Grey Line With Black, Blue And Yellow
Georgia O'Keeffe
Say what you will about O'Keeffe, the colors in her works are vibrant and lovely and quite pleasing to the eye. I'm not sure what she was aiming for with this piece, but I guess you folks with bat it around and undoubtedly figure it out.
At least this isn't Lucian Freud's "Benefits Supervisor Sleeping." Search for it if you must.
Good morning kids. Loaded for bear with the link-fu as we hit the midweek mark. Last night, the President had another great rally in Phoenix. Throngs of supporters withstood temps that were over the century mark to hear him blast his, and really our enemies in the media/political Deep State complex, promising them a fight for the things he was elected to produce. It's an open secret that Mitch McCriminal and the President are, to be charitable, not seeing eye to eye; in fact there have been reports of shouting matches between the two. Reacting to that, PDT threatened a government shutdown if the border wall was not funded. He also took shots at John McStain and Jeff Fake. Meanwhile outside, the criminal insurrectionist goon squads attempted to riot, but were effectively handled by the police (see link #4 and enjoy).
In other news, a mixed bag of things. As usual, as PDT scores points with the people, alarm bells are being raised by immigration hawks about a proposed Amnesty deal being floated by some in the administration, and there's also a sobering essay by a former intelligence analyst who asks if the Deep State has won. But on a positive note, IBD is tracking the President's successful efforts on the infrastructure front while the great Betsy McCaughey assures us that the dismantling of NAFTA is going on as planned.
Lastly, a Planned Parenthood stooge openly admits the purpose of the agency (hint; it ain't mammograms and condoms) while the cultural revolution crosses the Atlantic and its target is Blighty. The first shot in that regard was when the ex-president returned the bust of Churchill. Meh, the Islamists will be converting Westminster into the next Hagia Sofia within a generation, so what's the big deal? (sarc).
Anyway, links from around the world, across the nation and up your street. Have a better one and remain blessed.
Tuesday Overnight Open Thread (8/22/17) For The ONT In All Of Us Edition
—Misanthropic Humanitarian
(We have your Ace right here)
*****
Quotes of The Day
Quote I
It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare.Mark Twain
Quote II
When a new source of taxation is found it never means, in practice, that the old source is abandoned. It merely means that the politicians have two ways of milking the taxpayer where they had one before. H. L. Mencken
Quote III
Good news is rare these days, and every glittering ounce of it should be cherished and hoarded and worshipped and fondled like a priceless diamond. Hunter S. Thompson
How far–how low–do religious leaders end up going when they decide that, in public life, the end justifies any means? Consider the case of Jerry Falwell, Jr. For the Liberty University president, the end was the advancement of social conservatism. The means: Donald Trump.
Falwell endorsed Trump for the GOP nomination ahead of the Iowa Caucuses last year, and soon he emerged as one of the New Yorker’s most ardent evangelical backers. Trump’s dissolute personal life didn’t make him an ideal avatar for the evangelical cause. Nor did his transparently opportunistic change of heart on social issues such as abortion. But Falwell reminded his flock that Trump was running for president, not “pastor-in-chief.”
What has this party done since Trump saved their bacon, keeping them in the majority, saving them from becoming a worthless second fiddle to a corrupt Hillary? Nothing. Just nothing. And now worse than nothing. I am not the first to say this, but let’s be clear, the GOP has become a party of spineless wimps and frauds. They have betrayed half of America, betrayed the base that once supported them so well, and also betrayed their country.
They have been watching fecklessly as the left is destroying the agenda they were sent to put into place. They have been sitting on their hands while the left has been destroying their own party’s president, not only doing nothing, but often actively helping the left in their attempts to take him down.
Donald Trump is not a perfect man. Hell, he might not even be a good man. But he is a much better man than the House and Senate GOP leadership combined.
Despite working six days a week, Marion, 37, a single mother of two, can’t make ends meet on the $9.50 an hour she gets at Popeyes (no apostrophe – founder Al Copeland joked he was too poor to afford one). A fast food worker for 22 years, Marion has almost always had a second job. Until recently, she had been working 9am-4pm at Popeyes, without a break, then crossing town to a janitorial job at Bartle Hall, the convention center, where she would work from 5pm- to 1.30am for $11 an hour. She didn’t take breaks there either, although they were allowed.
Even so, the US has threatened farmers who grow it and often treated it like a dangerous drug: the plant remains forbidden in the eyes of the federal government, which blanket-banned all forms of cannabis under the Controlled Substances Act in 1970. Now, republican Rep. James Comer of Kentucky is sponsoring the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2017, with the bipartisan support of 16 congresspeople. Kentucky's two Republican senators—Rand Paul and yes, even Mitch McConnell—are also in support of the bill.
Holy crap, Mitch McConnell sticking his neck out? Miracles never cease.
Despite major improvements made by the Affordable Care Act (ACA), our health care system remains in crisis. Today, we have the most expensive, inefficient, and bureaucratic health care system in the world. We spend almost $10,000 per capita each year on health care, while the Canadians spend $4,644, the Germans $5,551, the French $4,600, and the British $4,192. Meanwhile, our life expectancy is lower than most other industrialized countries and our infant mortality rates are much higher.
Further, as of September 2016, 28 million Americans were uninsured and millions more underinsured with premiums, deductibles, and copayments that are too high. We also pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs.
The ONT hopes you Morons explain to good Old Comrade Bernie what is fucked up wrong with his thinking.
*****
The ONT Musical Interlude
August 22, 1964, The Supremes started a two week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with 'Where Did Our Love Go' the girl group's first No.1. Holland–Dozier–Holland had originally composed the song for The Marvelettes to record it who rejected the song. via thisdayinmusic.com
***
August 22, 1970, Bread went to No.1 on the US singles chart with 'Make It With You', the group's only No.1 hit, which was a No.5 in the UK. Many artists have covered the song including: The Supremes, Aretha Franklin, Earth, Wind & Fire, Dusty Springfield, Andy Williams, and Marc Cohn. via thisdayinmusic.com
Bad news for Fluffy and Fido. A new study revealed that kids’ health may actually be more dependent on another household animal – the piggy bank.
Analyzing data from a California Health Interview Survey, researchers from the nonprofit RAND Corporation compared statistics on 2,200 children with pets and 3,000 children without them. This was one of the largest ever studies on the pet-health link in kids between 0 and 17 years old.
So how is climate settled? Oh yeah, easier to tax the bejeebers out of Fido's owner than Fido.
Want to scratch your head? Want to shake your head? Want to say, DA FUQ? Here you go.
For example, somebody can be privileged by the fact that they are cisgender, thin, and white, while being oppressed by the fact that they are queer, disabled, and female.
Because of this, we need a word to describe the complex social order that keeps these intersecting oppressions in place.
Kyriarchy is an excellent word for this concept – it is more in line with intersectional feminism, and is not as problematic as the word patriarchy can be.
According to dismaying new research data, the rate of severe allergic reactions to foods in America has risen 377 percent in the last decade — a nearly fivefold jump. The numbers come from a new study by Fair Health, a nonprofit with access to 24 billion health-insurance claims filed by 150 million individuals. To get these allergy numbers, the group looked for claims where the diagnosis was anaphylaxis caused by food, a condition that can be life-threatening. Researchers discovered that not only are there more attacks now than ten years ago, but that almost a quarter of them occurred in 2016 alone, the most recent year for which data is available.
The most depressing part is that scientists aren’t sure what’s causing this proliferation — which is starting to snowball something fierce. They assume Americans’ overuse of antibiotics and tendency to rear babies in almost totally “sterile” environments have something to do with it, though, and say the uptick in C-sections, which can mess up babies’ microbiota, might also be partly to blame.
And then reality happens. The endorphins and other feel-good chemicals stop coursing through our bodies, the high wears off, and we start to feel a physiological comedown, as well as a psychological one. The body is not only releasing itself from an uptick of stress hormones, but also neurotransmitters and endorphins that put us in an improved mood and state of mind.
Was that really it?
*****
The time to learn how to have a civil disagreement is in your childhood not as an adult.
In the wake of the Evergreen State College disaster, incoming freshmen will now be required to attend a workshop designed to teach them how to have civil conversations with each other.
To the woman who passed me on the highway the other day. Thank you for the stare. Was the stare part of your "Virtue Signaling" to a deplorable like me? Yes, I noticed the bumper stickers on your newer Subaru.
Nice bumper stickers by the way. RESIST and Make America Green Again
May I ask you a few questions? Just what the hell do you mean by resist? I take it you don't care for the POTUS. Tough. Our country is a representative democracy. You win some, you lose some.
Resist? What? Are you not paying income taxes? Did you walk out of Nordstrom's without coughing up your sales tax. Did you tell the State of WI to buzz off you're not paying state income tax? After all WI is run by Republicans and our state voted for Trump.
Resist? Like the Democrat State Senators who ran away from WI to Illinois and hid like children who didn't get their way.
Resist? You mean bring a gun to knife fight as our former president once muttered?
Did you stare at me because of my 20 year old truck with the NRA sticker on the back? Funny how you believe in "Freedom of Choice". Which by the way is not in the Constitution but my rights to own guns are. Why is it always "choice" for the things you approve of? While it is not freedom of choice for those who do not agree with you?
Your moral superiority is nauseating.
The bumper sticker, "Make America Green Again". Did it make you feel good to place it on your bumper? What does it mean? Funny that sticker wasn't on the rear flank of your horse as you plodded your way down the highway.
So are we to do away with highways? Cars? Power plants? I bet our country is greener now than when you were born.
Green? Should we live off the earth? Furs to keep warm? Your friends at PETA pretty much said fur is dead. Meat is murder. So how do we farm without diesel fuel, gasoline?
You believe "We are the world". But how do you propose that we feed the world without any type of environmental impact?
No, you didn't think that sticker through did you?
Your polite virtue signaling is just the tip of the iceberg of a vile and despicable political philosophy.
All of my life I've considered those of opposing views my opponents. No more. You are not my opponent. You are my enemy and I want to see your political philosophy crushed and destroyed. As Andrew Breitbart said, Fuck You. War.
In a story that seems made for The Onion, but is actually true, according to multiple Outkick fans inside ESPN MSESPN decided to pull an Asian college football announcer named Robert Lee off the William and Mary at University of Virginia college football game because they were concerned that having an ASIAN FOOTBALL ANNOUNCER NAMED ROBERT LEE would be offensive to some viewers.
Did I mention that Robert Lee is Asian?
On the other hand, having reread the piece, I notice that it is unsourced and I don't see anything about this on Lee's Twitter TL.
How Can There Be "Right Wing Extremists" If the Right Believes in Individual Liberty and Freedom, OR Why the Left-Center-Right Paradigm Is a Myth
—J.J. Sefton
In order for its weltanschauung to make any sense at all to its adherents, as well as to justify its actions in a broader context, the Institutional Left (and I already have a problem with that monicker considering the subject of this essay, but more on that later) is constantly propagandizing in every forum and classroom the concept of "multiple perspectives." In essence, as the Buffalo Springfield crooned 50 years ago "nobody's right if everybody's wrong." It's a neat pseudo-intellectual parlor trick--- and it's totally disingenuous.
Because we are human beings, we are all prone to the usual foibles, failings, sins and idiosyncrasies that have plagued us since time immemorial. But that doesn't mean that the concepts of good and evil don't exist. Concomitantly, the world may not be strictly black and white, but the shades of light and dark are both distinct and starkly contrasted. And this is why the Left has to proclaim a moral equivalency between the alleged extremists on our side and on theirs, that is, if they ever admit to having any. They won't, because they can't. And that is because if they did the real historical record will show a trail of blood, destruction and human misery so vast as to beggar the imagination. This is where having the media, academia and culture in your pocket comes in handy. Somehow, over the past 50 years, they have managed to brainwash the entire nation into believing that the Democrats all switched parties after the Civil Rights Act of 1965, transferring the original sin of slavery and Jim Crow onto Republicans and Conservatives. Therefore, it stands to reason that the Ku Klux Klan is part and parcel of the Right, along with racism, bigotry, sexism, homophobia, Islamophobia, xenophobia and all the rest of it, ad nauseum.
If you go a bit further back in time, the prewar butchery of Josef Stalin was already into the millions, but was conveniently covered up and/or excused by the Left (for obvious reasons). But with the coming of Hitler, by virtue of the fact that he was the mortal nemesis of good ol' Uncle Joe, Hitler and the Nazis became identified with "the Right," both the European and American Leftist definitions of that term, and it has stuck to this day, never you mind about the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact or the fact that Nazi is an acronym for "National Socialist."
The problems with America are the result of the human failings and frailty of flawed individuals. Yet, despite all of it, very flawed people still managed to build what I feel is the greatest society and system of government in all of human history. On the other hand, the problems with Socialism, Statism, Progressivism, call it what you will are inherent in the ideology itself. That's why you hear the moronic, egomaniacal proclamation every generation or so of "we are the ones we've been waiting for!" Communism failed because the leaders were not worthy enough. Or the masses (see any mass grave in Irkutsk, Pyongyang or Havana for clarification).
And so I circle back to this notion of political "extremists" particularly on the right. So, in reality, what does "the right" stand for? Individual liberty, personal responsibility, a belief in the free market and the rule of a just and stable law with the absolute minimum amount of government to ensure the proper functioning of the civil society,
Suffice it to say that the Left rejects this. Nameless millions of victims in the killing fields, gas chambers and gulags all over the world bear witness to the notion of the perfectibility of man and paradise on earth. This is why in Charlottesville, the so-called "alt-right" along with Neo-Nazis, the KKK and white supremacists are pinned on us, because, in fact, given the history, they are 100% part and parcel of the other side.
So, if this is the case how can there be extremists on both sides? It makes no sense. There is no moral equivalency between the two sides. THERE IS NO LEFT/RIGHT PARADIGM. There are only those who believe in freedom and liberty and those who do not; or more precisely, those who are willing to take advantage of the good nature and gullibility of all too many to seize control and to tear down America as founded, Judeo-Christianity, the Scottish Enlightenment, free market capitalism and every other aspect of real human progress the aforementioned have fostered over the past 2,000 years of history.
It is way past time we took back the language and set the record straight and reject this blood-libeling. Make them face up to their history.... Before they rewrite ours.
In that dark room, there should be either a brick wall or a pail of water, it doesn't matter which. I shall then proceed to either smash my head or dunk it until the lights go dim and this poisonous world recedes into the cool, blessed darkness.
First of all, I'd like to point out one tiny detail: THAT'S THE ENTIRE POINT OF FREE SPEECH. If you thought the title of the article was perhaps unnecessarily hyperbolic, well, you'd be wrong. The entire thing is a dog's breakfast of unsupported tropes, lefty shibboleths and insane leaps of "logic".
The author of this garbage is the Douglas Family Chair in American culture, history, and literary and interdisciplinary studies at Skidmore College. IOW, a credentialed idiot. She atarts:
Here’s the dilemma college presidents face in the fall: Either uphold free speech on campus and risk violent counterprotests, or ban conservative provocateurs and confirm the “freedom of speech” crisis on campuses. Either way their institution’s legitimacy is undermined.
Or they could, you know, support BOTH side's right to demonstrate, chant, march, pamphleteer etc..and crack heads if either one gets violent.
I can't quote the whole thing, and selected excerpts won't do it justice, but I'll try.
But that doesn’t diminish the extent to which the alt-right and conservatives are using “free speech” to attack and destroy colleges and universities, which have long promoted different variations of the internationalist, secular, cosmopolitan, multicultural liberalism that marks the thinking of educated elites of both parties.
Actually, this sentence is pretty accurate. The problem is that " the internationalist, secular, cosmopolitan, multicultural liberalism that marks the thinking of educated elites of both parties" is poison. It's wrong. It's EVIL. So yeah, maybe using free speech to attack and destroy it is a pretty good idea. It's the entire reason the 1st Amendment was created in the first place.
She spends a good deal of time talking about the 1950s and resistance to the Communist Party of the US, and even seems to admit that CPUSA needed to be opposed:
So anticommunist liberals made a series of arguments that justified denying communists these rights on account of their disingenuous intentions and totalitarian ideology. Most famously, liberal activist Arthur Schlesinger Jr. argued that communists hid behind the First Amendment to attack liberal democracy, using it as a shield as they sought to destroy the democratic system that upheld those rights.
But then she follows it up with this doozy of a paragraph.
Schlesinger understood there weren’t enough communists in the United States to actually foment revolution. But there were enough to divide progressive forces and thus create an opportunity for conservative Republicans to take power and repeal the New Deal, which he believed would in turn destabilize American capitalism and possibly tilt the balance of international power to the Soviets. Liberals would be chumps to let a principled commitment to “freedom of speech” undercut the pragmatic goal of political survival, which was the only way to ensure progress in civil rights and social welfare.
"We had to destroy the village in order to save it" logic at it's finest. So CPUSA needed to be opposed because it was interfering with the sacred leftist agenda, never mind that it was interfering by advocating for taking it to it's logical conclusion, which was anathema to most Americans and might make them resist the sacred cows of the left.
There's more, but it's all just unhinged lunacy. Read the whole thing, but I warn you, your brain will be reeling afterwards.
Democracy Dies in Delusion.
(P.S. I just saw an open thread go up, I put it back in draft because OM didn't know I was writing this one.)
There was also another conservative on Twitter, who unfortunately I did not capture and I can't remember now, who complained that he had a video demonetized with the message "we reviewed your video and have determined that it violates our terms of service blah, blah, blah", only it was a live stream scheduled for later that evening or the next day, and it hadn’t happened yet. There was literally no content to judge, and YouTube yanked it, anyway.
I would squeal like a teen-aged girl at a Justin Bieber concert if Trump wrote an EO declaring that Google, YouTube and Facebook are public utilities and are to be regulated as such. Throw in a heavy dose of 'commerce clause' and my joy would be complete.
But... but... principles.
Not all that long ago, I would not like this violation of the small government, laissez-faire principles I adhered to, but you know what, I just don't care anymore. Screw 'em. We're in a knife fight for our survival against those who want to turn our country into a socialist craphole run by a women's studies department, so arguing about the virtues of limited government is pointless and counterproductive. That is not the battle we have to fight.
So yeah, I've got no problem with using the weaponized government that progressives have constructed to bring them to their knees. They've sewn the wind, let them reap the whirlwind.
"It used to be that, if some idiot believed that lizard people were ruling the world, all his friends told him shut up, you're an idiot, and that would be that. But now, the idiot goes on the internet and hooks up with thousands of other idiots and they spread their stupid crap worldwide. The internet will go down in history as the greatest engine of idiocy and stupidity the world has ever seen."
I missed out on the eclipse thread yesterday, so here is my eclipse story.
At Casa de Muse, the sun would be 99.3% occluded at the max. Mrs. Muse said that was good enough for her, but I said no, you will regret not seeing the full 100%. So with a long-time friend and Muse son #2, we packed up some picnic chairs, water bottles, and our special eclipse glasses and drove 30 miles north, where we found a public park which wasn't too crowded.
Afterwards, Mrs. Muse agreed with me that the 30 mile drive just to get that extra .7% was well worth it.
The skies were clear, and the temperature felt like it was in the high 60s or low 70s. Perfect weather.
As the eclipse progressed, it seemed not to be getting very much darker, which surprised us. But we did notice the temperature steadily dropping, and I was starting to regret not bringing a long-sleeved shirt.
It actually didn't look like it was getting darker until the occlusion hit 90%. Then the darkness visibly increased.
And as soon as it hit totality, WOW. At 100%, the park was as dark as dawn, not pitch dark like night, but "light" dark like cool, clear mornings when the sun is just below the horizon and will be up shortly. Or like a deep twilight, I guess. Then the corona flared out and it was yuuge, and spectacular. It was amazing; I've never seen anything quite like it.
Everybody clapped and cheered. That was fun. At our location, totality lasted for one minute and 49 seconds.
And then we packed up and left. The traffic home was miserable, but we endeavored to persevere, and we eventually made it back.
Good morning kids. The President made his first address in his capacity as commander-in-chief to the nation last night, specifically about the situation in Afghanistan. After eight years of complete cluster-f***ery under Dubya and then a further eight years of having the commader-in-chief aiding and abetting the enemy, frankly I don't see the point of wasting any more American blood and treasure. The way you win wars is to inflict the most massive amount of pain, death and destruction upon the enemy until he cries uncle. In this case we are not necessarily dealing with a nation-state but an annihilationist ideology. To my way of thinking, you have to kill and kill massively, occupy territory, institute martial law, dismantle the mosques and madrases and "denazify" the country by controlling how Islam is practiced and preached and forcibly introduce Judeo-Christianity over a period of perhaps decades. Obviously that ain't gonna happen.
While it cannot be denied that Afghanistan is a breeding ground and launch pad for Islamist terrorism, the wave of attacks we have witnessed in the west over the past several years were carried out by citizens and/or recent immigrants to the individual nations themselves. Us included. Still, there needs be some sort of stability in that region. On the plus side, PDT is not going to micromanage the war and will let the generals do the fighting, hopefully with very loose rules of engagement. He also took aim at a huge terrorist enabler; Pakistan. And that has got to also be a shot at the Chi-Coms who are their biggest ally in the region. Still, the fact that very questionable people such as Lindsay Grahamaphrodite are in favor of this and that the plan was cooked up by H.R. McMustard, someone who is perhaps an Obama embed, I'm not exactly jumping for joy here. I hope PDT's instincts are right. His precedency is on the line as well as the lives of American soldiers in the field. G-d protect him.
Anyway, links from around the world, across the nation and up your street. Have a better one and remain blessed.
Monday Overnight Open Thread (8/21/17) Hope You Didn't Go Blind Edition
—Misanthropic Humanitarian
(Lovely. Just Lovely.)
*****
Quotes of The Day
Quote I
It's the friends you can call up at 4 a.m. that matter. Marlene Dietrich
Quote II
Equality, rightly understood as our founding fathers understood it, leads to liberty and to the emancipation of creative differences; wrongly understood, as it has been so tragically in our time, it leads first to conformity and then to despotism. Barry Goldwater
Quote III
The smallest minority on earth is the individual. Those who deny individual rights cannot claim to be defenders of minorities. Ayn Rand
The Atlantic’s very lengthy essay on the failure of the eclipse to occur where a sufficient number of black people reside is entitled “American Blackout.” It clocks in at a remarkable 4,544 words and does not appear to be satire.
Concerning “the Great American Eclipse,” Brooklyn Law School professor Alice Ristroph writes in the rapidly deteriorating magazine, “there live almost no black people” “along most of its path.”
The Atlantic’s longwinded law professor assures readers that “implicit bias of the solar system” is “presumably” not the cause of eclipse’s failure to affect enough black people.
“Still, an eclipse chaser is always tempted to believe that the skies are relaying a message.”
After record heat in the first quarter of 2016, something interesting began occurring, not reported in the press. Temperatures trended downwards sharply in the months of April, May and June of 2016. And most importantly the sharp downward trend contradicted the more typical tendency (at least for 2013, 2014, and 2015) to show no particular trend. The last six months on 2016 showed some above-average warming, but of a seasonal nature.
A fraternity at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor canceled a Nile River-themed welcome party after being condemned by fellow students for "appropriating Egyptian culture."
Vermont Attorney General T.J. Donovan said his office has concluded an investigation into the invoices and billing practices of Dr. Jonathan Gruber, an economic consultant who contracted with the state to provide policy expertise, research and economic modeling for Vermont’s abandoned single-payer healthcare system.
Former Gov. Peter Shumlin sought to create the single-payer system, known as Green Mountain Care, but eventually walked away from the plan after determining it would cost too much. The attorney general’s office’s began the investigation into Gruber’s billing after receiving a referral by State Auditor Doug Hoffer.
Funny thing. If you or I tried that we would be facing how many felonies? They do take care of their own.
As long as the Left is determined to tear down historic symbols of racism, I say we help them out and point them toward some statues and portraits of real racist scumbags. The country has any number of former Democrat racist “worthies” that will fit the bill quite nicely.
A hat tip here to the actor James Woods for suggesting that we tear down a statue of the late Democratic Senator Robert Byrd. Seems to me that Byrd, who was once an “Exalted Cyclops” in the Ku Klux Klan (a position that the reviled Robert E. Lee never dreamed of holding) is a prime candidate for black racists to scrub from history. Byrd, the so-called “Conscience of the Senate” once filibustered for 14 hours against civil rights for blacks. Why aren’t blacks demanding that statues honoring him be removed?
Whether it was due to pervasive drug abuse, or for some other reason, but fast forward two weeks when in response to a special question in the July NAHB/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI) survey, US homebuilders said that labor and subcontractor shortages have become even more widespread in July of 2017 than they were in June of 2016.
This is a concern as the inventory of for-sale homes recently struck a 20-year low. And while economists and the public cry for more inventory, many builders are pressed to meet demand. A labor and subcontractor shortage in the building industry has worsened over the past year, according to the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index survey of single-family builders.
Part of the problem is that kids are pushed into college/university rather than trade schools. Trade school programs continue to be dumped by the public school system.
The world continues to need tradesmen. That men's feminist degree isn't going to be handy when someone needs a HVAC tech.
Gaby B. Hanna, vice-president and regional head of MAN Diesel & Turbo – which produces diesel engines for marine and land use on a mass scale – described Iran as “the biggest growth market for us.”
“We are very active in Iran. We’ve restarted our company there, called MAN Iran Power,” Hanna said. “We see Iran, putting aside all the political issues, as a big market for us.”
First, someone might pour molten turkey fat down a drain. A few blocks away, someone else might flush a wet wipe down a toilet. When the two meet in a dank sewer pipe, a baby fatberg is born.
Eventually, more fat, oil, and grease congeal onto the mess and build up into giant stinking globs. When they get big enough, fatbergs can clog sewers entirely, sending raw sewage gushing into streets. By the time a 15-ton monstrosity was pulled from the sewers of London’s Kingston borough in 2013, many of the neighborhood’s toilets had backed up.
Fatbergs are a sewer scourge, and both the nasty blobs and the fights against them have been growing. London, Belfast, Denver, and Melbourne are just a few of the world metropolises that have discovered large fatbergs in recent years.
*****
The ONT Musical Interlude
August 21, 1961, Patsy Cline recorded the classic Willie Nelson song, ‘Crazy’. Cline was still on crutches after going through a car windshield in a head-on collision two months earlier and had difficulty reaching the high notes of the song at first due to her broken ribs. 'Crazy' spent 21 weeks on the chart and eventually became one of her signature tunes. via thisdayinmusic.com
***
August 21, 1952, Born on this day, Joe Strummer, singer, songwriter, guitarist, The Clash, (1979 UK No. 11 single 'London Calling', 1982 US No. 8 single 'Rock The Casbah, 1991 UK No.1 single 'Should I Stay Or Should I Go', first released 1982 plus 15 other UK top 40 singles). Joe Strummer & The Mescaleros. He died on 22nd December 2002. via thisdayinmusic.com
The First Lady of Zimbabwe has been granted diplomatic immunity after claims she beat up a young model in South Africa.
There were widespread calls for Grace Mugabe to be prosecuted after she was accused of assaulting 20-year-old Gabriella Engels in a luxury Johannesburg hotel.
Engels claimed Mrs Mugabe attacked her on August 13, whipping her with an extension cord that cut her forehead and drew blood. The model also posted photos of her injuries on social media.
The ONT wonders if she messes around with school lunch programs.
The Maine Learning Technology Initiative was one of the earliest and largest efforts to bridge that divide. Starting in 2002, it provided a laptop to every seventh and eighth grade student in Maine. It now distributes about 66,000 devices annually, including some to teachers, at a total cost of about $11.5 million per year.
But that investment hasn’t provided clear returns. According to NPR, the state’s standardized test scores have not increased in the 15 years since the program started, and state leadership is beginning to reconsider the initiative.
If spending money on the Head Start program doesn't work why would this? Let's throw others money down the drain so we feel good about ourselves. To hell with the results. Intentions are what matter.
From Axios:
Unshaven and working from home in cargo shorts as he moves into "Bannon the Barbarian" mode, Steve Bannon is thinking bigger than Breitbart.
Axios' Jonathan Swan hears Bannon has told friends he sees a massive opening to the right of Fox News, raising the possibility that he's going to start a network.
The idea makes sense – but there's a downside to living near a lottery winner. Neighbors of lottery winners are significantly more likely to declare bankruptcy within a few years of the big event than are people living near ordinary folks, according to a 2016 study. The study focused on lottery winners in Canada, and found that every $1,000 increase in lottery winnings raises the risk of bankruptcy among the neighbors by roughly 2.4 percent
A new display is going in at the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture on the National Mall.
According to representatives from the museum, controversial and unemployed NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick will get his own display inside the museum. The display will honor Kaepernick, who has yet to find a home on an NFL team this season after a series of deeply controversial statements and actions, in a new display about Black Lives Matter.
Curators at the museum have asked for artifacts from Kaepernick's infamous kneeling demonstrations during the national anthem last season.
I wish they would just come out and admit, it's not the color it's the philosophy that matters.
The counter-protests stayed mostly peaceful with only 27 people getting arrested, Evans said. Some counter-protesters shouted “shame” at those at the free speech rally and one elderly lady got knocked over by activists when some of them snatched an American flag out of her hands.
They wouldn't know shame if it jumped up and punched them in the genitals.
Free speech doesn't include hurling bodily waste or stealing some one's property.
“Alcohol has played a central role for SGM by facilitating exploration of sexuality and gender, coping with minority stress, trauma, and stigma and serving as an integral component of bars and clubs for SGM young adults,” the grant states. “Given this central role, it is not surprising that problematic alcohol use, including heavy episodic drinking (HED) and intoxication, and alcohol-related problems are significant issues for SGM young adults.”
The bottom line theory is that gays, lesbians and transgendered do not have any responsibility for drinking or getting drunk. Instead blame society and others, hence they do nothing wrong. This is really about people refusing to take responsibility for their own actions. Like the Pelosi’s of the world blaming the NRA for gun violence, instead of asking why hundreds, mostly blacks killed by blacks, are being murdered in Chicago each year.
Former Los Angeles mayor Antonio Villaraigosa told MSNBC's Hugh Hewitt Sunday that he's not worried Harris will be his primary competition in the 2018 California gubernatorial race because she's ramping up her operation in the early primary states, and plans to be knocking doors in Iowa sometime early next year:
*****
I thought you closed the door. No, I thought you closed the door. Genius Award Winner.
If you're wondering what this Hot New "Millennial Pink" (Seriously -- they say that) icon would look like, well, it basically looks like a uterine Poochey the Dog from the Simpsons.
Radical, guys!
I mean -- Radical, persons of a wide spectrum of gender choices.
So there you go: A further move to define the self as exclusively a function of skin pigment and genitals.
When will we stop this rampant identity politics raging on the right?, asked a Concerned #RealReporter on CNN.
Update: Joss Whedon just emailed me to say he banged Oooti after discussing Melissa Etheridge's third album with the emoji fangurl.
Hmmm: Democrat Congresswoman's Chief of Staff Wrote Off Equipment Which Disappeared In Hands of Awan Gang In a Manner Which Seems to Have Concealed The Equipment's Vanishing
But It does seem to raise some questions in need of answers.
A chief of staff for Democratic Rep. Yvette Clarke quietly agreed in early 2016 to sign away a $120,000 missing electronics problem on behalf of two former IT aides now suspected of stealing equipment from Congress, The Daily Caller News Foundation has learned.
Clarke's chief of staff at the time effectively dismissed the loss and prevented it from coming up in future audits by signing a form removing the missing equipment from a House-wide tracking system after one of the Awan brothers alerted the office the equipment was gone. The Pakistani-born brothers are now at the center of an FBI investigation over their IT work with dozens of Congressional offices.
A senior House official with knowledge of the situation provided TheDCNF with new details about how exactly the brothers are suspected to have stolen the equipment and possibly data from Congress, raising questions about the members or staffers who were signing the checks on equipment purchases.
The $120,000 figure amounts to about a tenth of the office's annual budget, or enough to hire four legislative assistants to handle the concerns of constituents in her New York district. Yet when one of the brothers alerted the office to the massive loss, the chief of staff signed a form that quietly reconciled the missing equipment in the office budget, the official told TheDCNF. Abid Awan remained employed by the office for months after the loss of the equipment was flagged.
Separately, the brothers are suspected to have orchestrated a long-running fraud scheme in which the office would purchase equipment in a way that avoided tracking by central House-wide administrators. They’re suspected of working with an employee of CDW Government Inc. — one of the Hill’s largest technology providers — to alter invoices in order to avoid tracking.
I don't know what's going on here. Maybe the Awan brothers were selling government-bought equipment on the side.
But if that's the case, why have so many Democrats seemed to affirmatively help them evade detection and prosecution? And even avoid losing their jobs?
I have no idea if that's the answer. But we do need some answers. To quote Mr. Plinkett, it would be best if the media took more of an investigative interest in this mystery than none at all.
I tried to get eclipse specs from Amazon on Friday, just after I told you guys to start scrambling. Most of them were sold out and the available ones were sold in five packs for like $60 or $70. I figured I could get them somewhere else.
Turns out, no I could not. When I started looking on Saturday (yes, I am an organized proactive personality type), everyone was sold out.
However, I did go outside to try the triple-sunglasses risk-your-eyesight play, and wandered upon neighbors who had got the specs. They were willing to share, because really, just a two second glimpse every minute was plenty.
By the way, don't bother trying the triple-sunglasses play. Not only is it dangerous, but you can't see the eclipse -- for some reason, you just keep seeing the same solar disc you always see, even though, if you look at the eclipse through eclipse lenses, you do in fact see a crescent occluded sun.
It was interesting. The ambient light did not get as dark or eerie as I expected. I thought the light got eerie and jangly during an eclipse. The light I saw just looked like the light on a cloudy day.
Cows did not rampage and start doing murders. Alas.
I wouldn't say it was oversold because I didn't really expect much from it.
In that way, it was much like The Defenders. Lots of anticipation, then some boring talking in between stuff that's slightly less boring, and then Big Finale where you go "Meh, this is pretty much a more shadowy version of Episode 3."
Gravity causes objects with mass to gravitate toward one another & on Earth it gives weight to physical objects, however, goats DO NOT care. pic.twitter.com/Ss0S7oRuMy
A Houston man has been charged with trying to plant explosives at the statue of Confederate officer Richard Dowling in Hermann Park, federal officials said Monday.
...
Schneck was arrested Saturday night after a Houston park ranger spotted him kneeling in bushes in front of the Dowling monument in the park, Martinez said.
When confronted Saturday night in the park, he tried to drink some of the liquid explosives but spit it out, officials said...
Schneck was holding two small boxes that included a viable explosive, a timer, wires connected to a homemade detonator, a battery and an explosive compound, according to the statement.
The media spends 24 hours each day warning us that heated rhetoric from the right will inspire the right's crazies to commit violent acts, and spends the other 24 hours each day not warning us that heated rhetoric from the left will inspire the left's crazies to commit violence.
Shock: Superfeminist Walking Pussyhat Joss Whedon Was Cheating on His Wife With Adoring Female Fans, Ex-Wife Says in Blogpost
—Ace
Noooo. I can't believe an ugly fat neckbeard dweeb would exploit his fame and 10,000 watt Virtue Signal like that.
Joss Whedon is a part-time director and full-time Twitter addict. He is constantly talking up Muh Feminism in both his part-time job (Buffy the Vampire Slayer, for example) and in his full-time job of calling for violence on Twitter.
His wife says that he's another one of those unfortunate betas who uses his fame and his political posturing as a rap to get into bed with girls he'd never have a chance with, except for Muh Feminism.
She says he explained away his early inappropriate contacts with other women as just part of his feminist upbringing.
There were times in our relationship that I was uncomfortable with the attention Joss paid other women. He always had a lot of female friends, but he told me it was because his mother raised him as a feminist, so he just liked women better. He said he admired and respected females, he didn’t lust after them. I believed him and trusted him. On the set of “Buffy,” Joss decided to have his first secret affair.
Fifteen years later, when he was done with our marriage and finally ready to tell the truth, he wrote me, “When I was running ‘Buffy,’ I was surrounded by beautiful, needy, aggressive young women. It felt like I had a disease, like something from a Greek myth. Suddenly I am a powerful producer and the world is laid out at my feet and I can’t touch it.” But he did touch it....
Joss admitted that for the next decade and a half, he hid multiple affairs and a number of inappropriate emotional ones that he had with his actresses, co-workers, fans and friends, while he stayed married to me.... He wanted it all; he didn’t want to choose, so he accepted the duality as a part of his life.
...
Despite understanding, on some level, that what he was doing was wrong, he never conceded the hypocrisy of being out in the world preaching feminist ideals, while at the same time, taking away my right to make choices for my life and my body based on the truth. He deceived me for 15 years, so he could have everything he wanted. I believed, everyone believed, that he was one of the good guys, committed to fighting for women’s rights, committed to our marriage, and to the women he worked with. But I now see how he used his relationship with me as a shield, both during and after our marriage, so no one would question his relationships with other women or scrutinize his writing as anything other than feminist.
...
We’re finally divorced; I’m doing architecture again, and slowly getting my life and self-esteem back.
...
Until recently, Joss was still letting the illusion of our marriage stay intact. Now that it is finally public, I want to let women know that he is not who he pretends to be. I want the people who worship him to know he is human, and the organizations giving him awards for his feminist work, to think twice in the future about honoring a man who does not practice what he preaches. But no matter what happens, or how people interpret this statement, I no longer have to carry the burden of Joss’ long-term deceit and confessions. I am free.
"So this weekend, the Boston Police had to endure peaceful bottles of urine thrown at them from-- wait, what the hell is this? I can't believe this! Get this thing outa here! AoSHQ is gonna hear from my lawyers!"
Prescience:
Painting I did in '89 titled August 21st, 2017.I actually thought 28 yrs in the future tourists might watch the eclipse from the Moon.Sigh.. pic.twitter.com/AFABanLuqf
I posted a Rothko about three months ago, and I sort of liked it. it wasn't great, but it was mildly interesting and sort of pleasant.
So I figured it was time to revisit him and find another one of his works that was interesting and, dare I say, innocuous.
And I couldn't. As far as I can tell, three months ago I stumbled upon the only Mark Rothko work I could stomach. But damn it, I decided on a Rothko, and you are getting a Rothko!
Good morning kids. Start of another week, and can anyone doubt that we are now in the beginning phases of some sort of insurrection? Some have called it a cold civil war but in the face of the Steve Scalise shooting, Charlottesville and indeed the targeting of law enforcement officers, it is indeed heating up. Even the usually level-headed Rush Limbaugh, who always says to nervous callers "I'll tell you when it's time to panic" had an opening monologue last Friday that had a message and tone that, at least to my ears, said "okay, time to panic."
On the pretext of "fighting fascists and Nazis" the so-called intellectual elite in the media/cultural/academic complex have openly declared that violence is acceptable. Except, as we all know, they are not fighting fascists and Nazis: they ARE the fascists and Nazis. This is all merely a patently obvious pretext to use violence to essentially overthrow the government, destroy the Constitution (what's left of it) and complete the mission that Bill Ayers and his fellow travelers fantasized about almost 50 years ago. Obviously, this cannot stand and must not be allowed to stand. The question is not only what can the President do in the face of this, considering the judicial system and indeed the instrumentalities of government within the bureaucracy are also in open revolt against him. More to the point, at the grassroots level what can we do to prevent this insanity from igniting into a full-grown conflagration?
In the sidebar, one small gesture; a petition to label "Antifa" a terrorist organization has already reached the 100,000 signature threshold that sends it to the White House for consideration. It would send a rather powerful message if we can get that total upwards of 500,000 or even a million (or more). The Maoists are attempting to erase our history, destroy our culture and grind our bones to dust. To paraphrase one of history's greatest mass murderers, let the real resistance bloom, with all of us.
As for the solar eclipse, if you are in its path, do not stare at it unless you have the appropriate safety gear. Anyway, links from around the world, across the nation and up your street. Have a better one and remain blessed.
We Americans have no commission from God to police the world. President Benjamin Harrison (20 August 1833 – 13 March 1901)
Quote II
It is doubtful if the oppressed ever fight for freedom. They fight for pride and power — power to oppress others. Eric Hoffer
Quote III
There is danger from all men. The only maxim of a free government ought to be to trust no man living with power to endanger the public liberty. John Adams,
Quote IV
On September 11th 2001, the American mainland was attacked for the first time since the War of 1812. The perpetrators were foreign – Saudis and Egyptians. Since 9/11, Europe has seen the London Tube bombings, the French riots, Dutch murders of nationalist politicians. The perpetrators are their own citizens – British subjects, citoyens de la république française. That's the difference: America is fighting a foreign war, Eurabia is in the early stages of an undeclared civil war. Mark Steyn
The Democratic Party of MO. Calls for the resignation of State Senator Maria Chappelle-Nadal. It took them long enough.
The Missouri Democratic Party called for the resignation of the state senator who said she hoped President Trump is assassinated.
"State Senator [Maria] Chappelle-Nadal's comments are indefensible," Missouri Democratic Party Chairman Stephen Webber wrote in a statement on Sunday. "All sides need to agree that there is no room for suggestions of political violence in America – and the Missouri Democratic Party will absolutely not tolerate calls for the assassination of the President."
Over the long and complicated history of spycraft between the United States and Russia (and its predecessor, the Soviet Union) nabbing and expelling secret agents was commonplace. Seizing real estate wasn’t.
In fact, no Cold War expert consulted by McClatchy could recall it ever happening in the United States.
The rules of the game changed last Dec. 29 when the Obama administration effectively seized Russian compounds in New York and Maryland and declared 35 Russians, including a cook, “personas non grata” in retaliation for Moscow’s meddling in the 2016 election and physical harassment of U.S. diplomatic personnel in Russia.
According to Dayton's WHIO-TV, a woman arrived at the funeral home claiming to be the current girlfriend of the departed. A police report indicates the man's widow wanted the alleged girlfriend to be removed from the funeral home, leading to a physical fight involving several women.
WDTN-TV reported that two men tried to break up the quarrel but were unsuccessful.
Four women are suing the Department of Justice so they can be moved from prison facilities housing transgender inmates. The government is telling them they should stay put.
All four plaintiffs are inmates in Texas prisons. They filed a motion for a preliminary injunction in June. Not only do they want to be moved to facilities without trans inmates, but they want the Bureau of Prisons to stop housing “male inmates in federal prison that normatively incarcerates only female inmates
"There's a clear right to be able to live in dignity, to enjoy a decent standard of living to get access to education, healthcare, and so on. All of these things are fundamentally linked to human rights," he said during an earlier Facebook live event.
One way to counteract the tremendous job loss that might take place in the nearing future is to consider Universal Basic Income. Guaranteeing each person a certain no-strings-attached amount of money every month would protect basic human rights, argues Alston.
The global epidemic is driven in eastern and southern Africa, and it’s driven predominantly among women,” said Mitchell Warren, executive director of New York-based advocacy group AVAC, which tracks more than 40 ongoing and planned PrEP studies across the world. “To really end the global epidemic, we have got to figure out if oral PrEP can have an impact in Africa like it can in other places.”
HIV diagnoses at the U.K.’s busiest sexual health center — London’s 56 Dean Street clinic in Soho — plunged 42 percent last year, and in San Francisco they have halved since PrEP was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in July 2012.
[Chronicle]: So do you think we’ll shift entirely to autonomous vehicles, or will there still be a place for the car that you buy and drive yourself?
[Hackett]: It’s the latter. We don’t know that autonomous vehicle intelligence in the future will all be delegated to a service that no one owns but everyone uses. It could play a role in vehicles that people own, vehicles that aren’t supposed to crash. You’re buying the capability because of the protection it gives you
I remember the days I couldn't wait until I could drive and have my license. My how times have changed, again.
The city council of Alexandria, Virginia unanimously voted to rename Jefferson Davis Memorial Highway and have now set up a survey for public feedback and suggestions for what to rename the road. You probably have ideas.
Alexandria’s decision to rename the highway that leads to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, Arlington National Cemetery, and the Pentagon was made in September of last year, and now people can send in suggestions. One of the people in our office has already suggested The Ayrton Senna Memorial Highway.
Here is hoping you VA Morons make a splash with the naming rights.
Everyone knows that watching an eclipse—or staring into the Sun in general—can damage eyes. But in a series of articles published Friday in JAMA and JAMA Ophthalmology, a group of ophthalmologists explains in detail how sunlight damages the retina, plus dispels some misconceptions about viewing techniques for the rare event. They also provide a case study of what happens when you go into an eclipse event eyeballs-out.
David Calkins and Paul Sternberg of The Vanderbilt Eye Institute in Nashville, Tennessee, (which will experience a total eclipse) wrote one of the pieces in JAMA Ophthalmology. In it, they point out that many people have the misconception that an eclipse allows safe viewing of the Sun—that the lunar disk will cover everything but the Sun’s beautiful corona. This is true for those lucky ones that are along the path of the total eclipse, albeit only briefly. For those in the totality path, the Sun’s core will be blotted out for no more than two minutes and 41 seconds. “However, for most people, at least some portion of the Sun’s core will be visible during the event,” Calkins and Sternberg note.
*****
The ONT Musical Interlude
Quite a bit of history on this day.
1949, Born on this day, Phil Lynott, Irish singer, songwriter, bass player, Thin Lizzy. (1973 UK No.6 single 'Whisky In The Jar'). Lynott died on 4th Jan 1986 of heart failure and pneumonia after being in a coma for eight days following a drug overdose. A life-size bronze statue of Phil Lynott was unveiled on Harry Street in Dublin in 2005. via thisdayinmusic.com
***
August 20, 1924, Born on this day, Jim Reeves US country singer. The first country singer to crossover into the pop market. (1960 US No.2 single 'He'll Have To Go', 1966 UK No.1 single 'Distant Drums'). Reeves was killed in a plane crash on 31st July 1964 when the single engine aircraft flying from Arkansas to Nashville crashed in thick fog. via thisdayinmusic.com
***
August 20, 2004, A man from Stoke-on-Trent, England, named Bryan Adams as the 'other man' in his divorce papers after years spent trying to cope with his wife's obsession with the singer. Rob Tinsley said he had to live with a 6ft cut-out of Adams which stood at the foot of the bed and posters on the bedroom walls. via thisdayinmusic.com
Ear and forehead thermometers are great, but you don’t always have one on hand, especially when traveling. CNN host Lisa Ling posted her solution on Facebook. While on vacation, she used Fever-Bugz Stick-On Fever Indicators to monitor her daughter’s temperature.
Smoking marijuana can reduce the risk of a stroke to a large extent, a new study has found. The findings of the study have been published in the journal, "Neuropsychopharmacology."
Although the use of marijuana is legal for medical purposes in 29 states of the country, 21 states including Alabama, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, and Kansas do not allow the use of the drug. In the states where marijuana use is legal, strains of the drug are prescribed to cure chronic pain, anxiety, and epilepsy.
A number of experts have warned of the side-effects of marijuana. However, a new study conducted by the University of Texas at Dallas has found cannabis can improve a person’s health by enhancing the blood and oxygen flow, thus reducing the risk of blood clots and the possibility of a stroke.
Specifically, they’re bad for you in a work setting. BGU’s new study published in the journal Social Psychological and Personality Science reveals that sliding in that smiley emoticon, while well-intentioned, is likely to undermine you professionally. While a real life smile is likely to make people in the workplace both like and trust you, an ersatz one made of punctuation marks can have an adverse effect. (Emojis and emoticons seem to be used interchangeably here, though traditionally, the former refers to thumbnail images you add from a mobile device, and the latter refers to putting together keyboard symbols that they seem to represent a thing or feeling.)
'I was a member of the NASA Advisory Council on Planetary Defense which studied ways for NASA to defend the planet from asteroids and comets,' Brian Wilcox, now at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) at the California Institute of Technology, told BBC.
'I came to the conclusion during that study that the supervolcano threat is substantially greater than the asteroid or comet threat.'
The Republican National Committee expanded its massive fundraising lead over the Democratic National Committee in July, bringing in over $6 million more than its rival.
The RNC raised $10.2 million in July compared to the DNC's $3.8 million. This marks the Democrats' worst fundraising performance in July in a decade, according to The Hill:
The Democrats haven't raised that little money in a July since 2007; the party raised $3.4 million in that month.
What has the RNC done for the 2016 Republican voters? Other than confirming Neil Gorsuch to the SCOTUS. I can't think of much.
Sorry for my disillusionment, but F*CK the national GOP.
The Church Lady Updated: Fat, Blue Haired, Poorly Tattooed, and Full of Moral Outrage (MJ)
—Open Blogger
Close your eyes and you can picture exactly who I referenced in the headline. Always trying so hard to look like they're not trying hard. The Trigglypuff in the wild, who loves them some preaching, as long as its not coming from a preacher.
Al Gore? He's a saint.
Obama? God on earth.
Hillary? A martyr for the cause.
The Xerson they see in the mirror? Future God, looking to make a name for Xerself.
It's a tough circle to square, but they do it by suspending reality; clinging to incredibly far fetched plots that always cast their enemies as evil and themselves as the hero. Take cartoon merchant Scott Adams'' word for it:
But ask yourself which one of these versions sounds less crazy:
1. A sitting president, who is a branding expert, thought it would be a good idea to go easy on murderous Nazis as a way to improve his popularity.
or...
2. The country elected a racist leader who is winking to the KKK and White Supremacists that they have a free pass to start a race war now.
or...
3. A mentally unstable racist clown with conman skills (mostly just lying) eviscerated the Republican primary field and won the presidency. He keeps doing crazy, impulsive racist stuff. But for some reason, the economy is going well, jobs are looking good, North Korea blinked, ISIS is on the ropes, and the Supreme Court got a qualified judge. It was mostly luck.
or...
4. The guy who didn't offer to be your moral leader didn't offer any moral leadership, just law and order, applied equally. His critics cleverly and predictably framed it as being soft on Nazis.
One of those narratives is less crazy-sounding than the others. That doesn't mean the less-crazy one has to be true. But normal stuff happens far more often than crazy stuff. And critics will frame normal stuff as crazy whenever they get a chance.
Yeah...some of these are disgusting, but some are strangely appealing. I have eaten four of them, and I'll bet my parents sneaked a few more into me while I wasn't being attentive to the frequently disgusting food they served us. And let's be honest here; fried pizza sounds absolutely awesome.
The Many Disgusting Dishes & Culinary Horrors of Europe
Austria: Veal Heart Ragout (Salon Beuschel)
Balkans: Tripe Soup
Belarus: Pig Blood Soup (Chornaja Poliwka)
Benelux: Head Cheese (zult, hoofdkaas, preskop, kop or kopvlees)
Denmark: Liver Paste (Leverpostej)
Czech Republic: Sour Dough Soup (Kyselo or krkonošské kyselo)
England, Ireland and Wales: Blood Pudding (Black Pudding)
Estonia & Latvia: Blood Sausage (verivorst or vedarai)
Finland: Blood Pancakes (veriohukainen, verilätty or verilettu)
France: Pressed Duck (Canard à la presse, Caneton à la presse, Caneton Tour d’Argent, or canard au sang) and Frog Legs (cuisses de grenouille)
Germany: Blood Tongue Sausage (Zungenwurst)
Greece: Cow Lung Soup
Hungary: Fried Blood
Iceland: Rotten Sharks (Hákarl)
Italy: Horse Steak
Lithuania: Goose Blood Soup (Juka)
Norway: Lutefisk
Poland: Duck Blood Soup (Czernina)
Portugal: Rice in Blood (Cabidela)
Russia: Dressed Herring (Сельдь под шубой; Seld Pod Shuboi)
Sardinia: Maggot Cheese (Casu marzu)
Scotland: Deep Fried Pizza
Sicily: Raw Sea Urchin
Slovakia: Lard (Chlieb s Masťou)
Spain: Bull’s Testicles (Criadillas) and Squid Ink (Arròs negre)
Sweden: Fermented Herring (Surströmming)
Switzerland: Nestlé
Turkey: Boiled Animals Heads
Ukraine: Salted Pig Fat (Сало; Salo)
******
I chuckled, but in reality bread is one of those elemental foods that can be incredibly satisfying...like beer! A fresh loaf of bread, still warm from the oven, slathered in good butter is an incredible culinary experience. Or if you are a savage, dip it in some good olive oil. That's damned fine eating too.
One of my most memorable meals was sitting on the beach below Fort Ross on the North Coast of California, pleasantly tired from abalone diving, eating salami, cheddar cheese, and an incredible loaf of San Francisco sourdough that we had picked up at Safeway that morning. The six pack of Henry Weinhard's Private Reserve Beer didn't hurt.
******
I made these and used them for burger buns, and they were a qualified success, but only if you like the idea of pretzel rolls in the first place, But I left out the celery seeds. Why they are in recipe is a real puzzle. Yuck. What an unpleasant combination. Next time I will use the King Arthur Flour recipe and see which is better....
Pretzel Rolls
• 2 3/4 cups bread flour
• 1 envelope quick-rising yeast
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon celery seeds
• 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons (about) hot water (125°F to 130°F)
• Cornmeal
• 8 cups water
• 1/4 cup baking soda
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1 egg white, beaten to blend (glaze)
• Coarse salt
Preparation:
Combine bread flour, 1 envelope yeast, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon sugar and celery seeds in food processor and blend. With machine running, gradually pour hot water through feed tube, adding enough water to form smooth elastic dough. Process 1 minute to knead. Grease medium bowl. Add dough to bowl, turning to coat. Cover bowl with plastic wrap, then towel; let dough rise in warm draft-free area until doubled in volume, about 35 minutes.
Flour baking sheet. Punch dough down and knead on lightly floured surface until smooth. Divide into 8 pieces. Form each dough piece into ball. Place dough balls on prepared sheet, flattening each slightly. Using serrated knife, cut X in top center of each dough ball. Cover with towel and let dough balls rise until almost doubled in volume, about 20 minutes.
Preheat oven to 375°F. Grease another baking sheet and sprinkle with cornmeal. Bring 8 cups water to boil in large saucepan. Add baking soda and 2 tablespoons sugar (water will foam up). Add 4 rolls and cook 30 seconds per side. Using slotted spoon, transfer rolls to prepared sheet, arranging X side up. Repeat with remaining rolls.
Brush rolls with egg white glaze. Sprinkle rolls generously with coarse salt. Bake rolls until brown, about 25 minutes. Transfer to racks and cool 10 minutes.
(Can be prepared 6 hours ahead. Let stand at room temperature. Rewarm in 375°F oven 10 minutes.)
******
Food and cooking tips, extra Pappy van Winkle bourbon, fresh Morels and other goodies such as fresh-killed possum: cbd dot aoshq at gmail dot com
You know who's really ugly? Whoopi Goldberg. I just happened to see a short clip of the View and I don't remember her being quite that ugly. She looks like she's partially bald and what's left of her stringy, matted hair gives her an uncanny resemblance to the alien in the 'Predator' movies.
Goldberg was never a beauty, but years ago, when she was playing Guinan on ST:TNG, she wasn't bad looking. I mean, she was attractive enough that Ted Danson bedded her. So what happened?
It is my belief that progressive politics makes you ugly. That is, more consistently you adhere to progressive ideology, which by its very nature is anti-reality, anti-beauty, and anti-life, the uglier you get. Because, in engineering terms, human beings were never designed to function the way progressivism demands. Even though we have a great deal of built-in resiliency, nevertheless the more progressive you are, the more out-of-tolerance your whole self is operating, and if you keep it up, eventually you're going to get deformations, malfunctions and breakdowns, whether moral, intellectual, spiritual, or even physical.
The ugliness and deformation starts on the inside, and as the years go by, it eventually works its way to the outside.
I believe that SJWs and crybullies, as an aggregate, have a greater inclination toward depression and other forms of mental illness than conservatives do. Not that conservatives are free of mental illness, but the more firmly you believe in your heart and mind that there are 83 genders, the higher the probability that you have either Zoloft, Xanax or Risperdal in your medicine cabinet.
The progressive starts out with "the personal is political". Great googly moogly, how f*ed up is that? If there's no distinction between the two, there's no stopping you from believing that your personal preferences and idiosyncrasies should be national policy. Again, how f*ed up is that?
Here's a comment from the book thread I thought was interesting:
I'm noticing more and more, when I'm out and about in a large crowd, that there are more "Pat's" in the world these days, if you know what I mean.
People whose gender cannot be easily determined from a first or even a second look. And none of these people are hotties, either male or female. Lots and lots of out of shape, saggy and baggy, young to old folks. And the expressions on their faces are not happy or joyful now that they have what they want. They just look...sad, with a bit of what-are-you-lookin-at thrown in.
Posted by: Boots at August 20, 2017 09:56 AM (EBwPV)
Does anybody here really believe that Trigglypuff is happy and well-adjusted?
Good morning to all you 'rons, 'ettes, lurkers, and lurkettes. Welcome once again to the stately, prestigious, internationally acclaimed and high-class Sunday Morning Book Thread, where men are men, all the 'ettes are gorgeous, safe spaces are underneath your house and are used as protection against actual dangers, like natural disasters, or Literally Hitler, and special snowflakes do not last. And unlike other AoSHQ comment threads, the Sunday Morning Book Thread is so hoity-toity, pants are required. Even if it's these pants which are part of a suit that should only be worn as a joke.
Across the country, ugly campus protests over speakers with dissenting viewpoints, as well as a preoccupation with "micro-aggressions," "trigger warnings," "safe spaces" and brand-new "gender identities," make it obvious that something has gone terribly wrong with higher education. For years, colleges have pursued policies favoring students based not on their merit, but on their race, gender, and sexual orientation. The disturbingly negative effects of this culture are now impossible to deny.
After reading the blurb, I find myself oddly in sympathy with the one-star reviewer who wrote, in effect, "this book won't tell you anything you don't already know."
...uses weaponized words, violent rhetoric, debunked and discredited pseudoscience, and shocking, unforgivable hate speech to explain why the people who are always fighting "hate" are the most hateful jerkoffs on the planet...and why anyone who spends their life "shaming" others for not thinking like a perpetually miserable, microchip-implanted, ideologically clubfooted, progressive brainwashed zombie Social Justice Warrior should be ashamed of themselves.
In painstaking and often painfully funny detail, this book focuses on cases where people died in ironic, unusual, or outright horrifying ways. Whether they died on roller coasters, in wood chippers, by shark bite, answering a Craigslist ad, while texting, in the course of masturbating, or simply because they laughed too hard, this book ties them all together in one big bloody red ribbon. You’ll read about severed penises, concert tragedies, kids who killed their parents, moms who killed their kids, women who murdered their husbands, couples who killed for fun, and felonious Santa Clauses. As this book illustrates in lurid detail, death is never fun—but it doesn’t have to be boring.
Do you like maps? I like maps. I've been known to sit down and look through an atlas, not because I wanted specific geographic information, but just because I wanted to look at different states or countries. So here are some map books that look interesting:
From the crude maps of ancient Babylon to the satellite-fueled precision of Google Maps, cartography has been both a record of dreams and of discoveries. Maps have played midwife to empires, helped win wars, and encouraged humanity to venture beyond boundaries of space and time. Containing numerous maps from the archives of the Royal Geographical Society, Mapping the World tells the story of the philosophers, explorers, artists, and scientists who brought together their skills to produce some of the most intriguing artifacts ever created.
Spanning many centuries, all continents, and the realms of outer space and the imagination, this collection of 138 unique graphics combines beautiful full-color illustrations with quirky statistics and smart social commentary. The result is a distinctive illustrated guide to the world. Categories of cartographic curiosities include: Literary Creations, featuring a map of Thomas More's Utopia and the world of George Orwell's 1984
These are maps of how the world looks to various groups. Many are quite humorous.
Repeating History
Now that we're apparently trying to either forget Civil War history or turn it into something it really wasn't, it's very timely that CBD pointed me to this alt-history collection, Dixie Victorious: An Alternate History of the Civil War.
Written by military historian Peter G. Tsouras, Dixie Victorious examines a number of convincing scenarios, real battles, actions, and characters, and reveals how choices or minor incidents could have set in motion an entirely new train of events. This fascinating “what if” book will have you pondering how easily history could have been swayed differently.
And all this for $1.99. Take that, crybullies!
Personally, I've always wondered why the British didn't intervene in the CV on the side of the South. Seems to me they could've negotiated a sweet, sweet deal on cotton exports that would've kept their textile mills humming for a long time.
-----
An anonymous lurker reminded me of the Sad Puppies flap where the usual presenter of the Hugo Awards, sci-fi author Connie Willis, refused to present the awards because of the presence of the Sad Puppies slate.
This is funny because Connie Willis' first novel is a sympathetic Treatment of Robert E. Lee. It's entitled Lincoln's Dreams and my lurking peep recommends it highly. It's about a research assistant for a Civil War novelist and a girl who meets who keeps dreaming Robert E. Lee's dreams. The novel is virtually a love letter to Robert E. Lee -- not to the Confederacy or slavery, to a kind, gentle, noble Robert E. Lee, the Marble Man of the South. Which Kindle edition you can buy for $4.99.
But according to the new rules, in writing a novel sympathetic to Gen. Lee, Connie Willis has committed WrongThink. Connie Willis and her novel must be purged from polite society and blacklisted, her reputation ruined, her career destroyed, and death threats issued against her and her family and friends. That's how the new crybully/antifa rules work, right?
We wouldn't know any of this had it not been for the left-wing crybullies' recent meltdown over Confederate statues and particularly Robert E. Lee. Thank you, left-wing crybullies!
My peep says:
I've met Connie on multiple occasions at conventions. She's a nice, sweet genius lady who made her initial authorial chops fighting against the initial stages of Political Correctness in her fiction ("Blued Moon," "In the Late Cretaceous," "At the Rialto" etc.). But the Left has made the rules (and Connie explicitly chose to side with it to enforce their rules).
And all of her virtue-signaling against the Sad Puppies will not be good enough to save her when the knives come out.
Moron Recommendation
Skandia Recluse sent me a review of Way Station by Clifford Simak that contains many spoilers.
The story starts out with an emotional impact that begins with a country boy going off to war, to do his duty where he faces and survives the horror of war, where he must be courageous during terrible times. He survives and returns home to a lifetime of hard labor on the family farm. This might not mean much to a city person, but it hit close to home for me. It is easy to see why it won the Hugo Award in 1963...the boy labors on alone until a mysterious stranger makes the young man an offer he can't refuse.
The Amazon blurb says:
An ageless hermit runs a secret way station for alien visitors in the Wisconsin woods in this Hugo Award-winning science fiction classic.
Perhaps that's too much of a spoiler right there. But it should be enough to whet your appetite.
___________
What I'm Reading
I've just finished the first book in Alec Lloyd's 'Man of Destiny' science fiction series mentioned here a couple of weeks back and have started the second. If I were to tell you here is a book that consists mainly of people talking, you'd probably give it a pass, but I'm actually finding it quite entertaining. The plot involves political infighting to revitalize and rule a decaying galactic commonwealth of 4-5,000 planets. Think 'Star Wars' done right, as the author described it to me in e-mail. The action scenes are few and far between, at least from what I've read so far, but I don't really miss them. It's also fun to spot the Star Wars tributes, like when somebody says "I've got a bad feeling about this" or characters that mirror the actual Star Wars characters. For example, there's a starship pilot who I think is kind of supposed to remind you of Han Solo (but not really), and the daughter of a galactic politician who I think is kind of supposed to remind you of Princess Leia (but not really), and a robot pair who I think is kind of supposed to remind you of C3PO/R2D2 (but not really). They're all different enough so that they're not just rip-offs, and of course, the majority of the characters are completely original.
A pretty good steal at $2.99 each on Kindle.
___________
Don't forget the AoSHQ reading group on Goodreads. It's meant to support horde writers and to talk about the great books that come up on the book thread. It's called AoSHQ Moron Horde and the link to it is here: https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/175335-aoshq-moron-horde.
___________
So that's all for this week. As always, book thread tips, suggestions, bribes, rumors, threats, and insults may be sent to OregonMuse, Proprietor, AoSHQ Book Thread, at the book thread e-mail address: aoshqbookthread, followed by the 'at' sign, and then 'G' mail, and then dot cee oh emm.
What have you all been reading this week? Hopefully something good, because, as you all know, life is too short to be reading lousy books.
I'd be fine with this but not for the reasons they are calling for. Do it! NAACP calling for boycott of NFL, Atlanta Falcons. In fact, just boycott all sports, movies, entertainment. Knock yourselves out.
Why terrorists are so focused on attacking Europe. Well, first off, Europe has made it very easy to get there. Second, even if you are on a watch list, you can still execute your attack successfully before they finally do something. Third, even if you are arrested for a crime say like raping a woman for hours and livestreaming it, you get a slap on the wrist and are released.
Wut?
I can safely say this has never happened to me. I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that 41% of men flying on Virgin Atlantic are direct descendants of Pajama Boy. 41% of men admit to crying during in-flight movies. OK, I'll allow that maybe 3% of these men were not crying due to the movie, but due to some methane emissions from another passenger.
Saturday Evening Movie Thread 08-19-2017 [Hosted By: TheJamesMadison]
—OregonMuse
It’s a Lord of the Rings style ending here!
That’s right, I’m just gonna keep on ending because that’s what great movies do!
Well, I was going to just leave the last one as it was and possibly revisit it later in time, but my mother, who does frequent the HQ from time to time (Hi, Mom!), insisted that I extend my thoughts a bit. So, because I’m such an independent thinker, I’m doing what my mommy told me to do.
Actually, the real reason I’m revisiting the topic so soon is because I watched the original Alfie this week and it ignited a fire of thought in my brain.
I was really shocked at how much I enjoyed the film for a few reasons, but that affection almost entirely extends from how the movie ends.
For about the first half of the movie, I was a little put off because Alfie is so repellent a character and the structure of the movie doesn’t follow the typical structure that Hollywood has conditioned me to expect. Instead of a three act structure, it more closely resembles the five act structure of Shakespeare. But, by about the three-quarters mark, as the ending really began, the structure and purpose of the film became very clear to me.
We watched Alfie lead his life of debauchery, leaving human devastation in his wake, and the ending is that devastation coming back to him in different forms. His child’s mother has completely moved on to marry and have another child with another man. The innocent redhead he picked up in a truck stop bar just packed up and left. The older, vivacious, American woman has replaced him with a younger model. The married woman whose abortion he paid for goes back to her husband, the only man she had been with before Alfie, a broken woman. The sight of his dead child breaks him. In the end, he’s as alone as the mangy stray dog that opens and closes the picture.
That ending was all about bringing Alfie’s journey full circle, taking him back to the same physical place he started, but as a changed and broken man.
The Village
M. Night Shyamalan burst onto the movie scene with The Sixth Sense and continued to impress pretty consistently through his next two movies, Unbreakable and Signs. It was at The Village that he really began the process of losing fans and it has everything to do with the ending.
Here's the thing, though, I actually quite like that ending, even though it’s out of order. People complain about the fact that the titular village is actually in the modern day and that the monsters don’t really exist. If can’t get you passed the modern day thing, then I can’t help you (it doesn’t really bother me but provides a nice explanation for the weirdness of the old-timey dialogue), but if Shyamalan had cut the ending just a little bit differently, I don’t think the problem people have with the unreality of the monsters would bother them that much.
Let’s bring ourselves back to that ending. Bryce Dallas Howard (who gives a very fine performance throughout) plays a blind girl who’s tasked with going out of the village to the “Towns” to acquire medicine for her fiancé’s stab wound. That stab wound came from Adrien Brody’s mental challenged character, Noah. Noah never received the proper attention or care he probably really needed, so he ended up acting out violently when he first felt like a jilted lover (he’s in love with Howard).
Howard goes with a couple of young men who end up abandoning her in the forest because they so scared and in the face of Howard’s seeming bravery, they leave. It’s at this point that we get a flashback to Howard’s father (played by William Hurt) revealing the costumes the elders of the village wear to play the part of the monsters in the forest. Right there, the dynamic of the narrative changes. We, as the audience, know that the monsters are not real.
However, the movie then tries to walk that back with a line of dialogue from Hurt where he says that there were stories of monsters in the woods, and it’s on that one line of dialogue that the tension of the ending to hang. We know it’s not real, but hey, maybe it actually is. So, we see the monster (a design I quite like, by the way) pursuing Howard in the forest. I think that the attempted walkback undermines the tension in the sequence pretty thoroughly.
Because, really, what’s scarier? A monster we’ve been told isn’t real, or a young man who’s tried to kill for love before and is obviously willing to try again? It’s the attempt by Shyamalan to have his cake and eat it too in regards to the monster that pisses people off, I think. A very slight rearrangement could fix that to some degree.
Split
Since I’ve already talked about one Shyamalan movie, why not another? And in the meantime, let’s bridge the two previous films by talking about a Shyamalan movie (like The Village) where the ending is a culmination of everything that came before (like Alfie).
I think Split is probably Shyamalan’s best movie. It’s focused and scary with great characters, a fantastic central performance from James McAvoy, and wonderful tension. The only real flaw is the psychiatrist who is named Dr. Exposition, I believe.
Anyway, the movie ends with McAvoy turning into the Beast, becoming what he had referring to through the entire movie. Creating a new personality that changes him physically and into a creature that’s as terrifying physically as he is emotionally. When he transforms, our main character ___, is still his prisoner and he ends up attacking her, culminating in this.
It's not a twist, but the culmination of an ideology, a conflict, and two people’s experiences reaching a dramatic high point.
Wow…
Okay, this got a little long. For those who’ve kept with me, thank you.
But, the essential point of the post is to call to mind two great endings (and one curiously flawed one) to talk about what I find to be ideal in how to finish a story.
Movies I Saw This Week: Ballad of a Soldier (Netflix Rating 4/5 | Quality Rating 3/4) Poster blurb: “Misses the emotional core in its ending, but hits it squarely twenty minutes earlier.” [Netflix DVD] Alfie (Netflix Rating 5/5 | Quality Rating 4/4) “Surprisingly affecting comedy/drama with a fun central turn by Michael Caine.” [Netflix DVD]
Contact
Email any suggestions or questions to thejamesmadison.aos at symbol gmail dot com.
I’ve also archived all the old posts here, by request. I’ll add new posts a week after they originally post at the HQ.
Good afternoon morons and moronettes, and welcome to the Saturday Afternoon Chess/Open Thread, the only AoSHQ thread with content specifically for all of us chess nerds who pay homage in the temple of Caïssa, goddess of the chessboard. Also, dress pr0n. Each week, I pick out a few lovely, modest, conservative dresses for the 'ettes to admire and appraise. And, for those of you who aren't nerdly enough for chess, you can use this thread to talk about checkers, or other games, or politics, or whatever you wish, only please try to keep it civil. Nobody wants to get in the middle of a pie fight on a Saturday afternoon.
Pic Note
Thanks to Skip for today's pic, which you can see entire if you click on it. He pointed me to a miniatures site where someone had incorporated it into a diorama, which you can see on this page.
Problem 1 - White To Play (546)
Hint: White mates in 3
1r6/1p3r2/p1pR2p1/2P3p1/4k3/1PK2pPP/1P6/5R2 w - - 0 1
r7/pp1bpkn1/3p1rpQ/2pPq3/2P1P2R/2N5/PP2B1P1/2K4R w - - 0 1
Problem 4 - White To Play (Bain 116)
Hint: White wins material
3r2k1/R4pp1/1p5p/4p3/6b1/1P1n2P1/P4PBP/4N1K1 w - - 0 1
Endgame of the Week (Endgame 183)
It's White to move. Can he force Black out of his defensive crouch and win, or can Black hold?
8/8/3k1K2/pP6/P7/8/8/8 w - - 0 1
A Note On Last Week's Endgame
A number of you morons raised question about my solution for the endgame last week, and I didn't have time to look into it as I had other things to attend to. So let's talk about it now. To refresh your memory, here is last week's endgame:
8/8/1p6/4pppP/7r/4k3/4P3/R3K3 w Q - 0 1
And the solution was to force an exchange of rooks which would free up White's h-pawn:
1.Ra3+ Ke4
2.Ra4+ Kd5
3.Rxh4 gxh4
4.h6 h3
5.h7 h2
6.h8=Q for the win
HOWEVER...
Anon Y. Mous, rickl, bradc, and Peter Ciarleglio each noticed that 1...Ke4 isn't forced. Black could instead move his king to f4 and then block the second check by advancing a pawn. Like so:
1.Ra3+ Kf4!
2.Ra4+ e4
And with the e4 pawn now gumming up the works, White has no clear path to victory. Indeed, I'd say it is Black who has the winning chances.
So good work, morons, and congrats to you all for discovering the flaw. I like to think it's kind of like science.
Dress Pr0n For The 'Ettes -- and the 'Rons?
From last week:
12 Maybe sundresses next week, eh?
Posted by: Soothsayer -- Fake Commenter at August 12, 2017 05:05 PM
Sun dresses and big hats.
Posted by: Colorado Alex In Exile at August 12, 2017 05:11 PM (Tnhbr)
Heh. Didn't think the 'rons would be interested. But hey, who am I to judge? So, by request:
Ha! Didn't expect that, did you? Actually, I think she looks adorable. But here are some older ladies:
Apart from the little girl in the red dress, Mrs. Muse didn't much like this batch of pics. She told me she thought they were "too showy". Maybe she's right. So it will be interesting to see if they appeal more to the 'rons than the 'ettes.
___________
Solutions Update
Problem 1 - White To Play
1r6/1p3r2/p1pR2p1/2P3p1/4k3/1PK2pPP/1P6/5R2 w - - 0 1
1.Re1+ Kf5
2.Rde6!
This is the move that may have been hard to see. White is setting up the mate next move, and there's naught Black can do about it.
2...f2
As good as any.
3.R1e5#
When I tried to solve this problem, I figured White's 2nd move had to be a "set up" move, and I thought it was 2.Kd4. Then then 2...f2 3.R1e5#. But my chess app found this line:
2...Re8
Throws the rook away, but stops the mate in 3.
3.Rxe8 Re7
Black: Hey look, I've got one more rook to throw away.
4.Rxe7 f2
5.Re5#
Problem 2 - Black To Play
6k1/4Qp2/6p1/r2p4/r1q5/B5P1/5PK1/R7 b - - 0 1
White's bishop is looking mighty vulnerable. How can Black take advantage?
1...Qe4+
Removes the defender. Black must take the Queen
2.Qxe4 dxe4
The bishop is now pinned, and will be taken.
3.Re1 Rxa3
4.Rxe4 and Black wins with a Rook advantage.
Problem 3 - White To Play
r7/pp1bpkn1/3p1rpQ/2pPq3/2P1P2R/2N5/PP2B1P1/2K4R w - - 0 1
1. Qxg7+ Kxg7
If 1...Ke8 then 2.Rh8+ Rf8 3.Qxf8#
2. Rh7+ Kg8
3. Rh8+ Kg7 (or 3...Kf7)
4. R1h7#
Problem 4 - White To Play
3r2k1/R4pp1/1p5p/4p3/6b1/1P1n2P1/P4PBP/4N1K1 w - - 0 1
1.Nxd3 Rxd3
2.Ra8+ Kh7
3.Be4+ g6
4.Bxd3
This is the published solution, White wins a rook outright. However, my chess app pointed out that Black is not forced to recapture the knight White takes on move 1:
So in this line, when the dust settles, White is up 3 pawns.
Endgame of the Week
8/8/3k1K2/pP6/P7/8/8/8 w - - 0 1
1.Kf5 Kd5
2.Kf4 Kd6
Black mustn't fall for 2.Kf4 Kd4 since 3. b6 wins outright.
3.Ke4 Ke6
4.Kd4 Kd6
5.Kc4 Kc7
6.Kd5!
If 6.Kc5 then 6...Kb7 7.Kd6 Kb6 8.Kd7 Kb7 and White cannot make progress.
6...Kb6
7.Kd6 Kb7
8.Kc5 Ka7
8...Kc7 9.b6+ Kb7 10.Kb5 Ka8 11.Kxa5 wins
9.Kc6 Kb8
10.Kb6 Kc8
11.Ka7
White seizes control of the queening square and wins.
Hope to see you all next week!
___________
Note: that cryptic line of letters and numbers you see underneath each board diagram is a representation of the position in what is known as "Forsyth-Edwards Notation", or F.E.N. It's actually readable by humans. Most computer applications nowadays can read FEN, so those of you who may want to study the position, you can copy the line of FEN and paste into your chess app and it should automatically recreate the position on its display board. Or, Windows users can just "triple click" on it and the entire line will be highlighted so you can copy and past it into your chess app.
___________
So that about wraps it up for this week. Chess thread tips, suggestions, bribes, rumors, threats, and insults may be sent to my yahoo address: OregonMuse little-a-in-a-circle yahoo dott com.
Tom Cat came to our house one day. I believe someone must have set him out in the country near our home.
At first I thought he was a she and so I scheduled an appointment with the vet, but turns out she was a he who had already been neutered.
I don't know much about cats, but I sure do love this one. He's very friendly and this cat will hunt.
Thanks in advance for including him on the pet thread!
ALH
No thanks necessary ALH. We are glad we could post your Tom Cat.
*****
Hi guys. Rich here, long-time lurker, very very occasional commenter, from northern reaches of the Bay Area.
In the foreground is Gordon Setter Luke, 10 years old and of questionable intellect. He eats his own ears for dessert. His primary duty is to serve as chew toy for the Dobie in the background, six-year-old Flirty. Unlike Luke she's highly intelligent.
Thanks for all you do.
Hey Rich, no thanks necessary. It is the Pet Thread who owes you and your gang a big thank you for your submission.
*****
I enjoy pet morons, thanks. -Robert
Thank you Robert, hope you stop by and tell us about these fine looking dogs.
*****
Hi, ive been lurking and occasionally commenting as rumcrook for maybe ten or more years at ace of spades, i think i recall migrating over
For aces news feed sometime after the guy who ran little green footballs went loco batshit crazy and kicked all the traditional cultural conservatives off the board including me.... man that seems like a long time ago now. Any way, i saw the pic of the chihuahua riding the other dog like a pony and thought i would add mine, she was a good dog and unfortunately drowned a couple weeks back just after the 4th of july. although the great pyranese she is riding is still in the back yard. Thier names are goofa (great pyranese mix) and petunia named so by my girls, although i allways called her "little dog" and she always came when i called her. She ended up being my daily quiet companion more so the kids, and it hit me hard. Harder than the kids. As an adult ive learned these attachments to dogs come with an eventual price tag of sadness. The kids are more resilient.
A wonderful photo but a sad story, so sorry for your loss.
*****
I'm mostly a lurker. Here are our two beagles, Houston and Scout. They were waiting for food in this picture, and if I don't get it quick enough they overturn their bowls until I get the hint. We've had Scout since she was a puppy and she's a real sweetheart, unless you have the temerity to walk past our back fence or down our street. We got Houston as a rescue a few years ago. Someone dumped him at a shelter because they thought he was too old. He's a real charmer, too, unless you are a squirrel. As with most rescues, he sticks to us like glue and has brought us so much joy. I love your pet thread!! -JulieC
They surely look mistreated to us JulieC. The next thing you'll tell us that they sleep on the couch. Seriously, nice looking pair of Beagles.
*****
Well that wraps up another Pet Thread. Can we ask a favor of your lurkers and commenters? Believe it or not our photo stash is getting quite low. We could use some photos. It doesn't matter if you have submitted before, send in a new photo of your pet.
So if you have photos or tips or stories, you can send them here to us at petmorons at gmail dot com.
Saturday Gardening Thread: Big Butterfly Edition [KT]
—Open Blogger
Hello, Horde! Back from vacation! Pixy has decided not to let me embed photos for now, so an abbreviated thread today. Thanks to The Horde, we have some content. I hope to be back up to speed next week.
JustGotHere sent photos of our insect species of the week, from Central Texas.
A few weeks ago, we found a few beautifully strange caterpillars on the lemon tree on our covered back patio, and discovered that they were Papilio cresphontes, the caterpillar for the Giant Swallowtail butterfly.
We didn't have a camera handy when the butterflies emerged from chrysalis, but here are a couple of the photos of the Papilio cresphontes if you'd like them for the Gardening Thread.
To me, they look like they are wearing crowns/tiaras, and they have tiny lavender dots on their backs -- which I did not see in any other online photos of the caterpillars. I think they are lovely critters.
Keep up the great work!
I could see the little lavender dots on the big original photos JustGotHere sent. I wonder if there could have been some hybridization with the Ornythion Swallowtail, which flies in the lower Rio Grande Valley. Its caterpillars seem to have more prominent lavender spots.
The Giant Swallowtail is most common in the Southeast, but is also found in other eastern states and even sometimes in Canada. Sometimes it strays into the West, too. I have never seen one.
There are some great photos at the link above, including butterflies in the air and a size comparison between the Giant Swallowtail and the Eastern Tiger Swallowtail.
Here is a Florida subspecies. The back and front of Giant Swallowtail wings have very different appearances.
Giant Swallowtails are a pest in some citrus orchards. The caterpillars are called "orange dogs" or "orange puppies". But they lived in the USA before there were citrus trees here. They have other host plants. I'll post a photo of one next week, if Pixy takes pity on me.
All the way from Minnesota, Gordon sends the following lovely flower photo:
Usually they are white. But this is the all-blue variety, and they are pale purple. You can see the blue barrels in which they're growing.
You can really tell from that photo that potatoes are in the nightshade family. Picking any new potatoes, Gordon?
He also sent in a very interesting story on commercial strawberries. Said it made him think of our own CaliGirl.
That story reminds me of my recently deceased mother-in-law's Strawberry Flowers. Filled with cream cheese. Gorgeous. Directions in the comments.
Gardens of The Horde
Nothing new going on in my garden. Hot and humid. A strange critter landed on my arm during the night this week. I think it was a praying mantis. Startled me.
Anything going on in your garden?
If you would like to send information and/or photos for the Saturday Gardening Thread, the address is:
Thread before the Gardening Thread: Where did today's white nationalists get their inspiration? [KT]
—Open Blogger
Serving your mid-day open thread needs
Good morning, Horde. I'm back from vacation. Looks like while I was gone, some really dumb stuff happened.
It seems like a long time ago now that I made a comment about the leftist dominance of higher education on Facebook. A "friend of a friend" asked, in an eager but not obnoxious way, if I was aware that I was the beneficiary of White Privilege.
I asked him, not in an obnoxious way, what he thought the most likely positive and negative outcomes of the growing academic obsession with the concept of "privilege" would be. This was even before those odious secondary education conferences on Privilege were dreamed up. He did not seem too interested in discussing where the concept of Privilege would lead the country. It was apparently only important for white people and men to understand that they had it.
"You are a white man. Check your privilege. Stay in your lane. You will never understand black people's lives or experiences. You're all about whiteness, that's how you're conditioned." -- SJWs
"I am a white man. What a privilege. I'm going to stay in my lane. I will never understand black people. I'm all about whiteness, it's how I'm conditioned." -- White Nationalists
I hope we don't have to watch the commies and the fascists fight this weekend. You doing anything interesting?
Have a wonderful Saturday without pulling pony tails or running with sharp objects. Play nice with one another and enjoy these links or something else in this open thread.
A bit of a good story to partially stem all the bad in this world.
Thursday night, I'm driving down from Louisville to home in Tn. Late, but instead of stay the night, I want to beat the race traffic.
It's been raining, and it's foggy, and I'm driving a set of secondary highways through the Cumberland Gap in what I am sure is some amazing scenery on a clear day.
Come off one mtn a little past the Kentucky border into Virginia, and my right headlight goes.
10 minutes later, a Jonesville deputy has the rollers on behind me.
It's 3 a.m. The world is crazy. Your mind can't help but think of all the ways a simple stop can go wrong.
I pull into the first well-lit parking lot I find in their sleepy little town, put on the dome light, and hold the wheel at 10 and 2 until he taps on my window.
"You've got a headlight out"
"I know - it literally went out 10 minutes ago coming off that last mountain".
"License and registration" he asks.
I hand him my license and my CCW, telling him I am carrying, and it is in the door pocket, and that my registration is the glove box, and it's a mess in there, so it may take some looking.
He thanks me for letting me know re. the pistol, and tells me to take my time finding the registration.
I hand it to him, and he asks if he can take the gun from the car and put it on my roof while he calls everything in.
I know it's not a requirement, but I don't want a hassle. So I tell him sure and "Would you like to get it yourself? It's in the door-pocket, a round in the chamber, and the safety is on."
He agrees, I open the door for him, and he takes the piece and puts it on my car roof while he returns to his car.
A few minutes later, he comes back, says everything checks out, puts my pistol back in the door, and says to be sure I get the headlight fixed.
Then he says something really nice and unnecessary:
"It was a pleasure meeting you."
I presume it was because I was calm, courteous and let him know everything I was doing so there were no surprises.
But I appreciate that he repaid my respect.
Chris Rock will not steer you wrong when it comes to dealing with the police, it doesn't matter what your skin tone is.
Notice: Posted by permission of AceCorp LLC. Please e-mail overnight open thread tips to player to be named later or CDR M. Otherwise send tips to Ace.
"You will have some of the best days of your life and some of the worst days of your life in the U.S. Navy, you know what I mean?" Mattis told sailors at Naval Base Kitsap, Washington, according to the official transcript. "That means you're living."
"That means you're not some pussy sitting on the sidelines, you know what I mean, kind of sitting there saying, ‘Well, I should have done something with my life,'" he continued.
In response to his speech, NBC News complained that "Defense Secretary Mattis Uses Disparaging Term in Speech to Navy," comparing his remarks to Trump's comments on the infamous Access Hollywood tape about grabbing women "by the pussy."
Newsweek likewise complained that "Defense Secretary Suggests Civilians Are ‘Pussies' for Sitting on the Sidelines."
"Donald Trump's secretary of defense James ‘Mad Dog' Mattis appeared to suggest those who did not serve the country were ‘a bunch of pussies,'" read the lede.
The Washington Post consulted retired Col. Don Christensen, the head of an anti-sexual assault organization who said that Mattis' comments were "troubling."
Christensen noted that the remarks "clearly implied that those who don't serve are less manly than those who do."
Note this about that last sissy criticism: This comes from the same media that exalts itself as Truth Warriors elevated above every other walk of life in America.
Their objection isn't actually that Mattis suggested that one occupation is more elevated than another -- it's that he said the wrong occupation is the Most Exalted.
Everyone knows the media are the moast specialist people -- just read any magazine or watch any tv show! You'll see!
Open thread.
Don't forget, this stupid eclipse is on Monday, and I've decided okay, well, if it just happens once every 40 years or whatever, I guess I'll go look at it.
But it's hard to find eclipse glasses now, so if you're interested, start scrambling!
Flashback: When Obama Declared That There Were "Many Sides" to Blame for Islamist Terrorism -- Especially Christianity -- Media Not Only Defended Him, But Castigated Critics Who'd Dispute Obama's "Many-Sides-ism"
—Ace
Let's go all the way back through the mists of time, to a forgotten era of dinosaurs and wizard-kings, an age of wonder and mystery called "February 2015."
In this mythological age, evoking "many sides" to blame for violence was not considered "racist," but in fact was hailed as the very pinnacle of rationality and cosmopolitanism.
His latest challenge came Thursday at the National Prayer Breakfast. At a time of global anxiety over Islamist terrorism, Obama noted pointedly that his fellow Christians, who make up a vast majority of Americans, should perhaps not be the ones who cast the first stone.
"Humanity has been grappling with these questions throughout human history," he told the group, speaking of the tension between the compassionate and murderous acts religion can inspire. "And lest we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ. In our home country, slavery and Jim Crow all too often was justified in the name of Christ."
When Trump spoke of "many sides" offering violence, he was referring to the fact -- the fact -- that antifa thugs attacked the Nazis and, when the cops drove the Nazis from the park, surrounded them and attacked them with apparent police complicity.
When Obama spoke of many sides being to blame, he was going back to... the Crusades between 1100 and 1350 AD. Oh, and, of course, the famous Christian enslavement of Muslims, which did not happen.
President Obama is drawing some heat -- mostly from the usual quarters -- for invoking the Crusades while talking about Islam and terrorism on Thursday.
At the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday, Obama noted there was a time when people mass-murdered in the name of Christianity, too:
And lest we get on our high horse and think this is unique to some other place, remember that during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ. In our home country, slavery and Jim Crow all too often was justified in the name of Christ.
As many were quick to point out, the Catholic church's Crusades began more than 900 years ago, and the Inquisition began in the 13th century.
In the context of Obama's long-standing remarks on Islam and terrorism, though, invoking the Crusades and the Inquisition are wholly unsurprising. What is more surprising is that he hasn't done this sooner.
I'm not surprised the leftwing media has completely ignored its own history of defending "many sides to blame" arguments from the president.
I am surprised, however, that so many members of the #FakeNews "rightwing" media have, however.
More: At the eulogy for five dead Dallas cops assassinated by a Black Lives Matter terrorist, Barack "Many Sides" Obama offered this observation:
"We have all seen this bigotry in our lives at some point," obama told an audience of about 2,500 at a concert hall in Dallas. "None of us is entirely innocent. No institution is entirely immune. And that includes our police departments. We know this."
Telling cops they're racist at a funeral for their own was, by the media's estimation, the height of cosmopolitan nuance and sophistication.
Petition Started to Formally Declare "AntiFa" a Terrorist Organization.
100,000 signatures are needed by September 16th to get a response from the White House.
[J.J. Sefton]
[Update:]The goal has been reached! There are well over 100,000 signatures on this petition, and it's only been 3 days! Now things will get interesting [OregonMuse]
How do you say "Aloha Snackbar" in Finland? 2 Dead, several injured in Finland knife attack. [Mis. Hum.]
Somewhat related to Gorilla Pundit's rant this morning, This is Rush Limbaugh from his show on August 18th:For 30 years, the Democrats have been able to call Republicans anything with impunity --- racist, bigot, sexist, homophobe, and add on to that --- and there's been never any pushback. All there is, is Republicans trying to kiss up to the media so that they individually are not included in the smear. Well, this is what pushing back looks like, just like this is what trying to strip power away from the establishment looks like.
This is what it looks like when you push back. It was never gonna be easy, and it was never gonna be pretty. Somebody is trying to save the Republican brand by defending it against all of these smears: Racism, sexism, bigotry, homophobia. Too many Republicans have been conditioned to go along with the allegation and to ask for exemption from it.
I don't think President Trump's mission is to save the Republican brand. I think Rush is desperate not to alienate himself from the GOP but little by little, I think he has come to understand and to openly state that the GOP is every bit the enemy as the Democrats. The rest of that quote about what PDT is doing vis a vis fighting back is dead on. [J.J. Sefton]
California Bill: 1 Year in Jail for Using Wrong Transgender Pronoun "A new bill being considered by the California State Senate would punish people who “willfully and repeatedly” refuse “to use a transgender resident’s preferred name or pronouns” in a public health, retirement or housing institution." Because in all other respects California is functioning perfectly. [CBD]
"So this weekend, the Boston Police had to endure peaceful bottles of urine thrown at them from-- wait, what the hell is this? I can't believe this! Get this thing outa here! AoSHQ is gonna hear from my lawyers!"
