presidency (followed within days or weeks by a Harris presidency) will open the floodgates of illegal immigration? Can they ignore the evidence that the Democrats will award citizenship to millions of them? Can they avert their gaze from a future in which the levers of power will be controlled by a party that can illegally ensure never losing another election? Can the Supreme Court, indeed, disregard that it will soon be swamped by additional justices who will impose socialism on the nation?
In other words, will the criminals be set free to perpetuate their crimes? Will the Republic itself be murdered?
It can be argued that none of this is any business of the Supreme Court, and in ordinary times, that would be correct -- but these are not ordinary times. It has been said that "the Constitution is not a suicide pact."
We may be about to find out.
And therein lies the rub, regardless of the outcome, or actually if indeed Trump does prevail and the nation holds on for four more years. When one side not only no longer plays by the rules but is supported by a large percentage of people that views the nation itself as illegitimate and those who support it as an evil to be eradicated, then there is no nation, regardless of who is president. How are President Trump if he is vindicated, please G-d, and the rest of us supposed to live under these conditions when a third or more of the populace want us dead? Any move to eradicate the cancer that is the left - be it in politics, the bureaucracy, academia or wherever - will instantly be met by those who seek to destroy the Constitution hiding behind it while trying to burn its last remaining shred.
In more ways than one, we are definitely not voting our way out of this. I am scared shitless for the future, but at the same time I am angry beyond my capacity to describe it. All I can say is G-d help these bastards. One day, there will be a comeuppance. His will be done.
"The President's legal team has been working to make the case that the election was compromised by massive voter fraud in several key states. The question is how close are they to doing so?" President's Path to Reelection Continues to Narrow
"State and local officials brazenly violated election laws in order to advance a partisan political agenda," Phil Kline, director of The Amistad Project, said in a statement. "The pattern of lawlessness was so pervasive and widespread that it deprived the people of Michigan of a free and fair election, throwing the integrity of the entire process into question." EXPLOSIVE: Michigan Illegally Counted or Ignored 500,000 Ballots, Lawsuit Claims
GEORGIA:
"Until the signatures are matched, the vote count in Georgia is a complete fraud," former New York City mayor and Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani declared in a statement. "There is no way of knowing which ballots are honest and which ballots are fraudulent." Team Trump Demands Signature Audit as Dominion Server Crash Delays Georgia Recount
"Voting in Georgia when you are not a resident of Georgia is a felony, and encouraging college kids to commit felonies with no regard for what [it] might mean for them is despicable. These third-party groups have a responsibility to not encourage illegal voting. If they do so, they will be held responsible." Tank Abrams Voter Registration Group Denies Impropriety as Georgia Election Officials Investigate
ARIZONA:
"This does not mean Biden will receive the state's electoral votes. Certification triggers the right to contest the election, the Governor has said he won't certify electors until litigation is resolved, legislators can still send their own electors, and Congress can still object." AZ Gov. Doug Ducey Certifies Vote for Joe Biden But It Ain't Over Yet
"... Eventually, the response will be violence, and bloodshed, and brutality. I am not calling for it. I am simply predicting that it will happen, all because the Democrats refused to accept the legality of the 2016 election and then used any means to steal the 2020 elections, and the Republicans stood by and let them do it." This Election Has Been Stolen
"While it was evident to most people a few weeks ago, after counting many absentee ballots, today it became mathematically certain @leezeldin won re-election to Congress. Suffolk BOE expects to certify the race very soon - showing Congressman Zeldin won by 40k+ votes." New York Republican Rep. Lee Zeldin Projected to Win Reelection
"Democrats want to use illegal aliens and prisoners to determine legislative districts, as well as boxing out those who oppose them from any voice in how districts are drawn." How Democrats Plan to Control New York Forever
"Democrats and Never-Trumpers are working hard to demoralize Trump voters so that they willingly embrace defeat. Resist this pressure." Conservatives, This is No Time to Go Wobbly
CIVIL WAR 2.0: POST-ELECTION RIOTING, LEFTIST REIGN OF TERROR, WAR ON POLICE
CHINESE CORONAVIRUS FICTIONS, FACTS AND AMERICA IMPRISONED
"Think of this -- ten months into this pandemic hitting our shores, thanks to what President Trump has done here, we believe we're going to have millions of people getting vaccinated before Christmas this year. It's just unheard of in the history of public health, this accomplishment." HHS Secretary: Chinese COVID Vaccine May Be Available for Vulnerable People "Within Days"
"Earlier that day at a board of supervisors meeting, Kuehl called the outdoor dining "a most dangerous situation" with regard to the possible spread of [Chinese] COVID-19." (this is not only proof positive that this virus is essentially a nothing-burger in the grand scheme of things but that Leftists are tyrants - jjs) LA County Supervisor Dines Outdoors Hours After Voting to Ban the Practice
"History is consistent with common sense: it demonstrates that legislatures have the power to prohibit dangerous people from possessing guns," Barrett wrote in her 2019 dissent. "But that power extends only to people who are dangerous. Founding-era legislatures did not strip felons of the right to bear arms simply because of their status as felons." Justice Barrett's Vote Already Looking to be Decisive in First Big Gun Rights Case in Years
"Responding to the Fakhrizadeh assassination by reaffirming the commitment to rejoin the JCPOA would be a good way to send the message that terrorism doesn't work." Top Sanders Aide Accuses Israel of Terrorism
"The former vice president supports a labor bill that would be a government boot on workers' throats, a malign and destructive force." Joe Biden, Job Robber
CRIME & PUNISHMENT, NON-DOSTOYEVSKY
"A new study explores how police presence maintains public order." Beat Cops Cut Crime
"It is reflexive that those on the Left will always paint policing with a broad brush and in a bad light." Woke Police Reform Doesn't Work
EDUCATION, AND WHAT PASSES FOR IT
"The move may not sit well with Democrats in urban communities, who have seen the success of charter schools. Shavar Jeffries, president of Democrats for Education Reform, told the Journal that minority students have performed well in charter schools." Joe Biden Reportedly Working With Teachers Union That Opposes Charter Schools
"Grad Student Demand Letter seeks to strip him of access, resources, and teaching responsibilities for advocating 'against... setting up systems where group membership is a primary aspect of a candidate's evaluation. I believe we should avoid discriminating against anyone for any reason.'" Cancel Mob Attacks U Chicago Geophysicist Dorian Abbot For Questioning Diversity Hiring Dogma
"The public education establishment is losing customers as more parents take charge of how their kids learn amid the pandemic." Growth of the Pod
Victor Davis Hanson: "Something went wrong with the rapidly expanding university in the 1960s, and the new 21st century, high-tech, globalized campus has made the mess it inherited dangerous." Why Our Universities Have Failed
"The man who pretended to speak for the oppressed participated in oppression of the poor and his own family. It's yet another repudiation of his work on its anniversary." Karl Marx's Shameful Life Repudiates His Evil Ideology
NOTE: The opinions expressed in some links may or may not reflect my own. I include them because of their relevance to the discussion of a particular issue.
ALSO: The Morning Report is cross-posted at CutJibNewsletter.com if you want to continue the conversation all day.
(commercial vehicles).......But it’s a sector that hasn’t been cared about much by traditional automakers. Most of them are simply rehashing a 10- to 15-year-old architecture when going electric. They just replace engines with batteries in a vehicle that was never built to be electric in the first place. Avinash Rugoobur, president of Arrival, a five-year-old EV startup based in London, U.K.
Quote II
"Trees are like human beings. They have intelligence. They have feelings. They communicate with each other. And also, they are perfectly silent listeners. You can complain to them." Performance artist Marina Abramovic
Quote III
“The clean energy industry has responded in kind through investment, which in turn, will play a critical role in local Tasmanian economies creating employment opportunities now and into the future.” Chief executive of the Clean Energy Council, Kane Thornton
Quote IV
“I was in a complicated struggle to make ends meet. A lack of job opportunities for trans women of color led me to sex work. Through this experience I wound up in Florida, where I was arrested and incarcerated with cisgender men. That moment transformed my life forever. It helped me begin my journey in civic engagement.” Elisa Crespo
An 83-year-old man who was jailed for playing Classic FM too loud in his home has died in prison.
Ian Trainer, who had been repeatedly jailed in recent years, died in hospital on November 23.
The pensioner, from Eton Drive, Aintree, Merseyside, was given a restraining order in 2019 which prohibited him from playing - between the hours of 9am and 10pm - 'any audio at a volume above normal talking level' which was considered to be above 65 decibels.
We have previously discussed the alarming rollback on free speech rights in the West, particularly in Europe. The move to criminalize speech has led to an insatiable appetite for new limitations and broader prosecutions. Norway is an example of this headlong plunge into speech controls and crimes in the West. This week the legislature adopted (without even a vote) a new criminal law that punishes people for saying anything deemed hate speech toward transgender people in their own home or private conversations.
Minister of Justice and Public Security Monica Maeland declared victory because speech regulation must be “adapted to the practical situations that arise.” The “practical situation” includes speaking to your own spouse or family.
A man suspected in a carjacking attempt in Compton died after being shot by the intended victim and then run over by at least one vehicle Sunday night, authorities said.
Deputies of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department responded to the intersection of Compton Boulevard and Santa Fe Avenue shortly after 8:30 p.m. when someone reported hearing gunshots nearby.
A man was found lying in the intersection and pronounced dead at the scene, LASD stated in a news release.
The unidentified man had at least one gunshot wound and had apparently been struck by at least one vehicle, according to the release.
Detectives believe the man, who was armed with a handgun, had tried to carjack a vehicle that was stopped for a red light when he was shot by the motorist, KTLA reported.
The intended carjacking victim who fired a round at the attacker remained at the scene and was talking to investigators, Sheriff’s Department Lt. Alfred said.
The only twerking I want to see is a fish on the ice or in the bottom of my boat. Yeah, get off my lawn.
***
Dr. Walter Williams is a brilliant and one of a kind man. Too bad there aren't more of him out there. Discrimination And Prejudice
Let’s start with “discrimination.” Discrimination is the act of choice, and choice is a necessary fact of life. Our lives are spent discriminating for or against different activities and people. Some people shop at Wegmans and thus discriminate against Food Giant. Some students discriminate against George Mason University in favor of attending Temple University. Many people racially discriminate by marrying within their own race rather than seeking partners of other races. People discriminate in many ways in forming contracts and other interrelationships. In each case, one person is benefitted by discrimination and another is harmed or has reduced opportunities.
What about prejudice? Prejudice is a useful term that is often misused. Its Latin root is praejudicium, meaning “an opinion or judgment formed … without due examination.” Thus, we might define a prejudicial act as one where a decision is made on the basis of incomplete information. The decision-maker might use stereotypes as a substitute for more complete information.
Every year there are toys that are rushed to market without proper testing. This is especially true when manufacturers are trying to get their products out in time for the holiday season. While not all of the toys mentioned on this list are likely to receive a recall, they all still pose a risk to your children and are best avoided.
There are many different kinds of dangers that toys can pose. Many small toys are choking hazards, especially for younger children who are more likely to put the toys into their mouths. Other toys often involve projectiles that pose a particular risk to the eyes and face. Shockingly, there are still many toys being made every year with dangerous chemicals that can pose a serious hazard if ingested.
These are only a few of the different kinds of dangers posed by many of the toys lining the shelves in your local toy department.
According to World Against Toys Causing Harm, Inc. (W.A.T.C.H.) and their yearly “10 Worst Toys” list, the top 10 toys to avoid during this holiday season are:
Speaking of bad toys.........No one does it like Irwin Mainway......
Is expensive scotch (often climbing into the hundreds and even thousands of dollars) really that much better than mid-shelf expressions?
That’s a tough question to answer. Scotch, by its nature as an import, is a little more expensive overall than, say, locally sourced bourbon. Transport costs and tariffs add up. Still, there are some genuinely tasty and absolutely affordable scotch whiskies on the market. There are also some delicious, palate-expanding scotch whiskies that will break the bank, but just might be worth the expense.
Ultimately it’s going to depend on what you can afford and how much joy a good dram brings you. If you’re a neophyte on a budget, spending big cash on scotch is silly. If you’re an aficionado with money to burn, have at it.
Robberies in L.A. UP 500% Due to Mandatory Mask Order by Guv Nuisance
Great news for criminals. They can go into a 7-11, wearing a mask, rob the store and the video cameras will not be able to capture a picture of the robber. This is making it so much easier for crooks to make victims of us—with the mandate of the Governor. He us using junk science and ideology to close schools and churches, kill jobs and create crimes that cannot be solved.
“Criminals are just better than the rest of us. While more people than ever are eschewing masks and defying other COVID-19 diktats from California Gov. Gavin Newsom, criminals seem to be leading the way in compliance.
A stunning increase in the number of crimes committed in Los Angeles shows criminals of every variety are just doing their coronavirus-duty by wearing masks while they knock over the local 7-11 or perform strong-arm robberies.
USC’s Crosstown Initiative reports that crimes involving criminals who are wearing masks have shot up like a bolt of lightning – up nearly 500% – between January and October.”
A senior commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps was killed in a drone strike near the Syrian-Iraqi border Sunday night, according to reports, just two days after the assassination of Iran’s top nuclear scientist.
The IRGC commander and three of his escorts reportedly died after his car was struck by an unmanned aerial vehicle near the border, according to multiple media outlets citing Iraqi officials.
The drone strike is said to have targeted the senior commander after he had entered Syria via the Al Qaim border crossing from Iraq.
There were also reports that the men’s bodies had been transferred to the Iraqi capital Baghdad. Iran has not confirmed or denied any of the reports.
As gun owners, we’re well aware of the adage that “when seconds count, police are only minutes away.” Bill Norkunas, a 70-year old resident of Broward County, Florida, can tell you firsthand just how accurate that statement is, because he was forced to fend off a home intruder for more than fifteen minutes earlier this month while sheriff’s deputies waited at the end of his street.
Norkunas, who had polio as a child and has suffered lifelong disabilities ever since, had just gotten out of the shower on the evening of November 7th when he saw a shadowy form outside of his bathroom window. He turned on an outside light hoping to scare the stranger away, but instead the man was drawn like a moth to a flame to the front door of Norkunas’ home.
Norkunas grabbed his gun and his phone and called 911 while he warned the stranger that he would shoot if necessary. Despite repeated calls by neighbors and Norkunas himself, however, sheriffs deputies got no closer than 500 yards to Norkunas, and now the Broward County Sheriff’s Office isn’t answering any questions about why deputies didn’t respond, issuing a statement to the Sun-Sentinel newspaper filled with boilerplate language about an ongoing investigation and promises that the office is constantly reviewing and assessing “its responses to emergency calls in order to provide the highest level of service to the public.”
The ONT Musical Interlude
One of my biggest pleasures in life has always been attending concerts. 2019 was a good year for me. 2020 sucked, thanks Kung Flu. Will 2021 be a comeback year?
With the outbreak of or Covid-19, disruption has been rampant across all industries, especially the entertainment world. While streaming and social media are bigger than ever, live music has been taken out of the equation. This not only affects fans and artists, but also booking agencies, sound engineers, and managers.
The struggle is real for the live music scene, but not all is lost. We will hopefully see the return of in-person performances before long, and in the meantime, we can relive the memories of concerts and festivals past.
What can we expect for the future of the live music industry, and is there a reasonable timeline to expect a return to normal? Let’s take a look at the main factors at play, and consider some short-term solutions.
Vaccine and Immunity
Flip on the news nowadays and the Covid conversation is focused mainly on producing and distributing a vaccine. It’s uncertain how effective or desirable vaccination could be, but public health experts deem this to be a crucial step forward.
Yes, there have been concerts streamed. It isn't the same as being there live.
On this day: 30 Nov 1996
American singer and ukulele player Tiny Tim (Herbert Khaury) died from a heart attack on stage while playing his hit ‘Tiptoe Through the Tulips’ at a club in Minneapolis. On 17 December 1969, he married Victoria Mae Budinger on The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson, a publicity stunt that attracted over 40 million viewers. (they had a daughter, Tulip Victoria). He performed at the 1970 Isle Of Wight Festival in front of a crowd of 600,000 people. via thisdayinmusic.com
&&&
On this day: 30 Nov 2012
Glen Campbell played the very last live performance of his lifetime when he appeared at Uptown Theatre in Napa, California. Campbell revealed his Alzheimer's diagnosis to the public in 2011, and had set out on his Goodbye Tour as a way to say farewell to his fans. via thisdayinmusic.com
NOVEMBER 18--A “half dressed” Connecticut man who was spotted “humping trees” in a stranger’s backyard is behind bars on multiple charges, records show.
According to a Naugatuck Police Department report, officers were dispatched Thursday afternoon to a residence on High Street after a 911 caller reported there was “an unknown male in a backyard, half dressed, humping trees, screaming, and eating branches.”
When cops arrived, the suspect ran into a neighboring house, causing its inhabitants to “flee their home in fear.” The intruder, identified as John Fignar, 36, subsequently exited the residence and was placed under arrest.
The police report does not indicate which half of Fignar, seen at right, was unclothed.
A 12-year-old Georgia boy is making history after being admitted to Georgia Tech.
Caleb Anderson has dreams of studying aerospace engineering and other planets.
It was not hard for Kobi and Claire Anderson to discover their firstborn son was different. The bubbly baby boy was babbling and trying to speak at just 3 weeks.
“He would mimic whatever people were trying to say. You can tell that he wanted to speak,” said Claire Anderson.
***
Weekly commenter stats for week of 11-29-20
Top 10 commenters:
1 [622 comments] 'Insomniac' [87.31 posts/day]
2 [533 comments] ' chique l'African Viking Math Queen of Greenland (Happy Thanksgiving to my American allies!)'
3 [485 comments] 'Sponge - Office of the President Elect'
4 [482 comments] 'Bete'
5 [442 comments] 'clutch cargo'
6 [426 comments] 'Asshoes'
7 [421 comments] 'Skip'
8 [393 comments] 'Commissar-Elect Hrothgar - I Have Earned, And Deserve, Different Rules! '
9 [392 comments] 'redbanzai the Southerner'
10 [390 comments] 'Braenyard'
Top 10 sockpuppeteers:
1 [275 names] 'Ping from Guoanbu > Bob from NSA' [38.60 unique names/day]
2 [188 names] 'Miklosian Anti-Marketing SA de CV'
3 [93 names] 'Bete'
4 [50 names] 'Duncanthrax'
5 [32 names] 'Count de Monet, President-Elect ISTJ'
6 [20 names] 'Adriane the Demagogue Critic ...'
7 [19 names] 'Bertram Cabot, Jr.'
8 [18 names] 'Notorious BFD'
9 [16 names] 'andycanuck'
10 [15 names] 'Cicero (@cicero43)'
***
Tonight's ONT has been brought to you by Plausible Explanations.
Notice: Posted with limited authority by the Ace Media Empire and its redheaded step child AceCorp, LLC. There is no check point to enter The ONT zone.
Biden's Choice for Head of the OMB, Neera Tanden, Spread Conspiracy Theories, Without Evidence, That Russia Changed Actual Vote Tallies, Shifting Votes for Hillary to Trump
The announcement that Joe Biden intends to nominate Neera Tanden as his Director of the Office of Management and Budget -- a critical position overseeing U.S. economic and regulatory policy -- triggered a wide range of mockery, indignation and disgust from both the left and the right. That should not be surprising: though a thoroughly mediocre and ordinary D.C. swamp creature from the perspective of both ideology and competence, Tanden’s uniquely unhinged, venomous, corrupt and pathologically dishonest conduct as a Clinton Family and DNC apparatchik and President of the corporatist-and-despot-funded Center for American Progress (CAP) has earned her a list of enemies far longer and more impressive than her accomplishments.
...
Few people took Hillary's 2016 loss to Donald Trump as hard as Tanden, or handled it as poorly. Indeed, she refused to believe it really happened, and encouraged others to similarly refuse to accept its reality.
In the weeks after Trump’s victory, Tanden joined numerous Democrats in encouraging electors of the Electoral College to ignore their states' votes and refuse to elect Trump as President (many rationale were invoked for this: Tanden's was a CAP article promoting #Resistance fanatic Richard Painter’s argument that Trump's violations of the Emolument Clause precluded an Electoral College win). She insisted that Hillary lost because of Russia, claiming the "Russians did enough damage to affect more than 70k votes in 3 states." And she was not only one of the first to push the Steele Dossier's claim that Russia held blackmail power over Trump but also one of the last to do so -- insisting in 2018 that “the dossier been mostly proven to be true” and claiming as late as 2019 that nothing in this discredited junk report had been disproven.
But what really distinguished Tanden when it came to unhinged and toxic behavior was her repeated (and obviously baseless) claims that Hillary only lost because Russian hackers invaded the U.S. voting system and clandestinely changed Hillary’s votes to Trump’s, costing the real winner --Hillary -- her rightful place on the throne, behind the Resolute Desk.
...
Tanden's insistence that Russia changed the voting results through hacking did not once her traumatic shock in the weeks after Hillary's loss dissipated (if it ever did)....
This conspiracy-mongering led by Tanden and other prominent liberal activists had a corrosive effect on the ability of Democrats to perceive basic reality, to put that mildly. A 2018 poll from Economist/YouGov -- conducted more than a year after Trump’s inauguration -- found that a large majority of Democrats (66%) believe that "Russia tampered with vote tallies in order to get Donald Trump elected President."
Hillary Clinton herself was the first I know of to push that conspiracy theory -- though her leftwing media partisans never discuss that.
Nor do her liberal NeverTrump covert partisans.
Even squishy liberal Republican John Cornyn says that Tanden has "zero percent" chance of ever being confirmed for any position in government.
And thus: Bill Kristol hears the call to defend the indefensible.
Just like his progressive pals are paying him to do.
What is astonishing is that within an hour of proclaiming that all "serious conservatives" get behind this Hillary Clinton puppet, he also attacks alleged conspiracy theories about the 2020 election, branding anyone who believes in vote-shifting to be "crazy" and, one assumes, ineligible to hold any position of public trust.
Even as he pimps the conspiracy theorist Neera Tanden.
Serious conservatives, responsible moderates, and hard-headed liberals should want a tough-minded OMB head. OMB is where Cabinet secretaries' ill-considered projects go to die, where programs are evaluated, where trade-offs are made. Neera Tanden is the right person for the job.
"These folks are neither crazy or dumb. But they are willing to play along to con the rubes and set themselves up for what comes next. They may not be Truthers themselves, but they are willing to wink at it, and even traffic in it."https://t.co/oCfvLh1Za3
"Every time you think you have a grasp of how preposterous the Trump team’s election lawsuits are, another one comes out, dumber and more conspiracy-filled than the last." https://t.co/JFPyWbVOkw
Just to show he's a demented, crazy asshole who's Gay For Pay, Bill Kristol goes the additional step of attacking "Trump and his supporters" for refusing to accept the judgement of the voters.
You mean -- like NeverTrump and their progressive cocktail-party partners refused to do in 2016?
Setting up a covert #Resistance to undermine his government?
Promoting a farcical conspiracy theory to keep his government under the shadow of an illegally-spawned special counsel investigation?
You mean-- accepting the outcome of an election like that, Billybitch?
Do Trump and his supporters not understand how our elections work or how the judicial system works? I doubt it. They understand. They don't care. They don't respect the decisions of elections or courts. They just want Trump to win. Quality of evidence or arguments doesn't matter.
United Airlines on Friday commenced charter flights to send doses of Pfizer and BioNTech's COVID-19 vaccine candidate to prepare for distribution, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal that cited people familiar with the matter.
In a statement to The Hill, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said it was "supporting the first mass air shipment of a vaccine" on Friday.
"As a result of the historic pace of vaccine development through Operation Warp Speed and careful logistics planning, the FAA today is supporting the first mass air shipment of a vaccine," the FAA statement read.
...
Part of the company's distribution plan will include existing and additional refrigerated storage sites across the U.S. and Europe. The Journal also reported the plan includes using "dozens of cargo flights and hundreds of truck trips each day."
Pfizer did in fact conceal the fact, which it knew to be a fact, that its vaccine was ready for deployment before the election.
And the GOP will continue bending over backwardsforwards to let these megacorporations sodomize them.
Pfizer's vaccine is said to be 90% effective: only 10% of those receiving the vaccine contracted covid.
That is, the only symptoms we care about. Moderate covid symptoms are just a chest cold.
Continuing the spate of stunning news about COVID-19 vaccines, the biotech company Moderna announced the final results of the 30,000-person efficacy trial for its candidate in a press release today: Only 11 people who received two doses of the vaccine developed COVID-19 symptoms after being infected with the pandemic coronavirus, versus 185 symptomatic cases in a placebo group. That is an efficacy of 94.1%, the company says, far above what many vaccine scientists were expecting just a few weeks ago.
More impressive still, Moderna's candidate had 100% efficacy against severe disease. There were zero such COVID-19 cases among those vaccinated, but 30 in the placebo group. The company today plans to file a request for emergency use authorization (EUA) for its vaccine with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and is also seeking a similar green light from the European Medicines Agency.
This is exactly what Trump said would happen.
And the media, and the liberal ex-Republicans who are now in fact Democrats but continue to sabotage the conservative movement from the inside, jeered him for saying so.
I can't figure out why, but Professor AllahPundit has failed to note a study that says that use of hydroxychloroquine -- which Professor Allahpundit continually claimed would kill people, because The Science (TM) says that we must form a #Resistance against the Bad Orange Man -- results in 84% fewer hospitalizations than covid patients not treated with it.
A peer-reviewed study measuring the effectiveness of a controversial drug cocktail that includes hydroxychloroquine concluded that the treatment lowered hospitalizations and mortality rates of coronavirus patients.
The study, set to be published in the International Journal of Antimicrobial Agents in December, determined that "Low-dose hydroxychloroquine combined with zinc and azithromycin was an effective therapeutic approach against COVID-19."
A total of 141 patients diagnosed with the coronavirus were treated with the three-drug cocktail over a period of five days and compared to a control group of 377 people who tested positive for the virus but were not given the treatment.
The study found that "the odds of hospitalisation of treated patients was 84% less than in the untreated patients," and only one patient died from the group being treated with the drugs compared to 13 deaths in the untreated group.
I think all the liberals who railed against this life-saving, hospital-sparing drug should promise to refuse to be treated by it, even when infected by covid.
To prove that their constant shrieking about the drug wasn't just a very cynical and nonscientific jihad against Trump.
Larry O'Connor points out that the whole media " " " " fact- " " " " checked Trump -- by which they mean "compared Trump's claims to the Democrat-Media Complex's propaganda points -- when he claimed that a covid vaccine would be on the way to citizens "within weeks."
Well, Trump was right. The " " " " fact- " " " " checkers were wrong.
Will they be correcting their claims now? Will Twitter, FaceBook, and Google be censoring and slapping warning labels on this misinformation?
Remember when Kristen Welker "Fact Checked" Trump at the final presidential debate over this POTUS' statement: "We have a vaccine that's coming, it's ready, it's going to be announced within weeks, and it's going to be delivered"?
The Tyranny Monopolies are going to have to censor this article -- suicide (fed by loneliness and depression) killed more Japanese in October than covid took in ten full months.
But lockdowns forever!
There is literally no other malady we should be concerned with, apart from covid!
The New York Times reports that Apple, Nike, and Coca-Cola are among the many global companies and business groups lobbying Congress to weaken a bipartisan bill that cracks down on human rights abuses and forced labor in China.
"The bill also targets so-called poverty alleviation and pairing programs that ship Muslims from impoverished areas to work in factories elsewhere, which human rights groups say are often coercive."
For human rights supporters, the bill is great news. For companies that care about their bottom line first, it's terrible.
Whenever these transnational buccaneers do some evil shit, they immediately spring to repair their reputation with the hard left by running virtue-signaling commercials or punishing the right.
I expect them to run this play again. Expect more censorship from Apple against the right to appease the left for their own use of slaves to make their slave phones.
Meanwhile, functionaries of the Chinese Communist Party are pumping out crude terrorist-encouraging propaganda against the west, even as China Joe promises to treat them as allies:
Also, James Mattis -- he beloved by Know-Nothing NeverTrump Permanent Twitter Residents -- failed to acknowledge his ties to a firm that will make money off expanded trade with China when he was writing China-trade-boosting op-eds and planting them in major media.
n an online column denouncing President Trump's "America First" policy that includes measures regarding Beijing, ex-Defense Secretary James Mattis did not disclose his affiliation with an organization that fosters international business deals with communist China.
As coauthor with three other writers in a Nov. 23 Foreign Affairs column, Mattis did not mention that he works for the The Cohen Group consulting firm. Nor did he challenge China's tough talk against U.S. policies regarding Taiwan, nor the strict economic retaliation Beijing levied against Australia.
Instead, Mattis criticized Trump administration policies toward Beijing. Such policies, touted by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, are not in line with The Cohen Group's approach toward international business dealings with Beijing.
I don't want to let out any Deep State Secrets, but generals cannot wait to retire and began peddling influence to foreign countries.
A lot of generals provide "security consulting" to foreign countries. But this is widely known to be a sham. The foreign countries aren't really interested in what the generals have to say about security.
What they're interested in is paying them to be Friendly Forces for lobbying lawmakers and executive bureaucrats in DC, and assisting with information operations.
The claims about "security consulting" are in fact just a cover story to hide the fact that these men are in fact in the employ of foreign governments for the purposes of lobbying the US government. It's a lie designed to provide a legal defense if they should ever be prosecuted for failure to file as an agent of a foreign government.
It's a type of money laundering -- disguising the true commodity being sold for money by resort to a deceptive euphemism.
Mattis' op-ed was in fact an undisclosed paid advertisement for American corporations seeking to make money from China at the expense of the rest of America.
And it was also an information operation conducted on behalf of the Chinese Communist Party.
Former Defense Secretary James Mattis is back in the public eye with a book to promote, doing interviews and speaking in public about his career in government service.
That’s a golden opportunity to finally ask some tough questions about his prior service on the board of Theranos, a company that allegedly peddled fake blood tests and peddled connections to influential people in the national security world to get away with it for years.
Theranos was one of the largest business scandals of the past decades, described by the Securities and Exchange Commission as an “elaborate, years-long fraud” in which CEO Elizabeth Holmes and President Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, “exaggerated or made false statements about the company’s technology, business, and financial performance.”
Mattis not only served on Theranos’s board during some of the years after he’d retired from military service, while it was perpetrating the scheme, but he earlier served as a key advocate of putting the company’s technology (technology that was, to be clear, fake) to use inside the military while he was still serving as a general. Holmes settled the SEC case, paying a $500,000 fee and accepting various other penalties, while Balwani is fighting it out in court. (Holmes and Balwani are both battling criminal fraud charges.)
Nobody on the board has been directly charged with anything. But accepting six-figure checks to serve as a frontman for a con operation is the kind of thing that would normally count as a liability in American politics.
St. James of Twitter Memes is not above a little corrupt feather-bedding.
Watch the video: Half the kicking team is well, well offsides (that is, they have run past the ball before it is kicked). They're so far offsides because they know this kick will be awful, and the only way to stop a huge runback is to (illegally) get to the ball just as the receiving team does.
Note that despite 6 of 11 players being obviously offside for the kick, the refs don't blow the whistle. That's because they, too, know that this kick will be awful, and that this Participation Trophy Award Winner will need a lot of help from the Affirmative Action Referees to keep this from being an even bigger embarassment.
But she proved something, I guess.
She proved that women make really, really poor men. (And vice-versa, obviously.)
Covid did kill people, yes. But the overall number of deaths remained constant through the pandemic.
Conventional wisdom is that COVID-19 has caused thousands of deaths in the United States and nearly 1.5 million worldwide. This perception has been directly challenged by a study published by Johns Hopkins University on Sunday, November 22.
Genevieve Briand, assistant program director of the Applied Economics master's degree program at Johns Hopkins University, critically analyzed the impact that COVID-19 had on U.S. deaths. According to her, the impact of COVID-19 on deaths in the United States can be fully understood by comparing it to the number of total deaths in the country.
According to study, "in contrast to most people’s assumptions, the number of deaths by COVID-19 is not alarming. In fact, it has relatively no effect on deaths in the United States."
Wait, what? Really?
That's what it says. And, it should come as no surprise that not long after the study was published it was deleted within days.
The article was censored, it was claimed, because it was being used to "spread misinformation," which is now of course the Censors' go-to justification for censorship, just barely edging past "hate speech" or "causes harm."
The author of the article which explained the study (that is, a scientist crunched the data, a reporter wrote it up) responded thusly:
Today, on November 27th, The News-Letter officially posted their reason for retracting the article, stating inaccuracies in the analysis. I am frustrated at the explanation, and I think it is disrespectful to Dr. Briand's hard work putting data together and doing an honest analysis. If her analysis was to be contradicted, then at least an equal-level analysis should be done to provide more data and thus a new conclusion. Dr. Briand and her work deserve such respect.
I have received many messages asking the reason for taking the article down, and so I would like to officially express my opinions here. I even got emails saying that thanks to me, people now will not be wearing masks or practicing social distancing. They called me "a COVID denier and a minimizer" and that I have no idea the damage and the lives cost in me writing such an article. I was devastated to receive such accusations, but I stand my ground. The goal is never to undermine the effects of COVID-19 but to suggest a possible over-exaggeration in death numbers due to the pandemic.
In addition, another study finds that lockdowns have no impact on covid death rates:
A new study published by Frontiers in Public Health concluded that neither lockdowns nor lockdown stringency were correlated with lower death rates.
Researchers analyzed data from 160 countries over the first 8 months of the pandemic, testing several factors--including demographics, public health, economy, politics, and environment--to determine how they are correlated with COVID-19 mortality.
"Stringency of the measures settled to fight pandemia, including lockdown, did not appear to be linked with death rate," the researchers said.
The researchers found that the criteria most associated with a high death rate was life expectancy, though higher COVID death rates were also observed in certain geographic regions.
And this trend extends to allegedly "conservative" media-- because this isn't about The Science (TM).
It's about beating Trump.
Ninety one percent of stories by U.S. major media outlets are negative in tone versus fifty four percent for non-U.S. major sources and sixty five percent for scientific journals. The negativity of the U.S. major media is notable even in areas with positive scientific developments including school re-openings and vaccine trials. Media negativity is unresponsive to changing trends in new COVID-19 cases or the political leanings of the audience.
That last is an interesting point. It would be reasonable to assume that negative COVID coverage is part of the liberal media’s effort to drive President Trump from office, and to some degree I have no doubt that this is true. But "conservative" news outlets have shown more or less the same pessimistic bias...
Powerline blows that point off immediately, concluding that this must just be what Americans want.
It doesn't occur to them for one second to consider even the possibility that the "conservative" media has many shared agenda-items with the leftwing media. As well as a lot of shared Social Class DNA.
Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens broke COVID-19 regulations Wednesday last week when he dined at the Nico Taverna restaurant with seven other people at the table.
Just hours earlier, Dilkens was among mayors from the region who called for a "zero tolerance approach" when it comes to enforcement of COVID-19 regulations.
At the time, Windsor-Essex was under yellow "protect" status on Ontario's COVID-19 response framework -- and the maximum number of people allowed to be at a table together was six.
CBC News was made aware of the incident after it was sent a photo of the dinner group that was posted to Instagram.
After inquiries from CBC News, Dilkens made a statement to city council Monday afternoon. He called the incident an "unfortunate error on my part" that "should not have occurred."
Speaking of tyrants ignoring their own edicts: Axios' jackass "journalist" Dan Primack took time out to publicly call out a neighbor on Thanksgiving for daring to have guests over -- but was taken to task for having never once called out a politician ignoring lockdown orders.
You’re a journalist who chose to ignore COVID violations by elected officials in major cities but felt rage walking bu a private residence. Get fucked. https://t.co/BAv3VSPeFT
Remember when California reduced the penalties for knowingly spreading HIV? Think about that as they tell you you’re a bad person for doubting some of these lockdown regs
You know, they keep telling us "we're all in this together", like we're all suffering equally, but I don't think so. Think about it: Since our country got hit by the WuFlu, how have politicians suffered? How many elected officials, whether at the national, state, or local level, have lost their jobs? Or even missed a paycheck? And not only politicians, but any employee whose salary comes out of the public treasury. I don't think any public teacher lost a paycheck during the time that the schools were closed and they weren't teaching. What sacrifices have they made? How many of them have been forced to plow under their fields, or slaughter their livestock, or dump their milk?
How many elected officials, the ones who issue strict lockdown orders, and then ignore them (like the governor of California) or take a vacation in a more lenient state (as the mayor of Denver did)? Have they had to close their business and not reopen? Have they had to lay off their employees?
So I don't see any "we" here. I don't see them sacrificing or having to go without, or make do with less. All I see is two sets of rules: easy ones for them and their friends, and draconian ones for everyone else.
Plus, if this was an actual, serious, public health issue, they'd be shutting everything down all of the time, no exceptions. Once they started permitting some gatherings and forbidding others, once they justified the BLM protests by claiming that "racism is a public health issue", that was proof right there that we were being lied to. I had suspected all along, but seeing the unequal treatment made it obvious: When they permitted a massive BLM protest in Loa Angeles and did nothing, and then Gavin Newsom basically declared war on John MacArthur's church. I mean, c'mon, man. And this is why I find it difficult to take their edicts and pronouncements about the severity of the disease seriously. If certain, politically-favored groups can get a dispensation from the rules (i.e. Congressman John Lewis' funeral) but others (churches and synagogues) are made to feel the weight of the law only because they're defying tyrannical governors. That's not public health. That's politics.
Friday Who Dis: Don't get Mrs. Muse started on The Big Valley. She can talk the hind leg off a dog about how bad she thinks the acting was. Her favorite target for her ire is Barbara Stanwyck, but she's got nothing good to say about two other co-stars of that show, our Friday 'who dis' Linda Evans, nor Peter Breck, either.
Today's Edition Of The Morning Rant Is Brought To You By German Chocolate Pecan Pie:
Good morning, kids. Monday, and the last day of the month. It's also pretty much down to the wire in terms of the President presenting his case to the courts, the state legislatures or perhaps the House of Representatives as the Electoral College is scheduled to convene a week from tomorrow. The good news that a Pennsylvania court suspended the vote certification has evaporated as the state's supreme court overturned that decision much to the infantile glee of Lieutenant Governor John Fetterman, a Neanderthal-looking subliterate criminal who guarantees Biden will ultimately win the state. By win, he of course means steal considering what we all witnessed on Election Day.
Naturally, this was to be expected, as considering Pennsy's highest court is corrupt and usurped the authority of the legislature in determining how the votes were to be counted and validated (or not), and it was going to be appealed all the way to the SCOTUS no matter who won the initial argument. As I have stated time and again, the issue is not the strength of the case, in terms of circumstantial and/or statistical evidence and anomalies, physical evidence of counterfeit/fraudulent ballots and rigged computerized voting machines, as well as the Constitutional case involving wholesale disenfranchisement of classes of voters whose ballots were not afforded equal protection insofar as "curing" is concerned.
In short, the evidence is so massive and so compelling that a Vincent Gambini-level neophyte with a correspondence school JD could make it a slam-dunk, let alone the caliber of representation on Team Trump plus Powell, Wood et al. That is not the issue. The issue is will the final arbiters of the case have the stones to uphold the last vestige of the Constitution and the rule of law or will they essentially aid and abet the greatest crime in American history and snuff out the nation? No doubt, doing the former puts them and their families in actual physical danger, as well as unleashes a wave of violence that will doubtless exceed what roiled us over the past summer with the death of that fellow in Minneapolis. But the nation will continue, and hopefully with a concerted effort to eradicate fraud from our election systems. Easier said than done, ironically because of Federalism itself and because rigging elections is now proven beyond all reasonable doubt to be the only way Democrats can win or hold onto power. While I am not going to claim Trump won California or New Jersey, I would bet it was a lot closer in the supposedly solid blue states than it's been in decades. Of course we'll never know, but it's something that does enter into this issue and beyond.
Regardless of who is sworn in, I believe President Trump has touched off a sea change both politically and culturally across a very wide swathe of this nation. Despite the best efforts of the Enemy's Industrial Propaganda Complex to demonize what it cannot censor, at a most basic level, millions of Americans understand that what they have experienced since the lockdowns is, to say the least, not normal; especially given what they had experienced for the previous three - prosperity, pride and hope (real hope not phony Obama hope) for the future in an America once again on the rise. Anecdotally, look at the two stories about restaurant owners in New York telling Angel-of-Death Cuomo to get fucked. Look back to the mass MAGA rallies, even as the Democrat and RINO flunky governors tried shutting them down. Tens of thousands of people cheering on an America first agenda and the man who made it all happen. That is not a fluke; that is a movement, and one that I think will last beyond Trump, G-d willing January 20th, 2025. There are a lot of cynics, even here who think that we as a people are too complacent, too comfortable or too fearful to risk ourselves and our families in confronting the evil that is poised to smother us. I have a feeling the die has been cast. The Trump landslide was not only on Election Day. It's a hell of a lot bigger than that, and it's something that the Enemy will never be able to steal. One day, maybe very soon, they are not going to know what will hit them. Hopefully it's political and non-violent. If it isn't, they will only have themselves to blame, the propaganda machine's declarations notwithstanding.
"The blitz is on! Is there sufficient time between Election Day and certification to allow a challenge based on the general conduct of the election affecting a very large number of votes?" Blitzkrieg Ballots
"Ossoff's praise for Sanders could undermine the Georgia Democrat's ability to distance himself from the far-left senator's progressive policies." Ossoff Embraces Bernie in Georgia Runoff
"In Georgia, weak Republican politicians do not show the same iron will and sense of self-identity as do those who are using them." Fighting for Georgia
PDT: "The Wisconsin recount is not about finding mistakes in the count, it is about finding people who have voted illegally, and that case will be brought after the recount is over, on Monday or Tuesday. We have found many illegal votes. Stay tuned!" Trump Says His Campaign Will Make New Legal Challenge In Wisconsin After Recount
"The 'oppressed peoples, allies, white oppressors' political formula is a cruelly exclusive doctrine that cuts out the great middle of America. No ruling class with half a brain would go for a political formula like that." When the Ruling Class Needs to Steal Elections
Roger Kimball: "Despite the blandishments of the narrative, which seek to seduce you into acquiescence with rumors of inevitability, we really do not know how this story, which seems so familiar, will end." Reality and the Narrative
"When people invent conspiracies about elections that aren't based in reality, that's damaging and that's irresponsible and shouldn't happen," LaRose said, according to The Associated Press. "Because the fact is that elections are run better and more honestly than, really, I think they ever have been." Trump Officially Wins Ohio as State Certifies Election Results
"I have watched in abject disbelief as a disturbing and traitorous Hate America Strategy has taken root and flourished among the populace. It is only in the United States that this tactic has been effectively employed." The Hijacking of the 2020 Election and the Hate America Strategy
"Progressive Democrats might have deposed President Trump, but in return will get little more than the muscular meddling of American adventurism in the Middle East, and domestic stalemate." No Refunds
"Seeing empty shelves is very disconcerting. You wouldn't expect something like that in a great big grown-up country like the United States. But we will never become immune to the human condition. And that is at the root of this unreasoning buying spree." Pandemic Nightmare Returns; Supply Chains Stressed, Leading to Empty Store Shelves
"On Black Friday, thousands of people were crammed inside stores, nobody there to enforce social distancing or masks, toys being touched on the shelves and then put back ready for the next person to touch without washing hands, all the while small businesses and restaurants are being decimated when we are following the rules." Buffalo Restaurant Puts Up "Walmart" Sign to Protest Cuomo Restrictions
OFFICIAL DEMOCRAT PARTY-ENDORSED ANTI-SEMITISM, ANTI-CHRISTIANITY
"Fr. Kevin Robinson of Saint Anthony of Padua Church and Rabbi Yisrael A. Knopfler filed their suits earlier this year, which made their way through the courts. On Wednesday, they appealed to Alito after a lower court rejected their request for an injunction." Justice Alito Sets Deadline For New Jersey To Respond In Religious Freedom Case
"Six decades of contradictory messages has the faithful so disconnected they don't even know they're in a battle, let alone who the enemy is." The True Source of Catholic Democrat Confusion
"There was an unprecedented meeting in Saudi Arabia last weekend between Israel's prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman. News of the meeting leaked out, but no one is sure what the three men -- all sworn foes of Iran -- talked about." Trump Effectively Tying Biden's Hands on Iran
"This action was taken based on the inputs regarding these apps for engaging in activities which are prejudicial to sovereignty and integrity of India, defense of India, security of state and public order," India's Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology said in a statement. India Bans Dozens Of Chinese Communist Party-Linked Apps
"The American elite who oppose Trump's America First movement are globalists, protecting their gains and promoting the further expansion of what has become the American empire." Trump's Nationalism vs. Biden's Empire
Raymond Ibrahim: "Nothing more than religious contempt for Christian 'infidels' was needed to prompt Turks and other Muslims to invade and sadistically savage Christian countries." Jihadi Hate or Territorial Dispute?
DOMESTIC AFFAIRS, THE BUREAUCRACY, WASTE, FRAUD, ABUSE
"Right now in China, 195 million students K-12 are learning in-person in Chinese public schools. Meanwhile, millions of American public school students are learning in a failed remote system." 195 Million Chinese Students Are In School. Why Aren't Our Kids?
"Something went wrong with the rapidly expanding university in the 1960s, and the new 21st century, high-tech, globalized campus has made the mess it inherited dangerous." Why Our Universities Have Failed
Christian Toto: "[The producers'] tragic mistake? They told a story sympathetic to the same Rural USA which helped elect Donald Trump four years ago. Even worse? They did so at a time when both critics and Academy voters have little patience for tales told outside the progressive bubble." Hillbilly Elegy Shows How Hollywood Keeps Conservatives From the Oscar Party
"These days, you must hold the right opinions and express none of the wrong ones -- or else." The Age of Cant
"Far from internalizing victimhood, as Obama claims, white Americans are prohibited from defending themselves and have been deluded to not even realize they are under attack." Blaming Whitey
"A bestselling book offers a prescription for race relations that casts whites as sinners and blacks as children." Black Fragility
NOTE: The opinions expressed in some links may or may not reflect my own. I include them because of their relevance to the discussion of a particular issue.
ALSO: The Morning Report is cross-posted at CutJibNewsletter.com if you want to continue the conversation all day.
"As mayor, there is responsibility for me to lead by example and showcase to all in our region that we need to follow all restrictions and guidelines to the letter," Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens
Quote II
This is the first time, Trey, that I want to leave the state of California. Why? Because the hypocrisy insulting the intelligence of every citizen in California. We have a county health director, who is not elected, who makes half a million dollars, who is not even a medical doctor, and she shuts down the restaurants from outdoor dining. Leo Terrell
Quote III
G– d**n it! When the policy differences are between maintaining American democracy and substituting racist, one party rule. You’re G– d**n right, we want to criminalize policy differences that might exist between the outgoing administration and the administration that is about to take over.” Keith Olbermann
Quote IV
“It is hall-monitor tattletale whining masquerading as journalism: petulantly complaining that tech platforms are permitting speech that, in their view, ought instead be silenced.” Glenn Greenwald
Quote V
“They have basically come to say that they’re from this particular group and they’re there to repossess the home and want the people to vacate the premises,” Edmonds police Sgt. Josh McClure
Sat under an anticyclone, Britain’s contribution from wind power since yesterday has been less than 1GW, around 2% of the total electricity generated. This situation is expected to last a few more days yet.
As ever, it is fossil fuels which have come to the rescue, with gas currently supplying 60% of the nation’s power, and even coal, which has been fired up to give 7%.
Indeed, in the last day we have had more power from coal than from wind.
Thirteen years ago, the Labour government promised us that wind power could be powering every home by this year. (I wonder where I have heard that lately!)
Participant in India’s AstraZeneca Covid-19 vaccine trial sues after experiencing ‘severe adverse effect’
An Indian man who helped test a coronavirus jab based on AstraZeneca’s candidate vaccine has filed suit, claiming that he suffered extreme side effects during his participation in the trial.
The plaintiff, identified in media reports as a 40-year-old man from Chennai, is suing the Pune-based Serum Institute of India (SII) for Rs 5 crore ($676,000 USD). The individual alleges that he suffered serious neurological damage after taking part in the phase three trial of Covishield, the SII’s version of the Covid-19 jab being developed by AstraZeneca and the University of Oxford. The man was purportedly told that the vaccine was safe and chose to participate in the program in “the spirit of public service.”
No fine print to read? Something smells fishy here.
NEW YORK — A career criminal gangbanger with a “resume” of 70 prior arrests slashed a correction officer in the arm and stabbed a captain in the knee at the Manhattan Detention Complex on Thanksgiving Day, union officials said Friday.
The inmate, identified by a Correction Officers’ Benevolent Association spokesman as Franklyn Dominguez, a member of the Latin Kings, was already fighting with two Correction captains — and waving a sharpened piece of metal — when the officer got out of an elevator at the Lower Manhattan facility and walked right into the melee in the vestibule, New York Post reported.
Hardly any New Yorkers called in to rat out their neighbors over Thanksgiving, reports Tony Aiello of CBS New York.
“I heard back from 38 of the state’s 58 Sheriff’s,” New York Sheriff’s Executive Director Peter Kehoe told Aiello. “They reported that six calls came in through the state’s [PAUSE] hotline regarding gatherings of more than 10 people. Unknown if the State Police responded to any of them. Sheriffs did not, no resources available.”
CROSSFIRE HURRICANE: Carter Page Slaps $75M Lawsuit At The Whole Spygate Crew
Carter Page, who had been working as a CIA asset FOR America, was wrongly accused of being a Russian asset. Now he’s going after the players who tried to take him down. By name.
While the rest of us are in limbo playing the will-he won’t-he guessing game about what’s coming next with Barr and Durham, Carter Page is done waiting.
NHS to trial blood test to detect more than 50 forms of cancer - Researchers hopes Galleri trial will be a ‘gamechanger’ for early diagnosis and save many lives
If successful the blood test, known as Galleri, could revolutionise early diagnosis of cancer and save many lives by identifying symptoms quickly enough for prompt treatment to make the difference between life and death.
The blood test will be offered to 165,000 people in England from mid-2021, the vast majority of whom have no signs of the disease.
NHS England hopes the test may prove particularly useful at detecting early signs of cancers that are hard to spot and so have worse survival rates, such as ovarian and pancreatic cancer.
Audi Formula E driver Lucas di Grassi captured his night out at a karting track just outside São Paulo, Brazil, where every karter on track had a paintball gun. He described it as "Mario Kart in real life," and it looks like a blast.
"If you're driving your go kart and become upset because somebody got past, you can just let them have it and fire a hail of paintballs," di Grassi explains.
Taiwanese lawmakers hurl pig organs in Parliament during brawl over US meat imports
Things got downright ugly
Taiwanese lawmakers' battle over allowing the import of American pork and beef products devolved into a literal fistfight Friday on the floor of Parliament in Taipei, but lawmakers threw more than just punches: Pig intestines and other organs were hurled between opposing parties.
SAN BRUNO, CA—To combat harmful online material during the pandemic, YouTube will be removing any cooking videos that show you how to cook for more than 6 people. They have also stated that any channels that continue to post videos of large family-style meals with instructions for how to cook them will be permanently suspended from the platform.
The McDonald's McRib, a sandwich that has 70 ingredients but no rib meat, was first introduced in 1981 and wasn't much of a hit. But in the years since, it has established a cult following, and when it returns to the menu sporadically, those fans come out of the woodwork. That scheme is both accidental and deliberate, and understanding it requires a lesson in McDonald's business model, supply-chain logistics, and marketing.
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The ONT Musical Interlude
On this day: 29 Nov 2001
Beatles guitarist George Harrison died in Los Angeles of lung cancer aged 58. Following the breakup of The Beatles Harrison had a successful career as a solo artist and later as part of the Traveling Wilburys. The youngest member of The Beatles, (aged 16 when he joined), his compositions include ‘Taxman’, ‘Here Comes the Sun’, ‘Something’, and ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’. Harrison released the acclaimed triple album, All Things Must Pass, in 1970, from which came the worldwide No.1 single 'My Sweet Lord.' via thisdayinmusic.com
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Born on this day: 29 Nov 1933
John Mayall, 'father of the UK blues movement', his Bluesbreakers Band has featured Eric Clapton Mick Taylor, Mick Fleetwood, John McVie, Jack Bruce, Peter Green and Jimmy McCulloch. via thisdayinmusic.com
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When you think you misplaced something. Always check your pockets first Genius Award Winner.
LINCOLN, Neb. (KOLN) - A man accused of destroying metal detectors, a wine rack and other property inside a north Lincoln Super Saver was arrested following the incident Tuesday night.
Andrew Marr, 30, was booked into the Lancaster County Jail on charges of criminal mischief and possession of a controlled substance.
According to the Lincoln Police Department, officers were called to Super Saver at 27th and Cornhusker around 8:30 p.m. Tuesday on a report of a man ransacking the inside of the store.
Robby Dinero, a U.S. Marine and the owner of a gym in Orchard Park, New York, was fined $15,000 for violating the coronavirus restrictions after a confrontation last week with the Erie County Health Department.
The defiant business owner appeared on Fox News on Tuesday and tore the citation into pieces on live TV, ripping Gov. Andrew Cuomo for the “worst kind of leadership.”
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Tonight's ONT has been brought to you by DIY Bidets.
Notice: Posted with express permission from the Ace Media Empire and AceCorp, LLC. Thoroughly reviewed and cleared by Dewey, Cheatem & Howe, S.C. ONT tips, loose change, drink tokens and burner phones to petmorons at gmail dot com.
Howdy, y'all, and Happy belated Thanksgiving! I hope you were able to celebrate in the best way possible for you and find at least a few things to be thankful for. I made a quick run down to the farm to check on things this week, and everything was good, but it ended up being a quick down and back trip and I didn't have time to shoot any video.
So with that, grab a leftover drumstick and let's see what we have below, shall we?
Breathing Technique
We have recently had a number of questions and discussions in the comments on the topic of breathing while shooting. Breathing is something we tend to take for granted because we've been breathing without thinking much about it since we were born. However, it's an important part of shooting and there are right ways and wrong ways of doing it.
Correct breathing technique applies to all types of shooting. My match shooting was in a style called F-Class, where high powered rifles with optics are fired from the prone position at long distances. In this style rifles are supported by a front rest or bi-pod and a rear bag, which steadies the weapon and takes a lot of the work off the shooter compared to other disciplines, where the weapon is held in the hands or by the use of a sling, and fired while sitting or standing. That being said, anytime a part of your body is in contact with the gun, your breathing can and will affect your aim.
The Wrong Way
Pretty much any way other than The Right Way discussed below, especially if it involves holding your breath at any point in the inhale and exhale cycle.
The Right Way a.k.a.The WeaselWay
I am going to discuss what I do when shooting rifles from a supported position, however, the concept is the same for all styles of shooting. Please note in this discussion we're talking about shooting on a range at a fixed target, and without anyone shooting back. I haven't been in combat and can only surmise it raises your anxiety level a bit which is going to affect your breathing and aim. The same rules apply though, even on a battlefield, for a well executed shot.
Why is it important? Well your heart and lungs and circulation are all connected, and if you're huffing and puffing and holding your breath, then you're moving all over the place. It also allows you to go to your happy place and be relaxed as you shoot rather than tensing up your muscles, which is not bueno.
First let's talk a little about setup. You need to take care of all the little chores in setting up your gear before you settle in behind the rifle. I like to do things exactly the same way each and every time I shoot so it all becomes habit. You aren't doing your calm Zen state any good by freaking out and forgetting stuff and having to get up and down half a dozen times. When you settle in behind the rifle, you should be 100% ready to start shooting without distraction.
Reading wind is a big part of my match routine, so I will give it a brief mention now. My long range setup includes a spotting scope with the eyepiece about six inches left of the riflescope. In this configuration, I can go back and forth between the rifle and spotting scopes as I evaluate wind conditions by simply tilting my head. Once I have made the wind call on the spotting scope and decide to shoot, I go back on the rifle and settle in. Inside 150 yards or so, wind is generally not a big factor, so I mention it only as part of my process.
OK. So now you're on the rifle with a proper cheek weld on the stock and eye relief behind the scope. A normal, measured inhale or exhale for me takes between 2 and 3 seconds. As soon as I get setup, I start breathing at this rate; call it 2.5 seconds to inhale, then 2.5 seconds to exhale. I have done this so many times and for so long while shooting it's second nature for me now, and it just happens automatically. The important part is to find your own relaxed and consistent, measured inhale/exhale cycle. In and out without pausing at the top or bottom of the cycle. Figure out your own resting respiration rate, and go for that. Practice breathing at that rate and mentally review the mechanics of taking the shot with each cycle. Seriously practice this, and eventually you will find you are able to get into a relaxed state very quickly, and you begin to no longer notice peripheral distractions.
I will usually take one or two breaths in this fashion to settle in and get into my little shooting 'zone' where I am relaxed and allow my heart rate to settle some while beginning to focus on acquiring the target. As I begin the next breath, I am making my final target alignment. As I start to exhale, I begin taking the slack out of the trigger with the goal of being right at the trigger break point when I'm at the mid-point of the exhale. I continue to refine my aim point and break the shot at the bottom of the exhale. BANG!
That's it.
So for me, call it three consistent and measured breaths total. First two are settling in, and the third is executing the shot; target aim refinement on the inhale, then take out trigger slack at about the midpoint, and finally breaking the shot at the bottom of the exhale. Continue breathing normally. You can apply this to any style of shooting, but do not hold your breath ever. The minute you do all sorts of counter-productive physiological stuff begins to happen, none of which is good for your aim.
If you aren't doing this, or something like it already, then give it a try. Practice this 3 breath routine at home and mentally focus on the mechanics of breaking the shot during the third cycle. Then take it to the range and put it to use. Three breaths isn't a magic number, either. Maybe you need five, or sixteen, or two, or whatever number makes you happy. Just focus on relaxing, consistent steady breathing, and the timing of the mechanics during the last breath when the shot is taken.
QUIZ:
Q: Do we hold our breath when shooting?
A: No. No, we do not hold our breath when shooting.
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First up, our pal rickb223 mentioned this helpful handgun diagnostic target last week in the comments, and then sent it in. Thanks rickb223!
Have any of you used one of these and has it helped?
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Next we have a couple of goodies from our pal Neon Madman
Came across this old box of .22 lately. 80 cents a box sounds pretty good for .22, especially since my local range is currently selling bags of 50 .22 Long Rifle for $5.97, but you also have to remember that 80 cents was a lot more money 40 or 50 years ago, back when you could buy rifle cartridges in a paint and hardware store.
This is a group of Stevens rifle cartridges that were introduced from around 1895 - 1907, compared to the common .22 Long Rifle round. They are (left to right): .22-15-60, .25-21, .25-25 and .28-30-120.
By the way, this form of cartridge designation (by no means universal) indicates: caliber - power charge in grains - (optionally) bullet weight in grains.
Someone at Stevens seems to have had a thing for designing long, thin cartridges. In general, if you wanted more "oomph" from a cartridge, you needed more powder (to use the technical terms). Bottlenecked cartridges existed at the time, but there was apparently some resistance to them on the part of shooters. That meant the only way to get more powder in the case was to make the case longer. The drawback is that such long cartridges didn't work well in much of anything other than a single-shot action. The reference book "Cartridges Of The World" (fascinating book, if you don't have a copy you should get one) mentions in general that these were accurate rounds, but because of the small caliber and the fact that they were loaded with black powder bore fouling could be a problem. They have been obsolete, of course, for many years.
I've had this second picture for a while and don't recall using it before. Very, Very cool. Thanks Neon Madman!
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Next we have a great looking rifle and 100 yd target from our pal Wyoming Lurker:
I’ve built an AR in 6.5 Grendel. Notice the manufacturer on the lower. Lol. Seems Creedmore has taken over the 6.5 party. People younger than us don’t know about 6.5 Swede. Anywho, here is my build, and 100 yard group.
Nice shooting and nice rifle, Wyoming Lurker! Thanks for sending this in. Did that start as an 80% lower? How about you other 6.5mm guys and gals... what're you shooting?
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Next, our pal CK has been busy with a project or two!
Well, the never ending lockdowns made me realize that I need a new project. Hello 6mm ARC. My first AR was a DPMS Oracle, the only one that I didn't build, so I've decided that it will become a 6mm ARC. I just ordered a 20" Faxon barrel from Brownells. I have an extra rifle length A2 style handguard so I think I'll use the goofy Oracle gas block and make it a retro looking 6mm ARC. I'll put a FDE A2 stock and grip on it and paint the handguard FDE. A retro, saddle shoe 6mm ARC.
Things are coming along nicely with the new ARC . Scope, mags and Hornady Black ammo arrive this week and the 20" Faxon barrel and a bunch or 105gn 243's are on backorder. I love a good project. Once I started painting my little 762x39 got in the way too!!
Nice job, CK!
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Yay! Another video on the .223 and 5.56mm calibers! Seriously, this is a very good look at the differences in the two cartridges and interoperability. Well worth 12 minutes of your time!
Please note the new and improved gmail account morongunthread at gmail dot com. An informal Gun Thread archive can be found HERE. If you have a question you would like to ask Gun Thread Staff offline, just send us a note and we'll do our best to answer. If you care to share the story of your favorite firearm, send a picture with your nic and tell us what you sadly lost in the tragic canoe accident. If you would like to remain completely anonymous, just say so. Lurkers are always welcome!
That's it for this week - have you been to the range?
Last week's pastrami photo resulted in a deluded and frankly embarrassing conversation about mustard. There is only one mustard that belongs on a pastrami on rye, and that is a spicy brown deli mustard. Sadly, even world famous chef and gun writer "Weasel" chimed in with a cringe-worthy suggestion that yellow mustard...YELLOW MUSTARD! was an appropriate condiment for pastrami.
Obviously yellow mustard has its uses; on a good ball park hot dog comes to mind. But really, it is a child's mustard compared to the heavy hitters.
I would suggest that one need look no further than this abomination of a "food" for proof of the superiority of Western culture. Yes, we may eat some weird stuff (see below), but this one is just vile. And creepy.
[Hat Tip: Misanthropic Humanitarian] I thought he was my friend, but now I am not so sure.
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Sorry, but I don't remember who sent me this horror-show of Swedish culture. Which may be a good thing, because I don't take kindly to this sort of thing: bananas are disgusting. Certainly on par with maple syrup on French Toast, and maybe even worse.
Nothing revealing or new, but the photo is sort of cool!
[Hat Tip: Misanthropic Humanitarian]
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These articles are almost always click-bait, and I read them and almost immediately forget them. This one is particularly silly because at least three of those cities are well-known food destinations and nowhere near underrated.
I don't know whether is is a Southern twist, but the additional punch of 100+ proof rye is a big deal. My current mixing rye is Old Forester 100 proof, and I find that it is an excellent mixer for a reasonable price.
And...I use rye exclusively. I think that bourbon tends to be a bit too sweet and not spicy enough to stand up to the other ingredients in most of the brown liquor cocktails I make.
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Food and cooking tips, Large-breasted Muscovy ducks, young wild pigs, bartenders who use vermouth in Martinis (but not too much), pork belly that doesn't have 5-spice, low-temperature-roast chicken, and good tomatoes that aren't square, pale pink and covered with Mestizo E.coli: cbd dot aoshq at gmail dot com. Any advocacy of French Toast with syrup will result in disciplinary action up to and including being nuked from orbit. And yes, shaking a Manhattan is blasphemy...it's in the Bible!
What is the the world coming to when one can't even count on the structural integrity of a tea bag. This is not a complicated industrial machine; it's a damned permeable pouch with some very lightweight stuff inside. Yet the vast resources of the western world cannot design and manufacture a teabag that doesn't have a failure rate of less than a few percent!
This is quite simply unacceptable. Imagine other things in your daily life if they failed at that rate! Condoms, tires, surgical stitches, elevator cables, penicillin...where would we be if that were the case.
And I responded: And that brings up the larger question of whether is is internally consistent to enjoy the works of those whose political philosophy and behavior is anathema to what we believe.
And we were off!
Muldoon:
I like to think in the same terms that I try to when it comes to authors, essayists, entertainers, pundits and commentators. That is there is a balance between the person and the product. If a Michael Moore speaks a truth, it can be accepted as truth and appreciated outside the context of Michael Moore's total body of work, yet the total body of work affects my willingness to look for the occasional nugget of truth.
A single Tom Cruise movie might be enjoyable, but after a while the constant jaw-clenching facial expressions make it about Tom Cruise, not the storytelling, and it becomes less enjoyable.
If an artist or entertainer isn't wearing their politics on their sleeve and doesn't have a track record of supporting vile politics, go ahead and enjoy the work. But if the man's overall body of work is vile, reject the man by rejecting his art.
We are confronted by this in popular culture to an insane extent. Seemingly every dancing monkey and ventriloquist's dummy in Hollywood and the music industry feels compelled to plague us with his political philosophy, moronic and inconsistent and dismissive of most Americans though most of them are.
And dipping our toes into the history of some of the greatest artists and writers and composers can leave one with a very bad taste in one's mouth.
For example, I love Hemingway's writing, in particular his short works. But I am also aware that the man was a horrid friend, a worse parent, and had political tastes that supposedly included drinking daiquiris while observing Che Guevara murdering his political enemies. Whether that is true is beside the point. The man was a prick.
Fast forward a few generations and we arrive at Steven King, whose early works were quite good as light reads (though not on par with Hemingway, except perhaps in his own mind), but the man hates us! His vitriolic spewings about anyone to the right of George McGovern makes it clear that he wants no part of vast swaths of America, except when they buy his books.
The list goes on and on. Serious art, fluffy movies, popular music...it's all filled with politically charged blather from the so-called "artists." Luckily it is easy to ignore most of it, since most of it is crap. But the filter of time has preserved some fine work by some not-so-fine people, and that is a more difficult and interesting dilemma.
Good morning to all you 'rons, 'ettes, lurkers, and lurkettes, wine moms, frat bros, crétins sans pantalon (who are technically breaking the rules). Welcome once again to the stately, prestigious, internationally acclaimed and high-class Sunday Morning Book Thread, a weekly compendium of reviews, observations, snark, witty repartee, hilarious bon mots, and a continuing conversation on books, reading, spending way too much money on books, writing books, and publishing books by escaped oafs and oafettes who follow words with their fingers and whose lips move as they read. Unlike other AoSHQ comment threads, the Sunday Morning Book Thread is so hoity-toity, pants are required. Even if it's these pants, which look so fowl that not even mashed potatoes and gravy and a side of cranberry sauce would be able to save them.
The Kresge Law Library holds more than 420,000 print volumes of legal texts, along with digital access to millions of journal articles, cases and other documents through our numerous digital database subscriptions. But perhaps what the Law Library is most known for is its grand Reading Room, which awes with its two-story open archways and third floor wrap-around balcony.
Filled with study carrels and large tables, the library serves as an academic hub for the Law School.
If there's one person who really gets under the skin of progressive snowflakes (other than President Trump, of course), it has to be Jordan Peterson. They hate him with an insane passion. It's really quite bizarre, that a mild-manner Canadian clinic psychologist could inspire such mindless hatred.
I mean, get a load of this: Penguin has scheduled the publishing of Peterson's next book for March of 2021, and of course we know that the publishing industry is awash with progressive snowflakes, so the in-house staff at Penguin Random House Canada aren't at all happy. So management held a meeting to see if they could get them to calm down and act like grown-ups, but I don't think it worked. Listen to their boo-hooing:
One employee told Vice News that “people were crying in the meeting about how Jordan Peterson has affected their lives.” One contended Peterson radicalized their father, and another insisted that if the book is published it will negatively affect their non-binary friend.
A different staffer said that Peterson is “an icon of hate speech,” “transphobia,” and “white supremacy.” Another claimed Peterson is responsible for “causing this surge of alt-right groups, especially on university campuses.”
“We publish a lot of people in the LGBTQ+ community and what is the company going to do about making sure these authors are still feeling supported by a company that is supporting somebody who denies their existence?” one employee asked.
So Peterson is a racist, a bigot, an alt-right white supremacist, and a homophobe. Yeah, yeah. Of course, he's none of those things.
...warns that too much security is dangerous. What’s more, he offers strategies for overcoming the cultural, scientific, and psychological forces causing us to tend toward tyranny, and teaches us how to rely instead on our instinct to find meaning and purpose, even—and especially—when we find ourselves powerless.
While chaos, in excess, threatens us with instability and anxiety, unchecked order can petrify us into submission. Beyond Order provides a call to balance these two fundamental principles of reality itself, and guides us along the straight and narrow path that divides them.
There's no preview available (yet), but I will bet the rules Peterson proposes will be much like the ones in his first book. It'll be things like "clean up your room", or "finish your peas", or "comb your hair, "or, (and this one will be a fun one), "wait 'til your father comes home." Of course, most snowflakes have daddy issues, anyway, so it'll really send them into orbit.
By the way, Peterson's first book, 12 Rules for Life: An Antidote to Chaos is going for $2.99 on Kindle. And I can see why it would make progressives weep and gnash their teeth. Like this rule:
Rule 7: Set your house in perfect order before you criticize the world.
Because progressives are all about criticizing the world. Their own houses, not so much.
Who Dis:
(Last week's 'who dis' was A-list hottie Lana Turner
Celebrate Thanksgiving Weekend by topping off your library. Select from over eighty titles each priced at $0.99, including more than a dozen that are absolutely free.
These appear to be mostly science fiction and fantasy books. Selected authors include authors like C.J. Carella, Larry Correia, Jon del Arroz, David Drake, Eric Flint, Declan Finn, Amie Gibbons, Sarah Hoyt, Daniel Humphreys, Tom Kratman, Andre Norton, Richard Paolinelli, John Ringo, Adam Lane Smith, David Weber, David J. West, Michael Z. Williamson, John C. Wright, and others.
A Christian friend here at work recommended this. I’m going to get it. You’re welcome to borrow it. He said it starts slow, then ropes you in. His friend recommended it, said everything you need to know about guerrilla warfare is in it. My friend said the main character’s struggles with what God would want vs. protecting his family were moving, agonizing.
So, let me see if I get the chain correct: I heard about The Warwolf from a friend who heard it from one of her friends who heard about it from his friend, so we're, like, 3 deep here. And now all of you morons are hearing about it from me, so you're fourth in line. That's pretty dodgy, even for the book thread. But even so, it does sound like it might be an interesting read:
Originally published in 1910 and still in print in Germany, The Warwolf is available for first time in English.
The Thirty Years War, fought between 1618 and 1648, was a ruthless struggle for political and religious control of central Europe. Engulfing most of present-day Germany, the war claimed at least ten million lives. The lengthy conflict was particularly hard on the general population, as thousands of undisciplined mercenaries serving Sweden, Spain, France, the Netherlands, and various German principalities, robbed, murdered, and pillaged communities; disease spread out of control and starvation became commonplace. In The Warwolf, Hermann Löns's acclaimed historical novel, the tragedy and horrors of war in general, and these times in particular are revealed. The Warwolf, based on the author's careful research, traces the life of Harm Wulf, a land-owning peasant farmer of the northern German heath who realizes after witnessing the murder of neighbours and family at the hands of marauding troops that he has a choice between compromising his morals or succumbing to inevitable torture and death. Despite his desire for peace, Wulf decides to band with his fellow farmers and live like "wolves," fiercely protecting their isolated communities from all intruders. Löns's brilliant portrayal of the two sides faced by any person in a moral crisis—in Harm Wulf's case, whether to kill or be killed—continues to resonate.
I just can't imagine the scale of this kind of war.
I finished The Changewinds last night--when I want to read, I READ! (roughly 200+ pages in a single evening) Great ending, more than makes up for the minor flaws within the story otherwise. Has that ever been a topic for discussion? How much are readers willing to forgive in an otherwise "meh" story if the ending/payoff at the end is off the charts amazing? We already know what happens when a good story is derailed by terrible endings (see: the Star Wars sequels and the last season or so of Game of Thrones).
Also, Jack L. Chalker manages to be both timelessly relevant and extremely dated. He starts and ends the story at a shopping mall, the natural habitat of the 1980s white middle-class teenager, but the overall conflict is about the age-old balance between order and chaos. Great stuff. Not too many authors can do this successfully.
It's a Baen Book, but available only in paperback. The Amazon blurb tells you pretty much nothing, other than the author's name, Jack L. Chalker.
Although it's not his best work, I have yet to find a Chalker series I didn't enjoy on some level. The premise is that changewinds with the power to alter reality on a fundamental level periodically sweep through the multiverse with no rhyme or reason. Anyone or anything caught in the path is changed forever, leading to bizarre creatures and environments. A group of powerful sorcerers are seeking to control the winds through the Storm Princess, the one being in all reality who *might* be able to actually control the changewinds. Naturally, not all sorcerers have the same goals in mind.
If you are not familiar with Jack L. Chalker, the defining characteristic in pretty much all of his works is people get transformed into other genders/species at some point. Depending on the work, they might be transformed multiple times (sometimes within the same chapter!). It's one of his most common themes, but he pulls it off pretty well. If you like 80s-90s era science fiction, I'd definitely give him a shot.
If you want to give your money directly to Baen, the price is $15.00 for the paperback.
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146 I've been reading William Freehling's two volumes Secessionists At Bay and Secessionists Triumphant, a very long and detailed history of the South before the Civil War.
We tend to think of the antebellum South as a monolithic entity, but there were many Souths: a Border South, and Upper South and a Lower South, as well as an Eastern South and a Western South. The tensions among these and their attitudes toward slavery are almost as striking as the conflicts between the North and the South as a whole.
Posted by: Hadrian the Seventh at November 08, 2020 09:49 AM (mht8P)
The Amazon blurbs are way too long for me to even to begin to figure out how to pare them down, so you can read them for yourself at these links:
Why did the Confederacy lose the Civil War? Most historians point to the larger number of Union troops, for example, or the North's greater industrial might. Now, in The South Vs. the South, one of America's leading authorities on the Civil War era offers an entirely new answer to this question.
William Freehling argues that anti-Confederate Southerners--specifically, border state whites and southern blacks--helped cost the Confederacy the war. White men in such border states as Missouri, Kentucky, and Maryland, Freehling points out, were divided in their loyalties--but far more joined the Union army (or simply stayed home) than marched off in Confederate gray. If they had enlisted as rebel troops in the same proportion as white men did farther south, their numbers would have offset all the Confederate casualties during four years of war...
Also $9.99.
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Books By Morons
Long-time lurker Alma Boykin has just published the 16th installment of her Familiar Tales urban fantasy series, Knowingly Familiar:
A Mesopotamian curse sends ripples through the magical community of Riverton. Mages André and Lelia Lestrang find themselves fighting ghosts from their past. The battle draws them closer to Master Saldovado and the clans, closer perhaps than Lelia's heart dares to go. How long before Patrick Lee and Riverton's other magic users demand answers about the clans? The Familiars are keeping the secret. For now.
But breaking ancient spells comes easily for shadow mages. Juggling parenthood, budgets, car repairs, school schedules, and a six-year-old daughter's desire for a pet unicorn? (Or a house dragon, preferably pastel pink.) That's difficult!
So that's all for this week. As always, book thread tips, suggestions, bribes, insults, threats, ugly pants pics and moron library submissions may be sent to OregonMuse, Proprietor, AoSHQ Book Thread, at the book thread e-mail address: aoshqbookthread, followed by the 'at' sign, and then 'G' mail, and then dot cee oh emm.
What have you all been reading this week? Hopefully something good, because, as you all know, life is too short to be reading lousy books.
A woman was at her hairdresser's getting her hair styled for a trip to Rome with her husband. She mentioned the trip to the hairdresser, who responded:
"Rome? Why would anyone want to go there? It's crowded and dirty. You're crazy to go to Rome. So, how are you getting there?”
"We're taking United” was the reply. "We got a great rate!”
“United?" exclaimed the hairdresser. " That's a terrible airline. Their planes are old, their flight attendants are ugly, and they're always late. So, where are you staying in Rome?”
"We'll be at this exclusive little place over on Rome's Tiber River called Taste.”
"Don't go any further. I know that place. Everybody thinks it's gonna be something special and exclusive, but it's really a dump.”
"We're going to go to see the Vatican and maybe get to see the Pope.”
"That's rich," laughed the hairdresser. ”You and a million other people trying to see him. He'll look the size of an ant. Boy, good luck on this lousy trip of yours. You're going to need it.”
A month later, the woman again came in for a hairdo. The hairdresser asked her about her trip to Rome.
"It was wonderful," explained the woman, "not only were we on time in one of United’s brand new planes, but it was overbooked, and they bumped us up to first class. The food and wine were wonderful, and we had a handsome 28-year-old steward who waited on us hand and foot..
And the Taste hotel was great! They'd just finished a $5 million remodeling, and now it's a jewel, the finest hotel in the city. They, too, were overbooked, so they apologized and gave us their owner's suite at no extra charge!”
"Well," muttered the hairdresser, "that's all well and good, but I know you didn't get to see the Pope.”
"Actually, we were quite lucky, because as we toured the Vatican, a Swiss Guard tapped me on the shoulder, and explained that the Pope likes to meet some of the visitors, and if I'd be so kind as to step into his private room and wait, the Pope would personally greet us.
Sure enough, five minutes later, the Pope walked through the door and shook my hand! I knelt down and he spoke a few words to me..”
"Oh, really! What'd he say?”
He said: "Who fucked up your hair?
(H/T Legally Sufficient)
The X chromosomes of the Schwandts in Lakeview Michigan seemed to be very elusive after almost three decades.
But after years and years and years of practicing, about 28 to be exact, Jay Schwandt and his wife Kateri finally welcomed a girl into their family after having 14 boys who range in age from 2 to 28 years old.
Maggie Jayne was born on Thursday to large admiring family of mostly men (even the dog Boomer is a guy!)
The bizarre amphibious four-wheeled vehicle called Rhino was designed by the Greek-American inventor Elie Aghnides. In the 1940s, Aghnides was watching a tractor laboring through New York City’s Central Park and figured he could combine the stability of a bulldozer with the speed of a car, and create an efficient, all-terrain vehicle.
A few years later, he came up with the concept of an enormous vehicle nicknamed “The Rhino”. Defining features were its massive slanted front wheels, which had six-foot diameters and weighed 1,500 pounds each. The wheels were also hollow, which allowed the Rhino to float, meanwhile, a hydrojet propelled it forward along the water body.
On November 12th, 1970, Paul Linnman delivered a legendary news report on a whale carcass that had washed up on the shores of Florence, Oregon.
Authorities somehow thought using dynamite was the best way to dispose of the deceased sperm whale. Things quickly went awry and the infamous news report is often cited as one of the Internet’s earliest viral news clips.
The internet’s a blessing and a curse because any mistakes that you make in life can find their way online where they can stay there. Forever. On the other hand, these mistakes can act as cautionary tales for others. On how not to behave. Ever!
A redditor shared a story on the ‘Eff You Karen’ subreddit about a “male Karen” (which is technically a ‘Kyle’ if you’re wondering) who tried to aggressively barge into a Scottish tattoo parlor only to later complain about being mistreated. The owner of the Archangel 1608 Tattoo Studio in Glasgow, David McKinlay, quickly put them in their place in the most epic way. Read on to see what happened. I think that you’ll agree that the customer was acting extremely rudely and got what was coming to them. And, I’ve got to say, I’m a big fan of how the Scottish handle issues like this. No mollycoddling. No nonsense. Just a shower of sarcasm. And some gritty Scottish swearing. And all is well with the world
OK, Thanksgiving is past us, now to concentrate on Christmas...............
Vodka Christmas Cake
Ingredients
1 cup sugar 1 tsp. Baking powder
1 cup water 1 tsp. salt
1 cup of brown sugar lemon juice
4 large eggs Some nuts
1 bottle vodka 1 bottle vodka
Instructions
Sample a cup of vodka to check quality
Take a large bowl
Check the vodka again to be sure it is of the highest quality then repeat.
Turn on the electric mixer.
Beat one cup of butter in a large fluffy bowl.
Add 1 teaspoon of sugar.
Beat again.
At this point, it is best to make sure the vodka is still ok.
Try another cup just in case.
Turn off the mixer thingy.
Break 2 eegs and add to the bowl and chuck in the cup of dried fruit.
Pick the fruit up off the floor, wash it and put it in the bowl a piece at a time trying to count.
Mix on the turner. If the fried druit getas stuck in the beaterers, just pry it loose with the drewscriver
Sample the vodka to test for tonsisticity.
Next sift 2 cups of salt, or something.
Check the vodka.
Now shift the lemon juice and strain your nuts.
Add one table.
Add a spoon of sugar, or somefink.
Whatever you can find.
Greash the oven.
Turn the cake tin 360 degrees and try not to fall over.
Don’t forget to beat off the turner.
Finally, throw the bowl through the window.
Finish the vodka and wipe the counter with the cat
***
The ONT Musical Interlude
On this day: 28 Nov 1993
Steppenwolf drummer Jerry Edmonton was killed in a car crash not far from his Santa Barbara, California home, he was 47. Steppenwolf had the 1969 US No.2 & UK No.30 single 'Born To Be Wild'. via thisdayinmusic.com
&&&
Born on this day: 28 Nov 1943
Randy Newman, singer, songwriter, Composer of 'Mama Told Me Not To Come', 'Simon Smith And The Amazing Dancing Bear', 1977 US No.2 single 'Short People.' Film soundtracks including 'Ragtime.' Once hailed as the greatest songwriter alive by Paul McCartney. Since the 1980s, Newman has worked mostly as a film composer, his film scores include Ragtime, Toy Story; A Bug's Life; Toy Story 2; Monsters, Inc.; Cars; Toy Story 3; and Monsters University. via thisdayinmusic.com
A Hackensack School Board member who made national headlines by opposing a LGBTC curriculum has resigned after an embarrassing incident during a Zoom meeting.
Frances Cogelja didn’t realize she’d left her laptop camera on when she took it with her while going to the bathroom during the public comments section of a board meeting Monday night.
Nearly 150 participants, including students, apparently saw Cogelja relieve herself.
No one immediately said anything when she returned from her trip to the toilet.
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Tonight's ONT has been brought to you by Debatable Topics.
Notice: Posted with or without the Ace Media Empire and AceCorp, LLC's permission. The ONT is posted for what it is worth.
The ONT will be missing our curmudgeonly Moron Chavez the Hugo. I received an email from his lovely wife. Chavez lost his battle to cancer this morning. Condolences to Mrs. the Hugo and their children. [Mis. Hum.]
Arlington is seeking diverse voices in its Dialogues On Race And Equity, but so far the biggest group of respondents have been middle-aged white women who are relatively affluent.
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