Glibertarians.com 2017 Archive

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  • HAT HARD: A Hat and Hair Christmas Special, Pt. 2

     

    “What the fuck it that?” the hair asked loudly.

    “Gunfire,” Hope said as if she had heard the toupee.

    “Gunfire?” Donald asked. “What about my Diet Coke?”

    “Diet Coke?” the hat yelped. “There’s gunfire in the White House! Get me to my safe room!”

    Donald stood up abruptly and his belly knocked Hope over. There was a sickening crunch as her head met the edge of the dresser and she fell to the floor insensate.

    “Where’s my DIET COKE?!?” Donald bellowed, stepping over the supine Hope and opening the dressing room door.

    “Donald! Come back!” the hair called after him.

    The hat had moved to the edge of the desk they were on and was peering over the side. Hope’s skirt had been thrown up around her hips as she fell and her translucent La Perla underwear was on display.

    “Hairless, dude,” the hat told the hair. “I think she’s lasered.”

    “I find that offensive,” the hair said.

    “You would.”

    Donald shuffled back into the room, his socks leaving bloody marks on the white carpet. He had a full erection tenting his boxer shorts.

    “There’s no Diet Coke out in the hall,” he said despondently.

    “Where did that blood come from, Donald?” the hair demanded.

    “Dead guy in the hall, totally Cokeless.”

    “Donald,” the hair ordered, “Put me on.”

    “Me too!” the hat said. “We have to go see what is going on.”

    Donald laboriously stepped over the unconscious Hope again and took the hair off its mannequin head and settled it on his own. The hair sank tendrils into his scalp and arranged himself as best he could.

    “Pick up the hat, Donald,” the hair told him.

    “I don’t want to. I’m sleepy. I want a Diet Coke,” the elderly man complained.

    “Fast food coma,” the hat diagnosed. “All that grease has hit his colon.”

    “Donald!” the hair shouted, rocking back and forth on his head.

    “You’re going to have to drive, dude,” the hat said. “He’s going to be out of it anytime now.”

    “He’s so hard to puppet anymore,” the hair whined.

    “Oh, shut up,” the hat said.

    “It’s like driving a really old broken car with no brake, transmission, steering or wiper fluid. And the car is full of McDonald’s and gout.”

    “Bitch and moan, bitch and moan. Pick me up so we can go check out the carnage.”

    “Shouldn’t we get Donald to the safe room?” the hair asked.

    “Later,” the hat said. “I’m sure it’s all over by now. We’ll just take a peek through one of the gallery windows.”

    The hair put the hat on over himself with Donald’s hand and then bent over to strip off the bloody socks. “They feel really weird and gross,” the hair said, anticipating the hat’s question.

    The hair moved Donald and the hat as quietly as he could through the darkened corridors of the residence. They found four dead Secret Service agents before they got to the small windows that looked down on the ballroom, all shot in the head from behind.

    “This looks bad,” the hat whispered.

    “If they got this far into the residence, why didn’t they find us?” the hair asked.

    “I don’t know,” the hat answered. “I had never been in that room before. Maybe Hope just set it up or something.”

    There was another burst of automatic fire and the hair threw the three of them back against a wall. He slid them toward the window and peeked over the sill.

    “Duck down,” the hat hissed. “I can’t see anything.”

    “Diet Coke,” Donald mumbled and began to snore.

    The hair pushed Donald’s hand against the glass and the bottom swung outward like a transom. The guests in the ballroom were huddled together in a jumbled cluster in the center, mewling and crying, a ring of gunmen in ballcaps ringing them. A squat figure in a power suit and a ballcap waddled toward them, stepping over the bodies of dead Secret Service and DC Police.

    “Oh, shit,” the hat began.

    “Yeah, it’s her,” the hair said.

    “Laydies and genhentleman. Laydies and genhentleman,” Angela said in her thick German accent. “Due to this administration’s legacy of greed around the globe, they are about to be taught a lesson in the real use of power. You will be witnesses.”

    “Whut the fuck are you talkin’ ‘bout, you fat slut?” Jeff demanded, his little elf ears red with rage and shaking with fear.

    Angela pointed at him and one of the gunmen stepped forward and hit him with the butt of his rifle. Jeff fell like an erection at Lilith Fair.

    “Are there any further questions? No? I thought not,” Angela said crisply. When she turned to walk away the hat began to sputter in rage. Her ballcap read “MAKE GERMANY GREAT AGAIN.”

    “Euro trash bitch!” the hat managed to spit out.

    “Look,” the hair said. “They’re all wearing them.”

    Around the arc of the circle of gunman facing them they could see MAKE FRANCE GREAT AGAIN and MAKE FLANDERS GREAT AGAIN and NETHERLANDS and SWEDEN and LUXEMBOURG.

    “Most of those countries have never been great!” the hat gasped. “And what the fuck is a Flanders? Is that Simpsons reference?”

    “Be quiet,” the hair whispered. “Footsteps. I think someone is coming.”

    “Diet Coke,” Donald mumbled in his sleep.

    A walkie-talkie crackled from around the corner and there was a burst of foreign gibberish. The hair got Donald down in a crouch as the person briefly answered and then proceeded around the corner. He was armed with a squat machine pistol and a MAKE BASQUE LEGIBLE AGAIN hat. The hair launched the elderly and overweight body from the shadows under the gallery windows and the four of them went down in a violent tangle of limbs and haberdashery. The hair pummeled the gunman with Donald’s sticky fists and shot tendrils into his eyes and ears and nostrils and mouth. MAGA prime bit into brim of BASQUE hat and stripped its adjustable band away savagely. Finally, in a titanic heave, the hair got Donald’s corpulent bulk on top of the gunman and crushed the life out of his body.

    “Yeah, take that motherfucker!” the hat growled. “MAGA! MAGA! MAGA!”

    Donald’s body was breathing heavily as the hair got him back to his feet.

    “Take gun!” the hat said.

    “I know that,” the hair replied.

    “And the walkie-talkie!”

    “I know that too,” the hair said testily. “I know what I’m doing. I killed the guy, after all.”

    “Hey, I helped!”

    “You molested a hat.”

    “Did not!”

    “I saw what you did with that adjustable band. Christ, you are a sick fuck, you know?”

    “I was fighting for our lives!” the hat said indignantly.

    “Yeah, you keep telling yourself that.”

    The hair had Donald pick up the gun and tuck it into his boxer short waistband. It promptly slid down his gunt and fell out one of the legs and onto the floor.

    “Maybe you better carry that,” the hat said dryly.

    The walkie-talkie crackled again.

    “Mikolaus?” the voice on the other end asked. “Mikolaus? Txostena.”

    “Answer it,” the hat urged.

    “I don’t know Basque. Do you know Basque?” the hair asked.

    “A little.”

    “Bullshit.”

    “Just hold the button down, dingleberry.”

    The hair had Donald hold the walkie up to the hat and pressed the talk button.

    “Zein da neska prezioa?” the hat said and the hair had Donald let go of the button.

    “Who is this?” the voice demanded. “Where is Mikolaus?”

    “Button,” the hat ordered.

    “Olly olly oxen free, cocksucker?” the hat half-asked.

    “Oh, goddammit,” the hair moaned.

  • Wednesday Morning Links

    A healthy Aaron Rodgers has been cleared to play. I dropped him from my fantasy roster after the injury and he was thankfully picked up by Apatheists, who I dispatched of this past week. Thank God. Jose Canseco must have gotten hit on top of the head by another fly ball.

    Not the brightest bulb

    A few soccer games of note yesterday: Burnley temporarily moved into the top 4, Chelsea won. And Crystal Palace moved out of the bottom three with a furious final 3 minutes. Lots more on tap today, including Liverpool, Man City And ManUre. In hoops action, Cincinnati and Seton Hall were the only top 25 teams in action, and they both won comfortably.

    Over in the NHL, there were a ton of games. The Sabres piled more misery on the Senators, who have lost 12 of 13. De Debbils pounded the Kings. The Flyers doubled up the Maple Leafs. The Crapitals beat the Avs. The Oilers greased the Blue Jackets. The Lightning shocked the Blues. The MINNESOOOOOOOOODA WIIIIIIILD extinguished the Flames. Carolina beat Las Vegas. And the Blackhawks topped the Panthers in OT, to the pleasant surprise of one Swiss Servator.

    And now for something completely different…the links!

    Everybody in the world except Roy Moore himself, has accepted that Doug Jones won the Alabama Senate special election.

    P.T. Barnum reincarnated

    If any of you Glibs were duped in this latest con, I’m gonna be very upset. I mean…seriously?  This guy is a fucking con man and I just hope our government is no throwing money at him.

    See how many fucked up things you can pick out in this story. Or at least give me three ways in which a “civilian” caught doing this would be treated differently.  Or just read it and move on. No skin off my nose.

    Tough old broad fights off mugger. Police tell her she should have just given in (and coincidentally encouraged more criminal behavior). I say “good for you!” to the 75-year old.

    Everybody on here please take note of which Virginia Glib isn’t participating in today’s comments. Because when he gets back from his little vacation, we need to have a talk with him.

    Here’s a happy little piece to take y’all down memory lane.  Enjoy reminiscing and share which of these, or what you think is missing from the list, made its way under your tree. (You Jooz can participate even though you don’t properly celebrate Christmas).

    Oh hell yeah!

    And last but not least, I give you the wonderful miracle known as modern medicine. This one hits a little close to home for me and Banjos. Some of you know this, but Baby Reason, who is 5 now!, was born with a similar but less serious condition called an omphalocele. For her it was part of her bowel, colon and liver that was outside her abdomen. We spent the first several weeks of her life swapping out rooms at a Ronald McDonald House in Madera, California while she was in the NICU. And while that was tough, I can only imagine the road these people and their baby girl are going through. But stories like this speak to the never-ending will to learn and the ceaseless desire to save lives from medical professionals around the world. We’ve all got problems and we all have our challenges in life. But when we look at miracles like those these doctors have performed, we should all see them in perspective and realize that we have it pretty damn good.

    Sorry to get all sappy there, but stuff like this really gets to me. Especially around the holidays since Reason spent so much of her first holiday season in the hospital, but was happily sent home on Christmas day. Anyway, God bless those doctors and nurses and God bless these doctors and nurses for giving and/or restoring the gift of life.

    Its not really my kind of music, but after that last link, I felt compelled to play it.

    Have a great day, friends.

  • A Very Special Jewsday Tuesday: Chanukkah Edition

    Yes, it’s that time of year again, when Jews all over the world celebrate their most treasured and most holy days… well, not really, but I’ll Jewsplain.

    First, the part everyone knows: this is supposedly the commemoration of the Maccabees doing something or other. But here’s the catch- Jews do not accept the books of the Maccabees as canonical and derive their understanding of Chanukkah and the Maccabees from the Talmud. The usual reason given is that the Macs came along too late, the canon was completed. But it may be deeper than that, so let’s start with the familiar parts.

    The whole megillah happened around 2200 years ago when I was just a wee yeled. The Middle East was a seething cauldron of petty rivalries, bloody wars, and conquests back and forth, unlike today’s quiet and civilized environment. The two major warring empires were the Ptolemies and the Seleucids, who were proxies for various swarthy European types. There were some Macedonians, Romans, and Persians in the mix as well. Like I said, it was a mess. And as usual, the Jews were right in the middle of the shit because of their geographic location and because Yahweh liked fucking with us.

    If you read through the histories of that era, it’s a confusing mess because so many of the warring monarchs had the same name, with only nicknames and numbers allowing you to tell them apart. But the overwhelming cultural bit of this was the spread of Greek civilization, which brought things like rationality, philosophy, mathematics, and science to the gibbering tribal masses of Asia and Northern Africa. Unlike the tribal kingdoms, the Greeks were very big on universal culture and values, as well as a surprising tolerance for other ways of life- they basically were the first assimilationists, and in ways that would seem very familiar to Americans.

    Now, the official story is that those awful Greeks, who at that point in history ruled over Palestine, had a culture that was so attractive that the Jews started assimilating, speaking Greek, adopting airs of tolerance, eating pork, wrestling naked, and wearing clip-on foreskins (that is not a joke, they really had them). This, of course, could not be tolerated by the Jews, goes the usual narrative. And then, in a total reversal of Greek policy, the latest tyrant, Antiochus IV (Epiphanes), was said to have outlawed Jewish religious practices and forced everyone who hadn’t adopted Greek culture and mores to do so by clipping on foreskins and chowing down on ham (anticipating the later American Jewish custom of eating pork by dismissing it as “Chinese food”). So after the usual litany of atrocities, which prominently featured defilement of the Temple in Jerusalem, they naturally rebelled. The Talmud gives its version of one of the atrocities, the story of Hannah and her sons. One at a time, Antiochus ordered each of Hannah’s sons to eat bacon, and each son in turn refused, shouted a slogan about their devotion to Yahweh, and was then killed for maintaining their religious righteousness. After watching each of her sons in turn being executed, Hannah threw herself off a building in a fit of grief and madness. An inspiring tale, nu?

    The familiar tale continues with the great Judah Maccabee leading his ragtag band of righteous Jews into a successful rebellion against the heathen Greeks, driving them out of Palestine, then rededicating the Temple by the use of various priestly rituals. Note the last. The miracle of Chanukkah was the burning of a ritual lamp in the Temple for eight days while consuming only one day’s worth of oil, which is all they had in terms of ritually pure oil.

    As a libertarian sort, I’ve learned to be a bit cynical and assume that any story like this glides past unsavory truths. I also assume that cupidity rules and is usually the driver of events. So, with that in mind…

    At that time, there were multiple schisms among the Jews- the famous Life of Brian scene about the Judean People’s Front versus the People’s Front of Judea was not entirely a joke. Three of the major factions were the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and the Hellenizers. The Pharisees and Sadducees fought over who really had control of Jewish law, with the Pharisees maintaining that the rabbis were really the ones to control things, the Sadducees insisting that it was the Temple priests, and the Hellenizers being the Reform Jews of their time, incorporating Greek practice and language into the Temple rituals and eschewing the fundamentalist interpretations of Jewish law (yes, this is an oversimplification, but the big picture always is).

    Judah Maccabee was the son of Mattathias, who was a Temple priest and a fundamentalist. Within the priesthood, the Hellenizers and fundamentalists struggled, with the Hellenizers having won out. Their priest, Menelaus, deposed the fundamentalist priest, Jason, by paying off Antiochus. This was a good investment since this gave Menelaus control of the Temple treasures and receipts. Mattathias, being a fundy allied with Jason, was clearly a loser here. In his view, anyone not following the religion in the way his faction thought proper should be executed, and they certainly did their share of killing. And indeed, one of the outcomes of the rebellion was the execution of Jason as a heretic and traitor to the One True Faith.

    So a cynical person might look at this as less of a rebellion against Antiochus, but more of an internal struggle between factions fighting for power and treasure. The winners write history, so the fact that the Greeks mostly didn’t interfere with religious practice before or after the Maccabean rebellion but somehow Antiochus was the exception and tried to wipe out Judaism could possibly be… well you know what self-serving storytellers and drama queens those Middle East folk can be. The cynic might look at historic parallels and see the Maccabees as akin to the modern Taliban, fighting against the encroachment of civilization (literal, in this case) in favor of a strict and violent fundamentalism that just coincidentally put them in power. And that’s what we celebrate for Chanukkah.

    Fun fact: the Hebrew word for a Jew who has given up strict religious practice is “apikoros,” which derives from the Greek “Epicure.”

    One more cynical observation: why the books of the Maccabees are not canonical among the Jews despite lots of slaughter and a Yahweh miracle. Although the usual excuse is timing, someone miiiiight notice that the decisions about canonicity and religious practice were made by the faction which survived and ended up controlling Judaism: the Pharisees, bitter foes of the Sadducees, the latter of whom the Maccabees, as priests who got their share of Temple treasure and tribute, were aligned. But that would be overly cynical, right?

    Fun fact: Judah Maccabee was the first Jew to make contact with the Romans, seeking assistance in his fight against the Greeks. As readers of Matthew will note, this did not end well for the Mac family.

    Fun fact: although potato latkes seem like the canonical Chanukkah food in the US and Europe, in Israel they’re almost unknown. The treat of choice is… jelly donuts. And why is that? Because the bakers in Israel have traditionally been part of state-sponsored trade unions. And although latkes are easy to make at home and best served fresh, donuts are more difficult and are much easier to pick up at a (union) bakery. Just look for the union filling.

    And speaking of latkes, here’s the way to do it right.

  • Afternoon Links – the Tardy Edition

    Links…late, but here:

    • Perk of the job, under fire?
    • Drugzz are bad, m’kay?
    • I found one of Ronald Reagan’s “Welfare Queens“.
    • STEVE SMITH GO OUT TO EAT IN NYC?

    OK, have at ’em.

  • HAT HARD: A Hat and Hair Christmas Special, Pt. 1

     

    Pulling away from Andrews Air Force Base, Donald pawed at the intercom switch blindly.

    “What do you want, Donald?” the hair murmured.

    “Why didn’t we take the helicopter?” the hat asked.

    “He wanted to drive home,” the hair replied.

    “Where’s the fucking intercom?” Donald asked and farted irritably.

    “Forward a bit,” the hair told him. “No, too far, back a bit.”

    “I never want to go to Florida again,” the hat said mournfully.

    Donald jammed the intercom button down and rumbled “I’m hungry,” to the front of the car.

    “Donald,” the hair said, “There’ll be food at the party and we are late as it is.”

    “I’m hungry, Argyle” he said again, pressing the intercom button so hard that his finger turned white.

    “Yassuh, Mistah Prezident! Yassuh, right away!” the driver said cheerily. He could be heard informing the police escort of the change in route before Donald let go of the intercom.

    “We don’t have time for this,” the hair said.

    “Donald gets what Donald wants, combover,” the hat snapped.

    Donald leaned over slightly as the limo took a left a little too fast and the hair groaned.

    “What’s the matter with you?” the hat asked.

    “He took too much Viagra last night,” the hair said. “I can feel it soaking into my roots. I think I’m turning blue? Do I look blue to you?”

    “No,” the hat said, “Just sort of asshole-colored like always.”

    Donald swayed as the motorcade pulled into the parking lot. Hope’s pale face appeared on the monitor. “What would you like, Mr. President?”

    “Two Big Donalds, hold the buns, extra secret sauce, like extra extra. Three large fires, extra salt, so much salt. A chocolate shake. A large chocolate shake. Huge. Huge chocolate shake. And make the shake chocolate, Hope. And get yourself anything you want. And Argyle. At least get Argyle an apple pie. Argyle loves their apple pies. So American, apple pie. Get me three apple pies. So tremendous.”

    Her maroon lips had compressed into a tight, thin line as he ordered and she seemed to have difficulty prying them apart to speak. “Yes, Mr. President,” she said.

    The monitor went dark as the inside of the limo lit up under the bright lights in the parking lot. Donald scratched his Big Mac and sniffed his fingers. He watched the vague shape of Hope in the front seat through the smoked glass partition as she leaned over the driver to shout into the call box.

    “Where’s her hand?” the hat asked and laughed. “I think Argyle is getting his holiday bonus.”

    “You know his name’s not really ‘Argyle,’ right?” the hair asked.

    “Who gives a shit? He makes Donald happy with his Stepin Fetchit act. And with what we pay him, he should just be happy with whatever he feels like calling him.”

    Donald sighed contentedly as bag after bag of food was passed back to him and the limo began to fill with the odors of grease, low-grade Argentinian beef, agar-thickened dairy and economic desperation.

    “FIGHT FOR 15!” the worker hanging out of the drive-thru window screamed as the limo and D.C. Police escort and Secret Service vehicles pulled away.

    “Loser,” the hat sniffed. “Go back in time and get yourself unknocked-up at 15, ya dumb cunt.”

    “Let them complain,” the hair retorted. “It’s all they have.”

    “Merry fucking Christmas,” Donald said, through a mouthful of half-chewed fries and milkshake.

    He was finishing his last burger as they pulled through the gates to the White House and pulled to a halt by the side entrance. Donald got out quickly and the fast food trash in his lap came out with him and fell to the asphalt. Secret Service goons chased after the blowing wrappers and Donald laughed at them until the distinctive buzz of a sniper round cut the night air and buried itself with a dull thud into the wood pillar beside him.

    “Do your worst, Feminists!” he yelled, brazenly stopping to brush some of the food waste of off his shirt and tie as Hope and Argyle dove for cover.

    “Keep the limo warm for me, Argyle,” he said. I might be going out later.”

    “You are not going to Roy’s Christmas party!” the hat told him again. “The optics are terrible.”

    “No, they aren’t,” Donald groused as he was herded inside. “He always gets the best looking girls.”

    “Emphasis on ‘girls,’ Donald,” the hair told him. “That’s why you aren’t going.”

    “Tiffany is bringing some of her friends,” the hair said, hoping to placate the lumbering man.

    “She’s weird-looking,” Donald muttered.

    “She’s your daughter, Donald,” the hair said.

    “Doesn’t keep her from being weird-looking. Ivanka’s not weird-looking. Donny Jr and that other one’s not weird-looking,” Donald argued.

    “Yeah, nothing weird-looking about the cast from American Psycho,” the hat muttered down into the tangled mass of the hair.

    “Stop it,” the hair hissed back. “If I get to laughing, I’m not going to be able to stop.”

    “Bret Easton Ellis is gonna sue them,” the hat replied and the hair rustled with suppressed laughter.

    Donald lurched into the White House Christmas party and looked around. The usual hangers-on were about. Melania was shooting hateful glares at anyone who got near her. Ivanka was toting one of her children on a cocked hip, her ruined breasts spilling out of her elegant gown that was already stained with chocolate pudding or maybe blood. Jeff was backed into a corner–frightened, angry, making himself small and trying to be overlooked. Paul and Mitch were doing shots and looking miserable. Sarah had her face down in a trough of hors-d’oeuvre set up to keep her away from the rest of the human food.

    Foreign dignitaries milled about in a tight knot out in the middle, with the sullen air of hostages already, and the painfully formal dinner hadn’t even been served yet. The Secret Service and Capitol Police providing security kept an eye on them, barking “MERRY CHRISTMAS!” at them every time one the foreign guests peeled away from the main group to try to go to the bar or the bathroom.

    “Who invited all the beaners and ragheads?” the hat asked.

    Donald burped loudly and then swallowed with some effort. He backed away down a hall when he saw Melania cutting across the ballroom floor toward him.

    “Where have you been?” she hissed, her botox-frozen face attempting to twist in anger.

    “Florida,” he said.

    “You are late. You should have taken the helicopter.” She pronounced “helicopter” as four seemingly unconnected syllables.

    “I’m the President. I can do whatever I fucking want.” Donald burped again and spat a half-digested french fry on the floor.

    She glared at the hat and the hair. “Get him upstairs and clean him up. The guests are waiting.”

    She turned on her heel and stalked away before the hat could think of a good insult. He just mumbled “whore” under his brim as Donald wandered away.

    In the residence, the hair was resting on a mannequin head and the hat was on the table beside him as they watched Hope struggle to get Donald in his tuxedo. She had him down to his boxers, socks, and a stained undershirt and had put the TV on to try and calm him down–an old episode of Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous on VHS that was worn from repeated watching, static on the scenes of a young Donald, the soundtrack warped and warbling.

    “I want a Diet Coke,” Donald said distractedly, his eyes fixed on himself gesturing on the screen. Hope kept gingerly removing his hand from his crotch when he tried to masturbate. She tried to wrestle his pallid arms into a tuxedo shirt.

    “Where’s my Diet Coke button?” he demanded, as automatic gunfire began downstairs.

  • Tuesday Morning Links

    Yesterday was one of the lightest sports days I can remember.  The Fins beat the Pats. LaVar Ball is sending his boys to…Lithuania to play for a club in a town with 10,000 people.  The NFL Network suspends three analysts, including Ike Taylor and Marshall Faulk, over #metoo. A couple other guys were named in the suit including Donovan McNabb, but they don’t work there anymore. And lastly, Greg Schiano’s Tennessee deal was going to be worth over $27 million. And the memo of understanding, which was signed by the school’s AD, doesn’t say anywhere on it that the school president, CFO or any other party is required to endorse it.  Dude is about to get paid for wrongful termination. And rightfully so.

    Marshall Faulk gets #metoo’d

    On the ice, there were six games. The Panthers beat the Red Wings. The Islanders beat up on the Crapitals. The Dallas Stars beat the Rangers. The Avs beat the Pens. The Jets drilled the Canucks. And the Anaheim Mighty Ducks bested the Hurricanes.

    Like I said, it was a light day. Which probably pleases some of you to no end.  ::sigh::  But I digress.

    Well, this is what you waited for! I present to you…the links!

    President Trump calls for an end to “chain immigration” in wake of botched NYC terror attack. Apparently, the guy got in, according to my friend Simone, because his best friend’s sister’s boyfriend’s brother’s girlfriend heard from this guy who knows this kid who’s going with the girl who got the guy a green card at a 31 Flavors.  That might be a little elaborate. Actually, he got in because his aunt or uncle became a citizen and could then sponsor parents, children, siblings, nieces or nephews. Which I’m just sure there’s no way to abuse when we’re talking about third world countries with dubious record-keeping at best.

    Late San Fran Mayor Ed Lee

    San Francisco mayor Ed Lee dropped dead overnight. The first Asian-American mayor of the city began public life in 1991. He had been elected twice. Board of Supervisors president London Breed will take over his office for the time being.

    Trump vows to send man back to the moon and even to Mars. Does not explain how our broke asses will pay for it.

    Chicago makes it rain to the tune of a $31M settlement for four men coerced into making a confession and spending 17 years in jail for a crime in which DNA evidence exonerated them.  The FOP issued a statement about rewarding bad guys. So I guess they mean the animals who are probably getting pensions after sending people to prison for 17 years due to coerced confessions and questionable police practices.  Meanwhile, the residents get hit with a $31M kick in the nuts and those pensions are still safe.  What. A. Shitshow.

    Want to know why a lot of those Disney kids grow up to be train wrecks? Shit like this might have something to do with it. I’m not saying that’s the only reason, but I wouldn’t be shocked if this kind of thing is rampant in the kids entertainment world.

    America’s best hope for a Korean solution. Seriously.

    Dennis Rodman: Statesman. Seriously, he’s probably do better than anybody else that’s tried to intervene with that lunatic in a Mao suit.

    Just make sure to leave all that tax money at the door. KTHXBAI.

    I know I won’t be leaving here with you.

    That’s it. Enjoy. And have a great day!

  • Monday Afternoon Links of SMH

    The Links have been seized…by me. OK, not really, Brett is buying a new fanboat, running over manatees or some Florida thing.

    So, we will have Links…that make you shake your head – sadly, or in disbelief, or laughing. Your choice.  So let me run them by all of ye, and you can comment away! [h/t sloopy on the first two!]

    1. Procedures were NOT followed. Seems this off-duty cop decided he would take care of business, on his own. NOTE: he is now an ex-cop (he “resigned”) and the Chief of his old department said “That’s just something we don’t do”. He has, however chanted the magic fear words. So we will see what happens.
    2. Rent Party lawsuit! Take a look at the settling defendant and tell me you aren’t shaking your head… in revulsion! Also, please read the whole thing to see the bonus fun of “a separate criminal case accusing him of unlawful disposal of a dead body”. I want your “Landlord From Hell” stories in the comments – can they compare to this guy!
    3. How about a little NYC reaction to the sort of ‘splody guy? “I said, damn, I’m gonna move back to North Carolina. New York City is too much for me.”
    4. Time to lighten it up a bit. See what the world asks Google about the UK. I start smh laughing, when I got to what the Brits google about everyone else, it got funnier (see the “Colombia” result).

     

  • Western Culture: The Left, the Right and the Tug-of-war

    There is a Romanian phrase, used when someone abuses a certain issue, which can be paraphrased along the line of, “Easy with the Western Culture down the stairs.” If you rush too much, you may break whatever you are rushing with, is the meaning. I feel that recently this is the case with Western Culture in the Culture/Social Justice/Whatfuckingever wars that do not seem to go away.

    There are two facets to this. Well let’s not go to binary, like gender there are a million facets to this. One is that the CW/SJW thing is often little more than a massive distraction, a lot of noise to drown the signal, keep the participants busy while corrupt politicians keep doing corrupt politician shit. On the other hand, it cannot be fully ignored, because aspects of it are very dangerous. One of the main components of this was/is the late/great Western Culture. I will address this, sort of, kind of, with plenty of to be sure and wimpy language.

    So let’s get ready to a-rumble… in the ehm Red (Pinko sometimes) corner we have the Progressive Left. In the Other Red corner we have the various flavours of the alt right. In the middle we have the enlightened alt centrist; the self-described non regressive left; the modern right; the cosmotarians; and a few odds and ends. In the end, we have the battle of progressives versus literal Nazis.  And western culture is at the forefront, it is the gloves, if you will.

    Culture or a pile of rocks?

    To start with, let’s go to Wikipedia, because why not. “Western culture, sometimes equated with Western civilization, Occidental culture, the Western world, Western society, European civilization, or Judeo-Greco-Christian civilization, is a term used very broadly to refer to a heritage of social norms, ethical values, traditional customs, belief systems, political systems and specific artifacts and technologies that have some origin or association with Europe.”

    So, as we can see, Western Culture is a very expansive category. It can mean many things to many people (for some The Sistine chapel, for others The Chive and the invention of the bikini), then and there, now and here. This is why I am rather wary of overusing it as some generic all-encompassing term in a debate. We must defend western culture is the rallying cry. Which one? Which parts of it? To what ends? These are questions I feel we need to keep in mind.

    Just as a side note, I find the construct Judeo-Greco-Christian rather silly, and one of the things that annoys me about some modern conservatives. For most western history this was not a thing, as Christians were highly divided until recently and Jews have a long history of not being on the best terms with the mighty western culture. There is no single unified Judeo-Greco-Christian tradition. Yes, various flavors of Christian and Jew contributed to the development of the ideas behind the West, and the culture obviously developed in the context of religion. But this is not enough for this construct.

    I might state that I am not religious and I see little worth to attaching so called western values to a religion or other in the present, especially since a number of the enlightenment people who developed these values, while most likely being religious themselves, did not approach philosophy from a religious angle. Judeo –Christian means in modern speak not Muslim and sometimes not secular, and it is an attempt to try to co-opt all sorts of people as a collective. It is, as we say in Romania, an ostrichcamel.

    Good church need not be huge. Mind the hellfire.

    Now, for a second side note, let’s get subjective, as the various warriors are wont to do. You may not have noticed, but I am a Romanian. As such, I am somewhat at the fringes of western culture. Romania was not traditionally part of it, or not fully, at least. Always scurrying along the edges, looking in. An eastern orthodox nation heavily influenced by Russian and the Ottoman Empire, the habits, mores, traditions are different. We were of course part of Christendom in the premodern era, and had elements of western and eastern culture. And many a times the leaders wanted more, Romania was always on a long slow path to being more of a part of the West. When joining the EU many said we joined Europe.

    With all that said, I can say I admire many a thing about western culture, and as a modern Romanian I consider myself part of it. But I do not like to look at it as a uniform thing. As a libertarian, I like liberty and individualism. As a human I like security, prosperity and everything that comes with that. And I like the parts of Western culture that promoted those things, many then, most if not all, other human cultures. I am also critical of elements of Western Culture that did the opposite.

    I do not like mindless worship of anything, including culture. And I do not like nostalgia about some long lost ideal past. There was never such a thing. All cultures need improvement and everything needs criticism. Humans, and their societies, are hardly perfect. And it looks to me like all these western culture warriors only use it as a rhetorical tool and little else.

    The free speech war is a good example in this regard. One should not think rightists want to preserve free speech when they did not in the past. Just like the true face of the left free speech movement was seen after they thought they could get speech they didn’t like banned. It is also good to notice that, while free speech was a value of Western Culture and vigorously defended by many in the past, it needed vigorous defence precisely as it was constantly under attack by elements of the same culture.

    One issue is that, as a libertarian, you often are accused of wanting to go back to sometime in the past because you want a reduction in taxes regulations and general involvement of the state in the economy. This is due to the fact that leftist arguing 101 is to scream racist at people, and they constantly try to equate thinking that the regulatory environment was better in the past, that the whole society was better, and that you want all aspects of that society including the racism and discrimination. This is false and should be countered, which why it is important to phrase arguments properly beyond the western culture thing.

    I often sample western culture myself.

    Me, I do not want to go back. I do not like the phrase going forward either to be honest. But, to take the standard analogy, going forward on the wrong road is not a good idea. I want to go down the road to more liberty. If this implies certain aspects to be more like they were in the past, it is not going back, it is going toward liberty. If I find things wrong in the past, but OK now, I want to keep them. If there was something wrong then and wrong now, I do not want to “move forward,” I want change towards liberty.  But I do not appreciate keeping things as they are just because that’s how they are. If they are wrong, they must be changed.

    Everyone thinks repealing laws they don’t like is progress, but repealing laws they do like is regressive. Which is natural, let’s not stop progress towards my goal. But switching targets is not regressive in itself, even if I don’t like the targets. The trick to improvement is to keep the parts that are good and change the ones that are not. Change for the sake of change is not always desirable. And not everything new is good.

    With all the previous caveats, I do believe that western culture is up there with the best that human achieved, lacking as it may be. I do not judge the past based on the future, and while there are things in 1800 I find wrong, it does not in any way invalidate western culture or the achievement of those people, mostly white men who sometimes owned slaves or maybe didn’t think women should have equal rights.

    Free markets and capitalism brought the biggest increase in human prosperity in history. Of course this does not mean that some industrialists did not treat their employees poorly, although governments did have something to do with constant meddling. But this does not take away the achievements of capitalism, nor does it mean that without the big government of today, conditions would have remained like in the 1800s. Society and ideas evolve, views and attitudes improve. And above all, economic and technological growth moves things in the right direction, despite what government or some of the worse industrialists would want. You do not need the benevolence of the capitalist to improve worker conditions; the market does that just fine if you let it be. But I do not glorify the 1800s.

    I believe that the best development of the West was individualism and individual negative rights. This led to liberty and values that lead to a successful life. Through the tumultuous past, I see ideals of liberty as a fine wire weaved through, moving things the right way. There probably is an English expression for this but I can’t figure it out.

    Be a good person. Educate yourself. Earn your keep, have stable relationships, raise you children right (should you have any), and be charitable to the less fortunate. Help your neighbours, family and friends – as long as they deserve it. Be fair, be just. Do not initiate violence.  Drink good scotch. Don’t dress like a clown. This is all a part of western culture that must be not only kept but enhanced. We don’t have enough of it. But it is not necessarily exclusive to western culture and it was not, sadly, an overwhelming component of it.

    The height of Western political though has been achieved

    And here lies the problem that makes me somewhat more favorable towards the pro west-cult people than The Others.  The right try to make of western culture something that it was not, and some sort of sacred cow. The progressive left, and even worse the postmodern left (yeah yeah I know the word postmodern gets thrown about a lot, but I believe it applies), the SJWs of the world are in fact a much bigger threat. They do want to tear down all elements of western culture. Which is stupid. It is more than stupid, it is insane. Tearing down everything means there is nothing worth keeping. This is utterly ridiculous, as they were quite obviously the most successful nations, even when it comes to the stuff leftist claim to care about such as tolerance, secularism etc.  And being collectivists, they want to tear down individualism. This can only lead to disaster.

    Why are these people so suicidal insane? It is hard to tell. Human nature one would suppose. They are so desperate to push their idiotic economic ideology, that they just don’t care what they destroy doing so. How someone may think this is a good idea is baffling. Fiat Socialism, pereat mundus, I suppose.   Red or dead. Communism or bust.

    The moderate left is timidly fighting back, and more and more.  This is not just the YouTube sphere of the so called non-regressive left, but more of the mainstream. There is of course the vestige of the non-prog left, which does admit some value to western culture. These people are, of course, literally Nazis.

  • Monday Morning Links

    The Ravens were all like Yay! And then they were all like awwwww.  Tough loss, that. Steelers dedicated the win to Ryan Shazier, the former Buckeye great who is showing some improvement, according to reports. Hang in there, big guy.

    Army sang second!

    Some good hoops action over the weekend. Ohio State contuinues to look decent after their third win in a row. Villanova is really good. Arizona State beat Kansas and appears to be legit. Purdue and Gonzaga also both beat unranked opponents.

    In soccer, Liverpool were completely robbed by the officials, and the greed of one of their own players, and were stuck with a draw vs Everton. Man City beat United, and a dustup followed outside the locker rooms when, get this, United players said the City players were disrespecting them for celebrating the win too loudly in their locker room.  Jeez, what a bunch of pussies.

    On the ice, Chicago beat the Coyotes. Step away from the ledge, Swissy. Toronto blanked Edmonton. The Blues beat the Sabres in OT as  did the MINNESODA WIIIIIIIIIILD in their game with the Sharts.

    Now, if only the Weigel-Trump dustup counted as a sport, I could report on the score.  I guess I’ll have to estimate it: Trump 100-Weigel 25,000*.

    *Those scores aren’t what you think. Trump’s 100 represents the percent of the media coverage he deflected from Roy Moore. Weigel’s reflects the number of new twitter followers he garnered after DJT ripped him a new a-hole for falsely reporting on the crowd size in a smarmy, douchy way and then deleting it, also in a smarmy and douchy way,  when he was shown to be wrong (deliberately or otherwise).  So does 25,000 beat 100? Well, we will find out Tuesday night how good a score the 100 was. Weigel will find out in an ongoing manner how many of those 25k are shitposters that will make his life hell.  I’ll have to rely on third-party info to find out about that, however. He still has me blocked after all.

    That’s it for all that mess. Now get ready for…the links!

    Not satisfied with having a nuke program, Kim decides to take it up a notch. Still think giving them (the Kim nutters) all those concessions and continuing to make concessions every time he used the money we sent him to build weapons was a good idea, Obama, Bush and Clinton? Dumbasses.

    Kim Jong Un: mountaineer, weapons expert and nut job.

    If you’ve ever wondered what constitutes a “shitshow”, look no farther. I just hope the businessman, whose family has owned the place for over a hundred years, comes out of this in better shape than the prick kids trying to ruin his life for the audacity to try and have thieves who assaulted him punished for their crimes.

    Rahm Emmanuel prepares for an easy run to a third term as the city he is in charge of sinks further into insolvency, the police get more out of control and the death toll from violent crime continues to skyrocket.  I wish such piss poor performance resulted in that type of job security in my business.

    Former Masshole pol says “was that wrong? Was I not supposed to do that? Cause, I gotta tell you…” Well, you all know the rest.

    Mohammed bin Salman, doing good stuff.

    Saudia Arabian crown prince continues his push to bring Saudi Arabia into the 20th century. And yes, I meant 20th Century, not 21st.  After all, we were building them in western cities as early as the very late 19th century. But I felt generous and didn’t want to call out a culture who treat women as property and throw gay people off buildings to their death. Because that would be intolerant and bigoted of me. Kudos to bin Salman, though. He’s doing a good job of starting to rid the nation of the cancer called Wahhabism.

    And lastly, in case you’re a California lawmaker and are unclear, don’t corner a lobbyist in a bathroom and then proceed to jack it in front of her. Or, according to this guy, don’t be falsely accused of it, because that’ll make you quit as well. That pretty much removes the entire state house representation for the San Fernando Valley in California, as the other local delegate resigned last week for “improprieties”.

    YEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!

    Think good thoughts, even if the links are all full of assholes. And have a great day.

  • ZARDOZ’S SUNDAY EVENING LINKS

    ZARDOZ SPEAKS TO YOU, HIS CHOSEN ONES. ZARDOZ SEES THE BRUTAL HOLIDAY OF CHRISTMAS IS APPROACHING ONCE AGAIN. ZARDOZ WOULD ASK HIS CHOSEN ONES FOR SUGGESTIONS FOR GIFTS, FOR THE BRUTAL EXTERMINATORS. SINCE THEY HAVE ALREADY RECEIVED THE GIFT OF THE GUN, ZARDOZ IS A BIT STUMPED.

    NO REGIFTING THESE!

    ZARDOZ WOULD LET THEM HAVE SOME GRAIN, BUT ALL OF IT IS RESERVED FOR THE VORTEX.

    We are trying SP’s fruitcake recipe!

    IN RETURN FOR YOUR ASSISTANCE, ZARDOZ WILL GIVE YOU THE GIFT OF THE LINK. GO FORTH AND COMMENT! ZARDOZ HAS SPOKEN.

    • ZARDOZ SEES LITTLE PROBLEM WITH THIS. THEIR CONDITIONS ARE STILL BETTER THAN THE GRAIN SLAVES OF THE VORTEX.
    • ZARDOZ BELIEVES ANY “GESTURES TO BREAK PEACE IMPASSE” WOULD INVOLVE A SINGLE FINGER FROM THE BRUTALS INVOLVED.
    • ZARDOZ KNOWS HIS CHOSEN ONES CANNOT RESIST CLICKING A LINK INVOLVING THE BRUTAL MIA KHALIFA…ESPECIALLY WHEN IT INVOLVES HER “TAKING A POUNDING“. JUST DO YOU WELL TO REMEMBER THE PENIS IS EVIL!
    • ZARDOZ IS CONFUSED – HE THOUGHT THE BRUTALS HAD TO REFER TO THIS AS “ICE OF COLOR“? ALSO, DID NOT GLOBAL WARMING END SNOW IN THE BRUTAL UNITED KINGDOM SOME YEARS BACK?