One in Five Young Americans Has a Positive Impression of... Osama Bin Ladin

You don't say.

Gee, I wonder how they came by these insane pro-terrorist-violence Marxist opinions.

Oh that's right. I remember now.

The Daily Mail:

One in five young Americans has a positive view of 9/11 mastermind and Al Qaeda founder Osama Bin Laden, according to disturbing results of a DailyMail.com poll.

The alarming survey also found three in 10 Gen Z voters believe the views of the anti-Semitic terrorist leader who slaughtered thousands of innocent people were a 'force for good'.

Family members of 9/11 victims said the findings are 'horrifying' and proof of a startling trend suggesting some in the younger generation are growing sympathetic to terrorists.

Another DailyMail.com poll in October found one in 10 voters under the age of 30 had a positive view of Hamas, despite the group's murderous attack on Israel that killed more than 1,300 men, women and children.

You know who is definitely not down with Osama bin Ladin?

The one generation since WWII that's worth a damn.*

Gen X and President Biden: Reality bites
December 27, 20235:29 AM ET

President Biden is most unpopular among members of Generation X, who lean more conservative than those in other generations.

...

"Gen X is the most Republican of the generations," said Jean Twenge, a psychology professor at San Diego State University and author of the book Generations, which examines what drives generational differences.

NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist polling underscores that point: By generation, Biden has the highest disapproval rating from Generation X (62%), compared with the Silent/Greatest Generation (48%), baby boomers (48%) and Generation Z/millennials (50%). Biden also has the highest "strongly disapprove" rating from Gen X (52%), compared with the Silent/Greatest Generation (41%), boomers (39%) and Gen Z/millennials (35%).

Twenge says that political leanings of generations can be influenced by the popularity of the president when that generation is in adolescence or young adulthood. For Gen X, that is largely defined by an unpopular Carter and a popular Republican president, Ronald Reagan.
...

...

Walters added that Trump's "Make America Great Again" messaging appeals to older voters, particularly boomers but also their Gen X children. "They saw their parents doing well or making a decent life that they feel like they weren't able to have the same access to -- could be the other piece."

...

Culture wars are nothing new for Gen Xers -- the generation that coined the term "political correctness" -- but the current debate over when and how to police speech is particularly unpopular with them. "Gen X really prides themselves on being tough, and based on their upbringing and childhood and their adolescence, there's just a lot of pride in being able to roll with the punches and being able to have conversations with people you disagree with," said Twenge.

Gen Xers are not as culturally conservative as boomers -- the generation that preceded them. But they're also not as culturally progressive as millennials and Gen Z.

Sean Trende, senior elections analyst for RealClearPolitics and himself a Gen Xer, described it as "almost like a cultural libertarianism."

"We call it culture war or cancel culture or wokeness or whatever -- I think Generation X is the one that that reverberates negatively with the most," he said.

* As a generation, I mean. Obviously there are lots of great examples from all generations, and terrible examples from Gen X.

But yeah, overall, Gen X is the one which is broadly sane. Unfortunately, it's also the smallest generation. (Excluding older generations who are losing population due to dying off.)

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 02:30 PM | Comments (222) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Comer, Jordan: We Are Exploring Impeaching Joe Biden for Advising His Crackhead Bagman Son to Defy a Congressional Subpoena and Obstruct Justice

Nice.

Hunter Biden defied a congressional subpoena, because he did not want to answer questions about sending money to his father. He would either have to commit perjury, opening himself up to further charges, or admit that his father solicited bribes using him as the bagman.

He also did not want people to see him dodging the question and invoking vague "privileges" when in fact he's invoking the fifth amendment to avoid incriminating himself in a crime.

But apparently the "president" encouraged his son to do this. He encouraged his son to frustrate an impeachment inquiry against him.

Which sounds insurrectioney to me.

Jordan and Comer are considering adding new impeachment charges, for encouraging a witness to not testify.

Isn't Jack Smith claiming Trump obstructed justice by doing that?

"In light of an official statement from the White House that President Biden was aware in advance that his son, Hunter Biden, would knowingly defy two congressional subpoenas, we are compelled to examine as part of our impeachment inquiry whether the President engaged in a conspiracy to obstruct a proceeding of Congress," Comer and Jordan mentioned in a Wednesday letter to White House Counsel Edward Siskel.

The letter later goes on to later mention that "the fact that the President had advanced awareness that Mr. Biden would defy the Committees' subpoenas raises a troubling new question that we must examine: whether the President corruptly sought to influence or obstruct the Committees' proceeding by preventing, discouraging, or dissuading his son from complying with the Committees' subpoenas." As the chairmen note, "[s]uch conduct could constitute an impeachable offense." The letter cites 18 U.S.C. sec. 1505.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 01:30 PM | Comments (175) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Without Even Bothering With the Fig Leaf of a Trial, the Partisan Democrat Lunatic Maine Secretary of State Decrees, On Her Own Non-Existent Authority, That Trump is an Insurrectionist and Must Be Removed from the Primary Ballot

Hopefully we'll soon see a lawsuit and that the Supreme Court takes up this matter immediately and adds it to the Colorado election-rigging.

The left are insurrectionists and must be prosecuted as such.

Ed Morrissey, who then quotes the Washington Post:

In Maine, Democrats didn't even bother with a judicial pretense. Also yesterday, Maine's secretary of state Shenna Bellows barred Trump from appearing on the ballot after she decreed Trump an insurrectionist based on three challenges from registered voters. Bellows held a hearing two weeks prior to take testimony, and deduced Trump's guilt without any trial or judicial involvement at all:

"The events of January 6, 2021 were unprecedented and tragic," Bellows wrote in Thursday's decision. "They were an attack not only upon the Capitol and government officials, but also an attack on the rule of law. The evidence here demonstrates that they occurred at the behest of, and with the knowledge and support of, the outgoing President. The U.S. Constitution does not tolerate an assault on the foundations of our government, and [Maine law] requires me to act in response."

Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said Trump would quickly appeal the Maine decision.

"Democrats in blue states are recklessly and un-Constitutionally suspending the civil rights of the American voters by attempting to summarily remove President Trump's name from the ballot," Cheung said in a statement. "Make no mistake, these partisan election interference efforts are a hostile assault on American democracy."

Morrissey points out that sec. 3 was created specifically to bar Confederate soldiers from running for office. The judges in Colorado, and now this fruitbat Maine operative, just blow this off and decide that they will stretch the definition of the Confederacy.

He also points out that the law directs Congress, not the Colorado Supreme Court nor the Maine Secretary of State, to create legislation to address this. Congress has not in fact done this.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 12:30 PM | Comments (323) | Trackbacks (Suck)

THE MORNING RANT: End of Year Buck Shots (12/29/2023)

States are Fighting Back Against Woke Capital

Whatever may play out in the national GOP presidential horse race, there are some elected Republicans at the state level who are actively fighting the culture war against the Bond villains of woke capital. Be it Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, or West Virginia Treasurer Riley Moore, these are warriors who don’t just spout platitudes, they are using the power of their offices to fight and inflict setbacks on the corporatist/communist alliance.

Add another one to this list – Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti, who is suing BlackRock on behalf of Tennesseans whose investment returns are being compromised by the investment giant’s commitment to Net Zero and ESG.

“Tennessee sues BlackRock in first-of-its-kind ESG lawsuit” [Fox News – 12/18/2023]

"Yet for years, BlackRock has misled consumers about the scope and effects of its widespread ESG activity," it adds. "BlackRock’s conduct concerning the marketing or sale of its investment products and services constitutes deceptive acts and practices under the Tennessee Consumer Protection Act."

The lawsuit notes that BlackRock in recent years has joined activist organizations — namely the Net Zero Asset Managers initiative and Climate Action 100+ — which require member companies and groups to make certain climate commitments.

It cannot be stated enough that it is at the state and local level that conservatives have actual political power. Thanks to Ron DeSantis and Florida Republicans, freedom is on the march in the Sunshine State, and the woke left has taken some serious hits there. As much as I’d like to see Ron DeSantis in the White House, I’d like to see 30 more Ron DeSantises in governors’ mansions across the USA. We need several dozen more Republican attorney generals like Paxton and Skrmetti, who will aggressively target woke corporations and oligopolies. We need Riley Moores in every Treasury office denying woke capital the funds they need to do their evil work.

Let’s keep fighting nationally, but let’s keep winning locally.

And, yes, we are winning, and the Bond villains are scared of the state-level pushback against them. BlackRock and its CEO Larry Fink have suddenly started blanketing the media in Tennessee with ads, including full-page newspaper ads, and also ads on social media, like this one on Twitter.

This ad campaign won’t help. People are fed up with the woke/ESG insanity and they are fed up with Black Rock. I fully expect Black Rock to have to change its toxic name at some point, like so many of the tobacco companies ended up doing.

*****

Blue City Police Exodus

My suburban Tennessee town just hired a police officer with a couple of decades prior experience on the New York City Police Department. He is one of the police officers alluded to in this story:

“NYPD cops leave force in alarming rate — over 2,500 turned in badges so far in 2023” [NY Post – 11/25/2023]

This article mainly talks about the crushing workload on those officers who remain with the NYPD amid budget cuts and canceled police academy classes, but it must be incredibly demoralizing to try protect the citizenry from crime when the local district attorney is explicitly pro-crime, and the people whom the police are trying to protect vote overwhelmingly for pro-crime politicians.

One police officer, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retribution, told The Post he plans to leave the job this summer when he hits 20 years. “I keep in contact with the guys that I was in the police academy with and we all have the same notion,” he said of his 2004 class of 2,400. “I think maybe 95% of us are planning on leaving.”

My little southern town has also just hired a former Los Angeles police officer, and I have a new neighbor who took early retirement from another large California police department to move to Tennessee and seek other employment.

The good news is that these blue state cops fleeing to red states are bringing us more red votes. They’re predominantly conservative refugees coming to safe ground, not colonizers bringing hostile values.

*****

Dear Mega-Bank CEOs, I’m Sorry This is Happening to You

My pro-business, free-market, anti-regulation principles should lead me to care more about punitive regulations being imposed on Wall Street banks.

Posted by: Buck Throckmorton at 11:00 AM | Comments (313) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Mid-Morning Art Thread

St. Sebastian
Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino

Don't talk sh*t about my man Raf!

Posted by: CBD at 09:30 AM | Comments (225) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The Morning Report — 12/29/23

Good morning, kids. The final Morning Report for this accursed year of 2023 kicks off with yet another jackbooted stomp to our head, as the criminals running the state of Maine have joined Colorado in naked, partisan, banana republic election interference.

Maine Secretary of State Shenna Bellows held a hearing on three challenges related to the nomination petition of Trump, according to a copy of the decision. The petitions were separately filed by Mary Ann Royal, Kimberly Rosen and Thomas Saviello and Ethan Strimling, who challenged Trump’s qualification under the “insurrectionist ban” of the 14th Amendment.

Section 3 of the 14th Amendment states no person should hold elected office if they “have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.”

“For the reasons set forth below, I conclude that Mr. Trump’s primary petition is invalid,” Bellows wrote. “Specifically, I find that the declaration on his candidate consent form if false because he is not qualified to hold the office of the President under Section 3 of the Fourteenth Amendment.”

Whatever one thinks about the 2020 election and the events of 1/6/21, aside from the fact that Section 3 of the 14th Amendment has zero bearing on today, the reasoning of this filthy shit-whore apparatchik is complete and utter horseshit for one reason and one reason alone: Donald Trump has neither been tried nor convicted of leading or fomenting an insurrection.

Obviously, this doesn't matter in the least to these wretched bastards. This decision actually comes on the heels of the Colorado removal being stayed and Trump being kept on the ballot temporarily until SCOTUS gets the opportunity to review it. They knew this would happen and I'm sure the Maine GOP will do the same and be granted a stay as well. All this is is an attempt to slime Trump even further and more to the point, entangle him in so many legal battles as to drain away his financial and other resources.

As for SCOTUS, I'd like to think that they'd reject this 9-0, if for no other reason than for the sake of the nation since if it goes along party lines, the Left will condemn the court as illegitimate. For sure, if the court rules that removing Trump from the ballot is kosher, then if the nation isn't dead already, this would be taking a dump on its grave. That said, whatever the outcome of the 2024 election vis a vis who is either legitimately elected or like 2020 is "selected," one side is not going to accept the results.

Hold that thought for a moment while I regale you with the most chutzpocritical statement I've found this morning.

[Democrat Maine Rep. Jared] Golden took to Twitter to post his response to Secretary of State Shenna Bellows’ decision to remove the former president from Maine’s ballot . . .

. . . “I voted to impeach Donald Trump for his role in the January 6th insurrection. I do not believe he should be re-elected as President of the United States. However, we are a nation of laws, therefore until he is actually found guilty of the crime of insurrection, he should be allowed on the ballot,” Golden posted.

Following the Jan. 6 capitol riot, Golden supported impeaching Trump from office in January 2021, co-sponsoring the article of impeachment introduced by Democrat Rhode Island Rep. David Cicilline, according to News Center Maine. The Maine Democrat formerly stated he supported the impeachment “without reservation,” as he had “no question or doubt about the president’s conduct and responsibility for last week’s assault upon the United States Capitol and the United States Congress,” the outlet reported.

Golden further expressed his discontent with the former president’s actions during the Jan. 6 events, claiming Trump had “incited” the insurrection against the U.S. Capitol.

Wait a second; Golden voted to impeach him “without reservation” because he believes that he did lead an insurrection on 1/6 but that we need to "follow the rule of law" and leave him on the ballot " until he is actually found guilty of the crime of insurrection." Notice that he didn't say UNLESS, he said UNTIL. Either it's wishful thinking or, like every other thing in our whorehouse of a criminal justice system, he knows in advance what the outcome is going to be.

In any case, I understand that impeachment and removal from office is a purely political process and not a criminal proceeding. Regardless, this miserable worm knew full well that what happened on 1/6 was about as close to an "insurrection" as David "Little Shitler" Hogg is to being Mr. Universe (at least in the formerly non-woke, non-soy, relatively sane world of yore). But that said, if he truly believes that Trump led an insurrection, isn't what the Secs of State in CO and in ME did completely Constitutional? Why not come out and say that? Or more to the point, why not come out and declare the opposite?

Because he knows full well that to do so would be a clear admission that what is being done to Trump is pure, unmitigated persecution of the kind usually found in the worst dictatorships and totalitarian regimes. And, at least in my non-expert estimation, that would put what's being done to him by Jack Smith in a rather unflattering light to say the least. Perhaps to the point of collapsing that case entirely. Meh, with Judges like Tanya Shitcan, Amy Berman Jackson, Beryl Howell and Emmett "Freisler" Sullivan and a 12-0 to convict guaranteed from a DC jury pool . . .

That brings us back to the Supreme Court. And considering the gravity of the situation, it's going to be a case that John Judas Roberts will not be able to avoid before the 2024 Election. Oh boy.

“I think it’s really important Pete, for every single American who is seeing this news alert pop up to recognize how dangerous this is,” [Tulsi] Gabbard told “Hannity” guest host Pete Hegseth. “You have a secretary of state who is a known partisan, who is known to be against Trump, she supported the impeachment of Trump, single-handedly making this decision to say the former president cannot be on the ballot, taking away our right as voters in this country to decide who we want to serve as our next president and commander in chief.”

. . . “This is the M.O. of the Democrat elite. They will stop at nothing to try to maintain their power, even if it means taking away the right to vote of Americans. They have no issue taking Trump off the ballot, they have no issue pursuing him and persecuting him through a weaponized and politicized Department of Justice. They have no qualms doing whatever they feel is necessary to hold on to power. It is ridiculous that we are having this conversation in the United States of America.”

Ridiculous indeed, but nevertheless it's reality. And I highlighted that sentence from Tulsi Gabbard because if she's saying it, then she must understand the implications.

To be absolutely clear, I'm talking about physically taking out Donald Trump if all of these efforts fail.

Remember how Chuck Schemer threatened Trump? "Let me tell you, you take on the intelligence community, they have six ways from Sunday of getting back at you." And remember his gossamer-thin threats of physical violence against Justices Gorsuch and Alito to make them think twice about overturning Roe?

As an aside, Tulsi is no longer a Democrat and, regardless of who else is in the VP pool, she might be a dark horse (no pun). For sure she's a damn sight better by far than dusky duplicitous Nikki Haley. But I digress.

Psaki-psircling back to Golden boy, his motive for opposing the removal is purely political in that every time a new charge or new insane accusation is hurled at Trump, his poll numbers go up. And with Joey Sponge-Brain Shits-Pants' numbers cratering simultaneously as everything he touches turns to shit, it does not bode well for the Dems next November.

Beyond even the elections, there is just no way in hell that the Left in this country is going to give up their hold on power. Regardless of the fact that the real power, the Bureaucracy, is likely there forever, the nation itself has been cleaved in half. As events around the world become more and more out of control, and the situation devolves here with equal speed, the temptation for those who have dragged our nation, culture, and society down to a level that was inconceivable even just a few years ago have nothing to lose in doing the unthinkable. They have nothing to lose because they have everything to lose: the 100-plus year anti-American Revolution that they are this close to completing.

* * * * * * * * * *

As this is the last Morning Report for the year, I want to thank Ace, my co-bloggers and all of you for being here, commenting and all your support for making this the best place to be on the interwebz.

Wishing you all a happy, healthy, prosperous and peaceful new year ahead. See you next year.

ABOVE THE FOLD, BREAKING, NOTEWORTHY
• "Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn dedicated his book about the end state of communism ‘to all those who did not live to tell it.’"
  50 Years Ago, Gulag Archipelago Unveiled a Haunted World
  
• Fred Fleitz: "With the prospect of a major political change in the United States next November, 2024 could be a very unstable and dangerous year for American and international security."
  Upcoming U.S. Presidential Election Could Fuel Global Instability in 2024
  
• "Ironically, Biden is almost certain to campaign next year as the 'anti-dictator candidate,' all the damning details of his record notwithstanding. Las Vegas is not yet taking wagers on how many Revolutionary War cannons Biden will dredge up for his campaign speeches."
  Joe Biden and the Left are Putting the Rule of Law at Risk (Too late; they killed it 3 years ago - jjs)

Posted by: J.J. Sefton at 07:57 AM | Comments (322) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Daily Tech News 29 December 2023

Top Story

• The New York Times is suing OpenAI and Microsoft over copyright infringement by ChatGPT and Copilot. (Tom's Hardware)
  
  This suit seems more substantive than some earlier ones, with examples showing that ChatGPT will reproduce large chunks of NYT articles word-for-word.
  
  Where the case falls down is the NYT's attempt to paint itself as, if not a paragon of virtue, at least a public good, when the organisation is the editorial equivalent of pancreatic cancer, if pancreatic cancer were communicable.
  
  It's no real surprise that ChatGPT does this, of course. It's yet another weakness of building a language model rather than a fact model. Facts cannot be copyrighted.
  
  
  

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:00 AM | Comments (222) | Trackbacks (Suck)

20th Anniversary ONT

Today is the blog's 20 year anniversary, which is only one of the momentous things that happened on this day in history.

Ooof. Man, that's cold.

Posted by: WeirdDave at 10:00 PM | Comments (484) | Trackbacks (Suck)

No Roughhousing Cafe

Chamonix, France
by @maud_bsc

A cat always lands on its feet, and a cat always lays on its belly. It is known.

Dog decides to take it easy today.

Panda doing panda-type things.

Cat wants attention. She should just change her pronouns.

It's almost Friday. Almost.

The band comes down to play Duncanthrax's New Years Eve party.

Now this is some Republican-level pouncing.

A young monkey is rehabilitated and then reunited with his troop.

An Innocent Dog.

I think I'm being punked.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 07:24 PM | Comments (334) | Trackbacks (Suck)

20th Anniversary Repost: Tom Friedman

Originally published Nov. 18, 2015. The joke here -- which I think might have been inspired by a commenter's mention of it -- is that Tom Friedman only says two things in his columns.

1, that the world is interconnected and that there are zero downsides to every culture being leveled and made into corporate consumerist carbon copies, and 2, that every time he gets into a cab in a foreign country, the cabbie has some insight that points out just how right Tom Friedman is that the world is interconnected and that there's zero downside to corporate anti-cultural leveling.

Every single one can't stop themselves from telling Tom Friedman that the two things he thinks are 100% RIGHT.

If Klaus Schwabb had a Tinkerbell, it would be Tom Friedman.

Oh, and the other thing he writes about are glowing paeans to his Communist Chinese heroes, who he thinks are doing a great job of stripping people of their liberty and individuality to make them into perfect soulless production/consumption machines.

But I didn't write about that one here. Just the first two things.

A Conversation With a Cabbie and What It Tells Us About The Next Several Minutes of My Life

by Tom Friedman
Special Guest Columnist for Ace of Spades HQ

I was talking to my cabbie in Cairo, making idle chit-chat as we threaded our way through a colorful and boisterous bazaar, what the locals call a souk, when I pointed out how the world is becoming more interconnected every second.

Then, he stabbed me.

As the blade slipped between my ribs, it occurred to me the rubber of the knife's handle was made in Brazil, and the steel crafted in Japan. Much like the gaudy wares on display at the souk outside the red-flecked windows, my backseat butchering was a glorious melange of the intersection of ideas at the great crossroads of the world.

As my cabbie continued to stab at my torso, I pondered that this moment was made possible by what I call "the pollenization of possibility."

Consider: It required the melding of three cultures, Brazilian, Japanese, and Egyptian, to produce the perforation in my Minnesota-made kidney. It was as if the grand viziers of thought and the great moguls of trade had conspired for years to come together into the red-tipped point of my itinerant assassin's dagger.

You can see this everywhere in the world, in "American" cars with parts made in Japan and largely assembled in Mexico, or in the latest "killer" app, conceived in Silicon Valley but coded in Seoul.

The pace of cross-pollenization and adaptation is unstoppable and ever-increasing, much like the crazed murder-tempo of my assailant's unexpected blood-frenzy.

I hold up my hands in defense, like those "left behind" in the New Economy, trying to protect themselves from the incoming sharp edge of disruptive change. Though, in my case, I was actually trying to protect myself from the incoming the sharp edge of stabbing.

But, just as ideas from far-away cultures penetrate our society, the blade cuts into me like a viral meme, or perhaps a catchy Bollywood song.

But one of those songs that plunges deeply into the meat of your palm and severs the nerves to your fingers.

I cry out to passers-by for help, but just like those left behind by globalization, they are heedless of the changes happening all around them.

Finally, I catch their attention. Then they begin stabbing me too.

As the crowd gathers around me with knives and antiquated farm implements, some scratch-made, some from the nuevas factorias of Veracruz, it strikes to me that I am witnessing what I call the "sudden inevitable."

In my book The Sudden Inevitable, I trace how events that overtake us have percolated in the collective unconscious for decades, even centuries.

This guy just cut off my foot with a shovel.

Ideas are pregnant in the ether before any human speaks them aloud, much like the idea of stabbing me to death has long percolated (I suspect) in the collective mind of my closest confreres.

And thus, as I lie wet and wriggling upon the ground, this conclave of multicultural avatars pulling off my pants and leaving me naked to the waist for God knows what reason, I think about the quickening pulse of international concourse, and how it matches my own quickening pulse, as my heartbeat becomes fast, weak, and thready due to rapid exsanguination. Something of the world has been lost, and it will not be returning any time soon.

Rather like my foot, which I see now has been placed upon a table in the souk and is now being offered for sale at the price of one pound, sixty piastres. I'm rather proud that the foot of a simple man from the farms of Minnesota should command such a lofty price in this place, this chattering beehive of a bazaar where the locals come to haggle over bolts of cotton and baskets of taro, and where Westerners come to be butchered and stripped down for their organs.

And their foot.

I cannot speak any longer. My microrecorder (made in the Netherlands) is almost full. Oh bugger, they just took that too

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 06:30 PM | Comments (191) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Biden: You Know, the Ukrainians Will Probably Have to Cede Territory to Russia to End This War

Via David Strom, Biden is now declaring himself to be a Puppet of Putin and a peddler of RUSSIAN MALINFORMATION.

Politico:

With U.S. and European aid to Ukraine now in serious jeopardy, the Biden administration and European officials are quietly shifting their focus from supporting Ukraine's goal of total victory over Russia to improving its position in an eventual negotiation to end the war, according to a Biden administration official and a European diplomat based in Washington. Such a negotiation would likely mean giving up parts of Ukraine to Russia.

The White House and Pentagon publicly insist there is no official change in administration policy -- that they still support Ukraine's aim of forcing Russia's military completely out of the country. But along with the Ukrainians themselves, U.S. and European officials are now discussing the redeployment of Kyiv's forces away from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy's mostly failed counteroffensive into a stronger defensive position against Russian forces in the east, according to the administration official and the European diplomat, and confirmed by a senior administration official.

The White House signals to Politico that the war in Ukraine will end through negotiation, probably by giving up territory, something which if you said 6 months ago made you Putin's right hand man https://t.co/qkOPu0Lv6n pic.twitter.com/vacxWoKofr

-- Zaid Jilani (@ZaidJilani) December 27, 2023

Blinken on previous levels of funding and arming: "These levels of support and assistance will no longer be necessary."

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 05:11 PM | Comments (337) | Trackbacks (Suck)

20th Anniversary Repost: Kaboom Kids

Originally published September 4, 2013. I don't know why I thought of this, but it's true. I really was jealous of kids who got to eat the brand-name cereals.

We Can Run, But We Can Never Outrun Our Childhood Breakfast Cereals

I don't want to admit this, really, but -- and what you're about to read is pretty much actually true -- since I was a child, I've had a strong revulsion to Kaboom cereal, due to what may be called a early-childhood type of social dysmorphia.

And, ultimately, self-hatred.

You say you've never heard of Kaboom? You think I'm making Kaboom up?

Well let me explain this. You've heard of Apple Jacks, right? Sure you have. Everyone has.

I wanted to be an Apple Jacks kid.

Apple Jacks kids had so much fun in the commercials. Fresh-faced, healthy, and free, and hopeful for the future. Singing and dancing and just loving on their Apple Jacks.

And the cereal was awesome too. I had it once in a Snack-Pack that fell off a truck.

But there were no commercials for Kaboom.

It was just a dirty little secret, like massage parlors and the back room at a pawnbroker's.

That's why you never heard of it.

But Kaboom kids know. Kaboom kids understand.

Apple Jacks was for winners.
Kaboom was the cereal of The Defeated

I mean, look at this box. Who is that box for? Who is the intended demographic here ?

People who are coming up in the world? People who are upwardly mobile?

No. Kaboom was for people -- children, I mean -- who had decided to give up on life. And it's a sad thing for a six-year-old to have already thrown in the towel and said, "Ah well. The hopes and dreams of kindergarten are ultimately exposed as so much folly. Give me the Kaboom, Ma. I'm ready to settle."

Because that's all such a cereal is fit for, those who settle, who accept, those who lower their gaze in defeat and shame. This, this horrid Clown Cereal that looks like it's some kind of weird generic brand but it's actually marketed by General Mills. I suppose this was General Mills' attempt to tap the "downscale demographic" in six-year-olds.

First of all, children hate clowns. All children. There's a joke that everyone's afraid of clowns. Well that's not true. But everyone does hate them. Children most of all, because clowns get up in your grill with horrible jokes and diseased breath, eyes glassy with vodka and pedophilia.

So who's this cereal for exactly? I suppose clowns might buy it for their victims and abductees, but that's not a large market. Well, not that large, anyway. Couple hundred thousand units a year, tops.

When marketers found that most children
described the Kaboom clown as "creepy,"
they called a meeting, and then added
a creepy bear and creepy hippo into the mix.
Note that the hippo is not really your classic circus animal
but this is in line with Kaboom's "Who Cares?" design parameters

And look at that box. Look at the colors. They're horrible. And this was not a color scheme that was in vogue back in the day, either. No, among all the other breakfast cereals, Kaboom stood out as a cereal where the manufacturers simply were not even trying, because they wanted to appeal to children who had already decided that Track 3 in reading class was probably a bridge too far and not really worth the effort.

It's like they gave a bunch of crayons and construction paper to illiterate hobos and said, "Do your best. Or your worst. We don't care. We're aiming for the dregs of second grade. Try to include a clown. Or don't. It really won't matter either way."

And the cereal was not even good. You would think that if you're selling this abortion of a breakfast cereal to the primary school underclass -- the emerging nihilistic YOLO demographic -- you would at least load it up with sugar because, what does it even matter?, the sort of kids who eat Kaboom know they're going to die young anyway. They have no illusions.

But you'd be wrong. Actually Kaboom was not very sweet at all.

I think they decided to skimp on sugar so they could put extra sugar on the more upscale cereals like Frosted Flakes and Frosted Mini-Wheats.

It was mostly just... oats.

You know: Like what they feed to the animals.

Prize at the bottom of the box? Oh no way, not with Kaboom cereal. No way they're throwing a ha'penny whistle in there for the poor kids. You're lucky they even bothered putting the cereal into a box, instead of just distributing it off a government assistance truck into your cupped hands.

I think occasionally they had mail-in sweepstakes where you could win a welfare voucher.

Or maybe a coupon for the orphanage PX. So you could buy some extra gruel and sewing supplies for the weekend.

A "prize," if you can call it that, included in Kaboom cereal,
when they briefly offered such toys in 1972.
Kaboom cereal pioneered Choking Hazard technology
until tepid public criticism forced them to end the practice
and to issue a halfhearted apology.

And it was unappetizing looking in the bowl as well. The colors were off. They weren't bright friendly colors like you might find in more respectable, upwardly mobile cereals like Lucky Charms. They didn't even pay for regular food coloring. They made Kaboom with discount irregular food coloring usually used for cat treats.

Kaboom's color palette was like the bright hues of a poisonous toad designed to warn off predators, a mixture of the garishly day-glo and and bizzrrely dark (the purple was that of a deep bruise, still bleeding beneath the skin). When milk was added, Kaboom became a nightmarish swirl of ugly, angry colors not to be found in nature, making your milk look as if it was just curdling into a loathesome cheese produced by an alien mold.

Detail of Kaboom Cereal.
Nothing says "part of a balanced breakfast"
like the Faces of the Unquiet Dead.
The famous "death mask imagery" of Kaboom
teaches children that aspiration is vanity
and all dreams are lies

They should have called it "Kabul." Just come right out with it. Let the people know what they're in for.

This is a cereal intended for bulk purchase by the United States Department of Agriculture to feed dirty foreign children. And their animals, too. One stop shopping-- they can all feed out of the same trough.

The cereal's chief use was as a humanitarian insult.

You might wonder at this point, What possible connection is there between the clown theme and explosions, as suggested by the name "Kaboom"? Well, don't bother thinking about it too hard. They sure didn't. This product was slapped together more or less randomly by People Who Didn't Even Care, intended for sale to People Who Care Just a Little Bit Less Than That.

Kaboom is not really a product designed for those who enjoy the life of the mind. Quite the opposite. It's a product designed for those whose subnormal IQs locate them in the brutish twilight existence that divides, hazily, the crude human from the cunning beast.

The cereal is essentially designed with an eye towards the inevitable devolution of the species. Future-proof, if you will.

If the Morlocks had a cereal it would be Kaboom. But they'd insist on more flavor.

Wow, Kaboom, 45% of some vitamins and iron.
Way to swing for the fences on nutrition.
You know what 45% is in school? That's right, it's a failure.
Kaboom relentlessly transmits the message that Failure Is Freedom.
And I can't wait to cut out that "Circus Game" and
play with some cardboard, either.
It's like it's designed to teach kids that the power
of imagination will only end in embarrassment.

Kaboom was made with a special secret ingredient: Contempt.

Did I eat Kaboom as a kid? You bet I did. If I didn't, I wouldn't have such a strong memory about it. If I never ate Kaboom, I would have just said, "Oh, that's the cereal that other children whose parents don't love them eat."

But no. I ate Kaboom. Quite a few times. More times I care to remember. And every time my mom brought home that garish yellow box of sorrows, I had the same thought: "Ohhh... we're that sort of people then, eh? We're just not even keeping up appearances anymore, are we, Mother?"

We weren't. And although we struggled to deny it to ourselves, we were now Kaboom People.

The truth is a relentless hunter.

Oh, we didn't quite sink to Kaboom's level. Not at first.

We strove to endure.

We were fighters.

But the cereal did drag the family down. It very nearly ruined us all.

And this is hard to say, but -- in the end we surrendered ourselves to Kaboom.

The "New Look" of Kaboom attempted
to make the cereal more "relevant" to kids in the 80s,
apparently seeking to play on fears of nuclear holocaust.

Ultimately, our sin wasn't in consuming Kaboom. Our sin was in letting Kaboom consume us.

We Descended.

We found the Kaboom Folk, or rather, they found us. The Kaboom Folk know their own. The downcast eyes, the twitch in a shameful smile. The know the Signs.

And then together we went wild into the night, without shame and without shoe, running petty scams at the carnival, stealing newspapers out of boxes and selling them for a nickel, eking out a rough existence at the grubby margins of human habitation.

Half-feral urban nomads living in communion with packs of wild dogs. For six months I wore nothing but a a fur jerkin and a genital sock.

My pack name was Mokh-Mokh.

And each night we came back from our scavengings to our shelterpit to eat our Kaboom, our shabby bowl of weirdly-colored animal feed and shame. But we no longer cared. We were free, but it was not true freedom.

It was only the dark, oatey freedom of Kaboom. A freedom I would not wish upon my worst enemy, or even the urban dogs who would fight us for pigeon carcasses.

Nowadays I can afford any sort of cereal I like. I can even spring the extra quarter for the high-class muesli-inflected Eurocereals if I like.

But I'll never escape where I came from. And where I came from was Kaboomville. Population: A ghastly clown, his stupid pink-purple parasol, and me. With my spoon, crying into my oddly discolored milk.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 04:00 PM | Comments (422) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Vapid Wannabe-Cheerleader Nikki Haley, When Asked About the Cause of the Civil War: "What Do You Think Caused It?"

She answered like this because she's a liberal-ish neocon, and she has no idea what actual conservatives think.

Actual conservatives think that the Civil War was fought over the issue of slavery. (Well, you can say "states rights," and there is some truth in that, but that elides the fact that the state right being fought over was the right for some people to own other people. The war wasn't fought over states rights generally, but about one state "right" in particular.)

Nikki Haley had no idea how to answer so she punted the question back to the questioner.

Nikki Haley declined to say that slavery was a cause of the Civil War on Wednesday evening, placing the blame, instead, on the role of government.

The former UN Ambassador and South Carolina governor, who has seen her star rise in the first-in-the-nation primary state, was appearing at a town hall event in Berlin, New Hampshire, when a voter asked her to identify the cause of the war.

"I think the cause of the Civil War was basically how government was going to run," she responded. "The freedoms and what people could and couldn't do. What do you think the cause of the Civil War was or argument?"

The questioner, who could not be easily heard off camera, was apparently unpersuaded by Haley's response. When she asked him what he believed the cause of the war was, he replied that he wasn't running for president.

"I think it always comes down to the role of government and what the rights of the people are," Haley replied. "And I will always stand by the fact that I think government was intended to secure the rights and freedoms of the people. It was never meant to be all things to all people. Government doesn't need to tell you how to live your life. They don't need to tell you what you can and can't do. They don't need to be a part of your life. They need to make sure that you have freedom. We need to have capitalism. We need to have economic freedom. We need to make sure that we do all things so that individuals have the liberties so that they can have freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom to do or be anything they want to be without government getting in the way."

That might sound good, but that's part of Nikki Haley's song-and-dance about why we can't outlaw genital mutilation for children. It's the standard neocon hustle about any social issue: "The government shouldn't be involved in deciding what experimental surgeries children can get. I'm a Real Conservative!"

Kochservative more like it am i rite

When the questioner said it was "astonishing" to hear her respond "without mentioning the word slavery," Haley replied: "What do you want me to say about slavery?" She then asked for the next question.

She is very maladroit and has all the charm of a toe blister. Not sure why Boeing decided to shower her with millions of dollars.

Just kidding, I know why.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 02:45 PM | Comments (524) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Biden, Who Has Spent 40% of His "Presidency" On Vacation, Rounds Out The Year With, You Guessed It, Another Vacation

He's also skipping the customary end-of-year presidential press conference.

No surprise on that -- he's skipped that tradition three years in a row.

In order to go on another well-deserved vacation.

President Joe Biden is rounding out 2023 on vacation while the administration snubs a traditional end of the year press conference.

Biden and First Lady Jill Biden arrived at St. Croix in the Caribbean on Wednesday where they will stay through the New Year. The trip cements the White House's earlier decision to skip the tradition of an end of the year press conference with reporters.

In the last press briefing of 2023 on Dec. 21, White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre was asked why the president doesn't want to "defend his record" to the American people before heading out on a holiday vacation. Biden traveled to Camp David on Dec. 23 where he remained until Dec. 26.

"I think anytime the president travels and is in front of the American people, he does that," Jean-Pierre said. "He did that in Wisconsin, where he talked about Bidenomics. He talked about small businesses and how that's a pillar of Bidenomics and investing in America. So, you heard him do that directly to the American people."

While in Wisconsin to tout his economic policies, more commonly known as Bidenomics, Biden took a few questions from reporters after exiting Air Force One. The president responded to questions about hostage efforts in the Israel-Hamas war, Venezuela and the Colorado Supreme Court's December ruling to disqualify Former President Donald Trump from the state's ballot.

Jean-Pierre added the White House "makes an effort" to do a press conference as often as they can whether it be in D.C. or while traveling.

"He made time yesterday to talk to the press yesterday. He did," Jean-Pierre said after being asked why the White House didn't make time for a press conference. "He talked to them. We made time to make sure that he gave a statement about what was happening in Venezuela, the hostage exchange, the swap that you all saw that was very successful. He made time to do that. He stood in front of the press pool, in front of him, and made that statement and took some questions."

The White House press secretary also used Biden's December press conference with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to justify the decision to skip the end of the year press conference. Both Biden and Zelenskyy only took two questions each during their press conference.

The press secretary said the White House will make sure it does as many press conferences as possible in 2024.

...

Biden and his administration instead have heavily leaned on the use of social media and non-traditional media opportunities, The Washington Post reported.

...

Biden has done non-traditional interviews, too, the White House noted to The Washington Post, adding the president has spoken to the Weather Channel and Comedy Central. Most recently, Biden sat down with Conan O'Brien to record for the comedians' podcast.
...

The strategy, some speculate, is in an effort to limit concerns about the 81-year-old president's age by putting Biden in more controlled situations, according to The Washington Post.

This is a speculation? Seems like a fact. Traditionally, presidents have taken every opportunity possible to get their message to the public.

There is a reason why Biden does not.

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 01:32 PM | Comments (305) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Again: Now New York City is Unconstitutionally Restricting Immigrant-Carrying Buses

I say this is unconstitutional because the Constitution guarantees free travel in the United States. Petty local jurisdictions cannot harass "undesirable" travelers with restrictions intended to dissuade them from coming.

The left still shrieks about "sundown towns," where travelers weren't allowed to stay past sundown.

And yet here they are, intentionally making it difficult for illegal immigrants, who they still claim to welcome with open arms, creating weird and hard-to-obey regulations about when and where buses can enter the city and discharge passengers.

Chicago's woke mayor Brandon Johnson began this practice, and has now escalated to impounding buses from Texas.

The illegal aliens who are looking for a way to travel to wherever they hope is their final destination receive free transportation to a choice of six cities -- New York City, Chicago, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and Denver. They are provided with clothing, food, water, and other basic supplies. The buses are chartered using Texas taxpayer money.

Last month Chicago implemented new rules. Buses must arrive during business hours in designated areas Monday through Friday. Two buses have been impounded so far. There have been 110 citations issued. "Yes, we had to impound a couple of busses thus far. The whole impetus behind this, as you know, is to create some calm and some structure around this operation," Mayor Johnson said.

The unqualified woke mayor continues railing about Governor Abbott's "raggedy" and "reckless" policies of busing illegals to Chicago -- but can't find any words to mention Joe Biden, the author of this crisis.

I did offer the obvious warning that if this were allowed to continue, blue cities would all begin stopping Texas (and Florida) buses from coming.

Now NYC's weakling mayor Adams is implementing Chicago's unconstutional policies.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams on Wednesday announced new restrictions on charter buses from Texas bringing migrants to the "sanctuary" city in an effort to curb the numbers of migrants that have hit the city since last year.

Adams announced an executive order requiring charter buses transporting migrants to provide 32 hours' notice in advance of their arrival in New York City. The order also requires buses to arrive between 8:30 a.m. and 12 p.m. between Monday and Friday. Such buses are also required to drop off at one particular spot.

If buses do not comply, it would result in a class B misdemeanor, with penalties including three months' imprisonment and up to a $500 fine for individuals and $2,000 for corporations. Buses could also be impounded by the NYPD.

...

Gov. Abbott's office, which recently began flying migrants to Chicago and New York City in addition to the buses, accused the Democratic mayor of hypocrisy -- and pledged to continue the transportation of migrants.

"The hypocrisy of Mayor Adams is astounding. Mayor Adams had touted New York City's self-declared sanctuary city status, then sent his own buses of migrants out to small towns in New York. Texas has only transported about 32,000 migrants to New York City, while President Biden has been flying planeloads of migrants all around the country and oftentimes in the cover of night," spokesperson Renae Eze said.
Migrants are 'seeing the truth' of the Biden administration:

"With millions of residents, New York is only dealing with a fraction of what our small border communities deal with on a day-to-day basis," she said. "Until President Biden steps up and does his job to secure the border, Texas will continue busing migrants to sanctuary cities to help our local partners respond to this Biden-made crisis."

Meanwhile, the border itself continues to see record numbers. Fox News reported this week that during the four-day Christmas weekend, there were more than 35,000 migrant encounters, and since Dec. 1, there have been over 250,000 migrant encounters at the southern border -- meaning December could break the monthly record for encounters set in September (269,735).

Posted by: Disinformation Expert Ace at 12:14 PM | Comments (254) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The Morning Rant: Minimalist Edition

Israel is the target of vicious, coordinated attacks from many players...from the United Nations and its many satellite organizations to a world media that are mostly staffed by post-modern drones mouthing their Marxist professor's propaganda about the evil of the Zionist occupation.

Of course the current defensive war against Hamas is the proximate cause of these newest attacks, but aside from the built-in anti-Semitism of the left, one the basic motivations is the drive for the destruction of Western culture and philosophy. And Israel is the defender of that culture and philosophy in the un-admitted and unrecognized war with Islam.

Swap "Israel" with "Trump," "Christianity," "Traditional Culture," "Two-Parent Homes," "Classical Education," and a host of other things in that headline and nobody would be surprised!

A Coordinated Media Attack on Israel by the New York Times, Washington Post, and CNN

All three media analyses relied on “weapons experts and investigators” formerly from the U.S. government, the United Nations, and non-governmental organizations such as Human Rights Watch to detail Israel’s bombing campaign and damage. Not surprisingly, the experts are also known for their animosity to Israel. Some quit their governmental jobs to protest U.S. support for Israel, and one was fired when it was learned he was a collector of Nazi paraphernalia.

In the eyes of the radical left, Israel is a placeholder for traditional society, and the unrelenting attacks on it are not just to satisfy the rabid Jew-hate of the progressives. If Israel is destroyed, then the next target is obviously America...Little Satan first, then Great Satan! That Islam is a fellow traveler of the left is expected...they use whatever tools are available! BLM, Antifa, NGOs funded by our government...all are fair game. That Islam's precepts are antithetical to most of the left's goals means nothing. They will ride that tiger with the plan to destroy it or co-opt it in the future. They see it as nothing more than Stalinists vs. Maoists vs. Trotskyites vs.....

But if Islam and the left win this war, then the real battle begins, as Islam attempts to create a world Caliphate on the rubble of the West. Will Marxism prevail?

I doubt it.

Posted by: CBD at 11:00 AM | Comments (190) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Mid-Morning Art Thread

The Passing of Summer
Harry W. Watrous

Posted by: CBD at 09:30 AM | Comments (364) | Trackbacks (Suck)

The Morning Report — 12/28/23

Good morning, kids. Assume for a moment you were the so-called "leader of the free world," that is the President of the United States of America, and that at least two or three flashpoints, one in particular involving dozens of attacks on American military personnel, had the potential to touch off a major regional war if not World War Three itself. We'll leave aside the titanic catastrophe of a wide open border and non-functioning immigration system, which in and of themselves are an existential threat to the nation, since I only just swore you in a moment ago. And not on a stack of used Mandate and Inches magazines either.

Whatever your options as commander-in-chief might be, I'd bet this one wouldn't even be on the list let alone right at the top:

The attack against U.S. troops, claimed by Kataib Hezbollah militants, left three U.S. troops injured — one critically so. [Joey Sponge-Brain Shits-Pants] did, however, post on social media wishing Americans a “Happy Kwanzaa” from both his official and personal social media accounts.Biden then departed for a vacation to the U.S. Virgin Islands.

It is the first time a U.S. service member was critically injured in the spate of attacks against U.S. troops stationed in Iraq and Syria by Iran-backed groups since October 17.

The attacks came after the Iran-backed terrorists threatened attacks against U.S. troops if U.S.-ally Israel invaded Gaza in response to Hamas’s terrorist attack against Israel on October 7, which killed more than 1,200 people, many of them civilians.

There have been more than 100 attacks against U.S. troops to date, but Biden has ordered fewer than ten counterstrikes and has opted to hit mostly weapons and ammunition storage facilities.

So, Iranian-backed terrorists are attacking and killing GI's as well as choking off the Red Sea and by extension the Suez Canal. And our response is lob a few missiles at some empty warehouses and get dragged off by your tacky, low-rent Edith Wilson wannabe handler on yet another vacation. Well, at least your handlers had the decency to have your teleprompter wish everyone "Happy Kwanzaa."

82 million votes. Biggest win evah! For sure, there were 82 million ballots, with the margin of "victory" cast by around 820 individuals. Elections Overflowing Atlanta toilets have consequences. But I digress.

The Wall Street Journal reported that the White House declassified information indicating the extent of Iranian regime’s support for the Houthis. The release of this information seems to be an attempt to create a basis for potential military action against the Houthis.

The Iranian regime seeks to present the Houthis as the government of Yemen, but the international community does not recognize the Houthis as such. The Yemeni government, based in Aden, is recognized by the United Nations as the legitimate government of Yemen.

Ali al-Sarawi, media advisor to the Yemeni prime minister, stated in an interview with Al Arabiya that the actions of the Houthis are not separate from Iran's position. These actions are carried out under the orders of Iran and with Iranian weapons. Those involved are officers of the Revolutionary Guards and Hezb'allah.

Iran's goal in these operations is to negotiate around its specific interests, using the Houthis to create crises. The Iranian regime wants to enter into a defined deal and gain leverage through these actions.

The Western powers, however, are not interested in escalating the situation. They attempt to restrain the regime through diplomacy and dialogue, but this policy has failed. The tyrannical regime in Tehran only understands the language of force. The only way to stabilize the region is for the West to abandon appeasement policies. Silence in the face of the Iranian regime's arson will only expand the scope of the fire. The West can play a strong deterrent role. Targeting the root cause, the Iranian regime, is the most principled policy and the right strategy for peace in the Middle East.

This, of course, should be the aim and would be the aim of a sane, rational Commander-in-Chief with a Secretary of State and Joint Chiefs Chairman backing him all the way. But to say that we do not have that at this time is an understatement of massive proportions. Had we had those, we wouldn't even be in this predicament in the first place.

The goal of Prez Fog-Brain and the fools at Foggy Bottom has been to make Iran the dominant power in the Middle East, or at the very least act as a check against the State of Israel, the only liberal, western democracy in the entire region, and until now arguably one of our closest allies in the world. Kneecap, neutralize or even see Israel destroyed so that a dark age theocracy that believes and has as its central foreign policy aim, causing Armageddon as the run-up to eternal Islamic global dominance can be in the driver's seat.

Happy Kwanzaa, indeed.

So, Biden (and in point of fact Obama/Rice/Jarrett) are in a bit of a pickle. They're now forced into a confrontation with the very mullahs they've shipped billions of dollars and greased the skids of nuclear breakout for. It is to laugh, or would be if American servicemen's lives were not about to become cannon fodder or even risk a potential world war that would perhaps draw in the Chi-Coms, and possibly the Russians; at least their nuclear missiles.

Forget about the Abraham Accords, putting Iran on the ropes, finally taking on the Chi-Coms, along with the greatest domestic economic boom in a century. Trump said "pussy!" and "fight!" And he's "literally Hitler," which is kind of funny since quite a few of the younger generations are marching with their "Palestinian" friends (for now) in cheering on the second coming of Hitler to finish off the Jews. Tell them that and watch the aneurysms fly. Inshallah.

Meanwhile, in another part of the forest, John Fetterman continues to, if not impress, then certainly raise an eyebrow:

Carville has raised concerns about Biden’s chances to secure a reelection victory in 2024 because of the [so-called quote-unquote "president's] recent polling. Fetterman had an inflammatory response to Carville’s warnings, cursing him out and questioning his relevance in the interview, which was published Wednesday.

“There’s a whole lifetime in politics between now and next November as well. I’m not worried about that. And I’m very vocal about this, too, while there are Democrats that are being very critical about the president. … I’ll use this [as] another opportunity to tell James Carville to shut the fuck up,” Fetterman told Politico regarding Biden’s polling.

"Tell James Carville to shut the fuck up." Preach it, brother Fetterman!!! Of course, the reason he said it is something I don't support. But then again, considering the disaster of the past three years embodied in the nearly-embalmed Biden, which has supposedly cratered him in the polls across virtually every key must-have demographic, maybe this is Fetterman's version of a sort of "Operation Chaos?"

Look, I truly appreciate Fetterman's sincere and unequivocal support of Israel and condemnation of Hamas, much to the wetting of pants of the Maoist wing of the party, but I'm under no illusions that he is anything but at best a very extreme liberal. His protestations of not being a "progressive" I think are a political calculus on his part. It would be nice to believe that even he is moderating his stances, but I would caution against this unless and until he talks about abortion, the 2A and all the other issues in the same way he talks about Israel. We shall wait and see.

And speaking of Operation Chaos, Carville and Biden, is this a help or a hindrance?

Until 2023, Hillary’s career had been on one long downward slide. After she ran out of biographies to sell, she tried writing a children’s book, “Grandma’s Gardens” (which contrary to expectations was not about Vince Foster’s corpse turning up in Fort Marcy Park), then getting in on Chelsea’s racket of putting her name on collections of stories about feminist heroines (Greta Thunberg, Bella Abzug) and that failed, and then she tried to get in on Bill’s racket of putting his name on fictional thrillers about thinly disguised versions of himself with “State of Terror”.

In a career low, Hillary was reduced to marketing fanfic in which she’s struggling with “a Republican president nicknamed ‘President Dumb’ who pulls out of the Iran Deal and then goes to Florida to play golf” and still couldn’t get anyone to pick up a copy. That and trying to get people to buy memberships to Masterclass to listen to her talk about the “power of resilience” put her only a step above peddling Cameo clips side by side with George Santos.

Pause: Seriously, I take umbrage at this. Considering the Marianas Trench-depth of corruption, perversion, venality and will-to-power of 99% of everyone in government, George Santos is a paragon of virtue by comparison. And to put Hillary Clinton of all people (alleged) above him really is a cheap shot to say the least. Back to the action . . .

But 2024 looks like Hillary’s year.

When Argentina’s President Javier Milei arrived in New York City, he found Hillary Clinton there waiting for him. Instead of meeting with Biden or Secretary of State Blinken, the newly elected head of state met with a former secretary of state to discuss his country’s finances. A few weeks later, Hillary met with the families of Israeli hostages and blasted Netanyahu, claiming that he just cares about “politics and personal political survival” and told them to pressure the Israeli government to cut a deal. It was a return to form for Hillary, who hates the Israeli prime minister and boasted of being the “designated yeller” at him under Obama.

But the real question is why did anyone care what Hillary Clinton thought about anything? The answer, as usual, is power. It’s been quite a few years since Hillary had anything resembling power, but that’s no longer the case thanks to a former enemy: Joe Biden.

In 2015, Hillary had convinced Obama to sideline Biden in favor of her. Biden’s agreement not to run came after months of backbiting in which he spent entire meetings ranting about her. The only thing that could have changed his mind about her is his unpopularity inside his own party.

What has Biden worried most of all is not the general election, which will be fought on familiar ground, but the more serious threat that the Democrats might push him off the ticket. Unlike the Clintons and the Obamas, Biden never built a huge army of loyal operatives to protect him, and the closest thing that he has to a base is the Congressional Black Caucus. His allies managed to rig the DNC primaries, but that was before the polls showed he could lose in 2024.

Barack Obama despises Biden, didn’t back him in 2020 and has been undermining him now. David Axelrod, Obama’s consigliere, recently popped up to suggest that Biden may want to consider dropping out. So Biden knows better than to think that Obama will bail him out.

And that just leaves the Clintons. . .

. . . Biden may have once hated Hillary, but he has started turning into her. He’s a deeply unpopular and disliked establishment candidate whose main theme is that his opponent is Hitler. After watching multiple policy proposals crash and burn, his only path to the nomination is using the party’s machinery to intimidate or crush any opponents who might want to challenge him. This is Hillary territory.

The biggest problem with Joe Biden is that he wants money and people to pay attention to him, but he doesn’t actually stand for anything beyond some retail politicking. He turned over his first administration to Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Jim Clyburn to secure the support of the Left and the Congressional Black Caucus in the 2020 primaries. Now he’s mortgaging any possible future administration to the Clintons in the hopes of clinging to the ticket with the last shreds of his senility. Biden just wants to be out front, he doesn’t care who’s really running things.

And now the willing puppet has found someone else to pull his decaying strings. . .

. . . Biden’s odds of winning a normal election are poor, but between multiple indictments and trials, the odds are that this won’t be a normal election anyway. And Hillary may have something to add beyond the 2020 election legal battles. Some brainstorming hatched the idea of tying Trump to Russia. Who knows what malicious schemes may even now be brewing in her brain?

Hillary is a dangerous ally to have around and she may want something more than a piece of the action. If Democrats boot Biden, they have to decide who will replace him. Hillary was brought in to threaten existing candidates and those in waiting, like Gov. Gavin Newsom, but has she ever given up on the impossible dream of taking another shot at the White House?

This is very interesting speculation on the part of Daniel Greenfield and considering much of our government is populated by geriatric cases with one foot in the grave who refuse to give up power even unto death, and given Hillary's venality, bitterness and craven lust for absolute power, her throwing her soiled Depends into the ring is certainly within the realm of possibility.

It also sets up a battle royale between her and the Kalorama crowd. Hopefully, we don't get caught in that "Crossfire Hurricane."

ABOVE THE FOLD, BREAKING, NOTEWORTHY
• Lloyd Billingsley: "Signal 2024 as another year of living dangerously."
  Danger Signs in 2023
  
• "While the 'Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion' plague is still with us, pushback is mounting."
  DEI Resistance Is Advancing
  
• Daniel Greenfield: "A desperate Biden turns to Hillary Clinton to save his campaign. . . Biden already has a secret service entourage, but hopefully he will be very careful when flying over Croatia or strolling through Fort Marcy Park." (Good essay but I took umbrage to his crack about George Santos - jjs)
  Hillary’s Comeback
• "If you peruse the entire UN document linked above, you will notice that at no point is there any reference to putting any of these drastic and possibly catastrophic changes to the food production system up for a referendum from the people who will ultimately be affected by them. Democracy™ is exclusively reserved as a rhetorical bludgeon with which to bludgeon political opponents of these agendas."
  WATCH: WHO Terrorist Declares Fatwa on Global Agriculture
  
• Ann Coulter: "Now we know the truth: The FBI fueled the bloody rivalry between the Panthers and United Slaves. In the annals of the American ’60s, Karenga was the Father Gapon, stooge of the czarist police. Whether Karenga was a willing FBI dupe or just a dupe remains unclear. . . "Kwanzaa bells, dashikis sell, Whitey has to pay; Burning, shooting, oh what fun, On this made-up holiday!"
  Happy Kwanzaa! The Holiday Brought to You by the FBI

Posted by: J.J. Sefton at 07:53 AM | Comments (364) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Daily Tech News 28 December 2023

Top Story

• If you were looking to buy the latest Apple Watch Series 9 or Ultra 2, you can. (Tech Crunch)
  
  Or will be able to shortly. And perhaps briefly.
  
  Apple has won a temporary stay on the ITC ban from a federal court, while it files its full appeal. That only applies through to January 10, depending on the outcome of other proceedings.

Posted by: Pixy Misa at 04:00 AM | Comments (142) | Trackbacks (Suck)

Wednesday Overnight Open Thread (12/27/23)

***

The Quote of The Day

Quote I

“Trying to fill every hole in every tooth in her mouth in one visit is not only the antithesis of what was indicated, it is not humanely possible to achieve in an effective or constructive manner.” Dr. Avrum Goldstein

Posted by: Misanthropic Humanitarian at 09:51 PM | Comments (380) | Trackbacks (Suck)