The Daily Donnybrook, and other fine things

Posted on March 10, 2025March 14, 2025 by Mike Leave a comment

Welcome to Ye Aulde Colde Furye Blogge’s shiny new open-comments thread, where y’all can have at it as you wish, on any topic you like. All new posts will appear below this one. There will be blood…

Mike @Substack

New Eyrie posts go up every Monday and Friday, although the time of day may (and most likely will) vary. Mike’s latest Eyrie offering is available for perusal here: Cray-cray contest.

Please do consider subscribing to The Eyrie, gang; subscribers receive email notification whenever each new post goes live. All Eyrie articles are getatable (yes, that’s really a word—trust me!) for one and all to read and enjoy totally free of charge, regardless of subscription status. However, a paid sub is required to unlock commenting privileges—an almighty incentive to kick loose and chip in if ever there was one. Thanks!

Here is our current status after one month:

Posted on March 13, 2025 by Barry 1 Comment

– mortgage rates are down – egg prices are down – gas prices are down – overall inflation dropping – illegal immigration stopped at the border – wages going up – foreign aid shut down – woke initiatives being removed – massive manufacturing investments ongoing.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick Outlines Global Impact and Response from USA Tariff Hammer

The whole megilla

Posted on March 12, 2025 by Mike 1 Comment

Dude hits the nail on the head. I mean, HARD.

Regular reminder that every Ideological Turing Test study has shown that conservatives understand liberal viewpoints quite well, and liberals are incapable of understanding conservative viewpoints. We don’t have to argue, this has been shown and reproduced empirically. https://t.co/6IO5t0mxKq

— Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry (@pegobry_en)

March 11, 2025

Good as that is, it gets even better from there.

This is because leftism is a form of narcissism, so they can’t help but projecting their neuroses on other people, and so they’re incapable of modeling other minds (this is also known as “empathy”).

— Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry (@pegobry_en)

March 11, 2025

Being the lazy sod I am, I’ll make it easy on myself and just do a screencap of the rest.

As CF Lifers will know, I’ve posited the Leftard/perpetual adolescents connection countless times over the years here, but Gobry’s “leftism=narcissism” formulation never occurred to me. Although it must also be said that seeing it spelled out so directly and concisely makes it seem blindingly obvious now—as if the world’s biggest lightbulb had suddenly switched on in my head. Excellent work, Mr Gobry, sir. Found this thread via Ed Driscoll at Insty; not having known about this guy before, you bet your sweet bippy I hit the “Follow” button with a quickness.

Truly, truly pathetic

Posted on March 12, 2025March 12, 2025 by Mike 1 Comment

I downloaded a vid intending to upload it to my WP Media Library, then embed it here, but no dice; the Media Library file size limit is a paltry 2 megs, but the video in question clocks in at 4.1, thereby breaking the bank, so to speak. In any event, you very much need to head on over to Phil’s place and watch it, it’s mind-blowing. To quote my own comment over at Bustednuckles:

Whiny little baglapper. The problem with sniveling douchetools like this is that their cities have never been bombed, they have never been seriously hungry, cold, or afraid, and they were never spanked as children.

It’s that last item that’s most pertinent of all, IMHO. I also enjoyed Phil’s recommendations:

I would Rattle Can my old truck Green, Rattle Can the Sprite British Racing Green, (even though I hate that fucking color) paint the fucking sidewalk green and find a used John Deere riding lawn mower again just to fuck with this pretentious asshole.

I’m betting a guy could find some green Mylar window covers if he looked hard enough too.

This fucker would melt down in the middle of the street before he even got close to my front door before I was done.

A fuggin’ MEN, Phil. Alternatively, you could always just punch the whinging dorksnort right in the fucking mouth. Once he’s on the ground, kick his ribs and upper torso area until he’s helpless to do anything other than lie there and quack like a duck. Lather, rinse, repeat, each and every time he so much as looked like he was about to set foot in your yard or driveway.

Leftist catastrophe

Posted on March 12, 2025March 12, 2025 by Mike Leave a comment

Understand: they do not think like we do. Not even close, really.

This Is Literally the Worst News Democrats Could Get Right Now
The left’s desperate attempts to paint Donald Trump’s second term as an economic disaster are crumbling faster than Hunter Biden’s art career after his daddy left office. After spending four years gaslighting Americans about “Biden’s amazing economy” while families struggled to put food on the table, Democrats have suddenly discovered that inflation exists — and they’re trying to pin it on Trump. How convenient.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) recently embarrassed himself on ABC News when he claimed, “Donald Trump and Republicans consistently promised that they were going to lower the high cost of living, and they’ve done the exact opposite.”

That’s not what the facts say at all.

Remember when the left couldn’t stop squawking about egg prices? Well, those same Democrats are mysteriously quiet now that egg prices have plummeted. After reaching an all-time high of $8.17 per dozen in early March, egg prices have plummeted to $5.51. Democrats will be sad to know that this is below the $7 average price when President Trump took office in January.

But that’s not all — gas prices have dropped for three straight weeks. Funny how we’re not seeing wall-to-wall media coverage of these positive developments.

That’s because for the liberal media—along with D卐M☭CRAT politicians and Leftards generally—they AREN’T positive developments. Quite the opposite, in fact. When America wins, Left/liberals lose—every single time, no exceptions, always and forever. Probably need to add that one to our ever-expanding Mike’s Iron Laws section, methinks.

Memezapoppin’!

Posted on March 12, 2025 by Mike 6 Comments

Welcome to this week’s installment of our Wednesday meme feature, folks. Links to the “found via” sources will be attached to the specific MiQ’s (Memes in Question) whenever I can remember them, which likely won’t be very often. Only the first two memes will appear above the fold to save on bandwidth usage, since I assume not everybody who shows up at this here websty will want to see all of them. This intro will appear at the top of each week’s Memezapoppin’! post. Enjoy, funny-pitcher lovers.

Continue reading “Memezapoppin’!“ →

Elon’s assasination: not if, but when

Posted on March 12, 2025March 12, 2025 by Mike 2 Comments

If he isn’t taking this shit seriously, he’s a damned idiot. And we all already know he’s anything BUT an idiot.

Elon Musk Hit the Mother Lode of the Deep State. Now He Believes He’s an Assassination Target
Elon Musk and his DOGE team have now mined so deeply into the inner workings of government overspending and fraud that they may have hit the Mother Lode of public corruption. And he and his friends believe someone will try to kill him.

Fort Knox may be full of fool’s gold for all we know, USAID looks to be the mother’s milk of the international Marxist movement, and now Musk and his DOGE organization have hit the main vein: election manipulation.

As PJ Media colleagues Bryan Jung and Matt Margolis write nearby, the executive suite at ActBlue, the Democrat fundraising colossus, has nearly emptied. Many have done a bunk—to escape what DOGE allegedly uncovered?

What are they afraid of? Things appear to be worse than the oddly large “donations” made by pensioners in Washington state and other places, and worse than the dodgy credit-like cards issued to acolytes. Musk believes that the giant Democrat money machine paid for the “protests” —and worse?– done to his Tesla showrooms and charging stations throughout the country. And the DOGE team believes it has discovered a through line between ActBlue and illegality.

No stretch whatsoever, that.

Being the world’s richest man, Musk has had heavy security for years, and has spoken about the attempts on Trump’s life. He also believes that he’s also on somebody’s kill list, too.

And, like Trump, the left’s mainstream media went after Musk the same way they went after Trump.

“They actually want to kill me,” he told Rogan in his February 28 podcast. He says people with a screw loose may be inflamed enough because of media lies that he’s a “Nazi.” “They actually want to kill me. They say so online. There are Reddit forums where they don’t just want to kill me—they want to desecrate my corpse,” he told the podcast host. And he said, “If the legacy media is saying I’m a Nazi and that’s all you read, then you’re like, ‘He’s Hitler. We should assassinate Hitler, shouldn’t we?’”

When shitlibs are blatantly, openly threatening to kill you, the wise man takes them at their word and conducts himself accordingly. What we’re seeing here, in big-picture terms, is merely the latest iteration of Liberal Fascism. To wit:

Since Democrats are once again engaged in Kristallnacht-style violence because the electorate rejected their policies, it’s time once again for my periodic reminder that all Democrats are fascists.

I love the fact that whenever I point this out, some Democrat invariably claims “Derrrrr… you don’t even know what fascism is!” So let’s explore fascism a little, shall we?

Listed below are attributes and practices that all 20th Century fascists have in common with the Democrat Party of 2025:

1. Laws promoting the seizure of guns from law-abiding citizens and/or the denial of gun ownership rights for law-abiding citizens.

2. Censorship of free speech by pretending such censorship protects the citizenry from faulty information (i.e., so-called “disinformation”).

3. Government control of industry.

4. Government control of the mass media.

5. Control of the entertainment industry as a means of propaganda. (See: Leni Riefenstahl; Walt Disney Corporation.)

6. Children belong to the State and not their parents.

7. Political dissidents and opposing political leadership are to be persecuted for fabricated “crimes” under the color of law through the courts.

8. Political dissidents are locked up for months/years without a trial.

9. Leading political opponents who are a threat to the fascist order are to be assassinated.

10. Extreme nationalism (Democrats hate the United States of America, but are extreme nationalistic zealots for the Woke States of America).

11. Purposeful division of the population along racial and ethnic lines as a means to power.

12. Leadership of the ruling fascist party is chosen by party leaders without any input from rank-and-file party members, but an illusion of democracy is perpetuated. (See: Kamala as nominee with zero votes.)

13. Certain party criminals are turned into martyrs upon their demise. (See: Horst Wessel; Saint George Floyd.)

14. Destruction of statues, symbols and art of the pre-fascist order.

15. Accuse dissidents of the very crimes you yourself commit.

16. Justify all of it for the “common good.”

The Democrat Party of 2025 is a fascist party. Spread the word.

Indeed so. But, as Stephen helpfully reminds us, “They aren’t all fascists. Some are commies.” To adapt Keyser Soze’s famous maxim to current reality, the greatest trick the Left ever pulled was to convince the world that fascism is “right wing.”

2

Stand your ground?

Posted on March 12, 2025 by Mike 2 Comments

Oh HELL no. Not in the shitlib’s Earthly Paradise, you won’t.

Lifted from the comments, an illustration of progressive ethics. Or, How dare you defend your home and loved ones from sociopathic intruders with long criminal histories:

The bill’s sponsor, Rick Chavez Zbur, claims, “The bill’s goal is to prevent wannabe vigilantes… from provoking violence and then claiming self-defense after the fact.” Which suggests that finding intruders in your home, or breaking into your home, intent on thievery and God knows what else, is somehow not in itself an obvious provocation. Or a basis for vigorous self-defence.

Instead, the bill would oblige homeowners to “retreat” wherever possible, thereby reducing the risk of “force likely to cause death or great bodily injury” to the burglar or burglars, whose wellbeing is apparently a matter of great importance, if only to progressive lawmakers. This restriction is framed as a “safety” measure, albeit one that prioritises the safety of the criminal, who will presumably be enabled to continue his trajectory of repeated home invasion, but with reduced resistance and ever greater boldness.

But remember, wokeness is just about being compassionate.

Well, sure—for certain values of the word “compassion,” that is. But really, it’s not all that difficult to grasp; you just need to keep foremost in mind who Wokester “compassion” is reserved exclusively for, and who is undeserving of such.

The unsolvable mystery

Posted on March 12, 2025March 12, 2025 by Mike Leave a comment

Victoria Taft titles her piece with an excess of starry-eyed optimism.

Well, Well, Well: We May Be Getting Closer to the Truth About the J6 Pipe Bomber

Sorry Victoria, don’t mean to rain on any parades or anything here, but just because poor old Charlie Brown keeps on running up and swinging a leg hard as he can at the football doesn’t mean Lucy is going to let him kick it this time. In fact, I’d be willing to bet anything you like that, what with the FBI working so assiduously to ensure that it stays buried deep, we’re as close to “the truth” about J6 right now as we’re ever likely to get.

FBI Chief Kash Patel has been sending the documents that the Senate and House Judiciary Committees have been seeking for years. Julie Kelly reports that some of the documents turned over involve the January 6 pipe bomber.

The mysteries of Jan. 6, 2021, are legion. Law enforcement, the feds, and an untold number of their assets were in the crowd inside and out. Munitions were blasted at people protesting outside the Capitol Building, not because they were rioting — they weren’t — but to rile them up.

Intelligence specialists I’ve spoken with say the riot of January 6 was obviously an intentional operation. The Metropolitan Police Department of D.C. was seen on video encouraging protesters to get inside of the Capitol Building (and it’s charging Judicial Watch $1.5 million to get its hands on any more of the videos).

But the pipe bomber story is one of the biggest mysteries of January 6. The FBI originally released grainy video of an individual sitting on a bench in the dark and supposedly planting the pipe bomb the night before outside the DNC. The individual’s eyes have been blurred to subvert facial recognition software.

That person was seen talking on a cell phone. Yet the FBI swore that the same cell phone technology used to track down hundreds, if not thousands, of people in Washington, D.C. around January 6 was now corrupted for this specific bomber on the night of January 5. That’s as interesting as the Secret Service text messages going missing at that time.

The night before, the bomber left a bomb on a one-hour kitchen timer. Some federal officers contend in public that it’s of the kind they use in training. Yet no one has confirmed if this was a training exercise. If it was, everyone failed, including the K9s. Yet another mystery of January 6.

In early January, before Biden left the White House and Trump moved in, the FBI released new videos of the bomber with additional facts about him. That’s when Mike Benz discovered that the bomber’s eyes had been blurred in this new video. If they really wanted to find the bomber and were offering a now increased bounty on his head ($500,000), why wouldn’t they want us to see their eyes? The FBI released additional details about the bomber’s height, 5 feet 7 inches, and his shoes, which were Nike Air Max Speed Turf sneakers. They can’t say if the suspect is male or female.

Are these FBI guys sure they’re in the right business?

Of course they are. You just have to take an unflinching, clear-eyed look at what their business actually IS, that’s all. Note ye well, and understand: the FBI (YOUR FBI, as the long-running OTR drama so plangently insisted) assuredly is NOT in the business of investigating crime, nor in apprehending and jailing criminals, nor in preemptively disrupting criminal activities and/or plots—ie, none of the patent cow flop they’ve been peddling to gullible, naive Americans ever since J Edgar was in charge. No, the FBI’s sole and exclusive business is protecting, covering for, and supporting the Deep State. By any and every means: fair or foul, legal or not so much, openly or sub rosa, on the square or on the sneak.

You don’t have to like it; you shouldn’t like it, in fact. You DO have to accept it, much as it may hurt to have to admit it.

Good reads

Posted on March 12, 2025March 12, 2025 by Mike Leave a comment

Apropos of not much, really, I just wanted to mention Tactical Hermit’s brief summation of the fire-bombings of Dresden and Tokyo towards the end of WW2, both events the impetus of a great deal of Allied angst and self-recrimination even today. Doubtless historians, scholars, and pundits will be arguing the same unanswerable questions from now until Doomsday: Were the bombings ineffectual, perhaps even pointless and unnecessary? Can we ever truly know if they hastened the final collapse of Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan by so much as a single minute? Should they be thought of as simply part and parcel of modern warfare, albeit profoundly regrettable? Or were they in fact atrocities, crimes against humanity perpetrated by unfeeling monsters against blameless civilians?

The reason I bring all this up tonight is nothing so weighty as all that, thank merciful Heaven. See, it just so happens that, thanks to Amazon’s Kindle Unlimited, I have on my sail foam a seriously gripping historical-fiction novel in ePub format titled The Air Raid Killer (Max Heller, Dresden Detective Book 1). It’s one hell of a page-turner, as author Frank Goldammer’s Detective Heller doggedly pursues a mad, quasi-human serial killer through the dead, burned-out streets of once-beautiful Dresden just before, during, and after the city’s immolation and utter destruction by several thousand RAF/USAAF HE and incendiary bombs.

Steve Anderson’s translation is absolutely flawless—not often the case with ePubs, alas. In the usual run of things, the editing and/or conversion from dead tree to ePub is so godawful it can be an active nuisance, yanking you right up out of the story by your ears to leave you staring blankly at the nearest wall. You can but shake your head in sorrow, anger, and confusion, hoping against hope that whoever committed this heinous crime against lit’ratchure wasn’t getting paid for the job. Oughta be in jail, more like.

Didn’t realize it until just now, but there’s a sequel to ARK. Yclept A Thousand Devils, Book 2 features Max Heller plying his trade in the same locality two (2) years after his hometown’s nightmarish destruction. Gonna have to add that ‘un to the ol’ KU library toot sweet and give it a look-see, soonest.

Problem, meet solution

Posted on March 11, 2025 by Mike 5 Comments

Ah, the wondrous possibilities fairly well leap from the page, wildly waving their arms and demanding attention.

Watch: Drag Queens Surround the Kennedy Center in Protest of Trump’s Takeover
Hundreds of protesters — many of them clad in big wigs, makeup, and lots of leather — descended on the Kennedy Center on Saturday as part of a “Rally & March for Drag.” It was the latest in a series of protests in response to President Donald Trump’s ban on Kennedy Center drag productions, many of them aimed at LGBTQ+ youth under 18.

“This president is demonizing a marginalized community in order to control the arts in America. It’s shameful, immoral, and weak,” drag artist Tara Hoot told The Advocate before the event. “At a time when our artists and LGBTQ+ communities are under attack more than ever, we need to show up and speak up against this fascist takeover of the arts.”

Last month, President Trump ousted Joe Biden-appointed board members and named U.S. envoy Richard Grenell the organization’s chairman.

“Just last year, the Kennedy Center featured Drag Shows specifically targeting our youth — THIS WILL STOP,” Trump wrote on Truth Social on February 7. “The Kennedy Center is an American Jewel, and must reflect the brightest STARS on its stage from all across our Nation. For the Kennedy Center, THE BEST IS YET TO COME!”

How very disappointing, that I have yet to see even one daring soul suggest rounding up all the annoying, tucked-peenie protesters, sealing them up inside a cargo bay of one of Elon’s Falcon 9 rockets, and launching them directly into the Sun forthwith.

(Via Joe)

Call to violence

Posted on March 11, 2025 by Mike 1 Comment

I can only repeat what I said not long ago: For the Left, the step from calls for violence to acts of violence is never a big one, nor have they ever shown themselves to be at all reluctant to take it.

Political Violence Against Musk: The Left’s Playbook of Intimidation
The attacks on Elon Musk and Tesla are no accident. They are the logical, almost inevitable, consequence of the incitement coming from the highest levels of the Democratic Party, left-wing media outlets such as MSNBC and The New York Times, and billionaire activists like Alex Soros and Reid Hoffman, who fear that Musk is dismantling what they’ve spend years building. These attacks are not isolated. They are coordinated. They are deliberate. And they are meant to send a message—not just to Musk, but to anyone else who dares challenge the progressive orthodoxy.

The recent wave of violence against Tesla facilities, dealerships, and charging stations is staggering in its scope. In New York City, over 350 protesters stormed a Tesla showroom, smashing windows, attacking customers, and even assaulting police officers. In Colorado, an activist-turned-arsonist lobbed Molotov cocktails at Tesla vehicles, spray-painting “Nazi cars” on the walls. In Oregon, a self-described “transgender terrorist” opened fire on a Tesla showroom, shattering windows and riddling vehicles with bullets. And the vandalism isn’t limited to the United States—graffiti in Tasmania denounces Tesla owners as driving “swasticars.”

What fuels this madness? The answer lies in the rhetoric of those in power. Prominent Democrats have relentlessly demonized Musk, not merely as a political opponent, but as a threat to democracy itself. Representative Robert Garcia, in a heated CNN interview, declared that the fight against Musk requires “real weapons,” a statement that he later claimed was metaphorical but was nonetheless embraced by activists as a call to action. Reid Hoffman, billionaire donor and longtime Democratic operative, ominously mused that “actions have consequences” when discussing the attacks on Tesla—an implicit endorsement of political violence. Others, including Representatives Al Green, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, and Ayanna Pressley, have accused Musk of fascism, of being the next Hitler, of plotting to round up Democrats into concentration camps. This is not political discourse; this is incitement.

Lots more to this one yet at the link, of which you definitely want to read the all. I can’t refrain from including this bit from the closing sum-up:

This is not about Tesla. This is about the future of political discourse in America. If we allow these tactics to succeed, if we permit violence and intimidation to dictate who may speak and who must be silent, then we will have ceded our democracy to the mob.

Which, of course, is precisely why the Founders, to a man, warned their posterity so strenuously and continually against democracy—after all, at the end of the day “mob rule” is what democracy actually is.

(Via BRM)

End of an era

Posted on March 10, 2025March 10, 2025 by Mike 3 Comments

And good riddance.

BLM Plaza in DC dismantled after 5 years as bill threatens to withhold city’s funding
Work to dismantle the Black Lives Matter Plaza street mural in Washington, DC, that was put up in 2020 following the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor began on Monday.

Reconstruction at the site of the huge, yellow-painted letters close to the White House follows calls to withhold the city’s funding unless it removed the mural and renamed the location “Liberty Plaza.”

“The mural inspired millions and helped our city through a very painful period,” Bowser said.

“But now we can’t afford to be distracted by meaningless congressional interference. The devastating impacts of the federal job cuts must be our number one concern. Our focus is on economic growth, public safety, and supporting our residents affected by these cuts.”

Plans by House Republicans to scrub the divisive BLM mural were revealed in a Post exclusive earlier this month.

Monday’s dismantling of the mural was greeted with triumph by many conservatives — and slammed by those on the left.

“The world is healing,” wrote the Libs of TikTok account on X, run by pro-Trump influencer Chaya Raichik.

“The only people celebrating the dismantling of the Black Lives Matter Plaza in DC are racist fragile white people,” wrote another.

Let’s see now: racist, check; fragile, check (if you hit me in the face with a brick, do I not bleed?); white, check. Yup, ya got me—guilty as charged, on all counts. NOW what, fuckface?

New category for this sort of thing, inspired by the awesome, blistering Minor Threat song.

Update! For more of the impossibly brilliant DC hardcore of the legendary Minor Threat, check out this complete MT discography on YewToob. All the Minor Threat classics are here: I Don’t Wanna Hear It, Filler, 12XU, Small Man Big Mouth, Bottled Violence, Screaming At A Wall, et al. There really never has been anyone quite like ‘em, I must say.

Crooks, robbers, and thieves

Posted on March 10, 2025March 10, 2025 by Mike 5 Comments

Yet another question that answers itself.

12 billion dollars was allocated to the Navy for submarines and not one submarine was built.

42.5 billion dollars was allocated to hook people up to high-speed Internet, and not one single person was hooked up to high-speed Internet.

7.5 billion dollars was allocated to build…

— Insurrection Barbie (@DefiyantlyFree)

March 8, 2025

Annnnd your obligatory “Show more…” end run.

12 billion dollars was allocated to the Navy for submarines and not one submarine was built.

42.5 billion dollars was allocated to hook people up to high-speed Internet, and not one single person was hooked up to high-speed Internet.

7.5 billion dollars was allocated to build EV charging stations. Only 37 stations were built. Thats 200 million per charging station.

Where is the rest of the money?

Three guesses, first two don’t count. More and more I’m coming to think that all US ProPols, at every level, should be required by law to wear black bandanas over their faces, like the highwaymen of old. That way we’d all know right away what we were looking at, and no mistakes need ever be made about it. The truly pressing question, being brought home to us more forcefully with every passing day, is whether ANY of these villeins ever intended to spend the taxpayers’ money on what they claimed they were going to.

Aww, don’t bother, that one kinda answers itself too, really.

How deathless is DONE

Posted on March 9, 2025March 9, 2025 by Mike 3 Comments

The making of a masterpiece.

“Absence of Malice” and Why Some Movies Are Timeless
When a great satire is made, one that touches on themes that are endemic and universal to the worlds of which they make fun, what happens is that reality keeps coming back around and making those movies relevant all over again. Our tragicomic withdrawal from Afghanistan echoed the futility of the daily lives of the drafted surgeons of the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital (M*A*S*H). Our seemingly aimless and ineffective attempts to counter Putin in the Ukraine can sometimes make us believe that nothing much has changed in the halls of the Pentagon since Buck Turgidson, President Muffley and General Ripper hammed it up in Dr. Strangelove’s “War Room.” And “The Player” and “Network” so perfectly skewer Hollywood and the News Media that all these years later, they remind us that almost nothing about those industries has changed over the ensuing decades.

But it’s not only comedies and satires that can achieve this kind of cultural resonance… history rhymes, if it does not repeat, as they say, and so dramatic thrillers like “Serpico”, “All The President’s Men”, “Three Days of the Condor”, “Taxi Driver” and “Death Wish” also seem more relevant than ever, these days.

In the same vein, Sydney Pollack’s 1981 masterpiece “Absence of Malice” is one of those movies that perfectly skewers its subject, an unholy alliance between the press and the very government the press is meant to hold in check. It is so well done, that the drama is timeless. A movie that seems more prescient now, than it did when it was made.

The opening credits of “Malice” show us a full edition of a local Miami newspaper being written, typeset and printed. As the paper evolves into its final form, the headlines tell us that a powerful union boss has been missing for six months and is presumed dead, and that the Justice Department, the Miami PD and the DA are under trememdous pressure to solve the case.

Post credits we meet the Federal Prosecutor in charge of that case, Elliot Rosen (Bob Balaban), who has decided that a successful liquor wholesaler named Michael Gallagher, played by Paul Newman who was still one of the best looking men in the world even at age 56, must himself be involved in the disappearance in some way. Rosen doesn’t believe this because of any evidence he’s collected, he has none at all, but because Gallagher’s deceased father was affiliated with the local anti-union mob and so, therefore, his son must also be “connected”… quod erat demonstrandum.

Later, when the Miami Dade DA asks him which crime Gallagher is suspected of committing, Rosen answers “what’s the difference?”

“So you’re squeezing him?” asks the DA.

“You got somebody better?” is Rosen’s chilling response.

Unfortunately for Rosen, the US Consitution exists, and he cannot arrest Gallagher, put him in a deep dark hole, and sweat it out of him. So, he decides to put public pressure on the businessman in hopes he will break. To do this, he targets a young cub reporter named Megan Carter, played by Sally Field, as his weapon of choice. He leaks the existence of his “investigation” to Carter who writes an article that comes up just short of accusing Gallagher of the crime, an inferred accusation which Rosen knows will embarrass the man and destroy both his social standing in Miami as well as his business… eggs, meet omelette.

By now this should all be starting to sound very familiar.

Certainly it should be to attentive CF Lifers, mainly because of this clip featuring the incomparable Wilford Brimley.

I’ve run it here again and again, and watched it even more times, and it ain’t never getting old.

GIVE TIL IT HURTS

THANKS!

Mike @Substack

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