Sunday, November 8, 2020
The Left is Not What It Claims to Be
Saturday, November 7, 2020
R.S. McCain on the Coming Cataclysm
Here's my old blogging pal, Robert Stacy McCain, at the Other McCain, "Poised on the Brink of the Abyss."
*****
What inspired this, mainly, was Tim Pool on YouTube. While I am not generally a fan of political video, much preferring the written word as a means of communication, Tim is an exception. His audience is larger than most daytime shows on CNN, and it’s easy to see why. The guy is extremely smart and has a knack for finding the important inflection points amid the daily headline noise. For months now, Tim has been talking to his audience about the potential of civil war, even while acknowledging that most people will think he’s crazy for bringing up the topic. Back during the late 1990s, I recall how some people saw America drifting toward a conflict like the one that devastated the former Yugoslavia. The 1992 Los Angeles riots, the Branch Davidian showdown at Waco, the Oklahoma City bombing — it was a scary time. Back then, at various events, warnings about civil war were being issued by guys who knew what they were talking about — grizzled veterans of the various post-colonial struggles in Third World places like Algeria, Vietnam and what used to be called Rhodesia. The Cold War era had been an age of guerrilla warfare in lots of “hot spots” around the globe, and there was a certain authority behind the pronouncements of danger when they came from such sources as a scarred Afrikaner veteran who had fought Castro’s troops in Angola. We have had a bit too much peace lately, which is why talk of civil war now sounds like lunacy, but we can’t afford to take these things lightly. One of the strange things about such historical disasters is how, in retrospect, the allegedly intolerable state of affairs that preceded the outbreak of war was mild in comparison to what happened once the shooting started. Go back to the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand in 1914 and ask yourself what was so wrong in Europe as to necessitate four years of carnage and everything that followed in the aftermath of World War I. Ever heard of the Pottawatomie massacre? Five people were murdered in that 1856 incident, part of the struggle over “Bleeding Kansas” that shocked Americans at the time. Over a period of about three months after that massacre, about 30 more people were killed in Kansas, and this outbreak of guerrilla warfare on the frontier was viewed at the time as a grievous tragedy. Yet in the war that followed, the death of a few dozen men was a minor detail of outpost skirmishes. Most Americans today know absolutely nothing about, for example, the Battle of South Mountain in September 1862, in which 750 men were killed and a little more than 3,000 wounded. Now think of some of the police shootings that have sparked Black Lives Matter protests, and compare those cases to the wholesale death that might result if civil war were to break out. It’s simply unthinkable, yet there is a danger in not thinking about it.Trump Campaign Infighting as Biden Declared Winner
At WSJ:
Campaign officials met w/Cipollone on Thurs to go through remaining legal options & determined they had pursued every avenue to that point.
— Rebecca Ballhaus (@rebeccaballhaus) November 6, 2020
Some advisers acknowledge there is little path forward, politically or legally, that would prevent a Trump loss.https://t.co/3cvdX3qeB4
Let the Games Begin. #RealResistance
— Sebastian Gorka DrG (@SebGorka) November 7, 2020
Thursday, November 5, 2020
Democrats Got Crushed
I'm traveling, otherwise I'd be blogging the election like a banshee.
I've been reading all kinds of stuff on my phone, and watching the theft of Trump's victory in real time.
More on all of that later, when I get back to the O.C.
Meanwhile, check this Damon Linker piece, at the Week. It's anti-Trump, but he powerfully eviscerates the left --- and their Democrat Party enablers and allies.
See, "The left just got crushed":
Monday, November 2, 2020
'Stay'
Jennifer Delacruz's Monday Forecast
Sunday, November 1, 2020
Expect Election Day to Be a Repeat of 2016
Opinion | Keith Koffler: Biden is leading Trump in 2020 polls. But expect Election Day to be a repeat of 2016. https://t.co/WmAK8HQBlc - @NBCNewsTHINK
— NBC News (@NBCNews) November 1, 2020
Contrary to the prevailing wisdom among the cognoscenti, history and current circumstances suggest President Donald Trump is going to defeat former Vice President Joe Biden — for some of the very same reasons he came from behind in 2016 to shock the Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. It is understandable why conventional wisdom is getting this wrong again. Trump is down in the polls, the nation’s demographics are continuing to change in ways unfavorable to Trump and Republicans, the coronavirus has wrought death and economic destruction throughout the land and Trump’s personality provokes stormy oceans of antipathy — perhaps most crucially among women and suburban voters. But Biden and his campaign are making mistakes that will ensure little of this matters. And the polls are almost certainly wrong again. The only question is by how much. The economy is turning around, playing to Trump’s strength. The president has made significant outreach to minorities, and a relative handful of Black voters switching from Democrat to Republican could help him secure states like Georgia, Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and North Carolina. Not to mention that Trump — unlike Biden — is actually campaigning for the job. Think of it. Clinton wandering around the woods near her home in Chappaqua, N.Y., kicking herself for not appearing even once in Wisconsin. Meanwhile Biden is only now belatedly hitting the trail — a little. This is a risky experiment. Every modern presidential candidate has traveled as much as humanly possible — and then traveled some more. Meeting and speaking to voters — responsibly — is key. Biden is exploring the political equivalent of eating consommé with a fork. Campaigning does not just reach voters. It imparts a sense of vigor, industriousness and sociability that people want in a leader. I don’t think Trump should be drawing so many people to celebrations that feature sardine-packed, mask-less supporters whose health is at risk. But his rallies suggest that better days are ahead — the theme of most winning presidential campaigns. Thursday, there was a significant indicator that happy days may indeed soon be here again. The Commerce Department released the U.S. gross domestic product number for the third quarter, showing growth rate of around 33 percent. This will feed directly into Trump’s argument that he is best positioned to save the economy. Trump complains endlessly about mail-in ballots, ignoring that they may help him. Many more Democrats are voting by mail than Republicans. But these ballots are more likely to be rejected because mistakes were made filling them out or they were late — or simply got lost. And while the Covid-19 numbers are rising, this does not necessarily benefit Biden. Trump has been arguing that it is time to open up the economy and stop worrying so much about the spread of the virus. People have pandemic fatigue, and they are eager to go back to their regular, pre-Covid lives, even if this sometimes means endangering themselves or others. And not only is Biden staying home, his army of volunteers and canvassers have been cooped up as well, doing outreach on their parents’ Wi-Fi instead of out seeing voters. The Biden campaign only recently emerged from the basement — with the exception of its leader — after Trump’s operatives had already spent months contacting voters on their doorsteps. Refusing to mobilize voters by showing up in their neighborhoods early and often is another likely ill-fated Biden experiment in ignoring modern campaign practice. You also should not underestimate the vast amount of damage created by Biden’s second debate suggestion that he would eventually eliminate the oil industry. When moderator Kristen Welker asked him whether he would “close down the oil industry,” Biden answered “Yes,” he would transition from it. When Welker then asked why he would do that, he responded, “Because the oil industry pollutes, significantly.” Although the economy may be on the upswing, the American public is still suffering...
Friday, October 30, 2020
Alex Curry, Dang!
The #Friday office 🎃 pic.twitter.com/K3I0W9AzrL
— Alex Curry (@Alex_Curry) October 30, 2020
Mark Levin Absolutely Explodes
Man, I like Mark Levin, but sheesh, he needs some mood stabilizers or something.
Dang!
My appearance on Hannity TV last night pic.twitter.com/ghhC7M85bE
— Mark R. Levin (@marklevinshow) October 30, 2020
Wednesday, October 28, 2020
Trump Gets Late Election Bounce with Florida's Democrat-Leaning Colombian Constituency
More on Florida, at Foreign Policy.
Just watch Florida next Tuesday. Florida's results should come right around at 5:00pm, and absentee ("mail-in") ballots are counted before election day. We'll know who's winning in the Sunshine State.
The rest is all fluff. Well, actually, if Trump wins both Florida and Pennsylvania ... well, it's going to be a laugh riot.
See, "In Florida, Many Colombian Americans Fear Biden Is Soft on Socialism."
Tuesday, October 27, 2020
What If Biden Loses Florida?
He's toast, says Nate Silver.
But you gotta click through, at Althouse, for the link.
Trump Up 48-to-44 in Florida?
So that's why the leftist "Latinx" journos at LAT are alarmed.
See, "For Latinos, combating disinformation about the election often starts at home."
Hmm. Florida Hispanics are Cuban. There might be some newer arrivals from other countries, but like Cubans, they're also escaping communism and tyranny. With the Democrats going so far left this year, and the anarchy of antifa and Black Lives Matter, this poll, at AoSHQ, is not surprising.
See, "American Greatness Poll: Trump Takes Four Point Lead in Florida."
Pamela Horn, Country House Society
Sunday, October 25, 2020
V-Shaped Recovery in U.S. Manufacturing
A couple eager for a kitchen upgrade sold their existing refrigerator, stove and dishwasher, planning to replace them immediately. They were shocked to find out new appliances would be out of stock for months. https://t.co/6uBdrLjchM
— The Wall Street Journal (@WSJ) October 25, 2020
Friday, October 23, 2020
What We learned from Tony Bobulinski
From Kim Strassel, at WSJ, "The Biden ‘Family Legacy":
Here we go: https://t.co/SukHlG1zGs
— Kimberley Strassel (@KimStrassel) October 22, 2020
Joe Biden has a problem, and his name is Hunter. Because the former vice president hasn’t had to answer any questions on this topic—and continued to refuse to do so in Thursday’s debate—that problem could soon become America’s.
That’s the reality now that a former business partner of Hunter Biden’s has come forward to provide the ugly details of the “family brand.” Tony Bobulinski, a Navy veteran and institutional investor, has provided the Journal emails and text messages associated with his time as CEO of Sinohawk Holdings, a venture between the Bidens and CEFC China Energy, a Shanghai-based conglomerate. That correspondence corroborates and expands on emails recently published by the New York Post, which says they come from a Hunter laptop.
In a statement, Mr. Bobulinski said he went public because he wants to clear his name, which was contained in those published emails, and because accusations that the information is fake or “Russian disinformation” are “offensive.” He attests that all the correspondence he provided is genuine, including documents that suggest Hunter was cashing in on the Biden name and that Joe Biden was involved. Mr. Bobulinski says he was also alarmed by a September report from Sen. Ron Johnson that “connected some dots” on the CEFC deal, causing him now to believe the Bidens sold out their U.S. partners.
Mr. Bobulinski’s text messages show he was recruited for the project by James Gilliar, a Hunter associate. Mr. Gilliar explains in a December 2015 text that there will be a deal between the Chinese and “one of the most prominent families from the U.S.” A month later he introduces Rob Walker, also “a partner of Biden.” In March 2016, Mr. Gilliar tells Mr. Bobulinski the Chinese entity is CEFC, which is shaping up to be “the Goldmans of China.” Mr. Gilliar promises that same month to “develop” the terms of a deal “with hunter.” Note that in 2015-16, Joe Biden was still vice president.
As the deal takes shape in 2017, Mr. Bobulinski begins to question what Hunter will contribute besides his name, and worries that he was “kicked out of US Navy for cocaine use.” Mr. Gilliar acknowledges “skill sets [sic] missing” and observes that Hunter “has a few demons.” He explains that “in brand [Hunter is] imperative but right know [sic] he’s not essential for adding input.” Mr. Bobulinski writes that he appreciates “the name/leverage being used” but thinks the economic “upside” should go to the team doing the actual work. Mr. Gilliar reminds him that those on the Chinese side “are intelligence so they understand the value added.”
This dispute almost derails the deal. Hunter is hardly visible through most of the work, until final contract negotiations ramp up in mid-May. He brings in his uncle Jim Biden for a stake. (Mr. Gilliar in a text message soothes Mr. Bobulinski with a promise that Jim’s addition “strengthens our USP”—unique selling proposition—“to the Chinese as it looks like a truly family business.”) Hunter in texts and emails wants offices in three U.S. cities, “significant” travel budgets, a stipend for Jim Biden, a job for an assistant, and more-frequent distributions of any gains. As for annual pay, he explains in an email that he expects “a hell of a lot more than 850” thousand dollars a year (the amount Mr. Bobulinski, the CEO, is getting), since his ex-wife will take nearly all of it.
Mr. Bobulinksi pushes back, warning Mr. Gilliar in a text that they need to “manage” Hunter because “he thinks things are going to be his personal piggybank.” The duo worry about his “mental state,” substance abuse, and his ability to make meetings.
Hunter, in his own angry texts, makes clear that his contribution is his name...
RTWT.
Thursday, October 22, 2020
Alan Taylor, William Cooper's Town
Helen Pluckrose and James Lindsay, Cynical Theories
Evelyn Taft's Thursday Forecast
It's been cool, overcast. Its' a nice break from the heat.
Here's the fabulous Ms. Evelyn, for CBS News 2 Los Angeles:
Wednesday, October 21, 2020
Hunter Biden's Laptop Allegedly Features Photos of 'Underage Girls'
At Big League Politics. "SHOCK CLAIM: Rudy Giuliani Says Hunter Biden Laptop Had Pictures of “Underage Girls,” Bizarre Texts."
RELATED: This is gold, Scaachi Koul, at BuzzFeed, via Memeorandum, "Jeffrey Toobin Can't Be The Only Person Masturbating On Work Zoom Calls."
Tuesday, October 20, 2020
Saturday, October 17, 2020
Everything is 'White Supremacist'
Big eyerolls here, but it's absolutely true.
And it's the most stupid thing. I feel bad for white people, especially meekly progressive whites who are too afraid of being labeled "racist" (and having their lives destroyed) to stand up to the bullying.
At NYT, "'White Supremacy' Once Meant David Duke and the Klan. Now It Refers to Much More":
"As July 4 and its barbecues arrived this year, the activist and former N.F.L. quarterback Colin Kaepernick declared, “We reject your celebration of white supremacy.”THIS—>”’White Supremacy’ Once Meant David Duke and the Klan. Now It Refers to Much More.” The New York Times https://t.co/jhgUkDPq3H
— Christina Sommers (@CHSommers) October 17, 2020
The director of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, one of New York City’s most prestigious museums, acknowledged this summer that his institution was grounded in white supremacy, while four blocks uptown, the curatorial staff of the Guggenheim decried a work culture suffused in it.
The Los Angeles Times editorial board issued an apology two weeks ago describing itself as “deeply rooted in white supremacy” for at least its first 80 years. In England, the British National Library’s Decolonising Working Group cautioned employees that a belief in “color blindness” or the view that “mankind is one human family” are examples of “covert white supremacy.”
In a time of plague and protest, two words — “white supremacy” — have poured into the rhetorical bloodstream with force and power. With President Trump’s overt use of racist rhetoric, a spate of police killings of Black people, and the rise of far-right extremist groups, many see the phrase as a more accurate way to describe today’s racial realities, with older descriptions like “bigotry” or “prejudice” considered too tame for such a raw moment.
News aggregators show a vast increase in the use of the term “white supremacy” (or “white supremacist”) compared with 10 years ago. The New York Times itself used the term fewer than 75 times in 2010, but nearly 700 times since the first of this year alone. Type the term into Twitter’s search engine and it pops up six, eight or 10 times each minute.
The meaning of the words has expanded, too. Ten years ago, white supremacy frequently described the likes of the Ku Klux Klan and David Duke, the neo-Nazi politician from Louisiana. Now it cuts a swath through the culture, describing an array of subjects: the mortgage lending policies of banks; a university’s reliance on SAT scores as a factor for admissions decisions; programs that teach poor people better nutrition; and a police department’s enforcement policies.
Yet the phrase is deeply contentious. Influential writers such as Ta-Nehisi Coates and Ibram X. Kendi, a Boston University professor, have embraced it, seeing in white supremacy an explanatory power that cuts through layers of euphemism to the core of American history and culture. It speaks to the reality, they say, of a nation built on slavery. To examine many aspects of American life once broadly seen as race neutral — such as mortgage lending or college faculty hiring — is to find a bedrock of white supremacy.
“It is not hyperbole to say that white supremacy is resting at the heart of American politics,” Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor of Princeton, a socialist activist and professor of African-American studies, said in a speech in 2017.
But some Black scholars, businessmen and activists — on the right and the left — balk at the phrase. They hear in those words a sledgehammer that shocks and accuses, rather than explains. When so much is described as white supremacy, when the Ku Klux Klan and a museum art collection take the same descriptor, they say, the power of the phrase is lost.
Prof. Orlando Patterson, a sociologist at Harvard University who has written magisterial works on the nature of slavery and freedom, including about his native Jamaica, said it was too reminiscent of the phrases used to describe apartheid and Nazi Germany.
“It comes from anger and hopelessness and alienates rather than converts,” he said.
The label also discourages white and Black people from finding commonalities of experience that could move society forward,
Professor Patterson and others said. “It racializes a lot of problems that a lot of people face, even when race is not the answer,” Professor Patterson said.
Glenn C. Loury, a conservative-leaning economics professor at Brown University, hears in the term an attempt to spin a mythic narrative about a fallen America.
“So we declare structures of our country are implacably racist,” Professor Loury said. “On the other hand, we make appeals to have a conversation with that country which is mired in white supremacy? The logic escapes me.”
Then there are those whose cultural signposts are found outside the Black-white divide. The essayist Wesley Yang, the son of Korean immigrants and the author of “The Souls of Yellow Folk,” often examines racial identity and has found himself watching the debate over these words as if through a side window. Did this thing called white supremacy really so neatly define the lives of Black people and Latinos and Asians?
“The phrase is destructive of discourse,” he said. “Once you define it as something that has a ghostly essence, it’s nowhere and everywhere”..."
Geoffrey Parker, The Military Revolution
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern's Labour Party Wins Landslide Election
This is not good.
Have you paid attention to this woman? She's a budding leftist totalitarian, and New Zealand voters handed her at least three more years of power. Remember, she forced a major gun confiscation program following the Christchurch massacre in 2019, and New Zealand's coronavirus crackdown this year is perhaps the most draconian of any democracy on earth.
And she's a creepy "Karen" type of woman who assumes she knows what's best for you. "Cringe" is only putting it mildly.
At the New Zealand Herald, "Election results 2020: Labour's Jacinda Ardern wins second term, crushes National's Judith Collins; Winston Peters and NZ First out; Act's David Seymour and Greens' James Shaw and Marama Davidson get 10 MPs each."
The Sydney Morning Herald, "Victory an endorsement for Jacinda's steady hand in unsteady times."
And the Guardian U.K., "New Zealand election 2020: Jacinda Ardern to govern New Zealand for second term after historic victory -- New Zealanders give Labour more votes than at any other election in past five decades."
Friday, October 16, 2020
Peter Schweizer, Profiles in Corruption
Due out January 21, 2021, at Amazon, Peter Schweizer, Profiles in Corruption: Abuse of Power by America's Progressive Elite.
Thursday, October 15, 2020
Big Tech Censors Blockbuster Hunter Biden Exposé
Definitely got the Streisand Effect going on here.
Twitter made this an even bigger story by trying to block readers from sharing it.
At WSJ, via Memeorandum, "Facebook, Twitter Limit Sharing of New York Post Articles That Biden Disputes."
And at today's New York Post, via Memeorandum, "Emails reveal how Hunter Biden tried to cash in big on behalf of family with Chinese firm."
This is big. We'll see how things play out.
Also, at Instapundit, "AS THEY SHOULD: Twitter, Facebook face blowback after stopping circulation of NY Post story."
And Hot Air, "Biden Campaign Lashes Out at New York Post."
Washing Up
Well, Twitter does have its uses.
#RT if you like her big boobs! @BbtElle #tits #boobs pic.twitter.com/jGhoZ5o5te
— Big Breast Pics (@BigBreastPics) October 14, 2020
Tuesday, October 13, 2020
Thursday, October 8, 2020
Viral Ocean Spray 'Dreams' Star Nathan Apodaca
Jennifer Delacruz's Thursday Forecast
Wednesday, October 7, 2020
Celebrities Strip Down for Voter Registration Campaign
this seems exceedingly desperate. https://t.co/BaIEX7aR8b
— Apollycalypse (@PollySpin) October 7, 2020
Monday, October 5, 2020
Jumbo's Clown Room
At LAT, "How out-of-work strippers made their show virtual and are ‘taking the power back’."
When the pandemic hit, a group of dancers from the East Hollywood strip club Jumbo’s Clown Room realized no one was coming to save them.
— LAT Entertainment (@latimesent) October 5, 2020
So, they got creative💃💃💃: https://t.co/6wur5v85oW
Friday, October 2, 2020
Trump Tests Positive for Coronavirus
Say a prayer for the president and his wife. Hope Hicks too.
It's been nonstop bombshell news for days now, some of it genuine news (and most of it propaganda from the leftist media complex --- here's looking at you New York Times).
Check Memeorandum for all the headlines.
And at LAT, "President Trump and first lady test positive for the coronavirus."
The media's descended into hysteria. On CNN a little while ago, Dana Bash, Kaitlan Collins, and Dr. Sanjay Gupta all looked like they'd just woken up or hadn't been to sleep. Brian Stelter declared an international emergency. Oh brother. It's four in the morning back east. What a nightmare. And to think, I watched baseball all day yesterday, then streamed "Big Brother" with my wife, and then the news hit. Unfortunately, there's just one MLB playoff game until Monday. The Cubs and Marlins are making up a rained out game later today, and after that I'll just stream some shows I guess.
This election's killing me lol.
Tuesday, September 29, 2020
Monday, September 28, 2020
Fear and Loathing: The Election's 'Gonna Be Like War'
At LAT, "‘It’s going to be like war.’ Voters eye 2020 election outcome with fear and loathing":
Many supporters of Biden and Trump fear violence is likely in November. Each side blames the other.
— Los Angeles Times (@latimes) September 27, 2020
https://t.co/EnJ7qBieKo
When Jim Jackson looks ahead to November, he cringes at what he sees: a defeated President Trump refusing to leave the White House and his supporters waging war to keep him there.
“The militias and the white supremacists ... they’re going to put out the call to arms,” said Jackson, 73, who lives in the conservative-leaning suburbs of Milwaukee and voted Republican for 52 years, but not for Trump. “That’s my worst nightmare.”
Jeanine Davis shares his concern, though for different reasons.Seated near the Huntington Beach Pier, wearing a red “Keep America Great” hat, the Trump supporter suggested Democrats will do whatever it takes to elect Joe Biden, and riot if they fail. “It’s going to be like war amongst citizens,” said Davis, an executive recruiter in her 50s.Candidates often say a presidential contest is the most important ever, telling voters to act as though their life depended on it and the country’s future was at stake. Dozens of conversations with voters across the nation — from the West Coast to the Upper Midwest to the East — suggest that, this time, many people really believe it.Punished by pandemic, buckled by economic hardship and riven by relentless partisanship, America is facing an election unlike any in modern times, a vote shadowed by menace and fringed with paranoia — much of it fed by the occupant of the Oval Office, who incessantly acts to undermine confidence in the result.“He’s essentially trying to pull off a coup,” said Frank Dudek, a 70-year-old retiree, after casting his ballot at an early vote center in Arlington, Va., just outside the nation’s capital.Some voters worry about frayed family ties. Others see the whole country unraveling. A significant number consider threats and violence a reasonable way to solve partisan differences.“You have all these things — the pandemic, the protests, the counterprotests, the Black vs. white, the right against the left,” said Allison Trammell, 60, an Atlanta social worker who supports Biden. “It’s almost like everything is coming up at the same time and there’s no equilibrium. There’s no middle ground.”What is more, many are acting on their fears, anticipating all manner of chaos, up to and including armed insurrection. They’re flooding gun stores and shooting ranges, stockpiling ammunition and provisioning for a postelection dystopia.Ashley Avis, a 36-year-old nurse, was recently out with her father and 2-year-old son in Pinellas Park, Fla., buying plywood to board up their windows in case of civil unrest. She also plans to secure an alternative water supply, lest the public works around Tampa Bay are taken out of commission.“We’re hoping for the best,” said the Trump supporter. “We’re preparing for the worst.”Across the country, in a working-class neighborhood on Las Vegas’ east side, Michael Martinez said he, too, planned to lay in extra food and water “just in case there’s a disruption in our food delivery systems and whatnot.”“I wouldn’t put it past some people” if Trump loses, said Martinez, 69, a retired union carpenter and Biden supporter. “That’s the way they’ll try to disrupt the economy, try to disrupt the way we live now.”Not everyone sees election day as the dawn of a coming apocalypse.Dave Gorrasi, who owns Blue Hook Aquatics just outside Cincinnati, says he believes the talk of widespread upheaval is a device both sides are using to gin up support.“I think there is going to be less trouble once the election’s done because then we can go back to normalcy,” said the 41-year-old political independent, who is still undecided...
Still more.
'Can't Stop'
RHCP, from my errand-run early this morning, at 93.1 Jack FM Los Angeles.
"Can't Stop."
Suddenly Last Summer
The Motels
12:00pm
Runaway
Bon Jovi
11:56am
Down Under
Men At Work
11:46am
Thats All
Genesis
11:41am
The Distance
CAKE
11:38am
Sunday Bloody Sunday
U2
11:34am
Highway To Hell
AC/DC
11:30am
Time Of Your Life
Green Day
11:28am
Born To Run
Bruce Springsteen
11:22am
Just Another Day
Oingo Boingo
11:17am
Rock The Casbah
Clash
11:13am
Hey Jealousy
Gin Blossoms
11:10am
Hotel California
Eagles/Don Henley
11:03am
Bizarre Love Triangle
New Order
11:00am
Use Somebody
Kings Of Leon
10:56am
Rio
Duran Duran
10:45am
Centerfold
J. Geils Band
10:41am
Loser
BECK
10:38am
I Need To Know
Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers
10:35am
Enjoy The Silence
Depeche Mode
10:31am
Cant Stop
Red Hot Chili Peppers
10:26am
Talking In Your Sleep
Romantics
10:15am
No One Like You
Scorpions
10:12am
Saturday, September 26, 2020
Amy Coney Barrett
Today's big story.
The Kavanaugh hearings were a nightmare.
I dread the diabolical attacks Barrett's going to endure. But she'll be confirmed.
See Ed Morrissey's excellent post at Hot Air, "NYT: Maybe A Little Anti-Catholicism Is A Good Thing When It Comes To Barrett."
And at Twitchy, "IT BEGINS: Lib questions Amy Coney Barrett’s adoption of two kids from Haiti," and "Talking points have gone out — Another Democrat operative Goes after Amy Coney Barrett adoptions and then locks down after blowback."
More at Instapundit, "PRESENTED WITHOUT COMMENT."
On/Off Flashers
At Drunken Stepfather, "ON/OFF FLASHERS FRIDAY OF THE DAY."
BONUS: "BARBARA PALVIN TOPLESS OF THE DAY."
Sunday, September 20, 2020
Friday, September 18, 2020
We Are All Algorithms Now
Andrew Sullivan is so damn good. It's freaky, too, since he's such a weird guy.
But this is really good. I look forward to Fridays, when I can read his column. I think Matt Taibbi posts his big pieces on Friday as well, so I'm going to go troll over there for a while, to see what he's got going.
Here's Sully, "Is that what's really destroying the legitimacy of our democracy?":
Remind yourself that hefty chunks of our society still insist that Covid19 is a hoax, perpetrated for the sake of social control. Re-read Richard Hofstadter. Remember how vast numbers of white liberals drastically shifted their view of America — almost overnight — from a flawed but vibrant multiracial democracy to a version of apartheid South Africa because of a single video of a brutal arrest and murder. This week, I watched videos of people literally burning Harry Potter books, like latter-day Nazis, in the cause of transgender liberation. It’s safe to say, I think, that many of these people have lost their minds — just by staying online. And they not only think they’re perfectly sane; they think they’re heroes.RTWT.And online is increasingly where people live. My average screen time this past week was close to ten hours a day. Yes, a lot of that is work-related. But the idea that I have any real conscious life outside this virtual portal is delusional. And if you live in such a madhouse all the time, you will become mad. You don’t go down a rabbit-hole; your mind increasingly is the rabbit hole — rewired that way by algorithmic practice. And you cannot get out, unless you fight the algorithms to a draw, or manage to exert superhuman discipline and end social media use altogether.
But the thing about algorithms and artificial intelligence is that they don’t rest, they have no human flaws, they exploit every weakness we have, and have already taken over. This is not a future dystopia in which some kind of AI robot takes power and kills us all. It is a dystopia already here — burrowed into our minds, literally disabling the basic mental tools required for democracy to work at all.
If you watch video after video of excessive police force against suspects, for example, and your viewing habits are then reinforced by algorithms so you see no countervailing examples, your view about the prevalence of such excessive force will change, regardless of objective reality. A new study shows how this happens.
Wednesday, September 16, 2020
Monday, September 14, 2020
Between 30 and 50 Percent of West Virginia Schools Lack Internet Access
Not sure if the figures include private schools, but either way, it's unreal.
At WSJ, "Remote Schooling Out of Reach for Many Students in West Virginia Without Internet":
HARTS, W.Va.—Just before 9 a.m., Hollee Blair sat in her boyfriend’s Toyota Tacoma in the parking lot of Chapmanville Regional High School and waited for attendance to be taken.Still more.
With no broadband internet at home, Ms. Blair, a 17-year-old honors student who plans to study nursing after high school, used her boyfriend’s iPhone to connect to the school’s Wi-Fi for an hour-long orientation over Zoom.
“I’ll do whatever it takes to keep up,” said Ms. Blair, shielding her eyes so she could see the phone’s screen. “If it means doing this every day, I’ll do it. It’s worth it.”
Much of southern West Virginia had already been struggling with a drug epidemic and persistent poverty before the coronavirus pandemic took hold here. Now, as students return to school online, the region is coming up against another longstanding challenge: a lack of broadband internet access.
Nationwide, about 21 million people lack access to broadband, according to the Federal Communications Commission. When people with slow or unreliable internet connections are included, the number swells to 157 million, nearly half the U.S. population, according to a study by Microsoft Corp.
Providing service in sparsely populated areas is typically more costly and less profitable than in suburbs and cities. In Appalachia, the terrain has made it difficult to install and maintain the infrastructure necessary for broadband.
In West Virginia, between 30% and 50% of K-12 students don’t have internet access at home, according to the state Department of Education. By the start of school on Tuesday, the state had set up nearly 850 Wi-Fi hot spots at schools, libraries, National Guard armories and state parks for students.
So far, nine of West Virginia’s 55 counties, including Logan County, where Ms. Blair lives, are teaching all classes remotely after spikes in Covid-19 cases pushed them above a threshold for new daily cases set by the state.
But in the state’s other 46 counties, many students will still need to connect online as some districts choose a blended model that mixes in-person and remote classes. Counties may also be required to halt in-person classes if case levels rise too high.
Logan County has had 536 cases of Covid-19 and 36 related deaths.
This week, Gov. Jim Justice lifted a $50 million cap on how much the state can receive from a fund created by the FCC to bring high-speed broadband to rural areas. But it isn’t clear how much the state will ultimately receive and how long it will take providers to connect homes.
“You’ve just got to step up and meet this challenge,” the governor said.
Meanwhile, Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a Democrat, is seeking federal funding to set up broadband hot spots across the country to aid remote learning during the pandemic.
“This is a short-term fix to a long-term problem, but until we treat access to broadband like the need for electricity was treated in the 1930s, our students will fall behind,” he said.
In Logan County, which is blanketed by rugged mountains, nearly a quarter of residents live below the federal poverty line, according to census data. At Logan High School, the hallways and classrooms are empty, and teachers are troubleshooting tech problems as they begin broadcasting their classes to students from laptops.
Jennifer Stillwell, a history teacher, said some poorer students won’t have transportation to get to a hot spot. She is giving students the option to use a photo of themselves rather than live video, in case they don’t feel comfortable having their home appear on screen.
She was encouraged that after three days of classes, she had been unable to reach only five students who may lack internet out of 105 on her roster.
On Thursday, her AP history class got off to a smooth start, with 16 students logging in. “Let’s see if we can chat,” she said brightly, as she introduced herself from her neat classroom.
The Logan County school district is using a $375,000 grant from the state to get students connected. Patricia Lucas, the district’s superintendent, said as many 40% of K-12 students in the county might not have internet at home...
Sunday, September 13, 2020
Hard Times for High Times
A fascinating piece, at Politico, "How Legal Weed Destroyed a Counterculture Icon."
Fishnet Babes
At Drunken Stepfather, "FISHNET FRIDAY OF THE DAY."
Byron York, Obsession
California is Toast
SAN FRANCISCO — The cityscape resembles the surface of a distant planet, populated by a masked alien culture. The air, choked with blown ash, is difficult to breathe.Keep reading.
There is the Golden Gate Bridge, looming in the distance through a drift-smoke haze, and the Salesforce Tower, which against the blood-orange sky appears as a colossal spaceship in a doomsday film.
San Francisco, and much of California, has never been like this.
California has become a warming, burning, epidemic-challenged and expensive state, with many who live in sophisticated cities, idyllic oceanfront towns and windblown mountain communities thinking hard about the viability of a place they have called home forever. For the first time in a decade, more people left California last year for other states than arrived.
Monica Gupta Mehta and her husband, an entrepreneur, have been through tech busts and booms, earthquakes, wildfire seasons and power outages. But it was not until the skies darkened and cast an unsettling orange light on their Palo Alto home earlier this week that they ever considered moving their family of five somewhere else.
“For the first time in 20-something years, the thought crossed our minds: Do we really want to live here?” said Mehta, who is starting an education tech company.
It would be difficult to leave. They love the area’s abundant nature and are tied to Silicon Valley by work and a network of extended family members, who followed them west from Pittsburgh. But Mehta says it is something she would consider if her family is in regular danger.
“Yesterday felt so apocalyptic,” Mehta said. “People are really starting to reconsider whether California has enough to offer them.”
This is the latest iteration of the California Dream, a Gold Rush-era slogan meant to capture the hopeful migration of an old nation to a new, rich West. For generations, the tacit agreement for California residents resembled a kind of too-good-to-be-true deal. Live in the lovely if often drought-plagued Sierra, or beneath the beachfront Pacific Coast cliffs, and work in an economy constantly reinventing itself, from Hollywood to the farms of the San Joaquin to Silicon Valley.
But for many of the state’s 40 million residents, the California Dream has become the California Compromise, one increasingly challenging to justify, with a rapidly changing climate, a thumb-on-the-scales economy, high taxes and a pandemic that has led to more cases of the novel coronavirus than any other state.
During the course of his term, President Trump has singled out California, a state he lost by 30 percentage points, as an example of Democrat-caused urban unrest, irresponsible immigration policy and poor forest management, even though nearly 60 percent of the state’s forests are managed by the federal government. Several are burning today, with millions of acres already scorched.
Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) has responded specifically in some cases, but in others, he has invoked the California Dream, an aspirational noun attached to no other state. In his January 2019 inaugural address, Newsom warned that “there is nothing inevitable about” that dream.
“And now more than ever, it is up to us to defend it,” he said.
As the state’s climate has shifted to one of extremes, soaking wet seasons followed suddenly by sharp, dry heat and wind, no region has been safe from fire. This year — even before peak fire season has gotten underway — widespread fires have forced evacuations, from San Jose in Silicon Valley to the distant hamlet of Big Creek along the western slopes of the Sierra.
More than two dozen major fires are burning around the state and have consumed a record 3.1 million acres of land, more than 3,000 homes and at least 22 lives. Los Angeles has reported the worst air quality in three decades as a result of fires surrounding that city, already notorious for orange air and seasonal dry cough.
Wine Country has burned four straight years, with a number of vineyards lost. Homes have been destroyed far to the south in San Diego County, and more than 200 campers had to be airlifted to safety amid the Creek Fire, still burning hot and fast between Fresno and Mammoth Lakes...
Saturday, September 12, 2020
'Insane Video' of Big-Rig Slamming Into 11 Vehicles on Interstate 5 in South Sacramento, California
My goodness!
Watch, at the New York Post, "Insane video shows moment big rig triggers massive deadly crash."
Evelyn Taft's Saturday Forecast
She's looking fabulous in that mauve dress.
For CBS News 2 Los Angeles:
The Dialectic of Woke
At Free Beacon, "Why politically correct institutions cave to Communist China."
Friday, September 11, 2020
Remembering 9/11
At USA Today, "'America will always rise up': Trump and Biden pay respects to 9/11 victims in memorial visits."
And here's CJ Pearson, for Prager University:
Thursday, September 10, 2020
Evelyn Taft's Thursday Forecast
Nice and cool this morning, overcast.
The beautiful Ms. Evelyn, for CBS News 2 Los Angeles:
Wednesday, September 9, 2020
Ignore the National Polls
The real margin is probably within the margin of error. There for sure is going to be a secret Trump vote this year, and I'm betting it'll be larger than the 3 to 5 five percent of shy Trump voters in 2016.
Don't trust the polls. They've been terrible now for years, and, well, this is 2020. Democrats are even more desperate to win.
Check all the headlines at Memeorandum, "Presidential Contest Tightens as Campaigns Move Into Eight-Week Home Stretch."
And at see the Miami Herald, "Biden is struggling to win Miami Latinos, new poll finds. Will it cost him Florida?"
Tuesday, September 8, 2020
Why White Lives Don’t Matter
No, I’m not talking about this — not yet, maybe later today — but rather about an interesting fact you probably haven’t noticed: Nobody cares how many white suspects get shot by cops. And I mean absolutely nobody cares. Certainly no black person has ever bothered to investigate how often the police shoot white suspects, but white people don’t care, either. Like, if I got pulled over by cops tomorrow and became belligerent when they tried to arrest me, nobody would care if this resulted in me being shot to death. My own family wouldn’t really care. My friends would be like, “He probably had it coming. He was always an idiot.”Keep reading.
There would be no protest marches. Benjamin Crump wouldn’t be all over CNN complaining about the “excessive force” if I got shot by cops. And this is not just true me, but of any other white person.
What to Expect After the November Election
Lots of theories going around about what's going to happen in the election aftermath. Unless Trump or Biden wins a landslide, expect days or week of delays, protests, and riots. See Michael Anton, at the American Mind, "The Coming Coup?" And FWIW, at the Daily Beast, "The Left Secretly Preps for MAGA Violence After Election Day."
And Tucker's on the case:
Sierra Nevada Creek Fire
As the sun set in the Sierra Nevada Friday, about 50 residents of the mountain hamlet of Big Creek gathered on an overlook at the edge of town. The Creek fire, as it would be called, had just started burning in the canyon below.RTWT.
It seemed minor, and those assembled looked on hopefully as planes and a helicopter dropped water on it.
“It was a Friday night, something to watch, something to do. We are a bunch of hillbillies,” joked Toby Wait, the superintendent, principal and gym teacher for the town’s 55-student school. “Fire is part of our lives, but this was small.”
It didn’t stay small.
In the hours and days that followed, the Creek fire has exploded into a monster inferno that has consumed nearly 100,000 acres, enlisted nearly 1,000 firefighters, isolated small foothill communities and threatened to burn until mid-October.
California’s fire season got an early start this year with the massive lightning fires in the coastal mountains and wine country. Even without the fall Santa Ana winds, more than 2 million acres have burned so far in 2020, more than in any previously recorded year. Now the Creek fire promises to be one of the worst of the season.
For the mountain communities lying east of Fresno, the assessment as of Monday afternoon looked especially grave.
Fueled by millions of dead trees, the Creek fire has raced through mountain communities like Big Creek and vacation getaways like Huntington and Shaver Lake, confounding firefighters with unpredictable and terrifying behavior. Its smoke plumed nearly 50,000 feet high. There were lightning strikes. Forests seemed to explode.
The drama seemed to peak Saturday night when a CH-47 Chinook and UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter rescued some 200 campers trapped by flames at Mammoth Pool.
But among the thousands fighting the fire or evacuating from its path, there have been no reports of deaths.
Damage to property and homes is more difficult to assess. The fire is burning so dangerously and intensely that crews who normally count destroyed houses and buildings have been told to stand down for their own safety...
Sunday, September 6, 2020
The Best of Myla
Here's Ms. Maya from 2018:
Jennifer Delacruz's Record-Breaking Forecast
At ABC News 10 San Diego:
About Me
Rockin' the Blogosphere!
"Feel It Still"
Memorandum
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Flopping Aces, "Communist Defectors Warn About Four Stages Of Subversion — And America Is On The Last One ..."..."
View From the Beach, "‘Hail To Thee, My Alma Mater ..."Links
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