Biden Instructs His Fellow Party Members in the "Journalism" Corps to Start Reporting on the Economy "the Right Way"

Giving orders to the party apparatchiks.

Now I know what you're thinking: You're thinking, "Gee, ace, our press corps is so independent-minded, courageous, and immune from social pressure from other liberals that they'll completely reject this demand!"

Boy you guys just never get sick of thinking Things That Are Wrong. You're really starting the new year off on the wrong foot.

President Joe Biden hit out against recent news coverage of his economic policies, expressing confidence in the state of the economy heading into 2024 and criticizing reporters for failing to represent the current economy in "the right way."

"All good," Biden said in brief remarks over the weekend when asked about his outlook on the economy next year. "Take a look. Start reporting it the right way."

Biden is also telling his eager allies in the Marxist Media to portray his border crisis in a positive light. Austin Bay calls this the Afghanistan Withdrawal Ploy, because Biden likewise commanded his "journalist" water-carriers to portray the bloody catastrophe of that withdrawal as a victory.

Joe Biden, as reported by Reuters: "...I need not tell you (Ghani) the perception around the world and in parts of Afghanistan, I believe, is that things aren't going well in terms of the fight against the Taliban. And there's a need, whether it is true or not, there is a need to project a different picture."

Translation for Ghani: Ignore the debacle on the ground and tell a rosy lie that politically benefits me, Joe Biden.

No impeachment here, though!

The statement is undisputed. Also undisputed: On July 23, 2021, the Afghanistan debacle was in full swing, and the Biden administration was denying it then, pivoting to blame any and all problems on former President Donald Trump.

Which takes us to Mexico City, Dec. 27, 2023, where Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas met with Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (aka AMLO).

The State Department's Dec. 22 press release hyping the Blinken-Mayorkas meetup with AMLO says -- in self-important and arrogantly vague language -- the principals will discuss the "unprecedented irregular migration in the Western Hemisphere and identify ways Mexico and the U.S. will address border security challenges..." Blinken will also "reaffirm the U.S.'s commitment to the Los Angeles Declaration for Migration and Protection."

That's another giveaway The Ploy is being employed. The LA Declaration dates from June 2022 and ostensibly addresses controlling hemispheric migration issues. It abounds with noble words like "collaboration," "solidarity," "shared responsibility," "partnership with civil society and international organizations," et cetera. The lofty words are code justifying and masking the Biden administration's open border policy. Revelatory declaration phrase: "the imperative of promoting safe, orderly, and regular migration..." Rhetorical trick: Lumping all migrants in with "asylum seekers" and "refugees."

Sane laws recognize the difference between the genuinely desperate and lawbreakers entering illegally.

The Heritage Foundation's Simon Hawkinson wrote in 2022 "...the declaration does nothing to address the core problem: zero (law) enforcement at our border, which sends a clear signal to smugglers and would-be migrants across the Americas and the Caribbean that our door is wide open."

That's why the "irregular migration" Blinken bewails is unprecedented: Biden's wide-open door.

But there's a need to project a different picture, whether true or not.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 12:15 PM | Comments (488) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The Morning Rant: Minimalist Edition

Two hundred years ago, the United States told the rest of the world to stay out of our backyard. It seemed reasonable then, and it seems reasonable now. While the Monroe Doctrine said nothing about expansionist policies of our own government, it was an explicit recognition of spheres of influence.

Fast forward 200 years and we have significant encroachment in the Western hemisphere by genuinely bad actors...specifically Iran cementing military and economic relationships with Venezuela. Is it a coincidence that Venezuela is now making expansionist noises with respect to Guyana and its newly discovered oil fields? But Iran has been in the Western Hemisphere for years, mostly as a supporter of terrorism! Remember the AMIA bombing in 1994? That was Iran.

And let us not forget China's massive "Belt And Road Initiative!"

Has the Biden junta invoked the Monroe Doctrine to push Iran (or China) out of South America? No. Apparently our sphere of influence is malleable, and based on the political expediency of supporting Iran and the desire of Kalorama to create a powerful counterbalance to Israel's influence in the Middle East, or simply kowtowing to Biden's masters in Peking.

But shift to Eastern Europe, and we find the same expansionist tendencies that the Monroe Doctrine is designed to prevent, but in American behavior!

Imagine if the Soviet Union had begun to agitate for an expansion of the Warsaw Pact security umbrella to Mexico or Guatemala or El Salvador or Nicaragua!

Oh...wait! That did happen, and American policy, both public and secret, pushed hard against any Soviet influence in those countries. And it got ugly and nasty and brutal. We can disagree about the tactics, but the overall idea -- that communism controlled by the Soviet Union does not belong on our borders -- was a reasonable one.

NATO, perhaps the biggest boondoggle in American diplomatic history, is an organization in need of a purpose, and what better purpose than to recreate the Cold War! Sure...expanding into Ukraine, which BORDERS RUSSIA! seems a bit aggressive and confrontational, but those career diplomats and generals love those Brussels restaurants and call girls, and the graft available in Ukraine dwarfs the kickbacks from defense contractors. It's a Win-Win, except for the American taxpayer.

And if Russia fights? Well, that's good for defense stocks, and besides, who really cares about a bunch of Ukrainian and Russian conscripts.

We were well aware in 2008 that Russia was unhappy about the idea of NATO expansion into the former satellite states of the Soviet Union. The foolish talking point that NATO was the appropriate vehicle for economic and social expansion is moronic. NATO is military, and inappropriate for other diplomatic functions.

NYET MEANS NYET: RUSSIA'S NATO ENLARGEMENT REDLINES

Following a muted first reaction to
Ukraine's intent to seek a NATO Membership Action Plan (MAP) at the Bucharest summit, Foreign Minister Lavrov and other senior officials have reiterated strong opposition, stressing that Russia would view further eastward expansion as a potential military threat. NATO enlargement, particularly to Ukraine, remains "an emotional and neuralgic" issue for Russia, but strategic policy considerations also
underlie strong opposition to NATO membership for Ukraine and Georgia. In Ukraine, these include fears that the issue could potentially split the country in two, leading to violence or even, some claim, civil war, which would force
Russia to decide whether to intervene. Additionally, the GOR and experts continue to claim that Ukrainian NATO membership would have a major impact on Russia's defense industry, Russian-Ukrainian family connections, and bilateral relations generally. In Georgia, the GOR fears continued instability and "provocative acts" in the separatist regions.

So why do it? Confronting Putin may be a laudable diplomatic goal, because he is a thug and an autocrat, but risking a world war to contain him is simply unnecessary. Russia is not a global power, and its understandable desire to have influence in Ukraine will not lead to Russian tanks charging through the Fulda gap! But the graft must flow, and Ukraine's position as perhaps the most corrupt country in the West must be defended at all costs! So we now have a nasty border war that is consuming many thousands of Ukrainian and Russian conscripts, as well as a huge amount of our military supplies. And of course let us not forget the direct payments of many billions of dollars directly into the gaping maw of Ukraine' corrupt government. How much of that is coming back to America and NATO functionaries? How much to "The Big Guy?"

Am I pro-Russia? No. Am I pro-Ukraine? No. I am pro-America. I am content to allow Russia some control over its neighborhood, because while they may not be able to project power worldwide, they are a nuclear power with thousands of warheads and the capacity to deliver them. That gives them the privilege to control their borders the way the Monroe Doctrine gives us authority over Central and South America.

Add to that our confrontational stance over the last 15 years, and is it any wonder that Russia invaded Ukraine? That we are expending wealth we do not have on a border dispute between two kleptocracies with very few strategic implications speaks volumes about the real reasons.

[Hat Tip: JackStraw]

Posted by: CBD at 11:00 AM | Comments (384) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Mid-Morning Art Thread

The Fall of Man
Tiziano Vecellio

Posted by: CBD at 09:30 AM | Comments (393) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The Morning Report — 1/2/24

Good morning, kids. New Year's celebrations traditionally include fireworks, so why should 2024 be any different? Especially given the nature of the past 12 months (and the 24 or so prior)?

Officials with the New York City Fire Department said the incident unfolded near West 34th Street and 9th Avenue. Authorities have deemed it a mass casualty event, Fox News reported Monday. Officials with the New York City Fire Department said the incident unfolded near West 34th Street and 9th Avenue. Authorities have deemed it a mass casualty event, Fox News reported Monday.

Several people, including police officers, were hit when the driver apparently drove onto a sidewalk and eventually came to a halt. “Police responded to West 33rd Street and 7th Avenue and observed a dispute between the suspect identified as a 44-year-old male and another person, a police spokesperson confirmed to Fox News Digital,” the outlet said. . .

. . . The news came as New York City Police Department (NYPD) officers were working to keep crowds safe in Times Square during New Year’s Eve celebrations, Breitbart News reported Saturday.

Nothing to see here. A perfectly normal response from a perfectly reasonable, rational individual – identity still a mystery – who got miffed at someone. I assume the conversation included the words "pita," "shawarma," "Ikeeelyou" and "allahu akbar." All on New Year's Eve. With the Middle East on fire and a wide open border where anyone and everyone can get in unmonitored, unchecked and free to move about the country. Speaking of which, here's a statistic that puts things in perspective:

The number of illegal immigrants caught and released into the country in 2023 would be enough to fill Yankee Stadium more than 17 times, according to federal data.

Border Patrol recorded more than 1.7 million encounters with migrants crossing the southern border illegally in 2023, with more than 824,000 released into the interior of the country with future court appearances, according to the data, which doesn’t account for December. Yankee Stadium has the capacity to hold 46,537 people, according to Ticketmaster.

Federal authorities at the southern border also seized more than 229,000 pounds of drugs, roughly 22,000 pounds of which were fentanyl.

“In retrospect, 2023 at the border was a progressively worse version of 2022,” former Border Patrol Chief Rodney Scott told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Biden continued to double down on his failed border policies, illegal immigration continued skyrocketing to unimaginable levels, the cartels made more money than most people can fathom with less risk than at anytime in history, Customs and Border Protection suspended legal trade and travel to decrease the time in custody for illegal aliens, and the US Border Patrol shut down checkpoints and deployed nearly zero proactive patrols.”

“Biden’s only response was to send Mayorkas and Blinken to Mexico and asks them to control their border,” he said.

To which the degenerate Marxist Lopez-Obrador, whom the drug cartels that actually run Mexico installed as their puppet (sound familiar?) probably told them both to fuck off en Español. This of course assumes that Mayorkas and Blinken actually did tell them to control their border or even want the border under control in the first place.

If that really was the policy, we'd have built the border wall, tripled the size of the Border Patrol or even sent the National Guard to bolster the defense, deported anyone and everyone of the close to 50 million thanks to Biden who are here illegally regardless of their individual sob stories, cut them off from every penny of welfare that attracts them here in the first place, and tried and imprisoned every employer who knowingly hires them. But of course, this is what's known in the trade as sanity, and the front line of national security. Considering those who pull Biden's strings want this nation, or what's left of it, wiped off the face of the earth, it's a non-starter.

Meanwhile, back in New York, a few hundred miles to the northwest of the rotting, decayed, desiccated Apple, in the city that shares a name with Jack Benny's sidekick:

A couple was killed and numerous others injured just hours into the New Year when a car filled with explosives barreled into a crowd of people leaving a rock concert in upstate New York, police said. The fiery crash occurred at 12:50 a.m. outside the Kodak Center in Rochester, where roughly 1,000 people were filing out after a New Year’s Eve moe. show.

Rochester officers were helping pedestrians cross the street when a Ford Expedition sped toward the mob, but smashed instead into an Uber that was pulling out of a nearby parking lot, law enforcement sources said. “The force of the collision caused the two vehicles to go through a group of pedestrians that were in the crosswalk and then into two other vehicles,” police Chief David Smith said at a press conference.

The cars exploded into an intense blaze that took the fire department nearly one hour to extinguish. A couple riding inside the Uber were killed, while their driver was rushed to the hospital in non-life threatening condition, sources and police said. Three pedestrians were struck by the flying cars — one of whom was left clinging to life.

The driver who tried to mow down the crowd was transported to the hospital with life-threatening injuries. He died of his injuries around 8 p.m. Monday and was identified as Michael Avery, law enforcement sources told The Post. The incident is being investigated as possible domestic terrorism.

Avery, from Syracuse, had rented a hotel room in Rochester, where police conducted a search and recovered a suicide note and journal, according to law enforcement sources. Investigators are reviewing the journal for any clues into the attack and have interviewed family members who said they believed the suspect had bipolar depression, though he was never officially diagnosed, the sources said. Authorities are planning to conduct a search of a storage unit belonging to Avery in north Syracuse as well.

I'm sure the authorities will figure this out very quickly – and then cover it up just like they covered up the psycho transexual shooter from Nashville. Cultural rot that creates heroes and martyrs out of deviants and perverts while demonizing whites, Christians, conservatives and normal people is exactly the same as Muslims who slaughter the innocent among the aforementioned.

It's total chaos. If it isn't intentional (and there is ample evidence to make a very strong case that it is), it certainly is convenient cover for a junta that in every area of life and with every policy foreign and domestic has run this nation into the ground, and is on the verge of putting us at each other's throats as the specter of what happens, or is scheduled to happen, come November looms ever larger with each passing day.

D.C.’s permanent ruling class and its Marxist globalist allies throughout the globe are dedicated to one goal: eliminating national cohesion and erecting an authoritarian and technocratic super-State in its place.

Not one institution exists to help ordinary Americans.  The Pentagon is “woke” and ineffective.  The FBI-Gestapo is singularly invested in preserving the Deep State’s power.  The Federal Reserve is using “green energy”-induced inflation to transfer as much wealth as possible from poor and middle class Americans to the uber-elite before intentionally crashing the global economy.  The Department of Homeland (in)Security is using our open and undefended borders to flood the country with foreign terrorists and soldiers.  Klaus Schwab, Bill Gates, and the rest of the World Economic Forum’s faculty of “Dr. Evils” continue to promise more viral pandemics, Internet outages, and electric grid failures.  The criminal “justice” system excuses violent crime as necessary to fight “white supremacy” (for Democrats, two wrongs always make a right).  An entirely partisan Department of (in)Justice continues to punish J6 protesters for accurately identifying the 2020 election as tainted by mail-in-ballot fraud (lie, cheat, steal — the Uniparty way).  And with the whole world watching, the U.S. government seeks to lock up Donald Trump before he can return to the presidency. 

As we enter 2024, there is widespread public agreement about two things: (1) something big is about to happen, and (2) whatever that something is, it sure as hell won’t be pretty!  While it may get pretty ugly pretty fast, though, there is an upside to what’s coming: as a country, we can finally pull this disgusting Band-Aid off, face reality for what it is, and stop pretending.  However bad this year might prove to be, it might also be tremendously liberating . . .

. . . for too many years, a collection of the most depressed, least curious, morally relativistic, and intellectually homogenous people on the planet have been given pampered positions in exchange for acting as nihilistic and narcotic-dependent sea vessel captains willing to steer America into an iceberg of decline and failure.  

As that iceberg approaches, Americans who have long objected to this national suicide may at last get their say.  People with little left to lose often rise, sometimes lead, but rarely obey.  Perhaps 2024 will be remembered as the year Americans finally changed course and saved themselves.

Perhaps, but yet again, the question remains HOW? How, when the instrumentalities of government, the media, academia and the culture, along with perhaps one third of the populace are aligned in lock step against Americans?

Yes, we are the Americans. The latter are the Anti-Americans. And that doesn't even include the millions who, as the author notes, have been allowed to come here in waves, many of whom are military-age males from countries that do not exactly share our values and the ideals of Jeffersonian democracy.

The shit is for sure going to hit the fan, if not this coming November then not long after. Maybe even before then, considering the magnitude of the events that have happened around the world and within our own borders (or what were once our borders) in the past 12 to 36 months. 48 if you count the lockdowns.

It's predicated on one man, Donald Trump, who like it or not has become the focal point and the scapegoat representing America/Americans and another, Joey Sponge-Brain Shits-Pants, who is the ventriloquist's dummy for Anti-America and the forces who have a figurative (for the moment) knife at our throats:

It’s late 2024, and democrats/Socialists/Communists are getting desperate. Maybe it’s clear Trump is going to win beyond any imaginable margin of election fraud. Maybe they realize when 140% of registered voters cast ballots nationwide, Americans are going to make the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror look like a Girl Scout picnic. Maybe all those dead voters are ready to turn state’s evidence. Either way, they’re certain they’re going to jail—or worse--and not on trumped-up political charges. It’s time for martial law!

The question is, will our military fight for Joe Biden, or whichever d/S/C wants them to imprison, torture and kill Normal Americans?  . . .

. . . To be sure, there will be some social justice warriors that will turn traitor out of a misplaced sense of duty, or just because they want to be on what they think will be the winning side. But even now, most people in our military love America and Americans.  They’re the people buying the guns, living the American military ethic of duty, honor and country. They like Red Dawn and The Patriot. They’re not going to kill fellow Americans.  They know who America’s enemies are.

Who are the few that will? They’re the people who shrink from killing our actual enemies,  people who haven’t won a war in decades, people who can’t bring themselves to kill the demons that would gladly murder every American. They surely get excited, however, about strafing Des Moines, or nuking South Dakota. Suzie Soccer Mom and traditional Catholics are so much easier to beat than actual armies."

The author is former military and makes some interesting and perhaps for lack of a better word "comforting" observations about what the cutting edge of the military will do when they get their marching orders. It's cold comfort considering the nightmare scenario of even being in that situation. But the reality as it stands at least from where I sit is that this is no longer the plot of some dystopian film. The conditions here are such that it has jumped from the realm of the impossible, to the highly unlikely to something that could happen. The next two phases are the "distinct possibility" followed in short order by "quite probable."

Here's TuCa talking to Bongino last night:

“In the case of Trump, they started with protests, they moved to impeachment, now they’re at indictment. None of it has worked,” Carlson said. “What’s next? What is, what could possibly be next?”

“If you felt, and you really believe it, and a lot of them do, that the worst thing that could happen to the country, and more specifically, to you in the professional class is to have Donald Trump as president — and everything you have tried has failed, and they have been accelerating steps – protests, impeachment, indictment – like, how many more arrows do you have in your quiver? And what’s the next one? And of course it’s assassination,” Carlson said. . .

. . . “People have been assassinated in this country,” Carlson said of the United States. “Far more often than we’re willing to admit.”

Carlson said he spoke to Trump about a potential assassination, but the former president “did not engage” with the subject. Carlson admitted he does not know what Trump makes of the possibility, but said Trump is “smart, so he must know that it’s true.”

“If you want to know what’s true, just look at the things that you aren’t allowed to say. You’re not allowed to say them not because they’re conspiracy theories or lies,” Carlson said. “You’re not allowed to say them precisely because they are not conspiracy theories or lies. They are true. And that is true. Period.”

As the saying goes, "The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior." Look at everything that has happened, since at least the coming of Trump if not further back. Look at what the government (primarily the Democrats but for sure quite a few in the GOP) has done that has stripped away our freedoms, either via the legislature or more so the unelected bureaucracy, look at how even laws and due process have been either completely ignored or bastardized and used against any and all voices of opposition, look at how directly or indirectly, the government has used thugs, terrorists and criminals to foment a wave of anarcho-terrorism to keep us on edge and off balance.

It is evident to all but the willfully blind that those in power will indeed stop at nothing to maintain it. The writing is on the wall. The only unknown is our reaction to it.

Happy new year.

ABOVE THE FOLD, BREAKING, NOTEWORTHY
• “The quake collapsed buildings, cased [sic] fires and triggered tsunami alerts as far away as eastern Russia, prompting orders for residents to evacuate affected coastal areas of Japan.”
  Watch: Japan Rocked by 7.6 Magnitude Earthquake, Multiple Dead
  
• Victor Davis Hanson: "If the amorality of illegal immigration were not so deleterious to Americans, its absurdity would be laughable."
  The Utter Insanity of Joe Biden’s Open Border
  
• Kurt Schlichter: "When a dark force becomes suicidal."
  Leftist Idiocy: The Gift That Keeps On Giving
  
• "BIO is a dragnet using suspicion-less searches and compelled disclosures to look for potential financial crimes."
  The Beneficial Ownership Information Reporting Rule and the Surveillance State

Posted by: J.J. Sefton at 07:49 AM | Comments (365) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Daily Tech News 2 Undecimber 2023

Top Story

• ASML has cancelled DUV shipments to China following pressure from the US. (WCCFTech)
  
  Although the DUV scanners being sold are limited to the 14nm node, by use of multi-patterning they can produce (slowly and at significant cost) chips more-or-less equivalent to 7nm. Which is itself two generations behind the leading edge of mass production in the US, Taiwan, and South Korea.
  
  But the US government still isn't happy and wants to put a stop to that, which will of course force China to develop its own semiconductor tools industry, at which point the US will have no leverage at all.
  
  
  

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:05 AM | Comments (128) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Monday Overnight Open Thread (1/1/24) Happy New Year Edition

***

The Quotes of The Day

Quote I

“I’m always finding homeless stray animals. So it was typical for me,” Elizabeth Merriken

Quote II

"You don’t think of medical professionals doing this, but 10% of medical professionals divert drugs. 10%… That’s a lot." Dr. Robin Miller

***

Posted by: Misanthropic Humanitarian at 09:54 PM | Comments (435) | Trackbacks (Suck)

New Years Day Cafe

Arundel Castle, England

The ultimate battle: The Devil versus... Mr. Roarke.

Baby tigers walking around a living room.

Coming through! (I saw a different version of this a while back. It's a stunt.)

Drone flyovers of Neuschwannstein Castle. I'm seeing all sorts of angles now!

Man tries to remove little koala from the road, but he's a feisty one!

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 08:03 PM | Comments (222) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Sexy New Years Day Open Thread

A pre-James Bond John Barry.

Caution, the video is a little spicy. It features gallies in corsets and stockings.

Because the piece is called "Black Stockings."

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 06:43 PM | Comments (240) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Open Thread

The seventies were another time, man.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 05:15 PM | Comments (233) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Open Thread

When Cher met the Osmonds.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 04:00 PM | Comments (237) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Raven Gift Giving Open Thread

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 02:45 PM | Comments (206) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Open Thread: A Colorized Restored Variety Show from the Early 1940s

This is weird.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 01:40 PM | Comments (178) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Happy New Year!

Are you ready to charge into 2024 like a baby rhino?

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 12:25 PM | Comments (299) | Trackbacks (Suck)

THE MORNING RANT: New Year’s Update on Electric Vehicles, the Blood Diamonds of the Climate Cult

Welcome to 2024! Since New Year’s Day one year ago, the “electric vehicle transition” has gone from being a foregone conclusion to being a rolling failure. Auto manufacturers who bought into the hype are looking at a catastrophic financial miscalculation, and typical car drivers have gone from being curious (at best) to being generally negative about purchasing EVs. I believe that the conservative media’s pushback against EVs has had a considerable impact.

In other words, 2023 was a very good year – a year in which we turned opinion against electric vehicles. The people who want a boutique, status-symbol EV can continue to buy Teslas. (But can we please kill off the taxpayer subsidies for Tesla?) For all the rest, let 2024 be the year when legacy automakers throw in the towel on the eco-communist EV experiment.

For today, let’s do our periodic update on the EV Follies…

“Ford cutting 2024 F-150 Lightning production plans by half, suppliers told; The news comes amid an industrywide pullback in EV investment due to slower-than-expected sales growth.” [Automotive News – 12/11/2023]

Ford Motor Co. is dialing back planned output of the electric F-150 Lightning pickup by half next year because of "changing market demand," a steep pullback of a high-profile nameplate the automaker spent most of this year working to build in larger numbers.

Although I’ve enjoyed writing about how emphatically consumers have rejected Ford’s flagship EV, in fairness I should point out that the Ford F150 Conflagration Lightning is a spectacularly awful vehicle. Aside from its tendency to burst into flames, it performs poorly at towing, hauling for distance, and operating in the cold – the basic functionalities that are expected of a pickup truck.

The buried lede in this story isn’t that Ford is cutting weekly production of its electric pickup from 3,200 units per week to 1,600 units per week, rather it’s that Ford’s executives still think there is a market that will absorb 1,600 of these abominations per week.

*****

An electric vehicle enthusiast at Motor Trend magazine learned just how awful the EV experience can be when he and his wife had to jump in their Ford F150 Lightning and race 600 miles for a family emergency. 600 miles is at best a 10-hour drive for me in my gasoline-powered car, including gas and restroom stops. This unfortunate couple could not reach their destination in one day.

“Our Last Ford F-150 Lightning EV Pickup Road Trip Was a Nightmare” [Motor Trend – 12/22/2023]

The author of this piece points out that although Ford touts a range of 320 miles for the Lightning, it had only twice exceeded 200 miles on a charge.

We were tired and angry. Angry at the situation. Angry at Electrify America for being so historically and uniquely awful at its one job. Angry at the Ford Nav system for sending us to a charging station that, given available data, it could have known was, at best, a huge gamble on a holiday weekend.

We spent 25 minutes charging back up to 64 percent and weighing our options. We could keep pushing at this glacial pace, arriving just before dawn. Or we could find a hotel along the route with a charger, grab a couple hours of sleep, and plan on arriving at sun-up.

*****

It’s not just Ford that can’t sell its EVs. Half of Buick dealers would rather surrender their franchises than have to sell General Motors’ atrocious EV offerings.

“GM buys out nearly half of its Buick dealers across the country, who opt to not sell EVs” [Detroit Free Press – 12/20/2023]

GM’s awful executives, with little understanding of automobiles or their customers’ preferences, think they can simply dictate what consumers should buy. GM dealers, who actually understand automobiles and what their customers want, know better.

General Motors said nearly half its Buick dealers took buyouts this year rather than invest in selling and servicing electric vehicles as the automaker's brands transition to all electric by 2030.

That means GM will end 2023 with about 1,000 Buick stores nationwide, down 47% from where it started the year.

*****

General Motors is rolling out an electric version of its popular Chevrolet Blazer sport utility. Well, it’s trying to, but not very successfully.

Posted by: Buck Throckmorton at 11:00 AM | Comments (297) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Mid-Morning Art Thread

The Lighthouse at Two Lights
Edward Hopper

Posted by: CBD at 09:30 AM | Comments (233) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The Morning Report — 1/1/24

Good morning, kids. Happy and healthy new year to you all! Over the years, as I've become politically conscious, I've learned to dread election years. Whether it was the Democrat-Leftist propaganda machine sliming our candidates, and then later on discovering the awful truth that "our candidates" were just kabuki-bukkake eunuch frauds, Simon & Garfunkel's lyric about "every way you look at it you lose" went from hippie generation pop tune to emmes truth.

That is, until Donald Trump descended the Trump Tower escalator over eight years ago. Or more accurately, when what I cynically thought at that moment to be a farcical publicity stunt proved over the course of three incredible years to be a pivotal moment of actual hope for revival and reversal of the trajectory that Trump's predecessor – who no doubt still runs the show behind the scenes – had put the nation on. In point of fact, we had always been on that road that took us over a cliff, as my realization about the nature of the GOP I think shows. What Obama did was switch vehicles from a Corvair to a Lamborghini. And then he floored the accelerator.

On the other hand Trump, if not succeeding in throwing it in reverse, was to be the first Republican president to slam on the brakes and put a halt to the insanity. At least temporarily. Of course, Obama and his acolytes and comrades were not going to allow that. He's part and parcel of the counter-American Revolution that took almost a century to rot us out from within and put absolute power in his and his fellow travelers' hands. That was the other eye-opening moment; the in-your-face shredding of even the tiniest modicum of ethics and featly to the rule of law that exposed corruption not only in Congress but in our legal and judicial systems and vast swathes of the soon-to-be-extinct private sector. All because these degenerates crave absolute power.

It's out in the open. Despite the fact that the Left is wearing the rapidly decomposing skin-suit of liberty's defenders, they have no compunction. There is no nakedly criminal, banana republic act, nor red line which they will not cross to destroy our nation, or whatever's left of it, to transform it and wipe out anyone who stands in their way. That means us. Whether or not regular order and elections mean anything anymore, and readers of this column for any length of time over the past several years know that I believe they don't (on the national level anyway), at the very least, you'd think or you'd hope that there'd be an opposition party that is every bit as committed to going to the mattresses, as it were, to fight even a losing battle with the same kind of fury and anger that the Left does when in those increasingly rare occasions they have the shit end of the stick.

Here's just the latest example of having even a tiny bit of hope in that regard is a sucker's bet:

Detransitioner Chloe Cole had some tough words to offer Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine days after he shot down a bill that would have banned gender-affirming care for minors in his state, lambasting his decision for allegedly being “complicit” in the “sterilization and mutilation” of children.

“Parents don’t have a right to abuse their children. This is no different from any form of abuse,” Cole said Sunday on “Fox & Friends Weekend.” “This is the sterilization and mutilation of thousands of children happening within a state that is being entirely complicit in the choice to continue this.”

DeWine, a Republican, vetoed the GOP-backed Save Adolescents from Experimentation (SAFE) Act on Friday, sparking outrage from conservatives who blasted him as a “coward” for his decision. The bill would have banned gender-affirming procedures for minors in the Buckeye State and would have additionally barred transgender athletes from competing in women’s sports.

“Were I to sign Substitute House Bill 68 or were Substitute House Bill 68 to become law, Ohio would be saying that the State, that the government, knows what is best medically for a child rather than the two people who love that child the most, the parents,” DeWine said in his veto message. He additionally cited the “profound” consequences the bill could have on children struggling with gender dysphoria as well as their families and said his decision boiled down to input from parents who believed their children’s lives depended on the treatment they received.

Cole, who formerly took steps to complete a female-to-male transition and has since been among the most outspoken critics against gender-affirming care for minors, claimed DeWine’s veto came just days after she shared her story with him during a Zoom call. . . “He knows just how horrific this is to do to children. His decision to continue this… it’s not just a matter of pure incompetence or ignorance.”

She's right. It's a matter of pure, fucking graft:

Republican Gov. Mike DeWine of Ohio received thousands of dollars in donations from donors who provided transgender medical services or opposed efforts to ban the procedures for minors.

DeWine vetoed House Bill 68 on Friday, which would have prohibited doctors from prescribing puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for minors and banned boys from competing in girls’ sports, just hours before the deadline. A review of donations from 2018 to 2023 found that the governor received $40,300 from the Ohio Children’s Hospital Association (OCHA), Cincinnati Children’s, Nationwide Children’s Hospital and ProMedica Children’s Hospital, all of whom support transgender medical care.

OCHA donated $10,000 to the Mike DeWine and Jon Husted Transition Fund on Dec. 28, 2018, and another $10,000 on Dec. 7, 2022, according to the report. A transition fund allows candidates to spend donations for “transition activities and inaugural celebrations,” according to Ohio’s campaign finance handbook.

Cincinnati Children’s, an affiliate of OCHA, donated $300 on Dec. 15, 2022, to the fund and ProMedica, another affiliate of OCHA, also donated $10,000 in December 2018, according to the reports. Nationwide Children’s, a third affiliate with OCHA, donated $5,000 in December 2018 and another $5,000 in January 2023 to the transition fund.

It's one thing if this Swifty Lazar-looking stooge truly believed the crap that some flunky wrote for him. That would be bad enough insofar as we're supposed to be the party of sanity and normalcy, opposed to this insanity of equating child mutilation with that of being Rosa Parks, or keeping men who tuck their junk the hell out of girls locker rooms, where their junk magically springs to life.

But Mike DeWine has no principles. He takes payoffs and pretends to be concerned "for the children." Bad enough our election system is at best compromised and at worst rigged in advance for Democrats. But to be saddled with unmitigated scumbags like this guy is just the bitter end.

With that, I welcome you to 2024. If 2020 didn't finish us off completely, this year certainly will which is why I have dreaded it almost since the day Joey Sponge-Brain Shits-Pants was installed almost three years ago. But, as we discussed on the 2023 Year in Review podcast, we can never know the future. Our enemies hold the high ground and then some, but they are not infallible. I sense a change in the mood of the nation in its entirety, even across political lines among reasonable people who have had enough of the past three years and want no more of it.

Elections, rigged elections or no elections, change is coming. Buckle up, kids.

ABOVE THE FOLD, BREAKING, NOTEWORTHY
• Clarice Feldman: "While it seems unlikely that 2024 will be better than this one has been, there are some reasons for optimism."
  Happy New Year, Anyway
  
• "Goodbye, 2023; Hello, 2024."
  A Reckoning Approaches
  
• "A conversation with Shelby and Eli Steele."
  Race, Innocence, and Power
  
• Roger Kimball: "Benevolence is a curious creature. Its operation tends to be more beneficent the more specific it is."
  The Pitfalls of Benevolence: Unpacking the Toxic Mix of Universal Good Intentions and Political Correctness in the New Year

Posted by: J.J. Sefton at 07:49 AM | Comments (293) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Daily Tech News 32 December 2023

Top Story

• After migrating a huge application spread across a hundred servers from one cloud to another, my key takeaway was containerisation.
  
  Not using Docker, which is great if you're deploying simple applications created by some other group that has a build team. Well, not great, but adequate. Actually Docker pretty much sucks even then, but there are worse things. Like Node.js.
  
  My preferred containerisation platform is LXD.
  
  So they blew that up. (Linux Containers)
  
  To make a stupid story short, LXD is Canonical's - the people behind Ubuntu Linux - build of the Linux Containers system. It works well. It's still supported.
  
  But they've moved it from the Apache license, which lets you do pretty much anything you want, to AGPL, which forces you to release your updates if you build a complex service based on it. And that license makes corporate lawyers itchy.
  
  
  
• And they've added a contributor license agreement to control the terms under which open-source developers can contribute to the project. (Stephane Graber)
  
  This is not usually a good sign.
  
  
  
• And Canonical has stopped contributing to the upkeep of the public container image server. So if you're running LXD 5.20 or later - the version where these license changes took effect - and you want to install an image from that image server you should have done it yesterday. (Linux Containers)
  
  Access to system images is being phased out for LXD users in steps, starting today, with all access being cut off for all LXD users by May 1st.
  
  You can still install Ubuntu under LXD on Ubuntu, which is in fact what I do 97% of the time. The other 3% may become a problem.
  
  When you find a solution that works, it's only a matter of time before somebody takes it away.
  
  
  

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:00 AM | Comments (123) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Sunday Overnight Open Thread (12/31/23) New Year's Eve Edition Or Amateur's Night

As December Zappa Month comes to an end. I wish to thank each and everyone one of you who enjoyed it. The Lord willing and the creeks don't rise, Zappa Month will be back in 2024.

***

The Quotes of The Day

Quote I

"We're facing homelessness from the end of the lease because I can't afford to pay the $630 and her response to that was that if I don't vacate the premises by the first of January then the owners can take me to court." Jakki Brooking, RN

When a government program has the word "scheme" in it's title, look out.

Quote II

"My son is here so I need to come back and visit him - but I think it's going to be really hard to come back now.

"First they [The Home Office] refused to renew my visa, now they're making it impossible for me to visit. It's horrible what they are doing." Claudia Marcos Sanchez

Quote III

“There was a bit of oinking around in Springfield this week after a pig got loose and went hog wild,”The Ohio State Highway Patrol

Posted by: Misanthropic Humanitarian at 09:45 PM | Comments (734) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Gun Thread: Happy One Week After the Night Before Christmas Edition!

(is almost over)

Howdy, Y'all! Welcome to the wondrously fabulous Gun Thread! As always, I want to thank all of our regulars for being here week in and week out, and also offer a bigly Gun Thread welcome to any newcomers who may be joining us tonight. Howdy and thank you for stopping by! I hope you find our wacky conversation on the subject of guns 'n shooting both enjoyable and informative. You are always welcome to lurk in the shadows of shame, but I'd like to invite you to jump into the conversation, say howdy, and tell us what kind of shooting you like to do!

Holy Shitballs! How in the ever-loving hell did it get to be One Week After the Night Before Christmas? How many of you choose to celebrate? Do you go out and whoop it up, or are you usually asleep on the couch by 10:30, which is the Weasel M.O.? Thinking back I believe the last time I was up at the stroke of midnight was for 2000 with a small group of amigos, and since the world didn't end, went home shortly thereafter. Anyway, Happy New Year everyone!

I am still way behind on all of my email correspondence, so many thanks for your continued patience.

With that, step into the dojo and let's get to the gun stuff below, shall we?

Posted by: Weasel at 07:00 PM | Comments (272) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Food Thread: Pop! Goes The Bottle...Happy New Year!

Champagne is the traditional celebratory drink, and its place as the preferred New Year's Eve bottle is cemented in our culture.

But...there is a lot of crap champagne out there that isn't much fun to drink! Too sweet...to acidic...too bubbly...not bubbly enough. And when I say champagne I mean the real stuff from France and the sometimes excellent copies from around the world. Just because it isn't real Champagne doesn't mean it isn't going to be good, and real Champagne is no guarantee of quality.

But the really important part is whether you even enjoy a carbonated drink! There are lots of people who don't, and that is fine, because the only important calculation when choosing something to drink is; "Do I like it?"

Like Bourbon and Scotch and fine wines, there is a lot of hype surrounding champagne, and those $500 bottles are mostly advertising and scarcity. Sure, there are great bottles out there, and I have had a few bottles of vintage, aged Champagne that were pretty damned delicious.

So if you are looking for a celebratory bottle but don't have much experience, then a bottle from one of the several good American producers is a good bet, and they are a fraction of the cost of the French stuff. There's even one from New Mexico (Gruet) that isn't bad for the price. The Italians make Prosecco, which is a lower end sparkling wine, but it can be loads of fun and delicious. And the French make sparkling wines that are not from Champagne but are still delicious, and reasonably priced, so you can go that route as well.

Regardless...it's just bottle of fermented grape juice; it doesn't have mystical properties that will make your date into Claudia Schiffer or Chris Hemsworth!

Posted by: CBD at 04:00 PM | Comments (401) | Trackbacks (Suck)