This is one of those times when I need to do some advance casting to keep everyone informed on a timely basis. When I do that, it’s important that I make the time to get a decent reading done and not slack off on reading the ol’ charts. Unfortunately, the skies aren’t rewarding the effort for these next couple of weeks, with the planets (mostly) moving out of the way of each other and not giving up many secrets.
This week has got a couple of things, one confusing, one good. The first being that Saturn returns to direct motion on Tuesday. Ordinarily, planets returning to direct motion is a good sign. However, Saturn is usually a bad sign all by itself. Adding to the fact that this is happening right on the border between Pisces and Aquarius, but without actually crossing over means that the most confident reading of this sign is in Saturn’s aspect of the harvester. It’s an ideal time to end things. The other ideal day is Friday, and it’s an ideal day for romantic activities.
So many reversed cards this week. Watch out. A helmet is advised.
Scorpio: 2 of Swords – Conformity, courage (of the blind sort), concord in a state of arms, stalemate, inevitability.
Sagittarius: 3 of Coins reversed – Mediocrity, puerility, pettiness, weakness.
Capricorn: 7 of Coins reversed – Cause for anxiety regarding money, especially regarding lending or investments.
Aquarius: 6 of Cups reversed – The future, renewal, the past misleading about the present or future.
Pisces: 5 of Wands reversed – Litigation, disputes, trickery, contradiction.
Aries: 4 of Wands reversed – Prosperity, increase, felicity, beauty, embellishment.
Taurus: Ace of Coins – Perfect contentment, felicity, ecstasy, munn-ay!
Gemini: Judgement reversed – Weakness, pusillanimity, simplicity, deliberation, decision, sentence.
Cancer: 3 of Wands reversed – The end of troubles, suspension or cessation of adversity.
Leo: 10 of Coins reversed – Chance, fatality, loss, robbery, games of hazard, gift, dowry, pension.
Virgo: 3 of Swords – This card shows a heart pierced by three swords. And it’s being rained on. I’ll let you do your own interpretation.
Libra: Queen of Swords reversed – Malice, bigotry, artifice, prudery, bale, deceit.
This recording of JA’s anthem to what kurzgesat calls “optimistic nihilism” has got the minute of artsy mumbling at the beginning removed.
Yay! Where’s Trigger Hippie?!
Sagittarius: 3 of Coins reversed – Mediocrity, puerility, pettiness, weakness.
*puts plans for world domination on hold*
Let’s get this out of the way before my hockey tournaments.
‘Virgo: 3 of Swords – This card shows a heart pierced by three swords. And it’s being rained on. I’ll let you do your own interpretation.’
Probably good stuff?
Made me think of this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpBFOJ3R0M4
Cause for anxiety regarding money, especially regarding lending or investments. and Prosperity, increase, felicity, beauty, embellishment.
That’s going to make for an interesting week around house Imprudent.
“Cancer: 3 of Wands reversed – The end of troubles, suspension or cessation of adversity.”
Yay!
My company is announcing layoffs this week so that doesn’t sound so great.
I’m sorry to hear that. Do you think your job is reasonably safe (assuming you don’t own the company?)
No idea. Already in full search mode as this is not my first rodeo.
Yikes. I hope that doesn’t mean you.
Best wishes
The Proles are revolting (and smell bad too),
https://www.aier.org/article/alan-blinder-let-them-eat-disinflation/
-OR- Whycome you no like bidenomics? We told you it is good for you.
‘ inflation has fallen notably’
Okay, but 1. it is still higher than wage increases are likely to be in the future (unless you’re job hopping) and 2. wages never caught up to all the inflation that already happened.
It is so weird how people aren’t happy just because things have stopped getting bad *as fast* as they were.
Thanks, Obama.
2007: My husband takes care of paying the bills because I mentally shut down when I realized we didn’t have enough money unless I worked more, and I was working more but our bills kept going up. I couldn’t figure out why I was working more but never keeping up. Of course, this was a function of me never going out, and husband filling the gas tanks and paying attention to the grocery bill. He had to clue me in. I couldn’t believe it was so bad, but it was.
We honestly never really recovered.
I think 80 % of the population is aware that they’re financially worse off that they were in 2019. The remainder are wealthy and detached enough that they feel unaffected.
Gas prices shouldn’t be put aside in its own category that pertains only to personal commute; if the price of gas/oil is up, then the price of EVERYTHING is up. Everything has to be transported from here to there.
The economists exclude anything most people would need to buy, just like Bed, Bath, and Bankruptcy did with their coupons.
I’m one of the rare people who is financially better off now than in 2019, but that has nothing to do with the economy. I was between good paying jobs in 2019.
I was too young for it to really hurt in quite the same way(I just couldn’t find a job, woohoo), but yeah, I do remember everything getting more expensive. Especially beer for some reason went way up during his tenure.
Obama part 2 wasn’t as bad economically.
Or I could have read the article really nice to see someone throwing the history of benign deflation in the faces of these idiots.
[Blinder asked]: “Why don’t the hoi polloi appreciate that “unemployment is near record lows, net jobs are still being created at a breakneck pace, and inflation has fallen notably?””
I don’t know Dr. Blinder, why did the technocrats celebrate low unemployment, high economic growth, low inflation under Trump?
Would you care to talk labor force participation asshole [Alan]?
No. No, he would not.
Nice dog videos.
Chance, fatality, loss, robbery, games of hazard, gift, dowry, pension.
Seems sufficiently shitty.
I’ve got the grill warming up.
https://www.amazon.com/photos/shared/LKap09R7Qy6OETqPOptRxQ.7QY7Mt2Z-a6sLPDoTRJrJl
We had the plate pattern on the right growing up.
We had the pattern on the left.
so… Sean is your love child from UCS?
I don’t think I’m old enough to have sired Sean.
Unless you’ve mastered time travel.
I might later.
Us briars did, too.
Nice.
I went camping with the boy this weekend and we did streaks on the fire, they were perfect.
“…streaks on the fire”
Huh.
Some fire walking, and getting back to nature, whats not to love?
Things broke my way big time last week (on a couple of fronts) from Wednesday-Friday, so I went back and re-read IFLA from last week:
Yup, that worked out. This week it’s:
Woot! Making up for lost time.
Its SCIENCE!
Corporate greed is, as usual, the problem
But while they acknowledge that small farms have felt the economic impacts of the last few years very acutely, the pair went to see President Joe Biden speak on Wednesday in their hometown because they think he’s the one on the right track.
“Despite what everyone is saying, the economy’s been humming along pretty well,” Steven Read said. “I don’t blame Biden for inflation. I blame corporate greed.”
——-
Biden has long tried to make central to his pitch an understanding of the plight of the working class. This week, he touted $5 billion in new federal funding for agricultural communities as he kicked off a two-week blitz aimed at winning back rural voters who have increasingly turned away from Democrats in recent years.
“It’s about making things in rural America again,” Biden told a crowd inside the chilly barn in Northfield — some 30 miles outside Minneapolis. “Right now, the farmers and ranchers who actually grow the food only see a small percentage of the profit when the food is sold.”
What we really need to do is unionize all the farmers. Solidarity, brothers and sisters!
Steven Read sounds unbearable, him and his beard can go sod off.
Also, to be clear, inflation isn’t entirely Biden’s fault. Lockdowns and helicopter money to every soul in the country was a (big) factor too. Gas prices is more his thing, which does feed inflation too.
Yeah, his War on Energy is the part of the economy wrecking I blame him for. Inflating the money supply is a both sides thing… I just think we might have absorbed the brunt of it better if he hadn’t taken the economy into a dark alley to hamstring it, bludgeon it about the head then roger it repeatedly and all by making it more expensive to produce, more expensive to transport, etc.
Let’s not forget about adding another trillion in spending during a recovery from Covid. Even he ghost of Keynes was going wtf!???!!!
When the food is sold to whom?
Is he claiming that farmers deserve the profit from processing it and packaging it and transporting it and selling it?
Don’t you know they just pluck boxed mac and cheese off the new spaghetti trees?
Relevant
“Despite what everyone is saying, the economy’s been humming along pretty well,” Steven Read said. “I don’t blame Biden for inflation. I blame corporate greed.”
The prices of materials, energy, and labor have all remained the same since, like, forever! It’s just KKKorporate fatcats raising prices to fill their moneybins with more gold coins, yup yup.
Cyto,
In the last thread you were asking about where to get relatively inexpensive cheeses online.
I don’t typically buy them online as they are a local company, so I can’t vouch for prices.
https://igourmet.com/collections/gourmet-cheese
Thanks!
No Diwali party for me 🙁
IT Lady is a part of an extremely insular and conservative Indian community. And having a boyfriend is Just. Not. Done. So no invites for me unless we’re married.
From her description, the Capital Region Indian social life is like that of Karen Hill in Goodfellas. There is a core of eleven (!) families who do everything together, a main group of thirty-five families and a larger group of fifty-something that formed during the complete racial isolation days of covid.
Huh, there is a non-zero chance my relatives are part of that.
Pretty sure my brother-in-law works at your place (they are in Albany doing chips). They’re probably not as stuck up as she intimates, though her concern is not unwarranted entirely.
The bigger problem is that you’re (presumably) pasty white and she isn’t sure how they’ll react.
How old is she? Dating isn’t that big of a deal with the younger set in reality, though they all still hide it.
Late 40s.
She came over here in 1999, arranged marriage in 2000. Divorce in 2015, not everyone in that group have forgiven her for that yet.
I worked with a woman and she and her husband had two girls that were born here and were thoroughly American. No way were they respecting the old culture. I imagine fear of that runs deep in the group you are talking about.
I see, she’s a bit older and from India, so you’re not wrong. Honestly, they’ll probably never forgive her. Tell her to embrace being the bad girl and bring you around. 😆
In reality you’re not missing anything and they’ll spend the whole time speaking in Marathi anyway. You lucked out.
But … Indian food!
There’s another problem with Blinder’s analysis: he thinks deflation always and everywhere causes economic harm. “It takes a truly sick economy to cause deflation,” he warns. But he’s wrong. Demand-side deflation is dangerous. Supply-side deflation, caused by improvements in technology and productive capacity, is not.
We have many historical examples of benign deflation, including the US experience for much of the late 19th century. The supply of goods and services grew faster than the supply of money, causing prices to fall. Benign deflation does not reduce output and employment. On the contrary, the increase in money’s purchasing power is a crucial signal about general productive conditions, which helps markets create as much wealth as they sustainably can.
I have never understood the aversion to price stability.
Also, we imported deflation from China for two or three decades. Consumers did not seem to object.
The deflation from China really bothers me with regard to sewing. Once sewing your clothes was the way poor people got clothed, but your had the opportunity amd flexibility to really customize your wardrobe with quality fabric and craftsmanship. Quilting was to use up scraps in a creative way. Now, while both dressmaking and quiltmaking are luxury hobbies, you can pick up “fast fashion” for pennies that wears out in a season. It’s awful how the poors get priced out of their lives while being forced to buy cheap Chinese shit.
That said, I’m happy for cheap furniture that fills a basic need. Good woodworking/carpentry has almost always been out of the reach of poor people.
Taxes on time are the worst of all. In theory you can make more nominal dollars; you can’t make more nominal time.
My ‘7-kids on a welders wages’ grandfather would disagree. He just taught himself how to make it. Almost table/chair/bedframe/chest/coffee table/etc he ever made is still in use.
Well, that’s fine if you have the room and can afford the tools.
Harbor Freight is so cheap they almost pay you to take tools out of the store. Quality is meh but you can build a collection quickly and upgrade later.
That’s not my point, though.
At one time, sewing was a thrifty/frugal way to dress oneself. The barrier to entry was low(ish). Good fabric was a lot cheaper than ready-made clothes and my mom already had the skill to make our clothes.
At the point fast fashion became disposable, we had Harbor Freight. Not back then.
My dad was able to acquire/afford exactly 3 power tools during my childhood and adolescence (they were Christmas presents my mother saved for), and I still have 2 of them. They’re Craftsman. The barrier to entry of that particular skill was very high, and it is definitely a skill that takes a lot of practice, which requires a lot of material. He certainly did not have the money or time to learn to make furniture.
‘The deflation from China’
See, but the deflation from China was also mediated by big multinationals (‘the rich’).
If we had real deflation across the whole economy, the rich would have to pay back their loans with real money, which would be painful.
It used to really confuse me why the rich were always so okay with moderate inflation, but their companies also benefit from inflation in nominal terms (They can charge more $), while any loans depreciate. Remember, inflation was transitory right up until it started hitting wages. That is when things needed to be righted and inflation put in it’s place.
I played https://squaredle.com 11/05:
79/79 words (+41 bonus words)
🎯 In the top 3% by accuracy
🔥 Solve streak: 2
Wait… 41 bonus words and you weren’t in the top percentage for bonus words? Or, I suppose – you were closer on accuracy so it just reported that.
Too bad it doesn’t show break down statistics on all fronts… (It might in some nook on the web page I haven’t noticed, granted).
Got stuck at 41/79 and then life interfered.
I played https://squaredle.com/xp 11/05:
23/23 words (+1 bonus word)
🎯 In the top 20% by accuracy
I got bitch-slapped at https://squaredle.com 11/05:
79/79 words (+14 bonus words)
🎯 In the top 15% by accuracy
🔥 Solve streak: 49
I played https://squaredle.com 11/05:
79/79 words (+19 bonus words)
🎯 In the top 21% by accuracy
🔥 Solve streak: 16
I played https://squaredle.com/xp 11/05:
*23/23 words
🎯 Perfect accuracy
The deflation from China really bothers me with regard to sewing. Once sewing your clothes was the way poor people got clothed, but your had the opportunity amd flexibility to really customize your wardrobe with quality fabric and craftsmanship.
My mom made a lot of her own clothes when I was little. I think she did it as much for the satisfaction of craft as for cost, particularly as time went on.
Mine too and yeah it was both reasons.
News that should surprise no one: ATF director at Harvard talking about their gun registry.
Oh, the one they are forbidden by statute from creating? That gun registry?
+1 list all glibs are on
As I recall we had a few Glibs we tolerated despite their conspicuous lack of guns.
In the event of an apocalypse, I’ve got them covered.
*raises hand*
No guns, because reasons.
I do not have a bunch of guns. Some revolvers for now.
Don’t worry Moje, we will take care of you.
I am heavily armed, just not with firearms.
Self-explanatory
No one seems to like “Bidenomics,” the eponymous shorthand for Joe Biden’s economic policies — not voters, not Democratic officials, not even, at times, the president himself.
It’s a term that mystifies Americans and confounds even its namesake. “I don’t know what the hell that is,” Biden said in a speech in Philadelphia earlier this year.
In a September focus group with Pennsylvania swing voters, one participant told the research firm Engagious that the concept was a “jumbled mess,” adding that “it’s really hard to explain.”
What? It’s not hard at all: more government, more spending. To infinity, and beyond.
It’s just basic tactics – the regulatory state locates, fixes, closes with and destroys the most productive sectors of the economy.
The people that Joe is buying votes from varies from week to week.
You’re welcome.
“I don’t know what the hell that is,” Biden said ”
One of the few times I believe Biden.
Bidenomics = “The Experts say the economy is awesome, so shut up”
Virgo: 3 of Swords – This card shows a heart pierced by three swords. And it’s being rained on. I’ll let you do your own interpretation.
Well, I am going to the NW. And all the weather forecasts I’ve seen to date indicate non-stop rain.
NA is our motherfuckin’ Miss Cleo, I tells ya.
I don’t go to Seattle for two weeks, so possibly this is my reading for then?
Federal judge upholds Illinois gun ban
The federal appeals court in Chicago sided Friday with the state of Illinois against challenges aimed at blocking the state’s nearly year-old assault weapons ban, ruling that weapons covered by the legislation don’t have Second Amendment protection.
“Even the most important personal freedoms have their limits,” Judge Diane P. Wood wrote in the court’s highly anticipated opinion. “Government may punish a deliberately false fire alarm; it may condition free assembly on the issuance of a permit; it may require voters to present a valid identification card; and it may punish child abuse even if it is done in the name of religion. The right enshrined in the Second Amendment is no different.”
The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals found assault weapons and high-capacity magazines “are much more like machine guns and military-grade weaponry than they are like the many different types of firearms that are used for individual self-defense.”
*faints*
Because when the government gets to tell you what rights you have, you are truly free Comrades!
Now get that windmill built, Boxer…
SCOTUS bitchslap incoming.
I second this.
‘; it may condition free assembly on the issuance of a permit’
I don’t agree with this one anyway.
‘it may require voters to present a valid identification card;’
Only required to prevent abuse which would deprive others of their right to equal representation.
‘nd it may punish child abuse even if it is done in the name of religion. ‘
Again, directly preventing the abrogation of other’s rights.
‘the right enshrined in the Second Amendment is no different.”
Correct, you can’t murder people with guns or act similarly in a way which would likely result in the rights of others being harmed. How does this pass the historical restrictions requirement from the latest supreme Court ruling? They’re trying to sneak it by by calling it a ban on machine guns.
Well, a ban on machine guns is also unconsitutional, so…
They are, once again, trying to say semi-automatic weapons are roughly the same as automatic weapons because they both contain the word “automatic”. And that calling something an “assault rifle” makes it basically the same thing that actual soldiers would use in an actual assault, even though no military in the world would send armies into battle with only semi-automtic weapons.
Of course, “weapons of war” within the last century have included semi-automatic, even bolt-action, rifles. So, when they get on that hobby-horse, you know they’re after, well, everything.
They are very valuable “defensive weapons” too, aren’t they?
Government may punish a deliberately false fire alarm
Jamaal Bowman hardest hit.
yeah, that seemed a bit pointed at Rep Bowman, lol, though I suspect the judge (‘s clerk) wrote it thinking of the “fire in a crowded theater” nonsense.
Government may punish a deliberately false fire alarm
Especially in a crowded theater, right?
Wow. The Seahawks really embarrassed themselves today.
Time to tune into the exciting conclusions of several games.
The Vikings conclusion I got was exciting.
I grabbed lunch and some beers with a buddy
and we laughed it up over Sputnik being put in the game.
Yeah, good for the Vikes. I still have lots of Vikings fan friends. Let ‘em enjoy the little victories.
OK, I cleaned my car windows. That’s enough fun for one day.
Oh, and I swapped out my floor mats. Woo!
I took a little hike, all downwards. I passed a bunch of oldsters with their college kids, huffing and puffing their way up and looking kind of shellshocked, and felt a little bad for them. I tried the opposite direction a few weeks ago and noped the hell out of that.
Welp, time to peruse my ballot and try to develop an opinion on the city council candidates.
They already sneaked the measures (all for good causes, natch) that raised taxes through on the primary election when no one was paying attention. I voted nay, but that’s only because I just want PEOPLE to DIE!!
That’s fucked up.
Closed primaries here, they can’t pull that shit.
The fun of blue states is our exciting choices between Lenin, Trotsky and Mao.
Even some local Democrats here are complaining that the Democrats have been taken over by commies.
What say you, primary voters?
Zombie Grandma pulls the lever for whoever.
No Pol Pot? You’re being oppressed, you’re right to true representation denied!
Maybe, he is on Holiday in Cambodia!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-arzJFmA6hY
City air will set us free!
https://fee.org/articles/the-urban-origins-of-liberty/
Possibly the most important race Tuesday is for Sheriff.
The challenger is attacking the incumbent about his having signed a pledge upholding the 2nd Amendment (even in the midst of continuing mass shootings! Gasp!) and of trying to appeal to voters by being tough on crime.
Yeah, I voted for the incumbent.
Oh, yeah: The other beef that the challenger has against the incumbent is that he (incumbent) called for an end to the lockdowns during Covid hysteria.
The challenger needs never to come near government power again.
So the challenger is campaigning for the incumbent?
It is Seattle. Other way ’round.
It’s Snohomish County, different county than Seattle.
Thank goodness.
It was super cold a couple of weeks ago and I asked my husband to turn on the pilot light (gas fireplace). Then I remembered we’d had birds in our fireplace and thought to get a chimney sweep out to see if there was a nest in our flue. Guess what. Nest in our flue.
😕 Hope the flue birdies didn’t give you the flu before they flew the coop.
That pun chain set my heart a flutter.
I feel a sense of doom and foreboding
Original Night Court marathon on tv this weekend. 👍👍
Fun with dresses
Interesting that Jeff Bezos is leaving Washington State. Didn’t he want those Democrats who raised taxes to be elected? And Biden rewarded his support with an antitrust suit.
I remember when the general public thought Bezos was libertarian.
I ‘member when Cytotoxic thought Bezos would turn WaPo into a libertarian organ.
I also remember when libertarians thought Big Tech was libertarian and that the internet would make everybody libertarian and would never be censored.
Yeah.
I remember when Cytotoxic thought Turdeau Jr. Would be fiscally responsible and that Jeremy Corbyn was just a fluke.
Sure, he was fine with new taxes as long as they weren’t on him. Also, Miami gives him more opportunities to go swimming with his hot girlfriend.
Anyway California. The problem with California is that the urban Democrats have completely overwhelmed the small town and rural Republicans and imposed their terrible ideas and things have rapidly deteriorated. Similarly things are happening in the other blue states and will happen in the purple states and red states.
This doesn’t seem very sustainable. And the “sane” Democrat seems non-existent. Like the “sane” Communist.
The question is why do voters in cities keep returning Democrats to office no matter how abysmal the record of the party is in that locale?
Because a) they get free money from said Dems and/or b) they aren’t making cause-and-effect correlations to what they don’t like.
There isn’t enough free money to explain it – unless these people are bought off for pennies. In which case, okay, they get what they deserve. Actually that’s true for whatever the motivation is.
Republicans are racist, which is the worst thing conceivable.
It’s funny–there are lots of pro-pali, pro-Hamas demonstrators in DC yelling “F**k Biden!” over his (stated) support of Israel.
No idea who they’ll actually vote for. Maybe if they’re uninformed enough that they believe Trump is anti-Jew they will vote for him, despite his record to the contrary.
Of all the things that could factor into US 2024 elections, an Israel/Palestine issue was not one I expected.
I think I know.
Bernie?
No. Biden, or more likely, whomever the Swamp replaces him with.
Gavin is pretty dreamy.
What are they going to do? Admit they were wrong?
There is an old joke about the only difference between Heaven and Hell is that Some People like it.
You’re right about what they’ve done to blue states. The emigres from blue states to red states tend to vote Republican. California emigres to Texas may explain Ted Cruz getting reelected.
This seems reasonable to me.
If Texas or Florida turn blue, blame the locals. They’ve been doing this for a hundred years; they’re pretty good at it.
It varies. CO turned blue after a big influx of Californians. The more Californians move to AZ, the bluer it gets. The more Californians move to Austin, the more ultraviolet it gets.
There’s a ton of confounding variables, of course. But reason to be concerned.
I suppose I don’t understand people but it makes no fucking sense to me.
Californians forget they are refugees and act like occupiers.
Eh, if they mean like the year 1200 there could be a good argument that cities were a country balance to the past of the country lords and Kings and even the church… In some sense that encouraged some amount of liberty.
In the same way that the communists were for free speech in the US 50 years ago.
The problem seems to be that the current wealthy urban class control the government and have no interest in limiting their own power. Limiting government made sense when the aristocrats, the church and the king had all the power and they were heavily outnumbered by the peasantry but that is not the situation anymore.
Exactly right. Anyone expecting them to be on the side of freedom doesn’t get that the one who is in charge of always in favor of having more power.
In other words, Winston, “It’s good to be the king.”
Sucky afternoon. Coming home and driver pulled out in front of us from cross street. We’re ok including our pup and other driver is ok, vehicles aren’t. Love my truck to death but unlikely to be worth it on age and mileage.
Bummer
Sorry.
Sorry dude. Glad for no injuries.
May the insurance process go well for you. Glad no injuries!
Must be the time change has caused inattentive drivers? One of the guys in the Color Guard got hit on the way to today’s Veterans Day parade. And another guy said his wife’s brand new car was hit in the church parking lot this morning.
Out of town driver just flew in to deal with parent’s estate. Probably had a lot on mind, but just didn’t see us before attempting to cross from the stop.
That sucks. Our primary car has 183,000 miles on it and is still going strong, but any kind of even moderate accident will total it for sure.
I’m sorry that happened GL. It’s good you and your family are okay.
Glad everyone is OK. I saw a number of wrecks in Vegas yesterday, none of them good.
Thank you all. Talked to the other driver after, and everyone involved is very grateful no one got hurt.
Love the lilly vids as usual. Tanner got to play with a Newfie Poo last week at our school session. It was hilarious.
Gemini: Judgement reversed – Weakness, pusillanimity, simplicity, deliberation, decision, sentence.
Fuuuck Youuuu. Not putting up with that shit I will make my own stars.
Speaking of that, which glib was an artist or had an artist brother or some such? I am in need of such services.
“Not putting up with that shit I will make my own stars.”
I knew there is a good reason I like you.
Ha….I don’t make it around much anymore but I was glad to see you start commenting again.
My granddaughter is a superb artist. What are you looking for?
jemezhobbit at the protonmail
https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/tgif-bourgeois-peace-movement/
I notice that Richman glosses over the fact that John Bright ended his days as a Liberal Unionist allied with the Conservatives because he opposed Irish Home Rule and famously stated that “Home Rule is Rome Rule”.
Notice how Cobden took it as a given that education and free trade will lead to less war and more freedom. The problem with the likes of Cobden is that they did not forsee that the wealthy educated urbanites would turn against him. Surely the fact that neither he nor Bright were University graduates but the protectionist leader Lord Derby was an Oxford Graduate have told him that education per se does not make people agree with him?
Didn’t we conclude some time back that this Sheldon was not the smart one?
Clearly.
I’ve known Sheldon since he was an undergrad at Temple U.He is very smart, even as many libertarians will disagree with his conclusions.
I find him insufferable.
Paging TPTB, more content up for review.
I became a fan of Jimmy Dore during the Covid insanity and meant to follow his work and I finally got around to doing it.
The warmongers here might not like it. But I liked it.
Because I think the culture and mentality that gives birth to Hamas and their evil ilk should be stamped out, cut and burned root and branch, have the ashes pissed on and thrown into the sea I might be considered a warmonger.
That does not in any way affect my free speech absolutism.
Effect, dammit.
No, you had it right the first time.
Agreed.
What molded and formed that culture? Ron Paul called Gaza “an open air prison”. I was on the Israel can do no wrong team for a long time. Now I am on no team. They are not the good guys here, There are no good guys there except there is only innocent people being killed and I am on the quit killing innocent people team. JFC…..enough already. And if we are going by body counts, Israel is winning,
You are one side or the other. What would you do differently?
If you want to understand the formation of that culture, look around the region and read Bernard Lewis.
As one of (((them-ish))) with long ties to Israel, to say they can do no wrong is bullshit. They are made up of humans and of course can do wrong, such is life. But, right now they are in the right. Hamas fucked around and is finding out. The real issue, at least in my eyes, is that we are looking for a Western Civ response to a conflict that doesn’t care about Western Civ. It will get ugly, maybe rightly so, maybe not.
People have long said that the US was Israel’s leash, and we kept it pretty taught. I think they might have slipped the lede right now, due in no small part to the weakness of Biden.
Gazans haven’t protested that Hamas hasn’t held an election since the one they won in 2006. I don’t have much sympathy for Gazans that aren’t fed the fuck up with Hamas. So, if you can’t vote them out or drive them out, then get your own ass the fuck out.
I am no more sorry for Gazans that I would have been for Germans in 1940 or Japanese in 1942. The solution is the same as we imposed on both of those militarized societies.
Just because the militant Palestinian faction is evil and is an absolute blockade to any form of peace deal – as it has been for many decades – that does not negate facts on the ground that would lead one to liken Gaza to a prison.
But Gaza has been entirely self governing for a couple of decades. The people in the west bank chose a less militant, more competent government. They mostly have a peaceful existence and no “open air prison” metaphors. But Gaza chose poorly. It isn’t just Israel that locks down the border. Egypt has their border locked down as well…. apparently excepting Iranian weapons.
Gaza is an exponential baby boom society, so a major chunk of the population was not even alive when they last held an election. Even fewer were old enough to participate.
So feeling for the plight of the everyman is understandable. But one would probably do well yo remember that all of those everymen have been raised in an anti-israel and anti-us propaganda machine that renders them extremely hostile to both and to any peace that includes the existence of Israel as a state.
From the outhouse to the sea!
It’s getting First in here…
So take off all your clothes…
Getting First in here….
@Rhywun, good luck!
America and these dopes are united against. Hmph.
Ugh America is right.
Um. Wow, dude.
PS. Thank your guys for beating the Dolphins for me.
Our pleasure!
Sorry, rhy – unless Moje is speaking of something completely unrelated to proper American football, I can’t join in the good wishes.
I am indeed discussing proper American football. I’ve grown fond of the Buffalos. No idea why.
We are having a tournament Wednesday, sponsored by the local breweries, breakfast, a round of golf then lunch with beer of course then another round with more beer, what a treat.
*Me after I knock someone on their ass with one of my Firsts*
“If he dies, he dies.”
Just introduced XY to the concept of “principals, not principles” via his tales of Pizza Hut management. It was kind of fun watching it dawn on him.
Pizza Hut is a money laundering operation. At least the one in town here is.
No, that’s any given mattress store. 😂
XY was discussing the store manager’s powerlessness to fire someone who needs firin’, and (after this litany of egregious sins by the assistant manager) he said, “If they don’t fire her, I’m out. It shows where their principles are. Or aren’t.”
I said, “Principals, not principles.”
So then I had to explain it.
Maybe that explains half the stores in malls? I walk in various malls at various hours and swear there are stores in which I’ve never seen a customer.
I’ve been to the local mall a couple times since I moved here – it’s so dying. Kind of sad.
The Target is jam packed and there is a Best Buy and Dicks I have not had any reason to visit. Otherwise half the shops are empty. Several anchors are empty. The theater chain – the only one in town – threatened to close but somehow didn’t. There is a roller derby space but I haven’t figured out if it’s still operational.
I just want to say that I’m leaving because of ::rolls dice:: Mojeaux.
There. I said it.
Anyhow, see you all tomorrow.
I don’t believe you.
Hey, we had a bona fide flounce last night!
Bless his heart.
I felt bad for Derpy.
He was amazing
Yep, completely gracious about it.
Which just goes to prove my theory…. Glibs are the best people.
Truly an amazing collection of exceptional weirdos.
Half-way home now. But, that means Reno.
God, I hate this state. But, I at least got to drive the eastern Sierra route today. And man, that is beautiful.
Tomorrow Ill be in ████████, WA
Ill send pics if it stops raining long enough. In fact I need to get to bed- I got a 0600 flight.
Why do you hate Nevada?
Have you been here?
Seriously, it is one big strip mall, were you have to make a U-turn on every block to get anywhere. Not to mention that when you leave the two major cities, as soon as you are five miles out all you can see is white trash.
The worst thing about Nevada is the Californication of it.
395 is one of my favorite drives.
395 is very nice. did the section from Mono lake north today.
595 is down here. Not at all a “favorite drive” for anyone. Horrible traffic in Ft Lauderdale, connecting the laser straight section of I-75 through the flat and featureless everglades known as “Alligator Alley” with the Ft Lauderdale Airport.
Possibly my least favorite spur.
Years before they came after Trump, Sharyl Atkinson was a reporter who questioned why nobody would report on Obama’s misdeeds. She was canceled and actively discredited. She learned she was being spied on by the feds.
So she sued.
Recently her lawsuit discovery confirmed that the guy who told her she was being spied on was indeed an informant for the feds as he claimed. Her discovery showed that he was working for…. Rod Rosenstein. That name sound familiar?
So, now she can proceed to…. oh, wait. The informant turns up dead a week after her win in discovery. Oh well.
https://twitter.com/SharylAttkisson/status/1721246413898584423?t=snHI7-oWaqGgsaO0g6QRKw&s=19
New Twitter files bombshell… author of select committee report on Russian bots helped create the Russian Bots.
The whole thing was a scam, even the scam about the scam. And everyone knew it.
https://www.racket.news/p/twitter-files-extra-the-manufacture?r=5mz1&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
The net…
The “Russian bots” were created by democrats working to elect democrats…. and they were the same people who wrote the reports saying there were Russian bots.
And everyone at the top knew it the whole time.
So the one thing they keep clinging to on “Russian collusion”, the Russian campaigns on Facebook and twitter…. those were entirely fake and entirely run by democrats. And yet somehow a $38 million investigation by Mueller didn’t uncover this.
Taibbi has multiple threads on the topic, but WordPress doesn’t want me to post the link
Also, remember the stories claiming Tulsi was a Russian agent?
Exactly the same people.
https://twitter.com/mtaibbi/status/1720420943560872342?t=v4qM8Rh4aeniVdmT41UhQg&s=19
Somebody needs to start a real front company called Setec Astronomy.
Mueller didn’t uncover it because he was a doddering fool, and his staff ran the show. I bet they knew, didn’t want discovery to go down that rabbit hole, and worked to find “nothing” so the trail didn’t lead back to them.
Where is my shocked face.
So, in a short thread of “only on X and Substack” news, we have another body in democrat deep state cover ups, another Democrat organization that created the Russiagate hoax as much as the Steele Dossier, two Democrat targets of these schemes, another election (Roy Moore) that was “interfered with” by Russians who were actually democrats, a Democrat presidential campaign that was scuttled by the same people, and another example of the exact same people at the top of the FBI and DOJ acting corruptly….
All without even a whiff of coverage by any of the top news agencies.
Any one of these stories is probably bigger than Watergate. And not a Woodward or a Bernstein to be found anywhere outside of substack or Rumble.
Astonishing
Black Friday deals…. obscure needs edition.
Brandsmart USA has a $1,000 Kenmore dishwasher on sale for $300. Black stainless, 3 rack, stainless tub, 47db quiet.
For those who have not kept up, $300 is basically the cheapest price you can find on a dishwasher.
Runs through the 27th.
Coincidentally, my dishwasher fell apart this week. Headed down to get mine tomorrow.
Edit: whirlpool.
Looked at too many appliances today, forgot which was which.
The excellent repair guys I used in California said that Whirlpool was one of the very few appliance makers worth anything.
I would have preferred a Bosch… but that is another $350, minimum. Plus, the wife consulted with her dad, who sold appliances for years.
Whirlpool is the way to go. And we have had bad luck with Samsung and LG.
Soooo then this happens….
We are looking at the one that is on sale and some guy comes by and stops…. “is that black stainless???” We close the door so he can see. “Ooooh, nice! …. Oh, no… it is just a Whirlpool.”.
Having already decided this is going to be her new washer, she takes the insult. And being her, she can’t let it slide…
“Actually, my dad sold appliances and he said to stick to Whirlpool and Kenmore. Stay away from LG and Samsung. I *hate* samsung….. we have a nice $3,000 fridge from Samsung and it is falling apart (true). Every plastic shelf in the doors is broken. I mean, Bosch is nice, but that is more than double the price….”
Poor dude had to go show his boyfriend his little notepad with that lecture still hanging in the air. He really wanted the $800 Samsung.
For no good reason, I’m watching Slapshot.
Great movie.
You never need a reason.
Nobody will ever read this comment but Melinda Dillons titties are reason enough.
Obama was on.a pod cast yesterday (“Pod Save America”) talking about Gaza/Israel and said (among other gems):
What could you have done? Hmm maybe NOT give billions in cash to Iran and help further their nuclear program while they find Hamas, Hezbollah and other terror groups? Maybe that would have been a start.
He goes on to say that “’And you then have to admit nobody’s hands are clean, that all of us are complicit to some degree.”
Uh, maybe YOU do, Barack. He says the war is a “moral reckoning for us all” Buddy, you don’t speak for me.
The whole thing was ludicrous. He retconned his entire presidency. Dude is so proficient at rewriting things, he could get a job writing for Disney.
What was that LoTR character…..?? Oh yeah, Wormtongue. The unvarnished truth is that the leftist here, including Obama, Biden, Clinton, Pelosi…their ilk, are sympathetic to Hamas. Many on the left are claiming that Hamas is part of the left. They are anti-semitic to the bone. They will publicly say that terrorism and slaughter is bad and they are all against it but then they do what they can to passively foster it.
Fuck DST. I did not sleep right.
😞🌄☕
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PXzuDXZwZtI
🎶🎶
Morning, Sean
Good morning all!
Today we hear from John Entwhistle, off his first solo album, Smash Your Head Against the Wall.
You’re Mine.
<a href = https://youtu.be/T3hNjaIywWM?si=3Jyuu7LnoWOK8lXn<I Believe in Everything.
Share and enjoy!
Good morning, Beau, U, and Sean! (And Suthen, if you’re still around!)
Still working out exactly how to tilt my head to read my laptop with my new glasses. I had “progressive” (no-line multifocal) lenses before, but the new prescription is different enough (after four years, duh!) that I can tell the difference.
You’ll get used to it… or you’ll go mad. But you’ll have us for company in the asylum.
😄
(Why come I can’t find the happy face with glasses emoji on my laptop???)
😎🤓🧐 – Closest ones I’ve got.
Welp, I gotta head into the office.
Hopefully the grow light has helped the Lavender seedling and it will have some real leaves on the sprout.
🌱
Yeah, “lavender”…
*winks knowingly*
That’s what it said on the seed packet.
Good morning!
Got to get everything stabilized here, then off to Houston tomorrow morning!
So that’s why you’re trying to fit a folder full of DIE directives under that table leg.
This? This is my “seismic isolation device.”
Lovely date with IT Lady. Further evidence that 24 years in the US is offset by having an expat community: not only had she never seen a brie en croute, the concept was completely foreign to her.
Honestly, being a part-time vegetarian is making me select options that I wouldn’t ordinarily, and the results have been excellent.
No, I don’t think it’s a result of the expat community. I’ve been in the US even longer and never encountered that dish.
Food fads that I am now guessing UnCiv also missed:
Chocolate cake with raspberry filling
Wasabi everything
Fern bars
Blackened Redfish
Raspberry vinaigrette? Dried tomatoes? Lava cakes?
😉
Here’s the thing about fads – a small number of people make a lot of noise about them for a short period of time, then they fade away.
It was too much bother to follow fads. Quite frankly, the middle half of that list sounds disgusting. (Though, yes, I saw thw Wasabi craze, it was not particularly appealing to have it everywhere.)
*looks up brie en croute*
Looks like a dish where they wrap a wheel of brie in puff pastry and bake it. Sometimes with added ingredients to change the flavor from just cheese and pastry.
Good morning! Why am I up so early?
You’re not, the clocks are off.
Well, turn them back on.
😛
+1 canned Prince Albert
Hey from O’Hare. The United Club in terminal 2 is far superior to terminal 1.
However, if you have a long layover, I feel the peace and quiet is worth every penny.