Bandersnatch 2024
GnuBreed 2024
Captain Hate 2023
moon_over_vermont 2023
westminsterdogshow 2023
Ann Wilson(Empire1) 2022 Dave In Texas 2022
Jesse in D.C. 2022 OregonMuse 2022
redc1c4 2021
Tami 2021
Chavez the Hugo 2020
Ibguy 2020
Rickl 2019
Joffen 2014
AoSHQ Writers Group
A site for members of the Horde to post their stories seeking beta readers, editing help, brainstorming, and story ideas. Also to share links to potential publishing outlets, writing help sites, and videos posting tips to get published.
Contact OrangeEnt for info: maildrop62 at proton dot me
By which The Verge means Republicans are objecting to laws and regulations designed to make internal combustion vehicles more expensive and less efficient.
It subverts the VPN routing table to just run traffic directly over the network instead.
This applies to general anonymising VPNs that cover the entire internet. It doesn't affect corporate VPNs, and if you're running HTTPS or SSH over the VPN you're safe anyway.
Also, it doesn't work against Linux or Android devices, not because they are inherently more secure, but because they don't properly follow the network standard that is being abused by the attack.
It's not the fastest CPU in the world, but it runs well and won't burn a hole in your desk or your wallet.
So... I need another Windows license.
One of the systems I just set up I already partly set up two years ago, but then I forgot the password I put on it.
I tried to reinstall Windows, but the regular installer couldn't find the SSD.
So I created a recovery disk off an identical machine and used that to install it, which went fine, except that this ended up with this machine stealing the license key of the other one.
Since I didn't sign in to my Microsoft account before this happened, I can't recover the key either.
I have three Windows 11 Pro OEM licenses, except that you don't get the key anymore so I have no way to use them.
Random Vtuber Music Video of the Day
Not Hololive today, but indie vtuber Midas, with Touch Tone Telephone.
Disclaimer: Cause I'm the right one, on my VOLTE telephone.
The gift of fantasy has meant more to me than my talent for absorbing positive knowledge. Albert Einstein
Quote 2
“This is what this is all about — election inference, how do we stop it — and it’s a disgrace. President Donald Trump I wonder if this comment will cause the Honorable Wannabe Judge Dred to jail President Trump
South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem (R) pitched herself for a top NRA job as early as last fall, two sources told Axios.
Why it matters: Noem offered to step down early as governor for the role, according to a person familiar with her conversation with former NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre.
Late last fall, Noem called LaPierre to advocate to be the next executive vice president or CEO of the gun lobby.
Noem is now in a heated PR cycle over passages in her book about shooting her dog and meeting with Kim Jong Un.
I don't care if she met with Kim Jong Un. Plenty of Democrats Commies and/or Fascists have met with evil people and they aren't called out for it.
*****
In case you are wondering how my day went. There might be a Mystery click or two...
An engaged Wisconsin elementary school teacher was arrested for "making out" with a fifth-grade student on Wednesday (May 1).
River Crest Elementary School teacher Madison Bergmann, 24, faces one count of first-degree sexual assault and was released on a $25,000 signature bond, according to charging documents obtained by CBS News. The parents of the 11-year-old boy overheard the child having a phone conversation with Bergmann earlier in the week, at which point they found texts between two in which she allegedly discussed multiple encounters inside the classroom, during lunch or after school, as well as how much she enjoyed him touching her and "making out," documents stated.
RAGING BEAST Terrifying moment hippo attacks tourist boat sinking its huge teeth into vessel after charging across Namibia river
A witness said she was 'shocked to the wild mammal' chasing and hitting the boat
*****
The ONT Musical Interlude & Joint Operation Emporium
Birthdays today via this dayinmusic.com
6 May 1945
American singer-songwriter, guitarist and pianist Bob Seger, who scored the 1977 hit 'Night Moves', the 1987 US No.1 single 'Shakedown', taken from the film Beverly Hills Cop II, and the 1995 hit single 'We've Got Tonight'. Seger has sold more than 100 million records worldwide.
6 May 1929
American singer Leon Hughes, The Coasters. The rhythm and blues/rock and roll vocal group scored the 1958 US No.1 single 'Yakety Yak', the 1959 US No.2 and UK No.6 single 'Charlie Brown', as well as 'Young Blood' and 'Poison Ivy'. Hughes died at his home in Watts, Los Angeles, on 1 March 2023, at the age of 92. He was the last surviving original member of The Coasters.
Police: Sackets Harbor man drove vehicle off boat launch while following GPS
May 1—SACKETS HARBOR — A Sackets Harbor man told police that he drove his vehicle onto the village's boat launch and then into the lake at about 2 a.m. Monday while following GPS instructions.
Amazon delivery driver shoots, kills person with gun in attempted carjacking, police say
*****
Tonight's ONT has been brought to you by Questionable Marketing Slogans.
Notice: Posted with permission by the Ace Media Empire & AceCorp, LLC. For a transcript of tonight's festivities please send $5.00 American none of that Canadian crap and SASE to petmorons at gmail dot com
As fd said, "please please please, don't burn the place down!"
Or just get the good paintings out first, at least.
The NYPD is bracing for possible unrest to rock Monday's star-studded Met Gala, law enforcement sources told The Post -- as anti-Israel groups called for a "Day of Rage" protest at CUNY's nearby Hunter College.
Police security will be heightened in and around the Metropolitan Museum of Art as A-listers start descending on the iconic Upper East Side venue for the glitzy gala Monday evening, sources said.
No specific threats have been identified so far for Fashion's Biggest Night -- but everything is on the table, a police source noted, adding that protests in the vicinity are widely expected.
"We are using every tool at our disposal," a source said. "We approach this like we do all large-scale events -- examining information and applying it to a measured and calculated response should the need arise."
One ugly AWFL Karen protester already showed up and was arrested. Boy, The Regime doesn't f*** around when you disrupt one of their events, huh?
In the interests of peace and conciliation, I have contacted the Met Gala and they have appointed me mediator in this dispute.
Here is the Message of Peace the Met Gala wants me to pass on to the protesters:
You're all talk. I was just talking with representatives of the Met Gala, and they were all laughing about what ineffectual pansies and posers you all are. The Met Gala says your "men" are all homosexuals and your women wear the mustaches your catamite "men" are too weak to grow.
Their words, not mine.
You don't have the nerve to do what has to be done at the Met Gala. You don't have the guts.
The Met Gala is laughing at you. The Met Gala says that you all shame your ancestors with your filthy cowardice.
Again, their words.
Go ahead, prove me wrong. Prove the Met Gala wrong. They dare you.
I hope these Words of Peace sooth the wounds of our nation like a fine unguent.
Also Anna Wintour says, "PS, Suck a dick, softcocks."
Jon Stewart said President Biden is too old for the job.
"I know liberals say, 'Don't say Joe Biden is old' -- don't say what people see with their own eyes! You can say it, he can't hear us," Stewart said during a comedy performance in Los Angeles that was streamed on Netflix.
"I know you know how f--ing old he is, and I know you don't want to say it because [former President Donald] Trump is so scary, but he's so f--ing old ... when you watch him on television, you're nervous, aren't ya?" said the host of "The Daily Show."
Stewart made the remarks at an appearance at the Netflix Is a Joke Fest, which debuted on the streaming service on Friday, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
"I'm not saying that Biden can't contribute to society, he just shouldn't be president," Stewart added.
Wow, he can see that a plainly-demented man is too impaired to be president. Can we declare him a Prophet now, or does that take three miracles or something?
A Jewish woman was beaten to unconsciousness by pro-Hamas occupiers at UCLA while campus security refused to intervene. A group of Jewish students responded by returning to exact revenge and then, only then, did Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass (D) finally find a voice to condemn "detestable violence on campus". How convenient. How transparent.
Where was campus security? Intimidation by pro-Hamas occupiers towards students, faculty and staff, especially Jews, has been going on almost two weeks, with nary any interference from administrators.
Speaking with Fox News, professor Nir Hoftman recalled his hostile encounters with the protesters and accused them of deep antisemitism.
"This was never peaceful," he said. "Jews were not allowed to go into the campus. Jews were not allowed to go into the library. Jews were not allowed to go to classes. It was never peaceful. They're vandalizing the entire quad."
Hoftman added that there had been a "total breakdown of law and order" and denounced local authorities for restraining the police from disbanding the camp until Wednesday. To emphasize his point, he recalled an encounter he had with the protesters days before.
"You might be shocked, but I'm not -- because these people attacked me a few days ago," he said when hosts asked if he was shocked by the violent scenes involved in the police storming of the encampment.
The administrators of many of the universities hosting these encampments have either been too fearful to act or actually sympathize with the pro-Hamas brownshirts. They allowed not just the tent occupation on a public university campus to fester, but even with evidence of brownshirts' being trained ...
Hit the link to see a clip of these Hamas brownshirts training each other in (inept, limpwristed) hand-to-hand combat.
Probably because she's such a hottie. I look at her and wonder what the ragweed pollen count is today. She looks like a gorgeous, succulent, gawky, adenoidal 7th-grade boy and Treasurer of the D&D Club. (The Presidency and Vice Presidency are just popularity contests, the Treasury is where real change can be made.)
Last week, a professor wrote this FaceBook letter to protesting "students":
Melinda Roth
Dear Campus Protestors
I've seen other people write to you, but I just walked among you at one of your campus encampments (GW in DC).
Here are my thoughts:
Instead of hanging out in your nice brand new paid from unknown sources green and white tents, why not send them to those displaced in Gaza who really need them? After all, you have dorms and apartments that mommy and daddy are paying for right now.
You have catered food and an all you can eat snack bar, why not send food to those you claim are starving?
Since you are skipping classes (if you are actually a student), why not go volunteer to help in Gaza? Many American Jews have gone to help in Israel on farms and kibbutzes to provide missing labor as so many Israelis have been called up to military service. If you really want to help, why don't you go where you really could make a difference for the people you profess to be supporting?
Why don't you use all the time hanging out in the quad and in your tents to learn about what you are supporting? You are supporting rape, as your signs "resistance by any means necessary" state. You are supporting gender inequality and lack of any LGBTQ rights. You are supporting a named terrorist organization. Your call for an intifada revolution is a call for more innocent lives to be lost.
Let's address that for a second. You claim to be against the war in Gaza given all the innocent lives lost -- but in your next chant you want bloodshed everywhere with your call for an intifada revolution. It is glaringly inconsistent.
Why is there not a single sign or chant to release the hostages? Innocent people have been kidnapped, including women and children and Americans. How can you claim signs that say "final solution" or "zionists pigs get out" or chants like "Burn Tel Aviv to the ground" are not antisemitic? I believe strongly in free speech, but this is hate speech.
You call each other comrades. I spent a lot of time in eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union. I can promise you that most people in the world prefer capitalism over communism.
Why block people from coming in and or taking photos, why block the press and why taunt people like me trying to engage?
If you are so proud of yourselves, why hide those faces? Why mask up? I took photos this afternoon, and every single time a protestor noticed, they put their mask back on. Real protestors are proud of what they are doing and ready to face the consequences, whether getting arrested or suspended or whatever. You are not real protestors. You are sheep. You are indoctrinated to think Israel and Zionists and even Jews are evil.
You are not on the right side of history like you think you will be. No one with hate in their heart ever is.
You're not going to believe me, you're going to call me crazy, but it turns out that Biden's biggest billionaire donors are funding the American Intifada.
Some of President Biden's big donors are funding pro-Hamas demonstrations on American college campuses. Surprised?
Politico thinks voters are dumb, so we'll pretend to be surprised. Specifically, names like Soros, Gates, Rockefeller, and Pritzker popped up when Politico did a little digging. The premise of the article is that well-funded big donor money sometimes ends up supporting groups that don't necessarily align with a donor's beliefs.
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"There may be times where a donor may give to an organization or candidate that sometimes does something that clashes with their personal view," said Kevin Conlon, who has been a bundler for Biden as well as for Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, and now advises nonprofits.
Malarkey. That is a very Clintonian statement. Wealthy Democrats know what is going on and where their money is going. You'll notice that the article wasn't about wealthy Republicans funding campus chaos and anti-Israel hatred.
Socialist billionaire George Soros is a longtime Democrat donor who is frequently singled out by Republicans as the source of funding nefarious political actions. His money only goes to Democrats, who mock Republicans for pointing fingers at Soros. The truth is that Soros and other big Democrat donors are very involved in funding organizations like the Tides Foundation. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation also funds the Tides Foundation.
Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow are two groups that are funded by the Tides Foundation. Those groups are behind the demonstrations at Colombia University and other schools. Jewish Voice for Peace makes no secret about the fact that it is anti-Zionist.
David Rockefeller, Jr. sits on the board of he Rockefeller Brothers Fund. That fund gave $300,000 to the Tides Foundation in 2022. The Tides Foundation has given about $500,000 to Jewish Voice for Peace over the last five years.
Heirs to the Hyatt Hotel empire, Susan and Nick Pritzker, give big bucks to Democrat campaigns. They donated $6,000 to the Biden Victory Fund a few months ago. They gave more than $300,000 to the 2020 campaign. If the Pritzker name sounds familiar it is because Illinois Governor JB Pritzker is a member of the family. Governor Pritzker is a close ally of Biden's and a frequent surrogate for the Biden campaign. Politico describes Pritzker as the Democrats' secret weapon.
CNN: "[These anti-Israel campus protests] are funded by big Biden donors — the Pritzkers, the Gateses, George Soros, David Rockefeller, Jr. Should they stop funding these groups?"
Israeli Warplanes Begin Pounding Rafah Like Sweetdick Pounding Fani's Wretched Snizz
—Disinformation Expert Ace
In an obvious attempt to delay this final attack on their terror stronghold, Hamas announced they were "agreeing" to a ceasefire.
Not the ceasefire deal that Israel agreed to, of course. No, they "agreed" to a ceasefire deal Israel had no part of.
Avi Mayer
@AviMayer
Let us all be very clear on what is happening right now:
Hamas has not agreed to any known proposal for a ceasefire.
Its announcement that it has agreed to "a ceasefire" is meaningless, an obvious ploy and delay tactic meant to prevent the imminent military operation in Rafah
Earlier, Israel dropped leaflets on Rafah instructing civilians to evacuate.
Israeli warplanes pounded targets in Rafah, a city in southern Gaza, yesterday, as the military told about 110,000 people there to evacuate. Hours later, the political leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, said that the group had accepted a cease-fire proposal from Qatar and Egypt.
The full details of the proposal were unclear, but the conflict remains unresolved. Comments by Hamas and Israeli officials made it clear that Haniyeh was not referring to the plan that Israel had recently put forward.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said the proposal did not meet Israel's demands. Israel's war cabinet had also decided unanimously to "continue with its action in Rafah in order to exert military pressure on Hamas," Netanyahu's office said in a statement.
Biden is, of course, trying to save Hamas' terrorist leaders their just reckoning, to placate the pro-terrorist Democrat madrassas in Michiganistan.
Israel started the final phase of the war to remove Hamas Good The Biden Admin is reacting to political pressure in trying to stop this Netanyahu must stand firm pic.twitter.com/OZ5gb3EK6M
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology will no longer require prospective hires to pledge allegiance to the principles of diversity, equity and inclusion as an employment condition, becoming the first elite university in the country to do away with the controversial practice denounced by free speech advocates as a "political litmus test."
"Requests for a statement on diversity will no longer be part of applications for any faculty positions at MIT," a university spokesperson told The Post in an emailed statement, noting that the decision was made by MIT president Sally Kornbluth along with the support of the provost, chancellor and all six academic deans.
"My goals are to tap into the full scope of human talent, to bring the very best to MIT, and to make sure they thrive once here," Kornbluth said. "We can build an inclusive environment in many ways, but compelled statements impinge on freedom of expression, and they don't work."
Part CV and part DEI loyalty oath, diversity statements have become common practice in higher ed in recent years, compelling faculty or research applicants to bloviate over two to three pages about their commitment to "advance excellence in diversity, inclusion, equity, and belonging as a teacher and a researcher in higher education," as Harvard describes its own diversity statement requirement.
Similar descriptions can be found on the homepage of just about any prominent school in the US as top universities scramble to loudly proclaim their commitment to the practice.
Princeton peddles its diversity statement requirement as "an opportunity for you to highlight the ways you would advance an institution's DEI work," while Columbia University furnishes job seekers with a four-page guide to help applicants "showcase your understanding and activities" around diversity and inclusion.
As one of the country's most prestigious institutes of higher learning, MIT fields job applications from some of the world's top scientific minds. But even those applying for highly specialized fields weren't spared the diversity statement requirement.
In a 2023 faculty job posting for MIT's Department of Nuclear Science and Engineering, sandwiched between a requirement for three or more reference letters and examples of published research, candidates are instructed to provide "a statement regarding their views on diversity, inclusion, and belonging, including past and current contributions as well as their vision and plans for the future in these areas."
Such practices, though now commonplace at American universities, have long been condemned by academic freedom and free speech advocates as a political exercise.
...
Freedom of speech advocacy group the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression warned that diversity statement requirements "function as ideological litmus tests" which "threaten employment or advancement of opportunities for faculty who dissent from prevailing thought on DEI."
All because the media went all-in on the left's political op to turn George Floyd a referendum on Trump.
Menu prices in California will rise once again when a new law goes into effect in the summer, a double-whammy after fast-food chains in the state hiked prices to help pay for the $20 minimum wage the state imposed last month.
Restaurant owners in the state are warning that a new law signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom that bans "junk fees" in the state starting July 1 will force them to raise prices because it prohibits restaurant surcharges and fees.
Restaurant owners have often relied on surcharges to provide their employees benefits like health care. Some businesses would note surcharges on menus, and others would make them optional, with the decision left to the customer.
However, the new law is prompting restaurant owners to hike prices on their menus to comply with the new law.
California's attorney general confirmed to the San Francisco Chronicle this week that restaurant surcharges and fees would be illegal under the new law in a blow to the industry.
Golden Gate Restaurant Association Director Laurie Thomas told CBS News Bay Area the law will put restaurants in a tough spot with either lower wages for employees or by discouraging customers with higher prices.
"So, now, do you take their rate down and do you go to an old-fashioned tip model and say to your servers, 'You have to tip the whole house, but that drops everybody's salaries' or do you raise your prices 20%, 25%?" Thomas said. "It might make a lot of customers happier. They might say, 'We understand why prices went up.' Let's hope that happens. But I don't know if our industry can hope that's what happens. They're still struggling. It's been a tough year."
Unexpectedly, the restaurant sector is now downsizing. Or should I say, Bidensizing.
Starbucks announced a surprise drop in same-store sales for its latest quarter, sending its shares down 17% on Wednesday. Pizza Hut and KFC also reported shrinking same-store sales. And even stalwart McDonald's said it has adopted a "street-fighting mentality" to compete for value-minded diners.
For months, economists have been predicting that consumers would cut back on their spending in response to higher prices and interest rates. But it's taken a while for fast-food chains to see their sales actually shrink, despite several quarters of warnings to investors that low-income consumers were weakening and other diners were trading down from pricier options.
The job cuts -- announced internally on the eve of Google's blowout first-quarter earnings report -- targeted members of Google's "core" team, which works on the "technical foundation behind the company's flagship products" as well as the online safety of users and its global IT infrastructure, according to its website.
At least 50 of the roles were based at Google's headquarters in Sunnyvale, Calif. Google is expected to hire replacement workers for the roles in Mexico and India, CNBC reported, citing a review of internal documents.
"Announcements of this sort may leave many of you feeling uncertain or frustrated," Asim Husain, vice president of Google Developer Ecosystem said in an email to staffers last week announcing the cuts, according to CNBC.
The American Public Has the Right to Know, "Did the President Shit Himself, and When Did He Know He Shit Himself?"
—Disinformation Expert Ace
I used to make poopies the size of Buicks, my word as a Biden.
My bowel movement was voted to the All State Bowel Movement Team, I'm not joking.
I almost went to Annapolis to join their Shit In The Pants squad on a free ride scholarship, but they had a guy there, you might have heard of him, named Roger Staubach. He could crap like a choir of angels, I'm serious, this is a fact, you can look it up.
I have a degree in gerontology. This is called dementia posturing.
Everyone who handles him should be prosecuted for elderly abuse. Looking at you, Jill.
I looked up "dementia posturing." I guess a lot of people are looking it up, because I only typed "D - e - m" into google before it suggested "dementia posturing."
Dementia posturing refers to the changes in posture that may result from the onset of dementia. According to the Alzheimer's Society, those with Lewy body dementia experience movement difficulties, such as changes to their posture, that progress over time.
Posture refers to how the body positions itself when sitting and standing and how a person moves overall. Static posture refers to how a person holds themselves while standing or sitting. Many things can affect posture over time, such as excessive sitting in certain chairs or carrying heavy loads on the back.
Lewy body dementia is a type of dementia in which abnormal protein deposits reside in the brain, resulting in changes in thinking, movement, behavior, and mood. It can affect the posture by:
* stiffening and slowing the movement of limbs and causing trembling
* weakening the posture, resulting in a stooping back
* causing shuffling when walking
* causing difficulty in maintaining balance
A stooping posture due to dementia can result in falls that lead to injury.
Update: From andycanuck, an enhanced video using Stool-Detecting Infrared. You've been warned.
The left is always telling us to be terrified of hypothetical future violence, while also telling us the current real violence is no big deal and we should just take a mugging or a subway-heaving for the team.
Since Maxine Waters wants to run her big fucking mouth about MAGA, let’s remind her who incited riots!
“If you see anybody from that cabinet in a restaurant or a gas station, you get out and create a crowd and you push back on them” - Maxine Waters pic.twitter.com/8kqakYWAdC
Columbia University canceled its main commencement ceremony but will still go ahead with smaller-scale graduations, the school said Monday, after weeks of pro-Palestinian demonstrations disrupted campus.
The ceremony, which was scheduled for May 15, has taken place outdoors on its New York City campus where students had set up a pro-Palestinian encampment that was taken down by police last week.
The protests over the Israel-Hamas war that have swept campuses nationwide have prompted university administrators to rethink commencement plans with a goal of protecting students and guests from potentially ugly and violent political disputes. Concerns about security were one of the main reasons why Columbia decided to cancel the larger commencement ceremony, a person familiar with the matter said.
Artem Ilyanok, a senior at Columbia who wasn't part of the protests, said this is the second graduation he will miss out on, after his high school canceled its in-person 2020 graduation due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
"I am very disappointed to once again be deprived of a typical graduation experience," said the 22-year-old history major.
What a shame that a small minority of good students has to have their fun spoiled by the vast majority of amoral, feral future Welfare Earners of America.
As students call for the death of school administrators and trustees, D.C. law enforcement officials and the Mayor have denied George Washington University's request for the police to clear out the encampment that has taken over their campus.
The Jacobins and the Sans Coulottes are working themselves up to recapitulate The Terror, and the people in charge of our Nation's Capitol just smile and wave.
So, when's the New Helter Skelter Massacre coming?
Stu
@thestustustudio
At the George Washington University Gaza Solidarity Encampment today, the protesters held a "People's Tribunal" where they put President Ellen Granberg, Provost Christopher Bracey, the Board of Trustees, @GWPolice
, and many others on trial.
Is it normal for students to want to hang their provost and chop the heads off of the Board of Trustees?
"Guillotine, Guillotine, Guillotine, Guillotine"
"Bracey, Bracey, we see you. You assault students too. Off to the motherfucking gallows with you."
"As you already know where I am sending her [to the guillotine], her and her fuckass bob."
When will @GWtweets finally do something? If the students hurt any of these people in any way, the university will be completely at fault.
Update: I missed something very important -- while the university has asked the police to clear out the illegal encampments, the DC Police, controlled by leftwing radical Muriel Bowser, are refusing to do their job.
I didn't catch every single minute of the People's Tribunal since it was an Instagram Live, but I think we have more than enough to realize how insane this is. pic.twitter.com/3N91R6iaZd
I saw a poll in which Trump ties Biden on the media-promoted "Which candidate would do a better job of 'protecting democracy' question?"
With these Cultural Enrichers indulged and empowered by Biden and the apocalyptic cult called the Democrat Party, I expect Trump will soon have a lead on the "save democracy" question.
THE MORNING RANT: Partitioning Baton Rouge & the Importance of Dissolving Old Political Boundaries
—Buck Throckmorton
There is an important story out of Louisiana that may seem like a just a local story, but it could also prove to have significance as the first victory in a necessary national movement to break up old political boundaries that harbor failed municipal governments.
After a long battle spanning more than a decade, a section of East Baton Rouge Parish has successfully seceded from the Baton Rouge city/county consolidated government. The new city of St. George, Louisiana has been born.
The Louisiana Supreme Court ruled Friday to allow the City of St. George to move forward with plans to incorporate, a monumental decision for Baton Rouge and possibly the end to a decade-long battle over the creation of the new city.
The new City of St. George will include at least 86,000 residents across a 60-square-mile area in the southeast corner of East Baton Rouge Parish, making it one of the largest cities in the state — on par with Lake Charles and Kenner.
There are generally two hallmarks of failed cities – rampant crime and failed schools. Baton Rouge is renowned for both. The St. George movement didn’t even start out as an effort to form a new city, it was about trying to create a new school district independent of the dysfunctional Baton Rouge schools.
The St. George movement had preceded that election by a decade — it originally started as a push to create a separate, independent school district before evolving over the years into a full-fledged campaign for a new city.
Few people expect local government to be free of corruption and graft, but in exchange for an often-corrupt political machine, the expectation for local government had always been that it would effectively provide essential city services and maintain civil order. In the most recent Cut Jib Newsletter podcast, Michael Walsh, JJ Sefton, and CBD discussed the concept of “honest graft” as it applied to the Tammany Hall era of New York City. It was terribly corrupt, but it also provided policing and functioning schools, and it generally maintained civil order.
Unfortunately, Tammany-type Democrats in cities across America have been replaced by Pol Pot Democrats who seek to destroy the old order, embracing crime and lawlessness as tools in their vision of re-organizing society. Where working class residents were once the most important constituents, modern blue-city leaders have ditched the working class in favor of criminals and illegal aliens.
Milwaukee is a failed city that cannot pay its bills. Regrettably, the Republican-controlled legislature in Wisconsin is simply going to bail the city out, rather than letting it actually go bankrupt. Any bailout that keeps municipal services operating should also terminate the city as it is currently incorporated, because Milwaukee has proved it is not capable of self-governance.
Circling back to Milwaukee, I don’t know if it has neighborhoods that wish they could de-annex, but my experience is that in most any city, there are neighborhoods that were annexed against their will which wish to be free of the taxes and pathologies of the leftist municipal government that now holds control over them.
Here is an idea that is not originally mine, but it’s a good one. How about dissolving the failed state of Illinois and making it a territory? Or perhaps putting Chicago in federal receivership, making it similar to Guam as an unincorporated territory of the United States, and allowing the downstate counties to be annexed by neighboring states?
Boundaries and borders have always changed. Look at the video below to see how state boundaries have changed in this country since its birth. There is nothing sacrosanct about the current map that it must remain unchanged in perpetuity. In fact, it cannot stay unchanged. History tells us that. City boundaries are going to change. State borders are going to change. The ideal should be that they change in a peaceful manner.
Let Baton Rouge / St. George be the first of many dissolutions of political entities that are in need of a cartographical divorce.
Which city is next? How about Austin? It would be a prime candidate for partition/dissolution because it is currently engaged in an insurrection against the state of Texas, having declared itself a “sanctuary city” in order to protect the ghouls who are medically preying on children in the ongoing transgender social contagion. The City of Austin is in open rebellion against state law.
The Austin City Council approved a resolution making the city a sanctuary for transgender minors seeking sex reassignment treatments. Although the measure directly violates the state law that seeks to protect children by prohibiting hormonal and surgical gender transition interventions in minors.
The good news is that Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has given notice to the city.
If the City of Austin refuses to follow the law and protect children, my office will consider every possible response to ensure compliance. Texas municipalities do not have the authority to pick and choose which state laws they will or will not abide by. The people of Texas have… https://t.co/cvjrXo74ia
— Attorney General Ken Paxton (@KenPaxtonTX) May 2, 2024
While I am not an expert on municipal law, I would think that Austin’s open defiance of state law would empower the state of Texas to dissolve the city’s charter. Once the city is dissolved, the emancipated neighborhoods could then get a new opportunity to determine what municipality, new or existing, they wish to be a part of.
The Einzatz-groupies who mindlessly ululate with orgasmic glee at the events of October 7th, the largest, and most heinous single-day mass slaughter of Jews since 1945 also remember the Holocaust – with a yearning wistfulness. They want to finish the job that Hitler started, which is kind of funny since their brainwashers alternate between declaring that as their singular purpose in life and the notion that the Holocaust is a myth or an exaggeration. Then they flip back again, equating Israel with Hitler insofar as committing genocide against the mythical "Palestinian" people, who somehow since 2005, when Israel unilaterally withdrew from Gaza, have managed to triple their population. If that's genocide, then Bibi, old boy, you're not doing it right.
Speaking of genocide, despite Joey Sponge-Brain Shits-Pants doing everything he can to help Hamas pull out a win by forcing Israel to cease fire while at the same time trying to fake his support for Israel's right to exist, and thereby keep his coalition of the unbalanced intact this November, just the opposite appears to be happening. The Maoist/Muslim base has pulled a Trump and tarred Biden with the moniker of "Genocide Joe" as they feel he isn't doing enough and fast enough to throw Israel into the gas chamber. When another Foggy Bottom bottom dweller quits after being in that sewer of America- and Israel-hate – that's 18 years as an insider to the duplicitousness and desire to see us and our allies laid prostrate before our enemies yet still can't recognize Biden's and Blinken's fakery for the bullshit that it is – then the junta is for sure in trouble.
At the other end of the spectrum, the explosion of verbal and physical attacks on Jews and their supporters, have opened the eyes of perhaps a fairly significant number of independents (if such an animal really exists these days) and the relatively sane among traditional liberal Democrats as to just who they've been supporting, actively or just reflexively, for so many years. The images of 10/7 and now on campuses across the nation are the icing on the cake of the past three years of abject destruction that has affected them directly and personally.
Somehow, the wires got crossed and the wrong groups are reacting the wrong way to the wrong message. Perfect.
Hamas fired rockets close to civilian shelters, aimed a maximizing casualties in case an Israeli response. “The launches carried out by Hamas adjacent to the Rafah Crossing, located approximately 350 meters from civilian shelters, are a clear example of the terrorist organization’s systematic exploitation of humanitarian facilities and spaces, and their continued use of the Gazan civilian population as human shields,” the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said in press release Sunday afternoon.
Hamas proudly took responsibility for attacking the humanitarian border crossing. Israel was forced to close the passage of aid trucks following the strikes, the IDF confirmed.
The rockets were fired from the terrorist stronghold of Rafah, an area Israeli military plans to evacuate in case of a possible military operation to free the remaining hostages. In recent days, Hamas terrorists have repeatedly used Rafah’s civilian areas to fire rockets towards Israel. . .
. . . The rocket barrage comes days after the Biden [junta] reportedly ‘guaranteed’ Hamas that Israel will not enter Rafah and end all military operations if the terrorist group agrees to the latest hostages-for-terrorists deal.
The Israeli government rejected the Biden [junta's] unilateral guarantee to abandon the military mission to capture Rafah, where Hamas’s terrorist leaderships is hiding behind Israeli hostages serving as human shields.
You know how Biden can guarantee the IDF will not go into Rafah? Because they're halting shipments of munitions and materiel that the IDF needs at this crucial juncture.
The Biden [junta] last week halted an ammunition shipment to Israel in a bid to pressure the IDF into abandoning the planned operation in Rafah, Israeli journalist Barak Ravid reported in the new website Axios Sunday. The revelation comes as Israel’s military offensive against Hamas enters its seventh month. Israel, a key U.S. ally, relies of American-made weapons, ammunition and spare parts for its armed forces.
"Genocide Joe" alright. Too bad the micturating matriculating Muslim mavens at Columbia, UCLA and elsewhere don't understand who Biden is "genociding" or wanting to. My gut tells me that Israel indeed has what it needs to finish the job, and will likely be able to get what it needs to fill in any shortfalls from the Saudis or Emiratis.
Speaking of which, Biden over the past several years has gone off on the Saudis, mostly for their cutting oil production at a time when he needs their oil to keep our dying economy from flatlining before the election, after kneecapping our own production to appease the red-green enviro-commies before the election. I'm sensing a pattern here.
After draining the strategic petroleum reserve ahead of the midterms, Biden has been unable to refill it because his environmentalist allies and the Saudis have kept prices high. The Saudis had rejected requests to lower oil prices for anything short of assistance in building their own nuclear program. Shortly before the Hamas attacks of Oct 7, the Saudis had offered to temporarily boost production if it would make it easier to sell Congress on a defense agreement.
Back then the Saudi deal had been portrayed as an extension of the ‘Abraham Accords’ and offered ‘normalization’ of diplomatic ties with Israel. Whether the Saudis were ever serious about normalization is debatable but since Oct 7, any such agreement has been conditioned on an internationally recognized.Islamic terrorist ‘Palestinian’ state affiliated with Saudi Arabia.
The current expectation is that a deal between Biden and the Saudis will drop the Israeli component and focus on a defense agreement and nuclear power in exchange for cheap oil. Whether Israel is or isn’t on board, a Saudi nuclear agreement is a bad deal for America.
The United States is more than capable of producing its own oil. The only obstacle in the way of American energy independence is Joe Biden and his party who are determined to push ‘green energy’ that only makes us equally dependent on Muslim terror states and Communist China.
Nuclear energy could help solve our energy problems, but the Saudis, who are the world’s largest oil producers, certainly don’t need to go nuclear to fix any energy shortfalls. Nor do they care about the environment. A civilian nuclear energy program makes about as much sense for Saudi Arabia as it does for Iran. And the only reasonable argument for enabling the Saudis to go nuclear would be to counter Iran’s nuclear weapons program, but rather than averting a nuclear attack, that could double the risk and the possible vectors for nuclear armageddon.
The trouble with letting either Iran or the Saudis go nuclear is not just the direct nuclear threat, but the indirect one that will come from Islamic terrorists getting their hands on either nuclear weapons or materials. Saudi Arabia has made some progress under the MBS monarchy, including allowing women greater rights and backing away from some of the terrorist groups and movements that the kingdom has traditionally supported, and even purged some of the old guard who oversaw the Jihadi war against America (this led to Jamal Khashoggi’s death). . .
. . . Biden is proposing to swap nuclear capabilities in exchange for the Saudis providing cheap oil for his election. The Saudis have made it clear that they can’t offer long term price guarantees which means they’d be doing little more than providing a temporary market fix long enough to get a presidential candidate his second term in in office.
After all the talk of impeachable quid-pro-quos, here’s one that could get millions killed.
Nuclear materials in the hands of Islamic terrorists is the ultimate nightmare and Biden is risking mass death, the destruction of entire American cities, in exchange for an election day bribe. . .
. . . By emptying the strategic petroleum reserve to bribe midterm voters, Biden already dangerously endangered our economy and our national security. The cost of his illegal student loan debt bribes is already approaching an estimated $1 trillion and that may just be the beginning.
But there’s a big difference between stealing money to bribe voters and making a deal with an enemy nation that can cost the lives of millions. One is corruption while the other is treason.
I'm no Perry Mason, but I can make an argument that considering the intentional erasure of our borders and the flooding of our nation with 8 million and counting foreigners, among them thousands of hardened criminals, spies and saboteurs from our strategic enemies and worst of all confirmed jihadists, Biden indeed is guilty of treason right there. Already, the mass crime wave that has seen our citizens brutally raped and murdered makes Biden guilty before and after the fact in each one of those crimes, that taken together is a treasonous breach of his Constitutional oath. Yeah, I know. Go tell it to the Marines. Meh, they're under the control of Vanilli Milley and Lloyd Austin.
Great. Give the Saudis nukes, at a time when MBS' rule is perhaps not as stable as we might assume given the Wahhabists in his midst and the threat from the Iran-backed Houthis in Yemen.
Two of the main organizers behind protests at Columbia University and on other campuses are Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow. Both are supported by the Tides Foundation, which is seeded by Democratic megadonor George Soros as well as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, and it in turn supports numerous small nonprofits that work for social change. (Gates did not return a request for comment, and Soros declined to comment.)
Another notable Democratic donor whose philanthropy has helped fund the protest movement is David Rockefeller Jr., who sits on the board of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. In 2022, the fund gave $300,000 to the Tides Foundation; according to nonprofit tax forms, Tides has given nearly $500,000 over the past five years to Jewish Voice for Peace, which explicitly describes itself as anti-Zionist.
Several other groups involved in pro-Palestinian protests are backed by a foundation funded by Susan and Nick Pritzker, heir to the Hyatt Hotel empire — and supporters of Biden and numerous Democratic campaigns, including $6,600 to the Biden Victory Fund a few months ago and more than $300,000 during the 2020 campaign.
I saw Soros, Gates, Rockefeller and Pritzker open for The Fourth Reich at the Sportpalast in '45. Lots of hormonal Einsatz-groupies kept shrieking and spoiled the show. PLO terror towels are the new bobby sox.
ABOVE THE FOLD, BREAKING, NOTEWORTHY
"The ordinary person’s passivity in the face of the criminal and civil attacks on Donald Trump suggests that Americans think we’re already there." Has Leftist Lawfare Created the Police State Yet?
Victor Davis Hanson: "The one-eyed Jack American Left has been flipped over, and what turned up proved frightening." The End of Old Left-Wing Mythologies
Miranda Devine: "It is a manifestation of the growing political divide between men and women that has been evident in opinion polls for some time. There is a 10-point gap on most issues between men and women. Young unmarried women, in particular, skew very left, while young men are becoming markedly more conservative." Frat Boy Summer is This Year's Backlash Against an Epidemic of Arrogant, Entitled Women
" It would behoove us all for the world to recognize what this holiday of Remembrance of the Holocaust and for Strength is about. The world must come to its senses before we see the descendants of the Maccabees and Warsaw Ghetto forced to act in ways reminiscent of their ancestors." A Jewish Holiday About Strength, Not Victimhood
"The Kerem Shalom border crossing was reopened in order for humanitarian aid to reach the people of Gaza after [so-called quote-unquote "president"] Joe Biden and his [junta] kept urging Israel to reopen it. Hamas has previously attacked the crossing in 2021 during another conflict with Israel, risking the flow of humanitarian aid to civilians living in the Gaza Strip." Three IDF Soldiers Killed by Hamas Rockets at Border Crossing Biden Demanded Israel Open
"The U.S. reportedly told Hamas, through mediators in Cairo, Egypt, last week, that it could ensure Israel would not return to war after a temporary pause for the release of hostages and 'Palestinian' terrorists, but Israel disputed that." CIA Chief Heads to Qatar as Hostage Deal Talks with Hamas Near "Collapse"
Robert Zimmerman: "Their savage behavior also tells us what they think of civilization. They don’t simply disagree with its principles and foundation, they want to tear it down, as quickly and as violently as they can, and don’t care who they hurt in the process." The Pro-Hamas Campus Mobs Were Almost as Barbaric as Hamas Itself
"The events on our campuses and the equivocations of Democrat leadership after October 7 reveal that Democrats both propitiate and capitulate to radical Islamic extremists." The Moral Imperative of October 7
Clarice Feldman: "The [junta's] failure to act on the side of Western civilization is seriously damaging [so-called quote-unquote "president"] Biden’s reelection prospects and the prospects for the Democrat party itself." Camp Intifada: Students for Theocratic Authoritarianism
Columbia held “Resistance 101” training in March for students, which included a guest speaker from controversial Canada-based group, Samidoun, which celebrated Hamas’ attacks on Israel on Oct. 7 that sparked the recent conflict, according to the WSJ. The school opposed the event, twice banning it due to organizers’ ties to terrorism, with students hosting it virtually anyway, resulting in several suspensions. Left-Wing Groups and Long-Time Activists Reportedly Trained Anti-Israel Protesters for Months
* * * * *
Soros, Gates, Rockefeller and Pritzker . . . who opened for The Fourth Reich at the Sportpalast in '45. Lots of hormonal Einsatz-groupies kept shrieking and spoiled the show - jjs Pro-Hamas Protests Funded by Biden’s Own Political Donors
"Perhaps the noblest thing that thinking people can do is let America’s university system implode." Majoring in Jihad
"I’m old enough to remember the mayhem on the streets during the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago, which will again host the event this coming August. The mayor of Chicago is Brandon Johnson, as dim a man as ever crossed the threshold at City Hall. I’m sure the Hamasniks, for whom the convention will be their Super Bowl, have already made their travel plans." On the Violent Left, Eternal Recurrence
"Alleged pundits scratch their heads in puzzlement and ask: how did all these pro-Hamas outbursts suddenly appear on American universities?" Ongoing Jihadist Infiltration into America
“Foreign-born Hispanic or Latino workers accounted for 63.5 percent (792) of total Hispanic or Latino worker fatalities (1,248),” in 2022, according to a December release by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. “Fatalities in the construction industry accounted for 316 [or 40 percent] of the 792 foreign-born Hispanic or Latino worker deaths in 2022.” The government department will not issue death data for 2023 until after the 2024 election. (Guess who's paying the medical expenses for the thousands more merely injured - jjs) Joe Biden’s Border Policy Kills Hundreds of Illegal Workers
"Trump will enter his fourth week of the New York trial on Monday, where he faces 34 felony counts related to allegedly falsifying business records when reimbursing a payment to pornstar Stormy Daniels in 2016. Several polls released since the start of jury selection on April 15 have found that a potential conviction won’t deter voters from supporting Trump in November. Moreover, individuals nationwide say they don’t believe the former president acted illegally or is being treated fairly in Bragg’s case." Democrats Thought Bragg Trial Would Sink Trump’s 2024 Campaign. Polling So Far Suggests Otherwise
"This is about keeping Trump in court while Joe Biden is campaigning. This was the plan. It is election interference, which we have been assured is very bad. Indeed, while most criminal trials would be winding down or at least into the defense case at this point, the Trump trial is going into week four and we still haven't gotten deeply into the perfectly legal payments to Michael Cohen yet, which we were assured were at the heart of the bookkeeping case." We're Now in Full Goat Rodeo Mode in the NYC Trump Trial
". . . he says, and I agree, that the election was not fair, and it was rigged in many ways with Democratic states and cities changing election law and election practices up to the last minute, with the media, to include your network, and 51 Democratic intelligence operatives saying the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian disinformation and social media then censoring all those things. Those were all deeply unfair.” Cotton Defends Trump’s Claims About 2020 Presidential Election
"The current proceedings in a Manhattan courthouse aren’t the first time the interests have tried to lay low a wealthy populist icon." Another Trial in New York
CIVIL WAR 2.0: J-6 FBI FALSE FLAG "RIOT" & AFTERMATH, LEFTIST PERSECUTIONS, DEMOCRAT PUTSCH, AMERICAN DISSOLUTION
"Why and how did this angry, odious, insufferable fantasist become the intellectual lodestar for the global left?" Marx Still Reigns Supreme. But Why?
"The U.S. government believes that it can maintain control by exerting pressure on all of society’s constituent blocks." America’s Jenga Tower of Power
"The Left’s many accusations using the false-flag tactic have turned us into false-flag nation." False-Flag Nation
FIRST AMENDMENT ISSUES, CENSORSHIP, FAKE NEWS, MEDIA, BIG BROTHER TECH
Godwin’s exit from the network comes months after she reportedly lost a fair amount of her power, according to the New York Post. Debra O'Connell, the president of News Group and Networks with Disney Entertainment, reportedly began a review of Godwin and her management skills, accusing her of having a “hands-off leadership style,” according to CNN. (Translation: Another inept, unqualified diversity hire - jjs) Godwin's Flaw: Kim Godwin Steps Down as ABC News President
RED-GREENS, CLIMATE CHANGE HOAX, DEMOCRAT-LEFT WAR ON FOSSIL FUELS, JUNK SCIENCE, LYSENKOISM
". . . while there is evidence of marginal decreases in some nutrients, data also show that higher levels of CO2 “may enhance certain groups of health-promoting phytochemicals in food crops” that serve as antioxidants and anti-inflammatory compounds, says the paper, which lists seven authors and more than 100 references. The lead author is Albrecht Glatzle, a member of the Rural Association of Paraguay and a former international researcher of plant and animal nutrition." Scientific Report Pours Cold Water On Major Talking Point Of Climate Activists
“It certainly looks like the electric vehicle bubble has burst, and no amount of taxpayer bailout money can put it back together again. This continual pattern of taxpayers being forced to prop up unviable green companies should serve as a warning that ultimately the public will be left holding the bag when reality hits these green dreams. It’s beyond clear that the EV market is faltering, and to put more public dollars behind this failure will do nothing more than throw good money away.” Red State Taxpayers are at Risk of Being Latest Victims of Electric Vehicle Gambles
Police said that 26-year-old Bernard Junior Polite entered the Jesus Dwelling Place Church a little after 1 p.m. EST and “attempted to shoot the pastor as he was giving a sermon.” (At least he was "Polite" - jjs) WATCH: Man Tries To Shoot Pastor During Sermon, Gets Tackled
SECOND AMENDMENT
"New York and other states have tried to prevent gun possession by religious observers, but there is both a physical and psychological demand for self-sufficient personal security." Let Jews Carry Guns
Since the 2020 election, Democrats and their media allies have worked overtime to smear Americans concerned about the integrity of U.S. elections. No matter how legitimate these concerns may be, the left slanders anyone who challenges controversial elections won by Democrats as so-called “election deniers.” 10 Lies Democrats Tell About Our Elections (And How To Refute Them)
DEMOCRAT/LEFTIST AND RINO SCANDALS, MESHUGAS, CHUTZPOCRISY
"Johnson must be ruined, not only as a politician but as a person. He must not be allowed to leave Congress and then become fat and happy as a lobbyist or in some fake make-work job with a defense contractor (the obvious payoff for his treachery)." Mike Johnson Must Be Utterly Destroyed
POLITICS
House Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik (R-NY), Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH), and Reps. Byron Donalds (R-FL) and Wesley Hunt (R-TX), who have all been mentioned as part of the Veepstakes this election cycle, also attended. Other Republicans who were present included House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), Sens. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Reps. Jim Banks (R-IN), who is running for Senate; Michael Waltz (R-FL); Pennsylvania Senate candidate Dave McCormick; and Ohio Senate candidate Bernie Moreno. (Thank goodness Noem isn't mentioned - jjs) Trump Surrounds Himself With Potential VPs at Mar-a-Lago
"In contrast to Democrats, who are eyeing swing states like Florida and North Carolina, LaCivita says the Trump team has a solid opportunity to convert Virginia and Minnesota to their side if Trump indeed becomes the Republican nominee." Trump Advisor Explains How THESE 2 States Could Flip Red in November
"While the fundraised amount reported by Trump’s advisers is significant, the Federal Election Commission is yet to receive the official figures for this month. Last month’s reports indicated a $65.6 million collection by Trump, a substantial amount, but less than [so-called quote-unquote "president"] Biden’s fundraised total from his campaign and its affiliated groups." Trump Campaign Raises $76 Million in April
"The Democrats' persistent tendency to portray themselves as the champions of various demographic groups while disregarding the nuanced realities within those communities underscores a fundamental flaw in their approach . . . it's becoming clearer to these voters that the Democrat Party prioritizes power over genuine advocacy, thus prompting disillusionment that sends these voters to seek out other candidates who offer real solutions." Joe Biden Really Insults Women Voters
"It’s not a good look for a country to be run, overtly or covertly, by a man with this kind of mental state." Barack Obama, 21st-Century Schizoid Man (A King Crimson reference - jjs)
"American sanctions keep backfiring, so why do we keep using them?" (The author assumes Biden and Foggy Bottom are adversaries of Maduro - jjs) A Missed Off-Ramp for U.S. Venezuela Policy
"In layman’s terms, Ozempic makes the user look like a crack addict who smokes rocks for breakfast, and lunch, and dinner, with snack breaks in between. . . Will any of the numerous and multiplying documented detrimental health impacts of Ozempic as a first-resort weight loss solution dissuade lazy consumers bred on the drive-thru, give-me-convenience-or-give-me-death paradigm from taking the drug, or Medicare administrators on the take — shamans of The Science™ — from pushing it?" (Samantha Power to the white courtesy syringe - jjs) "Ozempic Face" Destroying the Hollywood Beautiful People?
". . . if we don’t understand the fluctuations in the Sun’s total irradiation and can’t predict those changes, how can we claim to understand and predict the long term fluctuations in the global climate?" Sunspot update: A minor uptick in sunspot activity in April
FEMINAZISM, TRANSGENDER PSYCHOSIS, HOMOSEXUALIZATION, WAR ON MASCULINITY/NORMALCY
"The women who opposed their own enfranchisement in the Victorian era have little in common with the 'Repeal the 19th" fringe of today." (Not so fringe, sugar tits - jjs) When Feminism Was "Sexist"
"If passed, the ban will make it so that healthcare professionals will not be allowed to perform gender surgeries, prescribe puberty blockers or provide hormone treatments for minors who identify as transgender. Additionally, if a child presents as a gender that differs from their biological sex or uses a name that isn’t their legal name, school principals would be required to notify parents or guardians." South Carolina Senate Passes Ban on Transgender Treatments for Kids
During his “Weekend Update” segment, for instance, SNL’s Michael Che dismissed the protests that have occupied administrative buildings and led to thousands of arrests. SNL Shrugs at Pro-"Palestinian" Campus Chaos: "So What?"
"There is a lot of great history and lessons to learn in the racing game, especially as it all tends to reinforce the conservative worldview." Secretariat’s Toughest Race
"Prior to receiving international acclaim for his role as the doomed captain in 1997’s Oscar-winning “Titanic” alongside stars like Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio, Hill was a familiar face on British television screens dating back to the mid-70s after securing a small role in the BBC TV series, “I Claudius,” according to the British Film Institute (BFI) journal, Screen Online." Titanic and Théoden in The Lord of The Rings Actor Bernard Hill Dies at 79
NOTE: The opinions expressed in the 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.
This comes a day after the game was removed from sale on Steam in 177 countries and dependencies because the PlayStation Network was not available there.
Which also goes to show how widely available Steam is. They don't care if you live in the Aland Islands or Andorra or Antarctica, if your credit card works you're in.
The system includes 8,064 Xeon E5-2697 v4 CPUs with 18 cores each, and 4,890 64GB DDR4 ECC memory modules.
Speaking of which, I have 40GB of DDR4 SODIMMs and 2TB of NVMe SSDs left over after after my latest round of hardware upgrades. And zero free slots to put any of those into.
At least I don't have coolant leaks, unlike Cheyenne.
He was not overly fond of the entertainment that evening.
The scrolls - hundreds of them - are, as you might expect given what happened to Herculaneum, mere lumps of charcoal, and it is only with modern CT scanning techniques and computer-aided reconstruction that we are able to read them. In fact, it's only last year that the first words were read this way.
Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble. Jesus Christ, Matthew 6:34
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The best comments on the webz can be found here at AoS.
These Are the U.S. Airports With the Longest Delay Times
Provo Airport in Utah just got called out.
Speaking of traveling. Regular commenter and all around good 'ron, Robert submitted the following. "As seen east of San Antonio.
If we can hit that bull's-eye, the rest of the dominoes will fall like a house of cards. Checkmate!"
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The Ben Shapiro vs. Candace Owens mean girl fight continues.
Do you think Ben's problem is that an older sibling zipped tied and/or duct taped him to the upright vacuum cleaner in the hallway closet?
He can be such a whiny bitch at times.
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The ONT Musical Interlude & Mandatory Fasting Emporium
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He's looking for an extended vacation at Anamosa State Penitentiary. Genius Award Winner.
Iowa City man allegedly brought drugs with him in his vehicle when going to police to be arrested on warrant
Top 10 sockpuppeteers:
1 [279 names] 'Ciampino - Duct-tape for the win' [39.16 unique names/day]
2 [157 names] 'Cap'm Miklos and the One eyed Dog'
3 [104 names] 'Quarter Twenty '
4 [91 names] 'NYC Refugee'
5 [75 names] 'Le Mikleuse'
6 [62 names] 'IYKWIM'
7 [54 names] 'Miklos hazards a guess'
8 [53 names] 'I am the Shadout Mapes, the Housekeeper'
9 [46 names] 'Intercepted DU Transmissions brought by the Intrepid AoS Liaison'
10 [45 names] 'Count de Monet'
Tonight's ONT has been brought to you by a Bicycle Built For Two.
Notice: Posted with permission by the Ace Media Empire & AceCorp, LLC. ONT Tips, frozen beef pot pies, accordion sheet music and pain killers to petmorons at gmail dot com. Everything else? The ONT isn't sure and doesn't care.
Howdy, Y'all! Welcome to the wondrously fabulous Gun Thread! As always, I want to thank all of our regulars for being here week in and week out, and also offer a bigly Gun Thread welcome to any newcomers who may be joining us tonight. Howdy and thank you for stopping by! I hope you find our wacky conversation on the subject of guns 'n shooting both enjoyable and informative. You are always welcome to lurk in the shadows of shame, but I'd like to invite you to jump into the conversation, say howdy, and tell us what kind of shooting you like to do!
Holy Shitballs! How in the ever-loving Hell did it get to be May? As I predicted last week, May was just around the corner, and well dang if it didn't come true!
With that, step into the dojo and let's get to the gun stuff below, shall we?
WeaselDoctrine
So who went to the range this week and focused on fundamentals? I mean, really focused on the task at hand? I probably don't give those who do enough credit, because frankly, it's not that easy to do. Sure, you might vaguely recall some retarded shit Weasel was yammering about the previous week on the Gun Thread about fundamentals and blah, blah, blah... just the usual crap, but are you really focused the whole time?. After all, you are already one tactical bad-ass mo-fo with a giant watch and the latest and greatest thing from Sig or Glock sporting a flashlight and optic and Pez dispenser. You read lots of internet stuff too, and impress the heck out of range babes with your mad skillz and drop rig holster. You go to the range and shoot and the results aren't too terrible, so who needs all the focusing and fundamentals crapola?
You do.
The single best way I know to focus all of your brain molecules and track progress is to keep score. It's really that simple. I intentionally try not to focus on competitive shooting here because I want this to be a general shooting-for-funsies-for-all thread and don't want it to turn into some boring, ultra-competitive, elite-shooter wanna-be deal. Having said that, I have always been a proponent of practicing with a purpose and keeping track of progress, and it turns out keeping score is very handy in that regard. Again, plinking is relatively easy, and shooting well for score is hard. It places you outside your comfort zone, and if you have the right attitude, causes you to try your best to make every shot count.
I will say it again, if you aren't participating in some sort of club level competitive shooting event, you are missing an inexpensive and fun way to very quickly up your game. The first time you go, you won't have any idea what you're doing and that's OK, but please avoid the temptation to just go to a match and watch. OK, maybe you can do that once, but the only way to learn and reap all the benefits is to go and participate. You will quickly find everyone is more than willing to help a new competitor, especially if you go with a good attitude, ask questions and are willing to learn. Not being an asshole is also helpful.
Please consider it. You will be surprised with how fun it is and how quickly you will improve.
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Competition Time!
In an amazing and totally not made up coincidence our pals blaster and sra blaster have started competing!
Since we went to the TxMoMe, sra blaster has been itching to compete in shooting. She looked a little at IDPA but locations and times did not gel for us. Then our local range started having "Steel Shoots." This is an "outlaw" competition that doesn't run under any sanctioning body. It's just indoor courses involving movement that are timed and scored and it was a good fit for us.
We did attend a training course for this that gave us a feel for how the events are run. Our first event we had a great time but scored poorly. We chalk it up as a learning experience. We've got our second event in a couple of days so we hope to do better and still have fun.
Here's how the courses are run: there is a setup in an indoor range and steel targets are arranged in various scenarios for you to shoot in a run. Some are static firing - stand here at this cone and shoot those targets 2x each. Some are in motion. Shoot at these targets while you are transiting from this point to this point. Some require a particular sequence - shoot the red target, then the yellow, then the red again. Some are shoot from behind an obstacle. An RSO follows you and times and keeps score and makes sure you aren't breaking any safety rules. You get one walkthrough and then it's time to shoot. After everyone in the group shoots the first course you move to the second.
No restrictions on equipment except you are limited to 3 magazines and you must have an OWB holster for your pistol and two mags. Also you must shoot frangible ammo since we are engaging steel at as little as 5 yards. Round count for a course may be over 40 so no math but that is going to leave 1911s out of the running. Everyone shot some high cap 9mm - Sigs, Glocks, and 2011s were on the menu.
This type of shooting is a real challenge. There is more than just putting a hole in a piece of paper. You have to think and remember and it's a competition also deal with adrenaline. And focus on fundamentals at the same time!
And then there is preparation. You need to have the right equipment. While three is the minimum number of mags to have, having 6 is better. Preloading them helps - I am loading each mag to 15 and then we will remove rounds to fit the scenario. We got caught short in the first event because we had to load 43 rounds in 3 mags in a short period of time - time that would have been better spent reviewing the course and watching others go ahead of us.
This is fun but I think it will ultimately make us better shooters, too. I hope our scores are better this time.
Very nicely done blaster and sra blaster!
Do you see this, people? Do you see? They had fun! They also realize this will make them better shooters. I call this a win-win situation with no downside other than perhaps initially demonstrating in public that you aren't quite ready for the SEAL Teams just yet. Always keep track of scores as a progress metric but don't obsess over them. They will get better fairly quickly as you begin to get comfortable with what you're doing. Simply set aside your ego as you learn, and listen more than you talk. Figure out who the best shooters are and become their bestest friends. Ask them how they do things and you are very likely to be surprised by how willing the truly accomplished shooters are to share.
Give it a try. I know we have some competitors here who can chime in on the value of shooting matches, so please speak up in the comments!
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FUNdamentals Review
Trigger placement
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Shelter On a Quiet Street
For the coming Spicy Times.
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Neutron Stars
These little guys seem like fun!
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2024 NoVAMoMe
Note: One of the great joys of NoVAMoMe season, at least for me, is being able to cut and paste the entire block of text below and haranguing you to register for the event. Have you registered? Are you focusing on the fundamentals of registration?
Alright, guys and gals, the long awaited and highly anticipated opening of 2024 NoVAMoMe registration is upon us! That's right, registration for the event of the season is open, which means you can register to attend! You see, in order to attend, you must first register, and then wait for June 8th, and then attend! It's really more of an application to attend based on whether we like you or not, but what have you got to lose?!
Q: Weasel, your world frightens and confuses us. How do we, how do you say, register for the NoVAMoMe?
A: Welp, it's pretty darn easy!
First, check your calendars for June 8th, 2024, and cancel anything already planned. Good so far? Then simply send an email to WeaselBell Productions expressing your interest, then sit back and anxiously wait for a reply. Our pal and most delightful 'ette and MoMe Hostess Extraordinaire bluebell will review your application and relevant permanent record notations to decide if you're NoVAMoMe material. If you're one of the chosen, you'll get a reply with a link and secret password to the registration site containing all the pertinent details. Look these over and complete the simple registration form, following the PayPal link provided at the end of the form to make your payment. The $30 pp fee covers appetizers, dinner (BBQ Chicken, hamburdogs, sides, and dessert) plus an unlimited amount of fun! Since we must guarantee a headcount to the caterer, all registrations must be made online by May 26th. We are not accepting payment for registration at the door. You do not need a PayPal account to register and can pay with any major credit card.
A NoVAMoMe PSA from our pal bluebell
Hi folks - just a quick PSA. If you write for info about the MoMe, please give us a few words in the body of the email just so I know you are a Moron and not a spammer (moron). I do receive spam on this email account because it's sitting right here in my nic, so that's why I'm asking. I don't want to give our details to a spammer. Also, once registered, remember to check your spam folder if you don't receive a confirmation email.
Thanks.
bluebell
Seriously, just send an email, go to the site with the password provided, fill out the simple form, and make your payment. If you forget, a link to the email is on the main page, left sidebar. If you do not sign up, bluebell will be disappointed. Weasel will be disappointed, too, but it's bluebell you need to worry about.
Win a Dream Date with Weasel!
Due to popular demand, we are again conducting a separate raffle for a Dream Date with Weasel This fabulous prize includes an entire day of shooting and personalized one-on-one handgun & rifle coaching and instruction at Weasel Acres on a mutually agreeable date with yours truly. The lucky winner will be able to not only bring and shoot their own weapons, but also try out a variety of WeaselWeapons using WeaselAmmo!
We will end the day with dinner at a good Mexican place in nearby Appomattox. The winner will be responsible for their travel to and from Central Virginia, hence the separate drawing.
Don't be a pathetic girly-man loser, register today!
Q: Weasel, anything else for 2024?
A: Why I'm glad you asked! There are in fact TWO things to mention for 2024.
First, we are again having a pre-party get-together the afternoon/evening before the main event. Details at the registration site.
Dos, we are again offering a NoVAMoMe commemorative mug for 2024 available only to NoVAMoMe participants!
We sincerely hope you can join the festivities. I promise you this event is as laid back and non-anxiety inducing as humanly possible, and nothing makes me happier than to meet new people who have been reluctant to join in the past. If sitting on the sidelines and just observing is your thing, you can do just that with zero pressure from anyone. I hope some of the past NoVAMoMe participants will jump in and share their thoughts on the event to inspire the scairdy-cat lurkers out there to throw caution to the wind and sign up!
Monster From Green Hell!
Have I featured this before? For some reason I believe I have. If so, here it is again.
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Musical Interlude
Here is Henry Mancini with a few favorites.
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Gun Basics 101
No new video from the She Equips Herself gal, so here is a re-run on safety at the gym
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Cigar of the Week
This week our pal rhomboid scores again with this excellent review of the Stillwell Bayou No. 32
Steve Saka, the founder and master blender of Dunbarton Tobacco & Trust, is also a pipe smoker, and a while back he collaborated with the chief blender of the pipe tobacco company Cornell & Diehl to blend some pipe tobacco-based cigars. I've reviewed two here previously: the Aromatic No. 1 and the Navy 1056.
The Bayou No. 32 is another in the line, the name drawn from the use of Louisiana's unique and venerable Perique pipe tobacco, from St. James Parish. In Dunbarton's description, the Bayou No. 32 is "A combination of Bright and Red Virginia leaf with the most select St. James Parish Perique pipe tobacco added to a medium-bodied Nicaraguan puro".
More experienced pipe smokers than I can probably describe the flavors better, but to me the overall experience was a sort of sweet tangy earthiness. Very nice. Smoke was ample, and as with all Dunbarton sticks, construction was excellent. There a couple other interesting cigars in this line that I hope to try in the future. Stillwell Star sticks are not your everyday cigar (unless you've made a killing in bitcoin, or were far-sighted enough to snatch up lots of new-in-box Colt Pythons back in the 80s) - they go for $14 and up.
Excellent, rhomboid! Thank you!
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Here are some different online cigar vendors. You will find they not only carry different brands and different lines from those brands, but also varying selections of vitolas (sizes/shapes) of given lines. It's good to have options, especially if you're looking for a specific cigar.
A note about sources. The brick & mortar/online divide exists with cigars, as with guns, and most consumer products, with respect to price. As with guns - since both are "persecuted industries", basically - I make a conscious effort to source at least some of my cigars from my local store(s). It's a small thing, but the brick & mortar segment for both guns and tobacco are precious, and worth supporting where you can. And if you're lucky enough to have a good cigar store/lounge available, they're often a good social event with many dangerous people of the sort who own scary gunz, or read smart military blogs like this one. -rhomboid
Anyone have others to include? Perhaps a small local roller who makes a cigar you like? Send me your recommendation and a link to the site!
This week's mailbag entry is from our pal 10 Gallon Hat. Great one!
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Please note the new and improved protonmail account gunthread at protonmail dot com. An informal Gun Thread archive can be found HERE. Future expansion plans are in the works for the site Weasel Gun Thread. 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?
Great cake...does it exist? Sure, but I think the topic is a bit more complicated than just throwing a ton of chocolate and frosting in and hoping it all works out. And even the frosting gets a little weird. Too many are just sugar bombs that feel like they are are rotting one's teeth with the first bite. And frosting hides a multitude of sins, most egregious being dry cake. Except it doesn't really hide that dusty, crumbly, sort-of-gross mouthfeel that a dry cake gives.
Oh, and another thing...don't use the same frosting in the layers as on the outside! I want some contrast, damn it! In fact, some of the best cakes I have ever eaten had a tart fruit based filling between the layers, which I think works perfectly with the sweeter frosting.
But not too sweet! Do I have to repeat myself again? And that's quite a trick, because frosting is sugar. But some bakers know how to do it, and that is a truly impressive thing. When the filling is delicious and the frosting is interesting but not too sweet and the cake is moist and flavorful, then that means that the stars have aligned and all is right in the world...at least for a few minutes.
Yeah...cake is complicated. There is a reason why great cake bakers are in demand.
Inflation is now baked into the cake (SWIDT>). The Fed probably won't raise interest rates, the government is spending like a drunken sailor, and the destruction of the labor force (minimum wage, regulation, welfare, etc) will keep wages high, so there is very little downward pressure and a whole lot of upward pressure on prices. And have you noticed...fuel costs are rising!
The profit margins in the restaurant industry are brutal, and while McDonalds can probably handle an extended run of even more pricing pressure, I can't imagine how the smaller restaurants are doing.
My sense is that even well-off folks are decreasing their discretionary spending. That's based on all sorts of anecdotal evidence, but I would lay money that I am correct.
Home cooking is going to make a big comeback. That's why you should tune in here every Sunday!
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I probably sound like a broken record, but damn! This technique plus a delicious marinade is a great and easy combination.
The technique is simple. Trimmed bone-in thighs on top of a bed of sliced onions. Lots of them! Then into the oven for about 30-40 minutes at 425.
The marinade was all of my leftover cilantro, blended with Dijon, honey, garlic, olive oil, salt and pepper, half a small onion, and half a Jalapeño. I left the chicken in the marinade for a full day, and I think that was the important step.
When the chicken looks good, remove it from the skillet and return the onions to the oven until they brown a bit and the liquid mostly evaporates. Five minutes?
Then eat!
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That is a composite cork, which has become quite popular with inexpensive wines. And that's sad, because screw-tops are much better, but more expensive. Those composite corks are irritating for both esthetic and practical reasons. Esthetically? They are ugly. Practically? They seem denser than real cork, and many cork screws don't work as well in them.
Sure...that's a classic First-World ProblemTM, but still!
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This guy is not screwing around. Bacon in the bread. Bacon in the cheese. Bacon in the meat. Bacon in the sauce.
From "The lurker sometimes known as Marty" comes an interesting photo. He seems to be testing his new griddle (a marvelous piece of cooking equipment!) with an interesting combination of salmon steaks and bear steaks!
I really like salmon, but have been cooking fillets rather than steaks for many years. One reason is that I like salmon steaks on the grill, and I suck at cooking fish anywhere near fire. Yeah...they usually stick a bit, and that disturbs my OCD! The other reason is that I have a bunch of solid recipes for fillets that are easy and delicious, so...I just stopped grilling salmon.
As for bear? I have eaten it, and I find it just okay. It is entirely possible that the bear I have eaten was not processed or prepared correctly, so I will reserve judgement, especially since that bear looks pretty damned good!
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[Hat Tip: Misanthropic Humanitarian]
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Good butter, and Flap Meat...whatever the hell that is...just send it, Broccolini that isn't $6/bunch, garlic...lots of garlic!, well-marbled hanger steaks and elk chops to: cbd dot aoshq at gmail dot com.
Who are those poor deluded souls who shake their Manhattans? These are the same people who drink fine bourbon with coke, and probably shake red wine with ice too.
However, I will give dispensation to those who use maple syrup on Brussels Sprouts! I tried that and it worked nicely. I still prefer Agave, but still...
And yes, I used to demand fancy bourbon, but let's face it, $1,200 for a bottle of bourbon is just stupid, insulting, and a ghastly affront to most people's palates and wallets. I think the sweet spot is $40-$60 for excellent and interesting bottles, and bumping that to $100 gets you an incremental improvement in quality, but nothing mind-blowing. More than that and I think you are paying for hype and rarity, which may look good in your liquor cabinet, but doesn't translate to more quality in the bottle.
What the hell? I open a box of chocolates (Sees Candy) and I see this? What has happened to American pride? What happened to our industrial base that a box of chocolates (dark chocolates with mostly caramels...of course) can slip past supposedly rigorous quality control and reveal a 180 degree catastrophe?
Data showed that while those who bought plant-based substitutes in previous years continued to do so, companies failed to entice new customers.
According to GFI, unit sales were down 9 percent in 2023 while dollar sales fell by 2 percent. As a result, the plant-based food market in the US went from being worth $8.2 billion the year before to $8.1 billion.
Well, actually, it's clear that existing customers are leaving too! Factor in inflation, and it's even uglier than at first glance.
This pattern holds true with all sorts of businesses, including the sacrament of The Sustainable Organic Church of The Carbon Apocalypse...the electric vehicle. The business plan is embarrassingly simplistic, and consumers aren't going along with it.
But look at other businesses that push crap we don't want. Lingerie for morbidly obese women? Shaving cream for transsexuals? mRNA-based vaccines that are a health crisis in waiting? Lesbian Studies degrees from 3rd tier colleges?
These products are going the way of the Dodo, and it couldn't happen to a more deserving bunch of lickspittle wanna-be fascists.
Sunday Morning Book Thread - 05-05-2024 ["Perfessor" Squirrel]
—Open Blogger
Welcome to the prestigious, internationally acclaimed, stately, and illustrious Sunday Morning Book Thread! The place where all readers are welcome, regardless of whatever guilty pleasure we feel like reading (HT: Dash my lace wigs). Here is where we can discuss, argue, bicker, quibble, consider, debate, confabulate, converse, and jaw about our latest fancy in reading material. As always, pants are required, unless you are wearing these pants...(Axeman's "pouncing pants")
So relax, find yourself a warm kitty (or warm puppy--I won't judge) to curl up in your lap, and dive into a new book. What are YOU reading this fine morning?
This is another random internet photo. I like the futuristic science fiction aesthetic. It's how my library would look on my intergalactic starship.
WHERE DO STORY IDEAS COME FROM?
In the video above, the YouTuber attempts to provide a structure and framework for story idea generation. "Where do your ideas come from?" seems to be a very common question for popular authors. I'm sure Stephen King, Lee Child, Brandon Sanderson, etc., have heard that question a thousand times. The truth is that ideas for stories are all around us. They can be found just by observing our surroundings. In my own office, we used to joke about the off-the-wall conversations we'd somehow have. Many of them could serve as story fodder if I was so inclined to write them down.
"Ideation" is a concept used in design thinking to describe the process for generating ideas. At one presentation I attended recently, the speaker showed us several images on a slide and then asked us to pick two of them. We were then asked to generate a new idea based on those two images. You can take this same approach to generating story ideas. How could you combine two otherwise unrelated pictures into an awesome story?
Sometimes a story idea will be generated by a random writing sample. Supposedly, J.R.R. Tolkien's The Hobbit was created when he was scribbling one day and the following popped out of his head:
"In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit."
The rest, as they say, is history.
Here at the AoSHQ, we are exposed to countless awesome stories from real life. any of them could easily be the seed of a story idea. Or take one story from the Morning Report, one story from the evening Cafe, and one story from the ONT. Then mix them up and see if you can create a NEW story idea just from those three individual story. Note that story ideas do NOT have to be good! For every decent story idea, you may have to go through 30-40 (or more) just plain awful ideas. However, if you write them all down, you may find a use for them later if something more interesting comes along.
For a challenge, look at last night's ONT picture or Friday's Cafe picture...How could you use one or the other (or both) in a story idea?
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WRITING TIPS FROM ERNEST HEMINGWAY
Ernest Hemingway is one of those authors that will most likely be "cancelled" sometime soon because he's not the "ideal" modern author, though I suppose he could be considered a quintessential American author in many ways. You don't have to like him--either as an author or as a person--but you can't deny he's an interesting character. Like a lot of successful authors, he's doled out tips and tricks for up and coming writers:
Start with a true, simple, declarative sentence. -- Very hard to argue with this. If you pick a book at random off your shelves, you'll find that 9 times out of 10, this will likely be the case. For example, "The star was classified as an A7 on the Morgan-Keenan system, hotter and brighter than the G2-class star humans had evolved under" (A Night Without Stars by Peter F. Hamilton). This one sentence tells us we are not in the Solar System and that this story will most likely be science fiction. Another example: "Higher education institutions all claim to teach some form of critical thinking" (Teaching Change by José Antonio Bowen). Here we have a sentence that indicates the book may be about education and that is is nonfiction. The first sentence can have a real impact on your audience.
Focus on details that create emotion. -- We humans are--at our core--very emotional creatures. Stories can and do touch us deeply on an emotional level. It's why we cry at the end of Old Yeller (movie or book). Stirring emotions through storytelling can change the course of history, raising and toppling empires. A history professor yesterday asked ChatGPT to write what life was like in 1824 America. He gives his students the same prompt. They have to describe--in depth and detail--what an imaginary version of themselves would be doing in America in 1824. AI tools cannot add in an emotional component to their descriptions. They come up with bland, uninteresting prose. However, we humans can describe the physical details--the sights, sounds, smells, taste of 1824 if we have even a remote exposure to outdoor life. The details that stir emotion *matter.*
Write concisely. -- This is probably good advice for newer writers, but I think it also demonstrates Hemingway's biases from his previous occupation in journalism. Isaac Asimov also writes very concisely, probably because he was a *machine* when it came to writing and thus was focused more on output rather than dedicating hours and hours to improving the quality of his writing. Every writer will find their own balance between conciseness and verbosity. As a technical writer myself, I find myself having to really trim down my writing sometimes. I can be a bit verbose when I get carried away. This is also something I teach my students. Write MORE than you have to as it's easier to trim it out than add more.
Build you vocabulary. -- Abso-frickin'-lutely! The best way to increase your vocabulary is to READ AND READ AND READ SOME MORE! Hemingway says if you need a dictionary, you are not a writer. You should instead read a dictionary cover-to-cover three times. Then maybe you can start writing. I think reading and encountering new words, then looking them up works better for me, because then I can see the new words in context so it makes sense.
Stop writing when it's going well. -- I will disagree with Hemingway here. Most authors I think would encourage you continue writing, but maybe switching from writing on your novel to freewriting exercises. Part of the craft of writing is developing the discipline necessary to write an entire book. It takes dedication and practice. Now, if you have written some good stuff over the course of an hour or so, then it's probably time to take a short break, stretch, walk around, etc., so that you can keep your mind fresh when you sit back down to write. Don't try to crank out a novel over a weekend. It won't turn out well at all.
Don't talk about it. -- This is another point on which I disagree with Hemingway. If you are new to the craft of writing stories you NEED feedback from other writers. No one wants to read a 400 page manuscript unless they are getting paid for it. However, friends and family will be happy to read a few pages at a time and provide feedback over the course of your novel. Or join a writers group, like the AoSHQ Writers Group sponsored by Moron OrangeEnt.
MORON RECOMMENDATIONS
I read Let Us Now Be Famous Men by Moron Author Len Nilinsky. The book was mentioned in an AoS comment that provided a download address, so I thought "why not?" This sci fi story is engaging and the main characters limited in number and very well developed. The story takes place on Terra (formerly known as Earth) and is a post-apocalyptic tale where the hero is a Veteran of the Black Ash, a nuclear war that destroyed most of the planet and the plant and animal species living on it. The vivid description of the ruin of present-day Terra is contrasted with museums showing, for example, the weather on pre-war Earth, including a rain shower in a green meadow. This was richly and emotionally described. The Vet is asked by the utopian government to help solve a robot problem on Luna (the moon) because no one else living has the requisite knowledge and experience. Well done and gripping story. (And this was my first e-book.)
Posted by: Legally Sufficient at April 28, 2024 09:17 AM (U3L4U)
Well, I finally did it and it's about time. I read The Screwtape Letters and Screwtape Proposes a Toast cover to cover. I've read bits here and there but never the whole thing. Lewis' writing, no matter the topic, is always a delight. The Screwtape Letters can be difficult at times because it is too prophetic and my blood pressure starts to rise.
I do wonder if Lewis was inspired by Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proposal" (which is brilliant) when he used the approach he did in Screwtape.
Posted by: JTB at April 28, 2024 09:23 AM (zudum)
Comment: I've heard of The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis, of course, but I had never heard of the follow-up story Screwtape Proposes a Toast (available online for free HERE). If you are not familiar with The Screwtape Letters, it's an epistolary novel in which the devil Screwtape is providing instruction to a younger devil on how to tempt a man. Lewis presents Hell as a vast bureaucracy, with Screwtape being a sort of middle-management. This idea has been borrowed by numerous other authors, such as Roger Zelazny/Robert Sheckley (Bring Me the Head of Prince Charming) and Terry Pratchett/Neil Gaimon (Good Omens).
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I read Slack Tide, by RKF Adams, which is a Moron-written book that I've had in my kindle unlimited selections for about a year and just hadn't read yet.
It's in the Perfessor's Moron Library link.
A retired Marine whose passion is bonsai gets dragged into taking down a child slavery operation.
It was a good adventure, with a mostly satisfying conclusion (you can't save them all, so you save who you can). Needs some more editing for occasional grammar errors and typos, but not too much.
Posted by: Dash my lace wigs! at April 28, 2024 09:52 AM (OX9vb)
Comment: I think it's great when Morons and Moronettes review Moron Authors' works. I've usually enjoyed them myself. However, a key point that cannot be stressed enough is the need for *intense* editing for grammatical and spelling mistakes. NOTHING destroys the immersive experience of reading quite like seeing painfully obvious errors in the text. So proofread, proofread, and proofread some more! Hire someone if you can afford it! (If not, then find some friendly experts or join a writers group where much of this can be addressed.)
More Moron-recommended reading material can be found HERE! (1000+ Moron-recommended books!)
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WHAT I'VE BEEN READING THIS PAST WEEK:
After reviewing some of OregonMuse's old Book Threads, I thought I'd try something a bit different. Instead of just listing WHAT I'm reading, I'll include commentary as well. Unless otherwise specified, you can interpret this as an implied recommendation, though as always your mileage may vary.
A Night Without Stars by Peter F. Hamilton
Hamilton's storytelling style is interesting. He often has stories within stories and mixes up genres. The last book, The Abyss Beyond Dreams, involved humans attempting to infiltrate the Void at the center of the galaxy. The local humans IN the Void attempted to stage a Marxist revolution (and succeeded, mostly) because of the corrupt government that was hiding key truths about the alien Fallers that are attacking the humans. In this book, Hamilton gives us more of a police procedural story as the human society on Bienvenidos has progressed from a late-19th century level of technology to mid-to-late 20th century. Now that the planet has escaped the Void, technological progress is possible and humans have a slight edge over the Fallers, even launching rockets and missiles at the Trees in space that are the source of Faller invasion. However, the Fallers have not been idle over the past couple of centuries and have developed new tricks for infiltrating and corrupting human society as they take it over from within.
Neuromancer by William Gibson
This is part of my ongoing quest to read certain books prior to my milestone birthday later this summer. I always find it fascinating to read this kind of book because it seems so cliche at first. But this is one of those books that has spawned a hundred--if not a thousand--imitations over the decades since it was written. I believe Gibson is credited with coining the term "cyberspace" for the virtual, computer-generated world he created. It's also referred to as the "matrix" (sound familiar?). At first, I thought it would be very difficult to understand, but constant reading in the genre has made it fairly easy to understand the tech levels involved as well as the slang, which has been used by other authors as an homage to Gibson.
Verdict: Meh. It was OK, but not great. By the time I got to the end, I really didn't care about the characters or the story.
WHAT I'VE ACQUIRED THIS PAST WEEK:
Aquasilva Trilogy Book 3 - Crusade by Anselm Audley
The Wonderland Gambit Book 1 - The Cybernetic Walrus by Jack L. Chalker
The Wonderland Gambit Book 2 - The March Hare Network by Jack L. Chalker
The Wonderland Gambit Book 3 - The Hot-Wired Dodo by Jack L. Chalker
The Crimson Shadow Book 1 - The Sword of Bedwyr by R. A. Salvatore
The Crimson Shadow Book 2 - Luthien's Gamble by R. A. Salvatore
The Crimson Shadow Book 3 - The Crimson King by R. A. Salvatore
Disclaimer: No Morons were harmed in the making of this Sunday Morning Book Thread. Any deviations from the norm can be blamed on Pixy's new hamster farm.
IDF begins striking terror targets in Rafah
"IDF says targeted strikes begin as War Cabinet unanimously votes to proceed with Rafah operation, Arabic sources say infantry, tanks crossed border." [CBD]
No One is Above the Lore "We have imported alien, violent, dark-age cultures that work hand in hand with our own native-born tyrants to drag us back to an even darker age. Forever. They must be vanquished and excised from our midst. If that means ditching the original Constitution to do so, then God help me, so be it." My latest essay over at Taki's Magazine. Please read and comment. [J.J. Sefton]
Author, historian and commentator Michael Walsh joins us in a wide ranging conversation centering on the twin evils of Leftism and Islam, the prospects for fighting both, predictions about the election, and so much more in a fast, free-wheeling and informative hour!
Hello Muddah, Hello Faddah, Here I Am at Intifada: "Are we willing to do whatever is necessary to preserve our freedom? The other side has clearly demonstrated what it is willing to do, and is actively doing, to take it away. That requires self-preservation 'by any means necessary.' As Allen Ludden (or Bert Convy) might say, the password is Revolution. Contemplating such a thing is unfathomable. But seeing New York City “fundamentally transformed” into Nuremberg-on-the-Hudson, the unfathomable quickly becomes not only fathomable but quite reasonable." My latest at Taki's Magazine. Please read and comment! [J.J. Sefton]
Ace: aceofspadeshq at gee mail.com
CBD: cbd.aoshq at gee mail.com
Buck: buck.throckmorton at protonmail.com
joe mannix: mannix2024 at proton.me
MisHum: petmorons at gee mail.com
J.J. Sefton: sefton at cutjibnewsletter.com
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