Saturday evening links of illness

by | Mar 11, 2023 | Daily Links | 170 comments

Okay, this is the fifth time I’ve been sick since I got the Covid vaccine, and the third time in the last three months. Prior to the vaccine, I hadn’t been sick in ten year. I fucking hate out government.

 

Pissy links, anyone?

 

Thiel wins again.

 

Given how rash the decision was to move for may people, I’m not surprised.

 

This is one way to get rid of the homeless this spring, when it all thaws.

 

Yahoo!Sports?

 

I imagine it’s pretty damn cold in hell right now.

 

You won’t be buying the gange in Oklahoma anytime soon.

 

Okay, back to the couch. Apropos.

About The Author

Spudalicious

Spudalicious

Survey says I’m a Paleolibertarian bitches. That means I eat “L”ibertarians for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Soave tastes a little fruity. Wait a minute, that doesn’t sound quite right…

170 Comments

  1. Sean

    Feel better Spud.

    • Aloysious

      Tea and/ or chateau le sink with lime or lemon juice works for me, do recommend.

    • Chafed

      Seconded

      • DEG

        Thirded.

        Black tea, lemon, honey, and bourbon.

  2. J. Frank Parnell

    Through Friday night, a total of 9.42 inches of rain was reported in Rocky Butte

    *giggle*

  3. The Late P Brooks

    Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund had no money with Silicon Valley Bank as of Thursday morning as the bank descended into chaos, according to a person familiar with the matter.

    Peter Thiel murdered SVB. It figures. Was he in cahoots with Musk?

    • Muzzled Woodchipper

      He’s not the only one. He advised ALL of his client to withdraw all funds. Several financial analysts have. There a run for sure.

      Shit banks like this is what happens when you listen to the government’s financial advice, and out most of the energy in a company towards JUSTICE!

  4. Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

    Well, I am going to be driving a huge chunk of California next week, including going over the Sierra’s a couple times. I hope it isn’t too much of PIA.

    • Chafed

      Pack extra money for gas.

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        Cash in my pocket, as we speak.

  5. The Late P Brooks

    This week, as panic turned into a bank run, some venture firms suggested that the tech industry had a moral imperative not to abandon SVB.

    “Who? Never heard of ’em.”

  6. Nephilium

    It’s a Saturday, and while I’m home, the girlfriend and I are planning on spending some time together and watching some movies, so I leave you the Zoom/Happy Hour/Meeting room for tonight.

  7. dbleagle

    Great WZ song. When asked by Letterman about his cancer his reply that not visiting a doctor for over 25 years was probably not the “best decision ever.”

  8. The Late P Brooks

    “Republicans, conservatives, I am sorry. I also believed wholesale so much else that has since turned out not to be as I was told it was by NPR, MSNBC and the New York Times,” Wolf also said.

    Be more suspicious next time.

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      We need Wolf and her ilk to make it safe for center left liberals to break ranks with the nutjobs and the hopelessly corrupt.

      • Sean

        I don’t care. I’m fresh out of fucks to give.

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        Scruffy is right. In order to set up an opposition to the lies we are forced to live under, we will need every last hand we can get, and sooner rather than later. Wolf is a gateway* that is safe for the “leans left but notices something is wrong” people to go through.

      • Pat

        Solzhenitysn’s essay Live Not By Lies encapsulates the sentiment nicely.

  9. dbleagle

    From the KIA link in response to Evan and Trashy.

    This was the scariest scene of “Cabaret”
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tUctFu46_c

    The youth are first to be sucked in, then the adults who should know better, and soon only one old man is standing firm but visibly fearful. “Do you still think you can control them?” is a great way to close the scene and the true question in 2023.

    We already see this behavior in restaurants, schools, and other public places. “Publicly join us or off to the ditch with you!”

    For the first half century of my life I could not conceive the MSM would loudly and proudly claim evidence should be withheld from the public so that the government could either protect or prosecute citizens based on their politics. Shithead politicians, of course they would but it would be behind the scenes. Now Moobs from a podium threatens SC Justices and most recently the one broadcast network not firmly in his pocket.

    A black pill isn’t dark enough. I didn’t want to have to be on another battlefield during my last years, now I just try to determine when the battle will be foisted on me. Fuck the leftists and their enablers.

  10. Yusef drives a Kia

    It’s not raining much here, cloudy for tomorrows tourney, snow?
    Nahh
    Tall Cans!🍻

  11. Scruffyy Nerfherder

    Crypto investors redeemed more than $2 billion in Circle’s stablecoin in the past 24 hours, according to blockchain data provider Nansen as of 10 p.m. ET on Friday. The pace of USD Coin redemptions accelerated through Friday, with most of the USD Coin burned in the last eight hours, Nansen said.

    As WSJ reports, some crypto executives questioned whether Circle has enough assets to cover its liabilities.

    “Are you solvent?” David Schwartz, chief technology officer at crypto company Ripple, asked on Twitter in response to a post from Circle.

    Paolo Ardoino, chief technology officer of Tether, said the issuer of the world’s largest stablecoin doesn’t have any exposure to Silicon Valley Bank.

    Tether has a market cap of around $72 billion, down from $74 billion late Friday, while USD Coin’s market cap is roughly $38 billion, down from about $41 billion, according to data from CoinMarketCap.

    Additionally, following USDC’s depegging, the stablecoin ecosystem immediately came under pressure, as DAI, USDD and FRAX also depegged from the U.S. dollar.

    I’ll say it again. Powell hates stablecoins. This was quite likely an attempt at unraveling that ecosystem.

    https://www.zerohedge.com/crypto/usdc-stablecoin-breaks-peg-circle-admits-billions-stuck-svb

  12. Animal

    We sure as hell don’t regret moving. Not one little bit.

    • Spudalicious

      You wouldn’t believe how many houses were bought here with nothing more than internet views. Never even visited the area.

      • Animal

        I believe it. We were talking to the lady who runs the pizza joint/deli in Willow a while back, and she regaled us with the story of a lady who dropped in to pick up some sandwiches; she was from California, and she and her husband were up looking over some land he had bought sight unseen to build a house on.

        Turns out the land he had bought had burned over since the photos were taken. (He probably has some recourse there.) But that wasn’t the best part. The lady asks the deli owner, “where is the mall around here?”

        Deli lady: “This is Willow, Alaska. There’s no mall.”

        CA lady: “Well, where do you buy clothes?”

        Deli lady: “The Walmart in Wasilla, usually. Or, there’s the Willow thrift store, just a half-mile or so up the side road.”

        CA lady: “Where’s the nearest mall?”

        Deli lady: “Anchorage, I guess.”

        Some people just ain’t smart enough to avoid buying a pig in a poke. But I take comfort in knowing CA Lady didn’t last through the first winter in the area.

      • Animal

        Anchorage is pretty much a shithole these days.

      • Muzzled Woodchipper

        I haven’t been in a long while now, but it pretty much was then too. I’m sure there are some nicer parts of town, but what I saw was a dump.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Last time we were there, there weren’t enough stores open in the mall to be a shithole.

      • Pat

        We bought the place I’m about to vacate from out of state without ever visiting it. Even 10 years ago, a real estate agent with a cell phone that takes video and a home inspector weren’t difficult to find. I’m going to be doing the same thing with my next place, in all likelihood. Then again my budget and standards are quite low. Rolling into town and discovering there’s no organic kale smoothie bar wouldn’t exactly send my bougie instatokbook life into a downward spiral.

      • Spudalicious

        People from California moved here sight unseen, and immediately started complaining about the weather.

      • Spudalicious

        And to be fair, I did buy my house in NY sight unseen. But I had plenty of video and intel from OMWC and WedDom, and I had also been to the area several times.

      • Pat

        I had lived in this state previously, so that helped a little. My next adventure will be into unseen territory, but areas where I’ve done a lot of research and may be able to persuade friends and acquaintances to help with intelligence gathering. I certainly won’t be arriving not knowing where the nearest grocery store and gas station are located. I couldn’t imagine picking up stakes and moving, and then being surprised about something as trivial as the weather. Good lord people, we have the most vast information reservoir of all time at our fingertips.

      • Spudalicious

        That’s all good. I just don’t understand people that go in blind.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        We’re trying to figure out how to avoid buying something sight unseen this summer. We’ll try to schedule a couple trips to do some showings, but it’s a 10 hour round trip, so we can’t be up there every weekend.

        That said, we’ve been there a few times before, so it’s not like the area is a surprise to us.

        I’m itching to buy something and be done with the waiting (going on 2 years from when we decided on SW Missouri), but there’s nothing making it urgent, so we can wait on the market to soften up a bit more. I’d like to be moved by October at the latest, though.

      • Chafed

        Lol. Idiots.

      • The Bearded Hobbit

        Mom’s house was purchased by someone from Hawai’i who only saw the pictures. $650k. Granted, it was on the river but the built it in ’02 for about $200k.

        All over the internet.

        We’re trying to buy another rental property. One came on the market and we made an offer, contingent upon the inspection. Inspection showed foundation issues so we were able to cancel the sale.

        All over the internet.

    • Name's BEAM. James BEAM.

      Same here.

      Amongst other things, when we moved from the Lower Rainland™ to Edmonton back in ’19, we ended up with twice the home for half the money. My wife was diffident at first, but is firmly in the “thank God we moved” mindset now.

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        Yeah, we are super glad we got out of the Bay Area, and moved to a small town. We might be in the penumbra of Portland, but it seems a forgotten shadow.

        And to think we almost bought a house in Berkeley.

      • Chafed

        You would have made a killing but you might also have been killed.

  13. The Late P Brooks

    We need Wolf and her ilk to make it safe for center left liberals to break ranks with the nutjobs and the hopelessly corrupt.

    I made an offhand reference to Major _______ de Coverly’s refusal to sign a loyalty oath (in Catch 22) at the end of the dead thread.

    That is truly what is necessary. Irreproachable, sane, well respected people need to look down their noses and say, “That’s completely insane. I won’t participate.”

    Those people aren’t exactly thick on the ground. Are they stirring in the background, murmuring and scuffing their feet? I hope so.

    • Muzzled Woodchipper

      I just find it very difficult to believe that people who vote left, do so because they’re totally down with the far left whackos and their insanity. I think it’s more likely they’re being convinced that voting right is a vote for Hitler, while holding their noses and pulling the lever for team blue.

      • Pat

        The left-wing political coalition, being composed of many mutually-exclusive identity groups who otherwise share few common interests and in some cases outright hate each other, should theoretically be very fragile, but it’s more durable than a fucking diamond somehow. Some large percentage of the coalition really does support the most radical policy proposals, and the rest will go along with just about anything, apparently, as long as they’re promised the pony that they never actually receive.

      • rhywun

        I can only imagine a lot of it is just plain inertia, given how many people who vote for Dems over and over again who are actively harmed by their policies.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        The thing that makes me wonder about the inertia theory is the number of what seem like otherwise reasonable (usually older) people who start talking and it’s all just $CURRENT_YEAR leftist pabulum. It’s not like they’re a 90s Democrat in policy who just so happens to have not kept up with the times. They may not be all in on every single plank of the prog-fascist platform, but they’re on board with most of them.

      • rhywun

        Yeah, maybe I’m out of touch. I haven’t run in those circles for decades.

        I think I can confidently say that propaganda works.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        I had a conversation with an elder at my church the other day, and it was clear after a few minutes that he was a lefty. This guy is in his 80s, so I expected a very 90s style leftism. Nope. He’s not in line on the LGBT+ stuff, but he hit the talking points (if a few years out of date) on guns, racism, Christianity, income inequality, public education, etc. The only thing he was missing was the energy to do anything about it.

        Similarly, I have had conversations with my early boomer (Christian) grandparents, and it’s all $CURRENT_YEAR talking points. They have the Matrix port in the back of their heads and Lester Holt beams in the talking points for an hour each evening. Yeah, it’s tempered somewhat by their faith, but 95% of the social and economic radicalism is there.

      • rhywun

        Yeah, propaganda is not just coming from politicians.

      • Gustave Lytton

        Yep, sounds like my parents. If it wasn’t for abortion, they’d be foot soldiers for the Democrat left.

      • J. Frank Parnell

        The thing that makes me wonder about the inertia theory is the number of what seem like otherwise reasonable (usually older) people who start talking and it’s all just $CURRENT_YEAR leftist pabulum.

        I run into that with all of my older relatives, and I’m convinced they are just reacting “argument clinic”-style to whatever horrible (usually strawman) thing they’ve been told the evil Republicans are doing.

      • Muzzled Woodchipper

        They’re also the only demographic that routinely has the corporate media as their main source.

      • EvilSheldon

        I think that it is because every single interest group in the left wing, has at least one policy proposal that is very very important to them, and is also completely fucking insane. They are willing to go along with *anything*, so long as they get their legalizing pederasty/government-funded abortion up ’til birth/massive ‘reparation’ payments/reducing the human population to a few millions hobby horse…

      • Chafed

        I’m on board with your theory.

    • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

      Much like the Hollywood blacklists under McCarthy, the people most affected, and most affecting, were the true believers. The fervent communists and commie hunters. And at that point, it was working as planned. But when normies started getting caught up in either side, having to take oaths and whatnot, that is when it went sideways.

      We are hitting that point right now, hopefully. But it will still take a lot of work.

      • Muzzled Woodchipper

        Nothing says freedom like having to make a DEI statement to get a job.

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        Most people want to be good. Saying you aren’t a racist seems like doing good. But, the pushing gets harder, and more and more people get screwed by much of this, and you have to point out that what is actually being asked is deeply racist. Look at what happened in VA, what was pretty much a blue state started getting caught up in this, and people started going “hey, lets look at this, and I mean really look at it” and did not like what was going on. And it flipped red.

      • Gustave Lytton

        The blacklists stemmed from the earlier HUAC hearings, not McCarthy.

  14. The Late P Brooks

    Every person not already despised by the mainstream talking coconut-heads who speaks out makes it easier for the next one.

  15. Pat

    “The faith community, I believe, and of course, I’ve got an iron in the fire on this, but I believe the faith community was a major player in what happened here,” Paul Abner, president of Oklahoma Faith Leaders, told Fox News Digital.

    Abner, whose group represents six Christian denominations including Baptists, Catholics, and Nazarenes, said that the widest margin he had seen from pollsters before the vote was 3% and that “you can’t quantify” the impact the faith community has in the state.

    I’ve been looking to relocate for several years now. I started looking around the country back around 2016, weighing up the issues of geography, climate, culture, and politics. 7 years later, as I’m about to finally undertake the task by necessity, I am fully convinced that there exists no place in this entire godforsaken continent where you can be governed by sanity. You either have to tolerate the fundamentalism of the modern cultural Marxist clerisy, or of 18th century agrarian rednecks passed over by the last 300 years of history. You’d think there would be enough fence sitters in just one town, within just one state, within this whole country that they would at least agree upon on some strange hodgepodge. But by and large, no. You either get convicted pedophile trannies reading to kids in public libraries, or blue laws and Reefer Madness. The cultural, economic and political schisms are such that I’ve made my choice with whom I’ll reluctantly throw in, but fuck me if we don’t deserve better enemies and allies.

    • Muzzled Woodchipper

      Yeah.

      I can’t say I’m very fond of the rednecks. They’re fine people overall, but that’s just not who I am culturally. It can be quite frustrating.

    • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

      The reason we are seeing those two groups, is at this point they have the most to gain/loose, and the normies don’t do either with things as they stood. But, as the cultural fight gets bigger and more encompassing, it sucks more and more normies in as the fight reaches the center.

    • Penguin

      Florida is relatively decent, but keep in mind the qualifier.

      • Muzzled Woodchipper

        Culturally FL is okay. But fuck the weather.

      • Pat

        Florida made my list, although I’m priced out for now. The climate was a huge, glaring drawback. After all these years in the desert, even 50% humidity feels like a swamp to me.

      • Muzzled Woodchipper

        I lived there until I was 26. Piss on 85 degree Christmas mornings and never ending summers.

        When you’re just sitting in a chair outside at midnight, the temp is 82 degrees, and you’re sweating profusely, that place can eat shit.

      • rhywun

        sitting in a chair outside at midnight, the temp is 82 degrees, and you’re sweating profusely

        That just reminds me of the last blackout in NYC.

        Fuck that.

      • R.J.

        I am here right now! Weather is quite good. Panama City Beach is as far as I like to go in Florida.

      • Pat

        I have a friend who lives in PCB, he’s been lobbying to get me to move there for years.

      • Pat

        Which raises another interesting point. I’ve never been the type of person who is overly attached to a town, neighborhood, or house. I’m always surprised when people are like evangelical about where they live or get offended if you criticize it. It’s a patch of dirt that somebody drew a line around, guys. Chill out. I guess it’s good to have strong community ties, but I don’t really want them for myself. It’s the only thing about me that’s remotely cosmopolitan. And yet I find cosmopolitanism and its adherents basically un-fucking-bearable. Another example of the frustrating cultural dichotomies.

      • westernsloper

        I thought you were in TX?

      • Pat

        IIRC, he’s on vacation.

      • Muzzled Woodchipper

        Panama City weather is typical of the panhandle coast, but nowhere else in the state.

      • rhywun

        Yeah. I know ahead of time I could never tolerate it.

        Really, anywhere south of the Mason Dixon line. Unless the humidity goes down away from the coast or something.

    • rhywun

      There’s no “center” left in this country. One side takes over a place and it must destroy the other side.

      • Muzzled Woodchipper

        I think most people are center-ish. It’s the big noise the edges make that crowd everything out.

      • Pat

        Centeredness isn’t a panacea either, unfortunately. Instead of “Let’s compromise: you can have legal weed and porn if we can have legal guns and bibles.” it usually goes more like “Fine, we’ll let you ban weed and regulate porn if we can ban guns and regulate churches.” What we really need is another near-empty continent to discover, build, and destroy again.

      • Gustave Lytton

        With dangerous wildlife/inhabitants or less wealth so must spend most time worrying about figuring out how to survive.

  16. The Late P Brooks

    I think it’s more likely they’re being convinced that voting right is a vote for Hitler, while holding their noses and pulling the lever for team blue.

    Agreed. But maybe as the feral children go farther and farther off the rails the pendulum will swing. As far as I’m concerned, at this point a coalition of the least crazy elements of the two parties would be a lot better than where we’re headed right now with Biden at the wheel. Mitt Romney? Why the fuck not?

    I know I’ll never see the government I want. A few more tolerable years would be appreciated.

    • Muzzled Woodchipper

      We need the center to do what those further right did (because Trump): learn to completely brush off the accusations of racism/sexism/etc. Embrace them, even.

      If disagreeing with teenagers being duped into transitioning and tendering life altering drugs to kids is transphobic, then I’m transphobic as fuck.

      Until they can get over the fear of being labeled racists and misogynists, they won’t change.

    • rhywun

      Keep in mind that in the 70s and 80s the crime rate was multiple times higher than even now, there were bombings every other day, and no-shit cults left and right.

      I’m afraid that we have a long way to fall further into craziness.

      • EvilSheldon

        Maybe not so much. The feds and big cities have been *heavily* cooking the books on the crime rate, since the late ’10s.

      • rhywun

        I haven’t seen that talked about anywhere.

      • EvilSheldon

        Nobody is talking about it except for concealed weapons instructors, and maybe a few fringey bloggers.

      • rhywun

        I guess it’s possible but I thought even I wasn’t that cynical.

        I mean, this should be a gigantic scandal if true.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        You can see the fringes of it with the “Soros DAs” issue. My brother is a cop in a Soros DA area, and the amount of skeevy shit he’s just stopped bothering arresting people for is a bit disconcerting. It’s at the point where he’s actively looking to move out of town because “I’m sick of bumping into people I repeatedly encounter at work while shopping at the grocery store.” However, until the DA changes course, they’re gonna be out there stealing shit and breaking into cars with nothing more than a disapproving look from the local PD.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        I miss the good old no shit cults, dangerous but interesting groups of people. Manson, The Family of God, the various Crowley stuff: they had style man.

      • PudPaisley

        I’m a fan of Heaven’s Gate.

        I wonder if they got the last laugh, and are cruising through space on the Hale-Bopp Comet.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        +1 on the vodka and phenobarbital, -1 on the self-castration

  17. The Late P Brooks

    You wouldn’t believe how many houses were bought here with nothing more than internet views. Never even visited the area.

    Same in Livingston and Bozeman. Cash offers, over the phone.

    • Muzzled Woodchipper

      The house down the street was bought sight unseen for an ungodly price. About double what any other house on my 1-street neighborhood had ever sold for.

    • dbleagle

      We moved to Bozeman in 1994. The houses we were looking at all cost one entire zero less in 1993. We ended up renting.

      The crazy thing was even in 1994 about 1/3 of houses stood empty all winter. I can’t imagine what the area is like today.

  18. The Late P Brooks

    Until they can get over the fear of being labeled racists and misogynists, they won’t change.

    Yes.

    “If it doesn’t matter what I do, I’ll just do as it pleases me.”

    • Muzzled Woodchipper

      Yep. People need to embrace The Wife Of Bath.

    • Hyperion

      “If it doesn’t matter what I do, I’ll just do as it pleases me.”

      Best policy, I just do not care how racist and whatever else ist I am, at all.

  19. Hyperion

    Greetings from Hellcife (pronounced ‘Hell’ ‘seef’-‘ee’), shitlords!

    Man I told my son-in-law, I am so fucking stealing that and using it first chance I get.

    • rhywun

      Recife?? Yikes, I’ve heard stories.

      • Hyperion

        Yes, I’m here for 2 months. It is fantastically beautiful here. I’m trying to upload some pics for sharing and I can’t get this Pixel 7 Pro to show the data, damnit.

        My son-in-law who lives here said Hellcife and I was laughing my ass off. That one is hard to top, I’m at a loss…

      • rhywun

        I heard it’s super-crimey. I hope you’re behind some gates or something.

      • Hyperion

        27th floor beachfront property. It’s very safe up here, lol.

      • Hyperion

        fucking gorgeous too. Most of this area is safe too. You just don’t go to the favelas man. I’d be worried running around the city if I wasn’t with Brazilians all of the time, but I am.

      • rhywun

        Cool. Hard pass on the weather, though.

      • Hyperion

        It’s not too hot up here, we turn on the AC in the bedroom sometimes. But we just open the windows and it stays pretty cool because of the constant breeze up here.

        We were out today and went to my son-in-laws Yacht Club and it did get uncomfortably warm there. But most of the time the heat is not an issue because we are either in our apartment we rented or in a car or somewhere that has AC.

        I’m having fun, but I have to go back to work on Monday, so 9-5 I’ll just be sitting here on my PC working, as usual.

  20. UnCivilServant

    I have a question on dog psychology.

    One of my neighbors has a dog of a larger beed (short fur, short snout, heavily muscled) which when in their back yard will agressivly bark at passers by and charge to the fence to bark at them closer up. Since myback door is right next to the end of that yard, I’ve been witness to this behaviour quite often. I generally just go about my business, since he’s never actually jumped over the fence (it’s short enough he could probably make it). This evening, however, I met this dog on the sidewalk in front of my house instead. His attitude was completely the opposite of normal, he looked at me silently, then withdrew to the front door of the apartment building his owner lives in. We’re literally just on the other side of my house from his normal turf. Why the difference?

    • dbleagle

      Where you wearing your walking gloves or a mailed fist at the time?

      • UnCivilServant

        No, I was in between driving and being at home.

      • R.J.

        Or the furry wolf costume?

    • Spudalicious

      Known quantity. Next time, slowly extend the back of your hand and see if he comes up.

      • Spudalicious

        While smiling and saying “hey, good boy”.

    • The Hyperbole

      ‘His turf’ says it all, the sidewalk ain’t his turf, the back yard is, even if people are just walking past, he’s barking as a warning.

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      What kind of fence? Chain link or something it can’t see through?

      Around here it’s all privacy fences, and some people put windows in their fences so the dog can see what’s on the other side. That seems to reduce the aggressive barking.

      To your specific question, it seems to be a case of territory. Inside the fence is the pack’s territory, so doggo is on sentry duty. Outside the fence is unclaimed land, so doggo is in social mode.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      So it’s basically a half billion goes *poof*? Yikes.

      • Sensei

        They may get like $0.25 on the dollar normally.

        But I’m betting once again on bailout. It’s the corrupt way most large Team Blue leaning companies work. Upside returns are private and downside returns shared with the public.

        it’s disgusting, but exactly what happened post Lehman.

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        And some Commie jackass will start saying that this is a failure of capitalism, and all the other leftards will nod along.

      • Hyperion

        The only way they can stop capitalism is to start by giving up their iPhone.

      • Sensei

        +1 Dodd Frank

      • dbleagle

        All those hundreds of thousands of small business owners and landlords biden and Moobs are “Fuck them. They didn’t and won’t vote for us.” The Tech Bros who are strongly Team Blue as an industry? “We must save them for the good of the economy. We can’t let one tech startup have to look for fresh funding or fold. Those are our people!”

        Let it burn down. Put the fear of the market and banking discipline into that sector. If you have over $250K, open a new account so it will be covered as well.

    • Muzzled Woodchipper

      I’d bet on a bailout.

      This was a goodthink bank. They flew all the right flags, and the leadership said all the right things about the right things.

    • Chafed

      Isn’t diversifying a company’s cash part of the CFO’s job? What were they all doing?

    • Scruffyy Nerfherder

      Of course they are.

      SVB made a massive double bet on low interest rates: loans to tech startups and purchasing long term Treasuries.

      Even I know that’s a bad investing strategy.

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      Unfortunately, we’re stuck on HP products at work, so I have a lovely piece of garbage laptop from them with all the requisite hardware and software issues. At least I get a new one soon.

      I do have an old HP Proliant server that is pretty awesome, but that’s not from the same company as the consumer grade crap anymore (the one I have is from before their split-up, though).

      • rhywun

        I’m on an HP right now and like it well enough. It’s more “pro-sumer”, though.

        I guess the printer shit is shady but prints anything anymore.

      • rhywun

        insert “who”

      • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

        I ship a lot of stuff, so I do. Also, air gun targets. But, I hear ya.

        and I use a strictly low-end laptop (I break them, so just price in a new one ever couple years) but I do not game, whatsoever.

      • rhywun

        I game, a bit. Not enough to need a big rig thank goodness.

        I bought a cheapo printer when I was jobless a while back and had to sign something to get my severance pay and I had literally no other way to do that although now that I think about it I probably could have done that at Kinkos or something.

      • rhywun

        Canon, I think.

        I have not used it since.

      • Pat

        I have a LaserJet Pro printer that I’ve been quite happy with (HPLIP is very convenient), but every one of their inkjets I ever owned was shit, and as the unofficial IT support guy for my friends and family over the years, their consumer-grade laptops have brought me no end of grief.

    • Chafed

      I switched a few years ago because HP ink is expensive. I also use Brother. It’s definitely less expensive.

  21. DEG

    Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund had no money with Silicon Valley Bank as of Thursday morning as the bank descended into chaos, according to a person familiar with the matter.

    🙂

  22. hayeksplosives

    Get well, Spud.

    I too am ill. Went to bed last night feeling fine, woke up at 4:30 with chills, pain, and fever. Eventually fever got up to 102.7.

    Today has sucked.

    • DEG

      Get well soon

    • Chafed

      Feel better HS. I missed many details of your sudden move. Do you have a cat to keep you company?

  23. Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

    There is no way to un-hear the interview that Mr Carlson did with former Capitol police office Tarik Johnson, who said that he received no guidance when he called his superiors, terrified, as the Capitol was breached, to ask for direction. [https://www.foxnews.com/media/tucker-carlson-talks-exclusively-key-capitol-police-officer-ignored-by-jan-6-panel-amid-footage-release]

    That situation is anomalous.

    There is always a security chain of command in the Capitol, at the Rayburn Building, at the White House of course, and so on, which is part of a rock-solid “security plan.” [https://www.dhs.gov/news/2014/09/30/written-testimony-usss-director-house-committee-oversight-and-government-reform].

    There are usually, indeed, multiple snipers standing on the steps of the Capitol, facing outward. I made note of this when I was researching and writing The End of America. There is never improvisation, or any confusion in security practices or in what is expected of “the security plan”, involving “principals” such as Members of Congress, or staff at the White House. I know this as a former political consultant and former White House spouse.

    The reason for a tightly scripted chain of command and an absolutely ironclad security plan in these buildings, is so that security crises such as the events of Jan 6 can never happen.

    The fact that so much confusion in security practice took place on Jan 6, is hard to understand.

    Wolf brings up a very good point, in that there was always a plan to keep all capitol riots contained, and there have always been large protests there, with the potential to get out of hand. Who called off the dogs? That is a line of questioning that really needs to be followed up, because someone did it, and they did it for a reason.

    Cough*Reichstag*Cough

    The woman is a bit on the nutty side, but she has been a professor for long enough to know how to actually do research.

    • Gustave Lytton

      He radioed asking for permission to evacuate members of Congress aka execute the plan. He wasn’t turned down, he was just not answered. Like it was intentional.

      • Chafed

        None of this makes sense to me. Pelosi (and McConnell?) denied requests for more police and the National Guard. The election was over. I don’t see the political motive to allow the situation to spiral out of control. My guess, and it’s only a guess, is a lot of rank incompetence is being covered up.

      • rhywun

        Pfft, I’m going conspiracy theory on this one. Every other one is turning out to be true, why not this one.

      • Chafed

        I can’t argue with you.

      • Scruffyy Nerfherder

        Over and over, we’ve seen that the Feds will create situations that are designed to swing public opinion. Why would this be any different?

      • R C Dean

        “I don’t see the political motive to allow the situation to spiral out of control.”

        I do. Simply put, to discredit and marginalize the MAGAts.

    • Gustave Lytton

      Also, lethal force (snipers) doesn’t mean squat if you can’t or not going to use it.

  24. LCDR_Fish

    Saw Operation Fortune this afternoon. Great flick. Highly recommended. Very funny and Aubrey Plaza was gorgeous.

    Am I correct in thinking that Daylight Savings Time starts tomorrow? Didn’t see any notes this week and didn’t check a google search till 5 min ago. Guess I’m getting 1 hr less sleep before church.

    • Chafed

      Yes it does.

    • Zwak tastes the soup, but never counts the beans.

      Aubrey Plaza is gorgeous. Emily the Criminal is on my list to watch, because she is also a decent actress.

      • rhywun

        She’s my favorite on Parks & Recreation.

    • Chafed

      Whatever works for you and the wife.

  25. LCDR_Fish

    Was listening to Reasonable Doubt earlier today too – an interesting discussion with Jacob Chansley’s *new* lawyer – and some details regarding his plea “deal” and some other likely lawyerly misconduct.

    https://youtu.be/G_HmFeuGe8I?t=1059

  26. Muzzled Woodchipper

    US beats UK in game one of pool play in the WBC. Only 5 players on the team were born in the UK, and I e if those was born in London to American parents who were stationed in England (USAF), and moved to the US when his dad was moved back. So, not really British at all. Most of their players are Caribbean.

  27. nw

    Zoom ended early again, apparently.
    How am I supposed to go out drinking,
    like a Wisconsinite should.

    Spring. Winter. Now it’s a haiku.
    Feh.

    • CPRM

      I got home at 10:30 and it was dead already. Just Penguin with camera and mic off.

  28. CPRM

    For the next cartoon I want to do some play on Putin’s Sock Puppet, with an actual sock puppet…but who is actually wearing the sock?

    • R C Dean

      Putin?

  29. nw

    Could go bar hopping
    Went home for the glib zooming
    Poor life choices again

    inventing senryus
    Drinking whatever she’s making
    Amusing myself

    Saturday night’s alright
    Not for fighting, but zooming
    But alas,

    strafinrun not here
    can’t argue about nothing
    confuse the ladies

  30. Festus

    Drank too many beers on Friday night

    O mother, please forgive me

    I swear that it was the last

  31. Sean

    Mornin peeps.

  32. Shirley Knott

    Mornin’
    Gods, how I hate DST!

    • Gender Traitor

      Good morning, Shirley, Sean, and…Festus? You still around, buddy?

      Got some of that snow overnight, Shirley. 😕❄❄❄

      • Shirley Knott

        Yeah, we’re getting more today and overnight. One advantage of apartment living is that shoveling is somebody else’s problem.