The amazing success of free markets can be traced through history, and their record is unblemished. That is not to say that they are perfect for all, because as Adam Smith pointed out 250 years ago, it is the millions of individual decisions that drive beneficial outcomes, and not all of those decisions are the best decision.

And...the fluctuations in supply and demand caused by those decisions can cause dislocations across the entire economy, as we see today with the price of petroleum, which has a massive global market and is an excellent example of market pressures at work.

But market economies do not work as well when they are constrained by regulation. Not regulation that controls damage to the public sphere, but regulation that impedes the natural growth of the economy. When businesses must navigate a labyrinth of sometimes competing regulations that do nothing but increase the cost of the project and increase the gap between investment and profit, they are naturally reticent.

Add in governments that are not committed to the freedom of global commerce, and the pressures to expand are overwhelmed by the easier, risk-averse, but potentially less lucrative work to improve efficiency and take advantage of rent-seeking.

Why US Oil Companies Are Holding Off on Drilling New Wells

“We’re seeing a combination of trying to reopen the Strait [of Hormuz] while simultaneously recognizing that there are going to be alternative routes to get oil and gas to market, including expanding production in new places and expanding production in the United States,” Caleb Jasso, policy expert at the Institute for Energy Research, told The Epoch Times. “The world as a whole is really reevaluating global energy supply chains and the need for a greater level of diversification.”

Thus far, however, America’s oil industry has remained cautious, holding off on major new investments and focusing instead on increasing output from existing wells. The combined number of oil and gas rigs operating in the United States declined from more than 700 in May 2023 to 558 today, according to Baker Hughes, an industry analytics firm. And while the oil rig count has increased from 410 at the beginning of this year to 429 as of May 29, most producers remain reluctant to pour significant money into new wells.

Capital intensive industries like petroleum (and semiconductors!) cannot function efficiently on a four-year political timeline. Global markets cannot function efficiently, or sometimes at all on those timelines, when freedom to conduct commerce across the globe is held hostage to the political winds in Washington or Peking or Tehran.

It is very easy to throw up one's hands and say, "Let's just get the hell out of the Middle East!" And based on the less than stellar outcomes of our adventures of the past 25 years, that is a rational thing. Nation Building^TM has been thoroughly discredited, and has, hopefully, been thrown into the dustbin of history, at least until the next president with delusions of grandeur and no common sense decides that Shitcanistan must become a Jeffersonian Democracy, and uses our blood and treasure! And the current situation in the Strait of Hormuz is in all probability a temporary dislocation, as the world scrambles to find alternative methods of transport.

But there is another Strait of Hormuz lurking out there, and another after that one. Even if we fix the issue of a chaotic regulatory landscape and give the economy freedom to plan past the next election, trade routes that can be closed at the whim of despots or 7th century savages is an issue that will never go away.

President Trump's actions against Iran may be politically difficult, but there is no looming occupation of Iran, and the goal of denying the Mad Mullahs and their IRGC handlers a nuclear weapon is unequivocally good. That he is simultaneously degrading their ability to affect global commerce is also an unalloyed good.

Now if we can only get Congress to get off its collective ass and do something about the regulatory miasma!

[Crossposted at CutJibNewsletter and X/Twitter]. If you folks who are on X/Twitter would follow us it would be much appreciated!

Posted by: CBD at 11:00 AM | Comments (172) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Friar Pedro Shoots El Maragato as His Horse Runs Off
Francisco José de Goya y Lucientes

Posted by: CBD at 09:30 AM | Comments (270) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Good morning kids. Considering the moral, cultural and societal degradation and collapse of Western Civilization that in most cases we brought about on ourselves, there are things that perhaps give us at least a sliver of hope on which to cling. The ghastly butchering of a white Englishman at the hands of an immigrant was bad enough, but the reaction of police and British authorities that made the victim into the perpetrator and the murderer into a hero was even worse, in that it further confirmed my initial assertion about our society and culture as we share a closely intertwined history and lineage with England and given what's happening there and here perhaps a similar fate. And yet, this is happening.

Based on the events that have taken place in Britain in the past 24 hours, this technique does not appear to be as effective anymore. For the first time in memory, white people are organizing in the streets — in large numbers — to advance their own interests. They saw what happened to first-year university student Henry Nowak, who was butchered in the street by a foreigner — like so many other innocent whites living in Britain. They saw how the police handcuffed Nowak and mocked him as the life drained from his body, all because the murderous barbarian claimed that Nowak had been “racist.” They saw how the police in Britain will strip you of your rights and your dignity if they believe you harbor any resentment whatsoever towards the foreign hordes who are destroying your country. They saw how the killer’s family conspired to hide the evidence and concoct a false claim of self-defense — without any remorse whatsoever, only tribal loyalty. And having seen all of this — just the latest in a long string of executions, systemic injustice and humiliation that whites have been forced to endure in Britain for the past several decades — the indigenous people of the UK are finally rising up. They are taking back their own country. 

Well whether that last assertion is true is debatable, but the protests over this as well as that of the Islamic rape gangs are, and the reaction from the powers that be in now going after anyone who dares stand up and speak out is naked tyranny. This is England in 2026, the nation that stood up to Hitler and gave us Magna Carta is teetering on the precipice of that New Dark Age that Churchill warned about, but instead of Hitler and the Nazis it will be homegrown self-hating Britons and the foreign-born masses they let in and subsume them that pushes them over the edge into the abyss.

Public outrage in Britain is rising after the release of harrowing police bodycam footage in the stabbing and subsequent arrest of Henry Nowak, an 18-year-old university student who was killed December 3, 2025 in Southampton, England, by a 23-year-old Sikh man named Vickrum Digwa. The circumstances of Nowak’s murder almost defy belief. On their own, they would be enough to send Britain into a spiral of race riots and civil unrest — if Nowak had not been white, and if his killer had not been Indian. As it is, the murder of Henry Nowak will probably not trigger the kind of rioting that George Floyd’s death did in the United States. But it does perfectly illustrate the logic of Black Lives Matter: racial minorities are to be believed and preferred, white people are not — even in cases where whites are the victims of violent crimes. When police arrived on the scene, he lied, telling them Nowak had called him a racist slur, which is a crime in Britain, owing to that country’s lack of anything like a First Amendment. So the police arrested Nowak, not Digwa, even as Nowak pleaded for medical aid, saying he had been stabbed. He told the officers he couldn’t breathe. He said this nine times, and four times he told them he had been stabbed...Instead of helping the victim of a violent attack, the police automatically believed Digwa. Why? Because he’s a racial minority and Nowak was white. The presumption of guilt and innocence, as far as the police were concerned, was determined entirely on the basis of race. The white boy must be guilty, the Sikh man must be the victim... On and on it goes, including the recent case of a Muslim man who called for the beheading of Jews but was released on bail, while white Britons who complained about him were arrested for posting about it on social media. ..This kind of thing has gotten out of hand in Britain, but the impulse to adopt racial preferences is actually an import to Britain from America. One of the odd and disturbing features of modern Britain is the extent to which they have adopted the racial narratives and in-group grievances of the American left — a paradigm wholly unsuited to British culture and history.

And speaking of this side of the pond and this kind of madness

. . . here are are again.

Rick Chow, a 61-year-old Chinese store owner, shot an armed teenager he suspected of stealing from his store while defending his son. After a trial, a jury found him not guilty which means that BLMers are doing their “No justice, no peace” and threatening race riots down in South Carolina.

That also means it’s a national news story why, because, well I’ll let CNN tell it, “Chow, 61, who is Asian, shot Cyrus Carmack-Belton in the back after chasing him from his convenience store in Columbia, but maintained he acted to defend his son. The killing sent waves of anguish and grief through the African American community in Richland County, where nearly half the population is Black.”

It’s very vital to spell out that Chow… is Asian. We’ve gotten used to the addition of ‘Black’ or ‘White’, to stories, but now Asians get the same treatment.

In 1992 we cheered on the Rooftop Koreans of Los Angeles who defended themselves from the bloodthirsty savages who were out for blood, to avenge the death of Rodney King. Hopefully there will be rooftop Chinese in Columbia. While the deaths of Rodney King and Carmack-Belton were and are questionable. The reaction to the former and potential reaction to the latter were and will be inexcusable, regardless of the narratives put forth by the usual suspects in the race-hustler/divide-and-conquer complex.

With that, you have to admire the cojones of at least some in the Duluth GOP and it too perhaps gives hope that, to coin a phrase that usually brings forth vomitus, decent people are at long last speaking truth to power, the consequences be damned.

Minnesota Republican Party delegates held a brief moment of silence for Derek Chauvin during their state convention in Duluth, and the expected outrage arrived right on schedule. "The audacity of the Minnesota Republican Party to honor an individual who has both been convicted by a jury of his peers for the murder of a fellow human being, while at the same time violated a professional oath to protect and serve his community, is disgusting," Floyd family attorneys Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci wrote Tuesday in a statement, according to The Hill. The attorneys demanded that state GOP leaders "issue an immediate retraction of this immoral act and issue an apology to the family of George Floyd and to the people of Minnesota that they serve."

. . . George Floyd, as we remember, died on May 25, 2020, after Minneapolis police responded to a call about a counterfeit $20 bill. The Hennepin County Medical Examiner ruled the death a homicide and listed the cause as cardiopulmonary arrest complicating law restraint and neck compression.

The same official report also listed arteriosclerotic and hypertensive heart disease, fentanyl intoxication, and recent meth use as significant conditions.

We're led to believe such an official report from a medical examiner, especially after so many people were fatally shot, yet during COVID, the bullets didn't kill them — the virus did.

Derek Chauvin was convicted of second-degree murder, third-degree murder, and second-degree manslaughter, receiving a 22-1/2-year state sentence and later receiving a concurrent 21-year federal sentence after pleading guilty to civil rights violations.

Chauvin is every bit on the same level as an Alfred Dreyfus, Alexander Solzhenitsyn, and to shove it in the face of the Left Nelson Mandela!

If there is a God in Heaven, Ben Crump and his ilk will soon be standing before Him awaiting eternal damnation.

On the one hand, I cannot see Derek Chauvin being exonerated and freed from the Minnesota Gulag but at least Mumia Abu Jamal is still rotting in prison long after I expected him to be unleashed on us by Josh Shapiro.

Funny how conservatives don't cause massive riots whenever real injustice, and not the fictional variety, is unleashed on us. If we were to add up all the depredations, indignities and injustices we have suffered at the hands of Leftists and their ilk lo these many years, there would be nothing left but dust and ashes if we reacted even to a minimal degree what the BLM/Antifa/SOROS goon squads were bought and paid to do.

Lord help them should the day come when we finally say enough is enough.

Have a great day,

ABOVE THE FOLD, BREAKING, NOTEWORTHY
• This story follows a report from late May showing that emergency room (ER) visits caused by tick bites had skyrocketed from 39 per 100,000 to 137 per 100,000.
  Scientists Propose Using Genetically Modified Ticks to Make People Allergic to Meat.
  
• Victor Davis Hanson: California’s decline is no mystery: decades of one-party rule have turned America’s golden state into a warning about the costs of ideological governance.
  Can California Still Be Saved?

Posted by: J.J. Sefton at 07:28 AM | Comments (304) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Top Story

• Apple's MacBook Neo is selling so well the company has doubled production. (MacRumors)
  
  At that rate they'll run out of bad chips and have to start using good ones, but economies of scale may make up for it.
  
  Also the company is reportedly working on a 12GB model for next year. If they can hit the same price that will offer a worthwhile bump in capabilities; 8GB is a bit restrictive even on a Mac.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:30 AM | Comments (117) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Good evening Horde. The time has come for mid-week shenanigans. The bar is open.

Welcome to the Wednesday night ONT which means another edition of random overnight fun and games. Pull up a chair and join the fun. Good will offerings of amusing puns are encouraged. Pants are optional but why would you be wearing pants for the ONT? Be nice to your fellow commenters and AoS contributors. This is a Tucker, Candace, Megyn and Bill Kristol free zone. Please.

I know what you're thinking. "I've been sitting here all evening in my underwear tearing through a bag of blue ranch Doritos contemplating the mysteries of life. There's crap on television and only cat videos on the internet. If only there was a place on the interweb that was an oasis of sorts. If only there was a place where the eccentric and eclectic gathered and Truth, Justice and the American Way still led from the front. I've got Dorito crumbs everywhere and my glass is almost empty but still...if only there was some overnight thread where the irreverent and insightful blend their collective wisdom and keep vigil to ensure the flames of freedom remain lit..."

Anyway.

[Top photo: Live Free or Die. For reasons.]

Posted by: Open Blogger at 10:00 PM | Comments (443) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Ardez, Switzerland

Duckling rescue squad!

Senior dog moves better than Biden and is ten IQ points smarter. And he's rested and ready to serve.

Cat just couldn't let the last little drop go.

German shepherd checks up on the new kittens.

This German shepherd is almost as keen a reader as I am.

Kitty door.

I think maybe hummingbirds would be easier to befriend than crows. Spencer Pratt managed it easily enough.

Oh, and crow update: The crow caller does something, but I don't know what. I can't summon the crows, but I sure can get them squawking. I had about a dozen of them squawking and cawing. But I don't know if their squawking was friendly or hostile, because I don't know if the sounds I'm making are friendly or hostile. I might be saying the crow version of the n-word.

If the crows don't work out, there are other birds.

Dancing with your cow.

Beyond the looking glass.

Even penguins understand right of way. So why do humans not understand they're not supposed to block the doors of buses, subways, and buildings as people are exiting?

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 07:32 PM | Comments (286) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Democrats pretend crime is just something that happens and that it's not fair to blame them for it.

But all of these crimes are the direct, inevitable, and easily-predictable consequences of the policies they choose, not just random events.

A deranged homeless man barred from entering Atlanta's public transportation stabbed an innocent 66-year-old woman 20 times for no reason, killing her.

Is it "public" transportation if the people actually paying for it can't use it because state-sponsored Droogs will murder them if they board?

One preventable slaughter after another.

A chilling, apparently random stabbing on a MARTA train leaves a 66-year-old woman dead

A 25-year-old man has been charged with murder after police say he stabbed a woman to death on an Atlanta commuter train in an apparently random attack.

It's not "random" any longer. It is, as the Joker says, "all part of the plan."

John Elijah Matthews was arrested around noon on Saturday, moments after he stepped off the Metropolitan Atlanta Rapid Transit Authority train at the Oakland City Station, said MARTA Police Chief Scott Kreher. First responders tried to resuscitate Margaret Swan, 66, but she died at the scene, he said.

...

Kreher said video from the train depicted an unprovoked and chilling attack on an apparent stranger, and that Swan was stabbed up to 20 times.

"There's no evidence at this time to suggest they knew each other -- this was merely a random act of violence," Kreher said.

"He walked over, stood next to her, and within 30 seconds he had killed her," using a small pocket knife, Kreher said. "He looked at her, didn't say anything to her, pulled out a knife."

Other people were on the train at the time, Kreher said, but the suspect did not approach any of them.

"He finished attacking her, and he just stood there and waited for the train to stop in Oakland City. He got off the train car, went over on the platform, and just sat down. He didn't even try to run or hide," Kreher said.

Why should he? He's been protected by the anti-human state all his life. Why should he expect this time to be different?

This Solid Citizen and Cultural Enrichment Officer was supposedly "permanently banned" from Atlanta's public transportation system. What does that matter, when you don't prosecute fare-evaders? It's easy to jump the turnstiles.

To get banned from a subway, you need to have had many contacts with the police.

But the Decarceration Agenda made sure he was free to menace and murder at will.

Horrific video taken by passengers of the slain woman lying on a train floor splattered with blood here.

The police are refusing to release video. Why would they? The Regime doesn't want the proles to see their handiwork.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 06:35 PM | Comments (147) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The judge is so determined to set the pedophile free to molest children that he's decided that it's "unconstitutional" to mandate that a repeat sex offender who has admitted he gets off on exposing himself to children can't, well, go into the YWMC lockers when little girls are present and expose himself.

He insists that the pedophile maintains that right, and that anyone attempting to restrict him via the sex offender registry is violating the Constitution.

You may say, well at least Virginia will appeal this ruling.

Except the guy appealing it will be the incompetent DEI disaster Jay Jones who proudly wishes for his political opponents' children to be murdered.

Even if he were to appeal it legitimately and not deliberately tank it -- he'd wind up tanking it, because he's an incompetent who only has his position and his law degree due to DEI and white guilt.

This is where we are now -- pedophiles have a right to go into your children's locker rooms and show them their dick and balls.

Registered sex offender Richard Cox is facing charges in Arlington County for exposing himself to women and girls in school locker rooms, but the case was thrown out by an Arlington County Circuit Court judge.

For months in 2024, Cox used women's locker rooms in Fairfax County and Arlington County. Those two counties allow people to use bathrooms and locker rooms based on their chosen gender identity.

Cox claims he's a transgender woman.

"My civil rights as a transgender person allow me to use a public facility, including restrooms and changing rooms that identify as my gender," Cox can be heard saying to Fairfax County police in November 2024 on a police body-worn camera that 7News obtained.

Although Fairfax County police never arrested the registered sex offender for exposing himself to women and girls in rec center locker rooms throughout the county, Arlington County police did.

In 2024, Cox used women's locker rooms in two high schools and a county fitness center in Arlington.

For that, the Arlington Commonwealth's Attorney Parisa Dehghani-Tafti's office indicted the sex offender for loitering within 100 feet of schools and child swim and gymnastics classes, and exposing himself to women and girls in the locker rooms.

Cox asked a judge for the indictments to be dismissed and that's what happened.

Judge Daniel Lopez ruled the Virginia law under which Cox is being prosecuted void for vagueness under the Fourteenth Amendment.

...

The judge's core reasoning is that the statute criminalizes "loitering" within 100 feet of schools and child day programs by some convicted sex offenders, but does not define "loitering" or give standards for when it becomes a felony.

Loitering has a long-established legal meaning -- it means contriving to remain present at a place without having any legitimate business there. If you are barred by law from entering a child's swimming center, you cannot hang around the doors waiting for kids to come out. Because, what is your legitimate business at this place? You have none. You are barred from entry. Why are you there, then?

This is a significant ruling because it not only found an issue with how the statute was applied to Cox. It says the statute itself is constitutionally defective.

The Arlington prosecutor disagrees with the judge's decision and appealed.

The Court of Appeals accepted the case, and now Virginia Attorney General Jay Jones will represent the commonwealth on appeal.

Great.

For now, everything in the Arlington trial court is on hold.

Separately, Cox was recently convicted by a jury for possessing child pornography, which Arlington police found when they arrested him at Barcroft Sports and Fitness Center.

He brought the child porn to the children's locker rooms. Great.

Meanwhile, in Fairfax County, Cox is charged with sexually assaulting a woman in 1988.

"I want to see justice served," the victim told 7News Reporter Nick Minock.

Note he's been a rapist and a child sexual material offender from before he "became transgender."

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 05:34 PM | Comments (197) | Trackbacks (Suck)

January 6th protesters stole a chair and a coat-rack so MAGA must be purged.

Meanwhile, Democrats are electing actual Al Qaeda terrorists.

This cannot go on. And the good/bad news is-- it will not.

Via David Strom:

Joel Mowbray
@joelmowbray

BREAKING -- A protege of the Jihadist behind the World Trade Center bombing, Adam Hamawy, has been declared the WINNER of the Dem primary in the solid Blue district.

Hamawy's mentor was Omar Abdel Rahman, known as the Blind Sheikh, who was close with Osama bin Laden.

...

Because it was such a crowded field, Hamawy got thru with just over a quarter of the vote. And since the district is very blue (61% for Kamala), this unrepentant Islamist will join Congress -- unless national Democrats can somehow force him aside.

They won't. They're all in. The Communists and Terrorists have, get this, joined forces.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 05:30 PM | Comments (162) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The childhood stutter flares up from time to time, resulting in dementia.

Former President Joe Biden crashed his wife Jill's debut book talk Tuesday, stealing her spotlight to bizarrely ask the former first lady whom she loves the most in a cringe-inducing moment before aides could cut him off.

Jill Biden had been wrapping up a Q&A about her newly released book, "A View from the East Wing," with moderator Whoopi Goldberg at the 92nd Street Y on the Upper East Side when Biden, 83, left his seat in the audience and wandered up to the edge of the stage.

Goldberg had read a comment from the audience thanking Biden for his service, and Jill, 75, stood up to give her husband a standing ovation when the ex-president's seemingly unplanned speech began.

"I have a question," Biden said unprompted, and without a microphone, while flanked by security guards.

"Joe has a question, like you couldn't ask it later?" Jill responded.

"Who do you love most in the whole world?" Biden enquired.

Christmas, this is embarrassing.

"Whoopi," Jill answered, causing the audience to break into laughter.

As "The View" co-host tried to speak, Biden continued to stand and blankly face his wife, seemingly unhappy with her answer.

The former first lady eventually caved and said, "I love you most, Joe. Was that it? Was that the answer he wanted?"

"It's overwhelming, isn't it?" the 46th president continued -- barely audible without a microphone.

"Overwhelming, well, that's what keeps him on his toes, he's never 100% sure, I always keep him guessing, is that not true?" Jill said as her husband lowered his head and made the sign of the cross.

In an attempt to end the bizarre moment and wrap up the event, Goldberg encouraged the audience to purchase Jill's new book. But Biden remained standing and pointed his finger as the exit music played.

"My book...," Joe Biden began before a crew member came from backstage to hand him a microphone. "My book, which comes out in September, read it..."

"Do I have to remind him that this is my event?" Jill asked jokingly.

"The only thing that Jill does better than write, she's a beautiful woman," Biden declared before the event finally concluded.

Her vagina goes "vroom, vroom." You should hear it.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 03:30 PM | Comments (276) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Although California will take days or weeks to full tabulate the " " " votes " " ", it appears that Karen Bass will take about 35% of the vote, Spencer Pratt will take 30%, and communist carpetbagger foreigner Nithya Raman 22%.

That means that Bass and Pratt will go on to the general election, which will be held on November 3rd.

Unless Karen Bass's fraudulent vote elves can print up enough fake votes to get her over 50%, in which case she wins immediately. But I think that's too big a lift even for the Democrat fraudsters of the Home of "Ballot Harvesting," California.

Ugh:

Byron York
@ByronYork

54m

At the moment we have 58% of the votes counted in the California governor's race and 63% counted in the LA mayor's race. From NYT: "Most Californians vote by mail, and ballots postmarked on or before Election Day have one week to arrive. In the 2024 primary, about half of results were reported by 5 a.m. Eastern time the day after the election. It took 10 days before 95 percent of results were reported."

Assuming they can't "harvest" enough "votes" to get to 50%...

When I saw those numbers, my first thought was "that's terrible, that means the communist vote is 52% combined and Spencer Pratt will lose."

However...

Karen Bass is the incumbent and could not manage but a tiny bit more than one third support.

An incumbent with 35% support is an incumbent in trouble. Not all of Nithya Raman's voters will migrate to Bass -- after all, they're choosing against the obvious leftwing candidate, the incumbent, for a reason.

Also... the fact that we've established that the total universe for votes for leftwing candidates is right around 52% is bad news for Bass. That's her ceiling. It's a low ceiling.

Regarding the governor's race: the top two vote-getters were Obama/Biden non-entity and incompetent Xavier Bercerra and British FoxNews populist commentator Steve Hilton. Deranged billionaire Tom Steyr and Republican sheriff Chad Bianco finished beneath them. Given that there are still votes to count, and anything can happen in a Democrat-controlled 5th Quarter of voting, it's possible that either of those two could slip into the top two.

There have been reports that Xavier Bercerra used dubious means such as bots to boost the impression that he was the front-runner. It seems to have worked, and there's nothing to be done about that now. But bots aren't going to put him over the top in the general election -- that will require real fraudulent votes.

Other Democrats have already conceded defeat, including college teacher and the Native American demonic Spirit of Ravening Hunger, Fat Wendigo Katie Porter.

I don't think Bass or Bercerra will wear well over the next five months.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 02:30 PM | Comments (228) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Adam Klasfeld
@KlasfeldReports

Scott Pelley is the face of the highest-rated newsmagazine on TV, and every "60 Minutes" staffer in the room reportedly gave him a standing ovation after this exchange.

The idea that Bari Weiss can blithely fire him without also committing institutional arson is naive.

Pelley did this because he has integrity-- but also because he has power.

Does he though...?

Dylan Byers
@DylanByers

#SCOOP: Scott Pelley had a meeting with CBS News leadership at 5pm ET to discuss a path forward after his protest in 60 Minutes all-hands. The two sides did not find common ground and it now seems likely he will either resign or be fired, though neither has happened yet.

He was given a standing ovation by the other communist cultists in the room, which they were eager to tell the media that they were sure Nick Bilton could hear as he was walking away.

John Ondrasik
@johnondrasik

The fact that every staffer stood and applauded is further proof that 60 minutes needs a full tear down.

And now: the bitch has been fired.

And I mean fired. CBS didn't just let his contract lapse without renewal, which they were obviously already planning to do.

Fired for cause, invalidating whatever time is left on his contract, and ending their obligation to pay him under it.

Gross insubordination is almost always a cause for a firing under the terms of a contract, and CBS exercised their right to fire for that reason.

And Pelley left them no choice. But this wasn't bravery. Again, he knew he was being let go. This flounce is all advertising for his substack and podcast, which I'm sure will be fair and objective, because that's what Scott Pelley insists he is.

CBS News axed veteran "60 Minutes" correspondent Scott Pelley on Tuesday night, a day after after the longtime network star blasted editor-in-chief Bari Weiss and challenged her newly installed leadership team in a heated confrontation that exposed the widening civil war inside the iconic newsmagazine.

In a letter obtained by The Post, newly appointed "60 Minutes" executive producer Nick Bilton blasted Pelley in informing him he was fired "for cause effective immediately."

"[Y]ou hijacked my first meeting with staff to disparage me, my qualifications, and my intentions with remarkable incivility and contempt," Bilton wrote, referring to Monday's heated face-off between the journo and his boss.

Bilton further accused Pelley of staging a "performative display of hostility" and claimed he had "no interest in contributing to the future success of the show, or approaching my new tenure with a mind open to collaboration and progress."

By the way, Sex Machine Brian Stelter reported that Bilton had asked to meet with Pelley privately, before the meeting, to discuss next steps. Pelley refused to attend a private meeting, choosing instead this flouncing public tantrum.

Brian Stelter
@brianstelter

Worth noting amid all the coverage of Scott Pelley's scathing criticism today: According to a person with knowledge of the matter, Bari Weiss and Nick Bilton sought out Pelley for a private meeting last week, but the longtime correspondent did not take them up on the offer to talk.

I think Pelley refused to attend that meeting because he expected they would tell him his contract was not being renewed "but we can talk about what your role will be as we wind down the time remaining on the contract."

And I have a source for that -- the source is It's F***ing Obvious, Jack! Open your ears, Jerky!

"I am here to deliver first-in-class news programming, not to make headlines about newsroom drama," Bilton wrote.

He went on to tell Pelley: "Your antipathy to the future of the show has come through loud and clear. And I have heard you."

At the meeting in question, Pelley told Bilton that the new leader had "slender" qualifications for the job and would "never be welcome here," sources previously told The Post.

Bilton fired back: "You are not going to intimidate me in front of this group of people."

The correspondent also accused Weiss of "murdering '60 Minutes'" and claimed she "was brought in to kill it and is doing exactly that," according to sources familiar with the exchange.

The clash lasted roughly 15 minutes before Bilton ended the meeting and walked out.

The confrontation divided staffers at CBS News, with some insiders branding Pelley's behavior "bullying" and "grandstanding" -- and yet another reckoning that it was "a set-up," sources told The Post.

Nick Bilton had no choice. If an underling pulls bullshit like this, degrading you, undermining you, and attempting to pose as your superior, you have no choice but to fire him. Gross insubordination can't be tolerated in any organization, even as trivial and inconsequential one as television entertainment. (Which is all 60 Minutes is.)

And now -- He's quitting Twitter and he means it this time, guys!

He's written a long ranty entry in his Slam Book and he wants you all to read it!

Scott Pelley accused CBS News management under Editor-in-chief Bari Weiss of trying to inject "falsehoods and bias" into reporting after the veteran correspondent was fired Tuesday.

Pelley, who spent 37 years at CBS News and became one of the most recognizable faces of "60 Minutes," leveled a series of extraordinary allegations against CBS News leadership without giving specifics.

"For my part, new management has instructed me to inject falsehoods and bias into a politically sensitive story," Pelley wrote. "I've been told to include assertions that are unverified."
Pelley claimed he repeatedly resisted those efforts.

"To date, in every case, I have managed to ignore these instructions or refuse them," he said.

He also alleged that politicians had been given influence over editorial decisions.

"Recently, politicians have been invited to choose correspondents for interviews on the broadcast," Pelley wrote. "Giving politicians control over 60 Minutes interviews is not how this is done."

Let me translate that for you. The media decided ten years ago that Republicans were Nazis and that they could no longer report "both sides" because there are not two legitimate sides -- there is the Democrat side, and there is Evil.

Bari Weiss had previously demanded the CECOT story be held up so that she could receive comment from the targets of the hit-piece. Democrat operative Sheryl Alfonsi freaked -- You can't include comment from Trump! He is the Antichrist! His words are the lies of the Devil!

But of course getting and publishing comment or denial from the target of a hit piece had been standard ethical media practice... until ten years ago.

Bari Weiss demanded a return to the former media practice, which was still biased as hell but at least they'd include a denial at the end of the story, read with unmistakable contempt.

That's what Scott Pelley is shrieking out about -- he won't include the "lies and falsehoods" in his story, aka "the denial and comment from the Trump Administration officials he is running political hit pieces against."

Scott Pelley is so obviously a grandstanding bitch that even fired, disgraced CNN Thumb Chris Ciilizza sees through it.

Seen in the most pro-Pelley light, he chose to confront Bilton and Weiss in an all-hands gathering as a way to make his point as big and brightly as possible. Huddling behind closed doors with the bosses wouldn't properly convey his upset over the restructuring at "60 Minutes" etc etc.

Seen in a less pro-Pelley light, however, Pelley chose to do his "truth to power" thing not in hopes of actually changing anything but rather as a way to make it as performative as possible -- in a content age in which performative emotion is absolute gold.

The immediate leaking of the audio of Pelley's remarks to literally every media reporter suggests to me that the latter -- and admittedly more cynical -- explanation has real plausibility.

Because let's consider how the next few days are likely to go.

Pelley is very likely to get fired by CBS News. I mean, you can't blast both your immediate boss and your big boss and expect to keep your job. And I would assume Pelley knew that going in! Like, if/when he gets fired, he is not going to be super shocked.

And when he gets fired, Pelley will cut a video announcing he is starting a Substack where he will engage in "fearless" commentary about the capitulation of CBS (and all other media) to Trump and the almighty dollar.

And that Substack will immediately rack up lots and lots of subscribers. And Pelley will make money. Maybe lots of it. (We've seen this exact arc play out repeatedly in recent years.)

Cillizza admits that his media pals are a guild of dinosaurs who just can't accept the public has been increasingly rejecting them for ten years and that they need to change:

But there is also NO doubt that broadcast news -- and cable TV news -- are a dying product. The average age of a CBS News viewer is 62! NBC News is 57. ABC News is a "youthful" 55.

That's a problem. Because unless science figures out a way to get us all to live until we are 150, the reality is that the main clientele for what CBS News is offering -- yes, including "60 Minutes" -- is, quite literally, dying off.

Which is why I found myself vigorously nodding my head to the defense Bilton offered on Monday amid the Pelley barrage: "Broadcast is an ice cube that is melting."

YES. YES. YES.

No one -- presumably not even Pelley -- thinks that the solution to what ails big media is more of the same. Like, yes, "60 Minutes" still works! But for how long? And doesn't it make sense to look at your flagship products -- whether that's "60" or the evening news -- and say "How are we going to make this product continue to work amid massive disruption in how people want to consume content?"

To me, the answer is very obvious. Which is why Pelley's criticism -- You guys don't have decades of experience running a broadcast news division!!! -- rings false to me.

If I was Ellison -- or anyone who owns a legacy media brand -- I would want people in the decision-making room who AREN'T old hands at the thing the legacy media brand was built on. Because we know those legacy media content delivery vehicles -- linear TV, print newspapers etc. -- are dying off. And that no amount of expertise in how to make great-looking broadcast TV shows or put together a whiz-bang front page of the print newspaper is going to reverse the steep decline of people who consume their content that way.

...

But, again, the fact that neither Weiss nor Bilton have long experience in making TV seems to me more an asset than a detriment. CBS News (and every other legacy outlet) has to figure out new ways to reach people on new platforms. Why not have people -- like Weiss! -- who has done that?

Why then was there a rush to tout Pelley as a hero and Bilton and, by extension, Weiss, as the bad guy(s)?

Because I think a whole lot of journalists -- mostly tied to legacy media but also some in the independent space -- are still clinging to the idea that the way things worked up until 5-10 years ago can still work today and in the future.

They can't.

...

We've reached the "kill your darlings" stage of legacy media. The boat has already hit the iceberg. Now the only question is what we do about it. And doing the same old things -- or slight variations on the same old things -- ain't going to work.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 01:20 PM | Comments (422) | Trackbacks (Suck)

I was wondering about Larry O'Connor's statement from a few weeks back: That the Nazi tattoo is only the tip of the iceberg and much, much worse was coming.

Was the sexting with 6-12 women the "much, much worse"? Or is there more?

Apparently there's more. The really toxic stuff hasn't been released yet.

No one is saying it but it sounds like they're hinting about the r-word, and I don't mean his already established racism. This seems to be hinting about sexual misconduct of some kind.

The latest is the sexting scandal wherein Platner texted sexually explicit messages to a half-dozen to a dozen women. The original report was about a dozen women and the campaign says it was only about a half-dozen. From there came revelations that Platner has been on a social site called Kik, which is a favorite site of predators. And, bubbling to the surface are allegations that Platner might have left school for alarming reasons -- those are being whispered about right now.

Could cheating or an honor code violation be an "alarming reason"? I don't think so. It sounds like something more serious.

He writes about the various people shifting blame for Graham Platner's serial infidelity to the staffer who tipped the media after the texts were shared by his wife.

This includes a Washington Post "reporter," who took the odd position that the source who revealed relevant information about a political candidate should be shunned and banned from employment.

That doesn't sound like a "reporter."

That sounds like a Democrat Party fixer determined to punish those who leak the truth about Nazi candidates:

After people questioned why a "journalist" is so committed to covering up the truth from the public, she deleted that tweet -- and has refused to answer questions about it since.

Of course, Democrat Socialists are also blaming... the Jews. See his substack for that, with a DSA "former campaign staffer" attacking a NYT journalist who wrote about the Platner affairs for having belonged to a "Students for Israel" group in college.

This is where I used to say "unbelievable" but of course it's not unbelievable, it's mainstream Democrat Communist/Nazi/Jihadist Party agitation.

As I've pointed out myself, he notes that when Graham Platner talks vaguely about problems he's had in his marriage, he's talking about a "marriage" that isn't yet three years old. He was sexting with strange women from his wedding day.

And his "redemption arc" is now only weeks or months old -- his wife brought these sexts to the attention of the campaign after it started, which is less than a year old.

He only covered up his SS Death's Head concentration camp guard tattoo a few months ago!

So all the "talks" and "growth" he's talking about -- happened in the past few months.

Back to Erickson, and hints about what kind of "alarming reasons" led to the rich bitch nepo baby's ejection from tony Hotchkiss Academy:

...

The man has a Nazi tattoo. He said soldiers in combat deserved to die. He blamed Susan Collins for sending him to war, despite volunteering repeatedly, even going back with Blackwater. He bragged about killing people. He fantasized about rape and said rape victims deserved some blame. He bragged about taking leave to have sex with prostitutes in Southeast Asia. And he claimed he can't get in a porta-potty without masturbating and fantasizing.

I didn't hear about the fantasies about rape, but it's very ominous when combined with the next sentence:

Soon we'll get the even worse allegations against him and what he did to women beyond fantasy.

Just remember that the Democrats have stuck with him. Eventually, the PodBros, Bulwark, and the rest will abandon Graham Platner. Once they're done blaming the Jews, the victims, the women around Platner, the Republicans, and others -- they'll abandon him. What's coming will force them to abandon him.

And when they finally flee, remember they were comfortable with him through all of these things -- things that all point to where the next accusations will be.

I can't wait for the Tucker Carlson interview.

Obviously I don't know anything about this, but I am able to read words and infer the meanings they're implying.

Now I wondered, if there's an absolutely radioactive attack coming, why is it being held? The primary is in six days, next Tuesday.

But of course Janet Mills has announced she remains a candidate in the race, albeit one whose campaign is suspended. So Democrats could abandon Platner and vote for Mills instead.

So I think this hit is being held until after they're locked into Platner, after they've chained themselves to his stinking corpse.

Or who knows, maybe this is a false op designed to scare Democrats off of Platner.

I guess we'll see.

In his interview with Two-Way, he says that classmates are talking about the reasons for his ejection from Hotchkiss, and "reporters are circling," and, once again, "women" specifically are talking about it.

Why would women in particular be talking about it if it's just about, say, an underaged DUI? Seems that the allegations have something specifically to do with women.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 12:12 PM | Comments (329) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Despite most of the Horde not yet reaching the age of 29, many nonetheless have memories that go back much further. This is a temporal oddity, but a useful one. As a result, many will remember the period 30 years ago. A lot was going on the interregnum between the fall of the USSR and the rise of globalization and Islamic extremism. Economically and financially, this era was defined by high finance (though not as much was the mid-aughts would be) and high technology. The latter, fueled by the promise of the Internet and manic irrationality brought us what is now usually referred to as the "dot-com bubble."

Companies with no profits, no real plan to become profitable and in some cases even without meaningful revenues went public and raked in credulous investor capital. Other companies saw staggering growth in valuations as already-public companies that became major players in internet infrastructure were handsomely rewarded by the mania. Not all of the latter companies failed, but many never recovered and have never achieved their dot-com heights in the thirty years since. The narrative of invincibility became a narrative of dread as it the mania collapsed. The aftermath of the dot-com bubble took years to shake out, and set up some of the environment that led directly to the subsequent 2008 "Global Financial Crisis" and the following Eurozone debt crises.

Posted by: Joe Mannix at 11:00 AM | Comments (281) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Good old Bart is considered one of the many Caravaggisti, and it is obvious that he embraced Caravaggio's style, and quite well!

From the Getty Museum website:

Bartolomeo Manfredi was known throughout Italy and beyond as Caravaggio's closest follower. More than simply copying Caravaggio's style, Manfredi reinterpreted his subjects and rendered new ones, while drawing upon and propagating Caravaggesque naturalism and dramatic use of chiaroscuro.

Posted by: CBD at 09:30 AM | Comments (265) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Good morning kids. While it certainly looks as if Graham "Oyster cracker" Platner is on the verge of going kerSPLATner. Sure he's utterly horrendous on every level. But he's not a one-off considering this happened just down the coast in New Jersey:

Adam Hamawy, a controversial candidate who previously volunteered with an al-Qaeda-linked group, has won the Democrat primary for retiring Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman’s (D-NJ) seat in the U.S. House of Representatives.

Hamawy, who was endorsed by the so-called “Squad,” became a lightning rod for criticism on the campaign trail due to his intense criticism of Israel and his having volunteered with the Benevolence International Foundation in Bosnia, per the New York Post:

An Iraq War veteran, Hamawy has made national headlines for saving Sen. Tammy Duckworth’s (D-Ill) life after a helicopter crash as well as for his volunteer work in the Gaza Strip.

How "controversial" could he have been and still come out on top let alone even be a candidate? Yes New Jersey, especially the bedroom communities/counties near NYC are leftist dominated with growing populations of Muslims from some of the worst Islamic hellholes on earth. The "Squad" are also not really outliers but represent more and more the majority of the Democrat base and ultimately are going to supplant the old guard allegedly "moderate" "liberal" leadership, bth those words in quotation marks for obvious reasons since Democrats are neither moderate nor liberal. Great he rescued Tammy Duckworth. This is kind of like Otto Skorzeny rescuing Mussolini.

Be that as it may, the Democrat/Leftist party and movement is at war and has always been at war with Americans and America as founded. Unless and until the hatred of this nation its people history and heritage are utterly burned out of that Party's black heart, we'll never know a moment's peace. It's us or them and it's high time we realize it. Of course there are those allegedly on our side who won't and never will, and worse, will aid and abet in our destruction:

. . . the American conservatives whom Mike Pence is urging to take the high road can’t afford to pretend that doing so will ensure victory. We are not facing political opponents who can be lectured into behaving more civilly. The late Freedom Center founder David Horowitz warned decades ago that we are at war with an enemy determined not to seek coexistence with us but to destroy us. Today’s Democrats call for and celebrate our murder, for God’s sake. They certainly won’t be shamed into cleaning up their language.

Pence writes that civility “is how we can find principled common ground in America.” This is a beautiful dream, but the reality is that Left and Right today have no common ground – none. There is literally no political issue – abortion, immigration, race, crime, education, the family, poverty, homelessness, national security, national sovereignty, the environment, foreign policy, religion – on which there is not a Grand Canyon-sized chasm between both sides. Even if there were a patch of common ground somewhere, the Left is not interested in tilling that soil, but craves total power. The idea that Republicans and Democrats can reach across the aisle and come together even in a grudging mutual respect is, sadly, a fantasy.

Yeah, about that civility:

There are judicial rulings that raise complex legal questions, and there are rulings that expose a deeper rot. Judge Leonie Brinkema’s decision to block the Justice Department’s Anti-Weaponization Fund belongs firmly in the latter category. What occurred here transcends a routine dispute over government spending — it is a profound assertion of judicial overreach. ..

The Anti-Weaponization Fund was established as part of a settlement in President Trump’s lawsuit against the government regarding the unlawful disclosure of his tax information. The fund creates a pathway for individuals who believe they have been harmed by government weaponization or politically motivated “lawfare” to seek compensation. Predictably, this objective has drawn fierce opposition from the very circles that spent years insisting such weaponization either did not exist or was entirely justified. Their opposition tells its own story.

Mike Pence hasn't uttered a sound about this:

rioter was charged Friday “for allegedly kicking and biting ICE officers” at a New Jersey illegal immigrant holding center on Thursday, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche said on X. Another individual was arrested after threatening to murder an immigration officer and his family, Blanche said Friday. The Department of Homeland Security arrested at least six rioters last Wednesday alone for allegedly assaulting law enforcement, while others were arrested in the subsequent days, ABC 6 reported.

The attacks took place outside an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in New Jersey called Delaney Hall. Fox News reported that “agitators…were seen establishing a highly organized logistics and support operation before protests began at the site. Stockpiles of masks, duct tape, hard hats and medical supplies were laid out near the facility.”

If we really want civility, we'll get it in a nanosecond once we have summary executions of rioters. Until then Ponce Pence can shove civility where the sun don't shine.

Have a great day.

Posted by: J.J. Sefton at 07:25 AM | Comments (442) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Top Story

• Windows has a fever and the only cure is more Linux. (The Verge) (archive site)
  
  Seriously, though. Microsoft is planning to fix problems with Windows by embedding more Linux into its operating system.
  
  It seems there might be an easier way to achieve that.
  
  
  
• Also, Microsoft, fire your designers. (Notebook Check)
  
  Now.
  
  All of them.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:30 AM | Comments (117) | Trackbacks (Suck)

From Earthglory

Howdy Hordelings! The Tuesday ONT is here! Open thread, as always. What's on YOUR mind tonight?

Posted by: Open Blogger at 10:05 PM | Comments (451) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Junya Watanabe

I think these are the pets you find in the Backrooms.

Donkeys are underrated.

Kitten must have older dog siblings.

Dog loves seeing the garbage men.

Hamster knows how to blend.

My Bodyguard.

Senior dog still has a lot of puppy in her.

Horses gathered for the Festival of the Republic in Rome escape and race along the street as a cowboy tries to catch them. This was a from a few nights ago.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 08:44 PM | Comments (104) | Trackbacks (Suck)