Category: Read and Heed

Lies, damned lies, statistics…

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And the Atlantic liberal-propaganda rag.

Atlantic Writer Claims Trump Got Angry at Paying for Soldier’s Funeral, Deceased’s Sister Responds
You really do not hate journalists enough.

Some guy named Jeffrey Goldberg at the Atlantic recently shoveled out another Trump Derangement Syndrome screed, claiming Le Bad Orange Man got angry at the bill for a deceased soldier’s funeral that he offered to pay for back in 2020, which reportedly cost $60,000.

For additional context: Spc. Vanessa Guillén was murdered in Fort Hood, Texas, by a fellow soldier in April of 2020. Ryan McCarthy, who was Secretary of the Army at the time, investigated her murder. President Trump expressed his condolences to the family and hosted them at the White House, offering to pay for the funeral.

Here is where the story starts sounding like it was made up:

In an Oval Office meeting on December 4, 2020, officials gathered to discuss a separate national-security issue. Toward the end of the discussion, Trump asked for an update on the McCarthy investigation. Christopher Miller, the acting secretary of defense (Trump had fired his predecessor, Mark Esper, three weeks earlier, writing in a tweet, “Mark Esper has been terminated”), was in attendance, along with Miller’s chief of staff, Kash Patel. At a certain point, according to two people present at the meeting, Trump asked, “Did they bill us for the funeral? What did it cost?”

According to attendees, and to contemporaneous notes of the meeting taken by a participant, an aide answered: Yes, we received a bill; the funeral cost $60,000.

Trump became angry. “It doesn’t cost 60,000 bucks to bury a f***ing Mexican!” He turned to his chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and issued an order: “Don’t pay it!” Later that day, he was still agitated. “Can you believe it?” he said, according to a witness. “F***ing people, trying to rip me off.”

Goldberg at least had the honesty (shocking, I know) to say that Trump spokesperson Alex Pfeiffer denied that this event happened, saying, “President Donald Trump never said that. This is an outrageous lie from The Atlantic two weeks before the election.”

Mark Meadows, Trump’s Chief of Staff at the time, is also calling the story fake, saying he was in the room when this “incident” happened:

I was in the discussions featured in the Atlantic’s latest hit piece against President Trump. Let me say this.

Any suggestion that President Trump disparaged Ms. Guillen or refused to pay for her funeral expenses is absolutely false. 

He was nothing but kind, gracious, and wanted to make sure that the military and the U.S. government did right by Vanessa Guillen and her family.

Of course, one might expect Trump staffers to take up for their boss, rightly or wrongly; thus, including them in his hate-piece is Goldberg’s not-quite-clever way of inoculating himself against accusations of bias, which would be entirely accurate. But what does the grieving sister of the deceased have to say about it? Nothing whatsoever good for Goldberg and his fellow Atlantic liars.


Pretty much dispositive, I’d say. Like the man says, no matter how much you hate them, you don’t hate them enough. You couldn’t, really, it isn’t possible to.

Opposite Rule, exemplified

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This. This. Right. HERE.

Your “See more…” workaround.

They put Bannon in prison. 

They put Navarro in prison. 

They are trying to bankrupt Gateway Pundit. 

They indicted the CFO of Epoch Times.

They are investigating Elon Musk. 

They are trying to put Donald Trump in prison. 

They are trying to disbar Jeff Clark.

They disbarred John Eastman and debanked him. 

They arrested the doctor who blew the whistle that a Texas hospital was illegally performing gender reassignment surgeries on minors. 

They indicted and disbarred Rudy Giuliani. 

They spied on Catholic Churches. 

They put concerned parents who went to school board meetings on the FBI watchlists. 

They imprisoned 1500 protestors, most first time nonviolent offenders. 

But Donald Trump is going to weaponize the government to go after his enemies?

Kinda says it all, don’t it? As codified in Mike’s Iron Law #462, actually.

Goose, please allow me to introduce Gander

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Hey, anybody remember when foreign interference in Amerikan “elections” was a BAD thing? Nah, me neither.

British Labour Party sending staff to campaign for Harris in US swing states
WASHINGTON (TNND) — The left-leaning British Labour Party is sending nearly 100 members to U.S. battleground states to campaign for Vice President Kamala Harris ahead of the presidential election.

Sofia Patel, head of operations for the Labour Party, shared the plans via LinkedIn Wednesday. She claimed current and former party staff will target key swing states like North Carolina, Nevada, Pennsylvania and Virginia.

“I have 10 spots available for anyone available to head to the battleground state of North Carolina – we will sort your housing,” Patel offered in the post.

Patel also noted she plans to arrive in the U.S. two weeks prior to the election and stay in Washington, D.C., for a few days afterward.

Patel’s profile shows she previously spent time in the Hillary Clinton campaign from October to November of 2016. She included the description “travelled to the US to campaign for Clinton in the presidential election.”

Leave it to MTG to make with the stinging, snappy riposte, in her accustomed gadfly role.

Reacting to Patel’s post was Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., who suggested via X it was “yet another reason to vote for President Trump.” Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., also weighed in, telling the Labour Party it is breaking Federal Election Commission law.

“Foreign nationals are not allowed to be involved in anyway in U.S. elections,” Rep. Greene wrote via X. “Please go back to the UK and fix your own mass immigration problems that are ruining your country.”

And of course, the rock star I know affectionately as the God-Emperor of Earth put his own oar in as well.

X owner Elon Musk wrote simply “this is illegal” in his own post on the matter.

Well said: pithy, straight to the fucking point, no BS, no mincing of words or surplus verbiage—only this and nothing more, as Poe once said in a slightly different context. You tell ‘em, Elon ol’ boy. Back to Limey-land witcha, MSXZZ Patel, and most ricky-tick; do not pass go, do not collect two hundred dollars.

Dog bites man

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Liberalism delenda est.

Halperin: Trump Win Will Trigger ‘Unprecedented and Hideous’ Mental Health Crisis
Many have been wondering how the left will take it if Donald Trump wins the 2024 election. According to veteran political analyst Mark Halperin, a Trump-Vance victory will trigger “the greatest mental health crisis in the history of the country.”

Halperin sat in on Tucker Carlson’s show this week for a wide-ranging discussion. When Carlson asked him what he thought would happen if Trump wins, Halperin predicted a psychological holocaust on the left that would fall somewhere between “The Purge” and the zombie apocalypse.

“I say this not flippantly,” began Halperin. “I think it will be the cause of the greatest mental health crisis in the history of the country. I think tens of millions of people will question their connection to the nation, their connection to other human beings, their connection to their vision of what their future — for them and their children — could be like. And I think that it will require an enormous amount of access to mental health professionals. I think it’ll lead to trauma in the workplace. I think there’ll be some degree of —“

At this point, an incredulous Carlson asked Halperin if he was being serious.

“A hundred percent serious. A hundred percent serious,” the political prognosticator assured him. Then he returned to his litany. “I think there’ll be alcoholism, there’ll be broken marriage—“

“What?” interjected the host. 

“Yeah. They think he’s the worst person possible to be president,” Halperin explained. “And, having won by the hand of Jim Comey and fluke in 2016, and then [Trump] performed in office for four years, and denied who won the election last time, and January 6 — the fact that, under a fair election, America chose, by the rules pre-agreed to, Donald Trump again, I think it will cause the biggest mental health crisis in the history of America.”

From there, the light-hearted banter delved into speculation about the potential for violence. “Yeah, I think there’ll be some violence,” Halperin confirmed. “I think there’ll be workplace fights. There’ll be fights at kids’ birthday parties. I think there’ll be protests that will turn violent. I hope they’re not, but I think there will be some.’

The seasoned analyst went on to plumb the nature of the imminent despair of the American left. “I think it will be less anger and more a failure to understand how it could happen. You know, like the death of a child, or your spouse announcing that she’s a lesbian and she’s leaving you for your best friend — like something that’s so traumatic that it is impossible for even the most mentally healthy person to truly process and incorporate into their daily life.” 

The most mentally healthy Democrat, he should have specified. Republicans and patriots face political defeat and alienation from their own country on a regular basis without going bonkers.

SO—shitlib D卐M☭CRATs will flip out, go insane, and generally run amok if Trump “wins” the “election,” eh? And we’re supposed to distinguish this unusual, once in a lifetime event from any other day of the week ending in “Y”…HOW, exactly? Thorne concludes:

Should a Trump-Vance victory come to pass, remember to bring in the pets and children and lock the doors before you start popping champagne corks.

Fuck that noise—load extra mags, zero rifle sights, establish good fields of fire, make sure your perimeter is well-lighted instead, among other things.

Terrorists to Israel: “Let’s stop fighting, we’re losing”

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Finish ‘em off, Bibi.

Hezbollah Wants a Ceasefire Now. Here’s Why Israel Shouldn’t Give Them One.
Ceasefire now? As much as Kamala Harris wants one and would capitalize upon one if it did materialize, the answer must be a firm no.

After exploding pagers and a series of carefully targeted Israeli airstrikes have completely decimated Hezbollah’s senior leadership, the jihad terror organization now wants a ceasefire with Israel. This will come as music to the ears of the Biden-Harris regime, which would like nothing better than an October peace agreement between Israel and one of the major players that are arrayed against it.

The Harris campaign could wave this agreement in the air every time someone pointed out that the world during the Trump years was a much more peaceful place than it is now, and use it going into the election as evidence of Kamala Harris’ superior negotiating skills. But for a number of important reasons, Israel should resist all pressure from Washington.

So far, the pressure for the moment is coming not from Washington, but from Hezbollah itself. CNN reported Tuesday that Hezbollah Deputy Secretary General Naim Qassem, who is the highest-ranking official in the organization at the moment (after Israel took out longtime Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and several of his designated or potential successors) said, “We support the political efforts led by (Parliament Speaker Nabih) Berri under the banner of achieving a ceasefire. Once the ceasefire is firmly established and diplomacy can reach it, all other details will be discussed and decisions will be made collaboratively.”

Ceasefire! Diplomacy! Qassem knows how to push all the right buttons to get the U.S. State Department, the European Union, and the United Nations on his side, and even to shower billions upon his straitened organization. Kamala Harris has already sent $157 million to Lebanon, which means to Hezbollah.

Nevertheless, Antony Blinken and his henchmen in Foggy Bottom are likely to take Qassem’s endorsement of Berri’s ceasefire proposal with the utmost seriousness, and start badgering the Israelis to accept it. If they prevail upon them to do so, they’ll only be enabling Hezbollah to survive and get back on its feet after the heavy losses it has recently suffered. This is certain from what Islamic law teaches about when treaties, including temporary truces, should be concluded with a non-Muslim foe.

Yep, those “temporary truces” being known by a specific name in Muzzrat circles: hudna, that would be, a strictly temporary cease-fire intended to allow an exhausted, nearly defeated Mooselimb antagonist to re-equip, refit, and reinvigorate for the next round of jihadi conquest. Thus:

The concept of hudna deserves a close look: It is not a Qur’anic term, nor is it the only Arabic word for a cease-fire or truce; others include: muhadana, muwada’a, muhla, musalaha, musalama, mutaraka, and sulh. But hudna is the most prominent. It is the first word used in Muslim history to mean cease-fire, specifically in the context of the seventh century Truce or Treaty of al-Hudaybiyya, often termed the Sulh al-Hudaybiyya (peace of al-Hudaybiyya).

Named after a village outside Mecca, the truce came six years after Muhammad and his followers abandoned Mecca for Yathrib, today’s Medina. This move, known as the hijra (emigration) is of enormous significance for the classical understanding of jihad, inasmuch as it sets a pattern of retreat followed by regrouping and rearming, which permits an attack on the territory previously left behind.

Spencer, for his part, understands what’s actually going on here perfectly well.

Blinken and his colleagues are dogmatically committed to the proposition that Islam has nothing whatsoever to do with the conflict between Israel and its jihadi enemies and can illuminate nothing about that conflict, but the facts are otherwise.

Islamic law does not envision a state of permanent peace between Muslims and non-Muslims. Instead, the Qur’an instructs Muslims to “fight them until persecution is no more and religion is all for Allah” (8:39). If Muslims must continue fighting non-Muslims until “religion is all for Allah,” that means that there is no place in Islam for the “coexistence” that the left professes to value so highly. There can be no coexistence, but only perpetual warfare, although there can be sporadic periods in which a temporary peace prevails.

Islamic law is very clear about when these pauses in the war can go into effect. It only allows for a truce if the Muslims expect their foes to convert to Islam, or if the Muslims are weak and need to gather strength to fight later more effectively: “If Muslims are weak, a truce may be made for ten years if necessary, for the Prophet (Allah bless him and give him peace) made a truce with the Quraysh for that long, as is related by Abu Dawud… Interests that justify making a truce are such things as Muslim weakness because of lack of numbers or materiel, or the hope of an enemy becoming Muslim…” (Reliance of the Traveller, o9.16). 

This idea is founded on the Qur’an: “So do not falter and cry out for peace when you have the upper hand…” (47:35).

Hezbollah is crying out for peace because it does not have the upper hand. It is calling for a ceasefire because it is weak, and needs time to gather its strength. This would, therefore, be the worst time to conclude a ceasefire. Heedless of all this, however, and hating Israel as they do, Biden, Harris, and Blinken will keep pressuring Israel to accept a ceasefire. Netanyahu should stand strong in rejecting this pressure.

And there you have it. Once again, I must repeat: Kill. Them. ALL. Contra the constant teary squeals of “genocide” from idiotic Western shitlibs and, embarrassingly enough, Crackpot Rightists in this context (neither Hezbollah, nor Hamas, nor Paleosimian, nor even Muslim itself constitutes a race, therefore definitionally rendering the claim of “genocide” entirely null and void), there really is no other long-term solution for Western Civ than just this.

Update! Francis asks the pertinent question.

I strive to use words according to their exact meanings. The word existential has such a meaning: “of, relating to, or affirming existence.” Thus, an existential enemy is one whose aim is to end your existence. There can be no greater threat than such an enemy; he poses an existential threat.

Is there a point – a defensible rationale – to negotiating with such an enemy?

A: No. No, there most certainly is not. In such a circumstance, you have but three (3) options: Kill him, surrender, or die your own self, the last two of which amount to the same thing when all’s said and done. Period fucking dot, all there is to it, end of story.

Lost America

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GREAT piece on the opening-credits sequences of those classic old 70s sitcoms.

Opening credit sequences are a lost art these days. “Lost” because the ritual of collective TV watching is a thing of the past with no real place here in the streaming era. And yes, once upon a time, Network TV watching was a ritual. Like a formal State dinner with seventeen different kinds of spoons and a new glass for each course, Network TV viewing came with a set of rules and an irresistable order. All over America families gathered around the TV set at the appointed time, tuned our sets to the proper channel and waited for the opening notes of the songs we all knew by heart, excited to spend half another hour with characters we’d come to think of as friends.

There was something gratifying too about the idea that all across the country millions of our fellow Americans were doing the same exact thing at the same exact moment. If you are of a certain age, you probably have a memory of getting up during a commercial break on a warm night, maybe to let the dog out, and hearing the sound of the same commercial you were just watching coming from your neighbor’s open window. There was something special about that sense of shared culture, all of us participating at the same time, no matter where or who we were…city mouse and country mouse…doctors, lawyers, electricians and plumbers. There was an irresistable allure to being a part of something magical that would only happen once and then never again.

Streaming TV viewing, by contrast, is a solitary act with no real sense of time or place and where nobody knows your name. By the time a popular 70’s show entered syndication, a committed fan would have watched the series opener one hundred times or more. But memorable credit sequences are more rare now, a function of their incompatibility with the churn-and-burn binge-viewing nature of the streaming model. Easier to just click the “skip” button, or “next episode”, and get on with it.

Instant gratification saves time, certainly, but in the process something is lost that perhaps should not have been. There is value in waiting. Part of what makes Christmas so special is the month long run-up that precedes it. There is also something captivating and mysterious about the idea of being treated to a show. To the knowledge that we can’t speed things up at a whim. That we can’t just skip to the good stuff. It is satisfying in a way that the wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am rhythm of streaming will never be able to deliver. And it’s hard not to wonder if the old ways of network TV might not have been good for us in some critical way we can no longer recall.

Sit down, relax…be still. Someone else is in charge for the next 26 minutes and you can’t skip ahead. You are not in control. If the episode ends in a cliffhanger, you’re going to have to wait a week to find out what happens. And that’s OK.

Everything moves faster now. And while it may be an article of faith at Wharton Business School that the customer is always right, there is no immutable law that says the customer will always be happier, or even better off, once they get it.

“Sometimes you wanna go…where everybody knows your name…and they’re always glad you came…”

The above closing line, of course, comes from perhaps my personal favorite of all the shows featured in the post’s embedded videos:

Cheers, Taxi, KRP, Kotter, M*A*S*H—they’re all here, folks, and it’s one hell of a great ride. No true child of the American 70s will want to miss this one, and definitely shouldn’t.

(Via Stephen Green)

Update! The comments-section discussion betwixt myself and Barry compels me to append a typical, wonderfully silly cab-depot exchange featuring Andy Kauffman as Latka Gravas and the incomparable Christopher Lloyd as the Reverend Jim Ignatowski in Taxi.

Heh. LOVE that show. What kinda disturbs me is that, what with all the things that have slipped from my increasingly unreliable memory over recent years, I can still recall both Kaufman’s and Llloyd’s characters full names without batting an eye.

Publick announcement

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Expect posting to continue to be as spotty as my damned internet connection has been the last several days. No clue why that is; best guess is the shitty ISP company here sustained some damage in the recent bout of high winds, torrential rain, and plagues of transgender locusts, so they’re in the process of fixing things. But who knows. At any rate, apologies for that, it’ll be back to the ol’ grindstone pour moi whenever things finally settle down around here. In the meantime, I commend your attention to tonight’s Eyrie post, which I did manage to get together and published just now.

They’re from the government, and they’re NOT here to help

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Tonight’s Eyrie post is on the thuggish FederalGovCo rakehells’ ham-handed interference with well-organized and effective private rescue efforts in and around Lake Lure and Asheville, specifically centering on Elon Musk’s (!) repeated run-ins with the infamous FEMA. It’s blindingly obvious to all but the most wllfully purblind fief-guarding tyranno-Fed that those poor people need every last bit of help they can possibly get, and aren’t overly concerned about whence it originated. Not that the Fedgoons give a tinker’s damn, of course.

That said, our friend of many years standing and fellow Carolinian Herschel Smith (maybe I’ve mentioned it here before, but his lovely daughter [or maybe niece? dunno, I was zonked out on pain meds at the time] kindly paid me a seriously morale-boosting visit at the thoughtful behest of her pop when I was laid up in rehab center durance vile not long after I’d become the World’s Greatest One-Legged Blogger™) has plenty to say on that score his own self. Read of it, for It. Is. Good.

The Hurricane Helene Hall of Shame
Following up on my post How Helene Affected The People Of Appalachia, there are a number of shameful things that we’re learning about the official response.

Let’s begin with this terrible report of a man who used his own helicopter to rescue stranded people above Asheville, N.C., and who was told if he continued, he would be placed under arrest.

The responsible officials are Dustin Waycaster – Fire Chief, and Chris Melton – Asst. Fire Chief. Congratulations men, you’ve made the hall of shame. It would take an entire article to examine the moral implications of preventing the rescue of men and women in danger, but we’ll leave it at that and cover it later. Suffice it to say that it sounds like you were discomfited by someone showing you up and “interfering with your operation.” Although it’s likely a manifest lie to say that anyone was really interfering with anything.

An eminently safe bet, I should think. Lots, lots more where that came from, of which you absolutely must read the all. Those taking nitro-glycerin pills for heart issues will definitely want to have their ‘scrip close to hand, and peruse Herschel’s piece in a cool, calm, and collected state of mind, preferably while seated. You won’t be any of those things for long, trust me on that one.

The HHHoS is populating itself all too quickly to suit me.

Update! Is it all about the lithium, perchance?


Several Lake Lure denizens calling in to the Rise Guys program yesterday and today said that great swathes of land on which private homes and/or neighborhoods formerly stood have been preemptively declared FedGovCo property. Lord knows the batteries in all those useless, dangerous EVs Harris/Biden & Pals are determined to cram down our throats are gonna require lithium aplenty. SO, then: fact, or merely the sort of paranoiac rumor that tends to fly around in extreme circumstances such as this? Is it really a case of Federal ad lib opportunism run amok, in essence a spur of the moment land-and-lithium grab?

Given what we’ve learned over the past several years regarding the far-less-than-benevolent nature of Amerika v2.0’s central Leviathan, it doesn’t take a cynic to think the whole thing a mite suspicious, at the very least.

Updated update! Re: those aforementioned chopper jocks, it bears mentioning that it’s not as if they were all just flying around willy-nilly, hither and yon, endangering themselves, their rescuees, other SAR personnel, and unwary shell-shocked survivors with their ill-considered blundering about. Oh HELL no!

These are fucking experienced helicopter pilots we’re talking about here, people—trained, capable, safety-conscious, procedure-oriented, highly intelligent. They are assuredly NOT the kind of vacuous ninnyhammers constantly tripping over their own dicks and guffawing a la Disney’s Goofy at their own gormless stupidity; quite the contrary, these are qualified civil aviators who’d never even DREAM of doing anything at all without a plan.

From what the pilot I heard on the radio yesterday morning said (and what I saw later in photos), the ‘copters were all arrayed in a neat line on the tarmac of a nearby airfield; every pilot was in close, constant communication with the others as well as with ground control; all had properly detailed flight plans filed with ATC before a single engine spooled up.

FEMA has attempted to portray these men as chuckleheads, amateurs, and gloryhounds—which, being arrogant, officious Überstadt pricks, is how THEY see them, certainly. But as anyone who has ever personally known either a fixed- or rotary-wing aircraft operator will attest, it just ain’t so. Turns out the bureau-rats are every bit as full of shit as they always are, have been, and forever will be. Imagine my surprise.

Update to the updated update! My brother-from-another-mother BCE reports on what I consider a most felicitous development. To wit:


Well. Well, well, well, well, well, well, WELL. Fancy that. Billy follows up:

And the reason for it?

No hard evidence but the general story is Mr. Director from Virginia got shitty with a woman and her three lil kids and wouldn’t let them get any water/food or supplies. She melted down and this asshole was all smug about it…

The local men didn’t like that much.

“That’s an asswhuppin’!!!”

Personally, I’d go for hanging, but I’ll get into that more in a few…

Me and you both, my friend, me and you both. Additionally, and perhaps mo’ betta still, we have this.


Damned skippy. Nice to know that, even in times as parlous as these, enough is still enough, by God. Back over to Big Country for a ding-dong doozy of a denouement.

And then, the very fact that low level midwit fucktards have been interfering in the “real work” that ‘non-sanctioned’ groups have been doing, and doing fucking well infuriates me at a core level that I forgot I had.

My rage as of late is so bad that I have recently thought that the best way -someone- could contribute is to go down there with a good scoped hunting rifle in the ubiquitous 30-06 caliber, and start ‘working their way through’ the assholes in the FEMA vests to start with.

Case in Point:

That soon-to-be-X Fire Chief, Dustin Waycaster of Lake Lure who demanded that the free-flying Rescue-Ranger Chopper Jockey cease and desist DESPITE his overwhelming success rate in his previous rescues and threatened to arrest and impound his bird?

My question:
Why is he (the ‘chief’) still alive?
Why is his dwelling still standing?
Why is his family still alive?

Hard times call for DRASTIC Measures. I’m not, per se, calling for any violence against this miserable toolbag fucktard nor his domicile or fam…. HOWEVER, I AM all about questioning his current apparent good fortune in these trying circumstances… That he, who, in truth as the “Lead Asshole in “Incompetence on Parade”? is still drawing O2???…. and that HIS domicile is untouched as is his job???

Took the words right out of my mouth, B.

As is entirely apparent, the swaggering Überstadt douchenozzles have become all too accustomed to being kowtowed to, groveled before, and unquestioningly obeyed by the lowly Serf Class oafs they lord it over so contemptuously. Might it be that, in such extraordinarily grim circumstances, a righteous if long overdue reckoning is now at hand? Might it be that, against all odds and expectations, our would-be Masters could now find themselves set upon by cruelly savaged Carolinians who no longer have anything left to lose? Might this be the first faint rays of sunlight which herald the dawning of a glorious new American day? Might the appropriate relationship between Public Servant and Citizen at long last be restored? Might horrific catastrophe, destruction, and human suffering yet turn out to be our salvation?

We shall see.

History lesson

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Our boozum chum, frequent commenter, and esteemed CF Lifer hhluce provides us with a real gem of an educational post centering on a Fredrick Douglass speech which includes some enduring words of wisdom which, IIRC, currently live on in our Notable Quotes section at right. hh’s post was good enough that, rather than excerpt and link it here, I decided to just repost in its entirety at my Substack hang as a bonus Eyrie edition. Do check it out, you won’t regret it.

“What Pro Wrestling Can Teach Us About Politics”?

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Plenty. In fact, pretty much everything.

Before there was a Kamala Harris the Frisco district attorney, there was a Kamala the Ugandan Giant who was really just a large black guy (billed as 6 ft. 7, 380 pounds) from Senatobia, Miss. (Weirdly, the last name of the original Kamala was also Harris: James Arthur Harris.)

If you hate pro wrestling, this is the part that drives you batty: It’s a bunch of lies — mixed with a heavy helping of utter nonsense — marketed to the masses. It’s clearly a bait-and-switch: You’re pretending this “sport” is one thing, when it’s actually something else. And YES TIMES A MILLION: IT IS FAKE!

But if you love pro wrestling, this is exactly what makes it so magical: How the hell did this fictional “sport” — featuring made-up characters doing the silliest, wackiest shenanigans imaginable — ever generate such passionate fandom?

Even Jerry Seinfeld was flummoxed. “If professional wrestling did not exist, could you come up with this idea?” he wondered. “Could you envision the popularity of huge men in tiny bathing suits, pretending to fight?”

But make no mistake, this fake sport makes real money. The WWE (World Wrestling Entertainment) has 90 million fans in the United States alone.

They also have a market capitalization of $8.37 billion. The WWE just signed a blockbuster deal with Netflix for $5 billion. It’s one of the most highly-valued entertainment properties in the entire world. Its stars include the top draws in Hollywood: “The Rock” Dwayne Johnson, John Cena, and David Batista. Retired stars like Steve Austin, Ric Flair, and the Undertaker are still commanding the spotlight; Hulk Hogan just addressed the Republican National Convention in primetime. 

This is Big Boy economics.

Why does it work so well? And will its “tricks of the trade” for evoking emotional responses translate to politics?

It’s probably worth noting that a very large percentage of pro wrestlers are hardcore Republicans. Kane, who played the brother of the Undertaker, is now the (Republican) Knoxville Mayor Glenn Jacobs. JBL (John Layfield) portrayed an ornery cowboy on WWE television, but he is a savvy financial planner who’s made hundreds of appearances on FOX News and FOX Business. The Undertaker (Mark Calaway), Road Dogg (Brian James), and Chris Jericho all donated money to Trump. Ric Flair and Hulk Hogan have openly campaigned for MAGA. Linda McMahon, the former president, CEO and co-owner of the WWE, served in President Trump’s cabinet.

And President Trump, of course, is a member of the WWE Hall of Fame.

Lots, lots more to this one yet, all of it bang on. For my money, sports entertainment just doesn’t come much more entertaining than this.

I consider it gratuitously insulting to compare the halcyon days of Eric Bischoff’s wild, rollicking WCW with the sewer sludge of politics theater in Amerika v2.0, but could be that’s just me.

The Opposite Rule

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In full effect, as always.


For more on the Opposite Rule, please see Mike’s Iron Law #462.

Lies, damned lies, and…

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BlueAnon.

The rise of BlueAnon
Unhinged left-wing conspiracy theories have entered the mainstream

Someone call the disinformation police! Left-wing conspiracy theories and attempts to manipulate the media are spiraling out of control ahead of the 2024 election. From tall tales about former president Donald Trump staging his own assassination attempt to the lower-stakes speculation that Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance is wearing guyliner, “BlueAnon” has reemerged in a big way.

BlueAnon is a blanket term coined by some conservatives to describe liberal and left-wing conspiracy theories. It intentionally rhymes with QAnon, the arguably better-known right-wing conspiracy, and mostly arose in response to what many regard as the Russian collusion hoax, the idea that Trump colluded with the Russian government to win the 2016 presidential election. Several stories stemming from the Russian collusion hoax were outlandish and unverified yet embraced by prominent members of the media and people in high-level positions within the national security state and the Democratic Party. The claims were also the subject of a special counsel investigation into President Trump.

Jonathan Chait, a political reporter for New York magazine, has said that claims of Russia blackmailing Trump with a so-called “pee tape” are “perfectly consistent with what we know about both parties.” Propelled by House Intelligence Committee chairman Adam Schiff’s claim to have evidence of collusion, and consistently false reporting from the media about Trump campaign contacts with Russia, left-wing figures like Rosie O’Donnell, Bette Midler, Spike Lee and the Krassenstein brothers pushed the hashtag #MuellerTime to insinuate that Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Trump would lead to his imminent indictment and arrest.

Disinformation experts and media outlets have routinely placed the bulk of the blame for “misinformation” and “disinformation” online on right-wing sources. But they have mostly failed to acknowledge the breadth and impact of the Russian collusion hoax, plus other popular BlueAnon fake stories: that Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh was involved in a gang rape; that actor Jussie Smollett was attacked by two Trump supporters; that Trump failed to condemn white supremacists in Charlottesville in summer 2017; that Trump told people to inject bleach during the pandemic and other stories that were shared — or are still peddled to this day — at levels as high as the presidency. Most also ignore the stories and ideas that were deemed right-wing misinformation but ended up being correct: the Hunter Biden laptop story; that Covid-19 likely came from a laboratory leak; that there were undercover federal agents at the January 6 riot; or that President Joe Biden was suffering obvious cognitive decline. All were labeled conspiracy theories; all turned out to be true.

Yers after the term “BlueAnon” first popped up on social media, it’s clear that left-wing disinformation is as prolific as ever — and that it becomes more prominent whenever Trump or Republicans appear to be succeeding.

David Harsanyi, a senior editor at the Federalist and author of the forthcoming The Rise of Blue Anon: How the Democrats Became a Party of Conspiracy Theorists, argues that left-wing conspiracy theories often receive institutional backing, which makes the average American more likely to believe they are true. That makes them “more dangerous,” he says.

But some mainstream actors are still reluctant to admit that BlueAnon is a legitimate problem. “The primary parallel between ‘BlueAnon’ and QAnon is that they rhyme. Beyond that, it’s a stretch,” the Washington Post’s Philip Bump wrote in mid-July. The Google News results for “BlueAnon” are significantly shorter than results for “QAnon” — three pages com- pared to thirty.

Harsanyi, though, says BlueAnon has always been around. It just didn’t have a neat nickname until 2021. “The left has been pushing wild conspiracies and paranoia for decades. I lay out that history,” Harsanyi says. “Are Democrats any more likely to accept the results of a presidential election? They haven’t done it in decades. After Trump won in 2016, they simply gave into their worst conspiratorial instincts. It’s a lot easier to convince people that their political opponents are crypto-Putin assets hell-bent on instituting The Handmaid’s Tale than it is to debate them.”

If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a blue million times: if it wasn’t for lies, the Goosesteppin’ Left would have nothing whatsoever to say. That really is the long and the short of it.

The irony here is that, after more than five (5) decades of touting the old Soviet Union as having a vastly superior system to our own in every imaginable aspect, they now find it convenient to wave their chubby little fists in apoplectic fury over the very idea that Russia could have any influence on Amerika v2.0’s political shitshow.

He’s at it again

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The esteemed Elon Musk, that would be, laying down the smack most righteously as usual.


If he said a single word in the above vid that wasn’t true, I surely missed it.

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