January 19, 2025
Timothy Birdnow
Uh, it failed Joe...
https://www.theblaze.com/news/biden-mocked-28th-amendment-era]
"Today I'm affirming what I have long believed and what three-fourths of the states have ratified," read the missive attributed to Biden. "The 28th Amendment is the law of the land, guaranteeing all Americans equal rights and protections under the law regardless of their sex."
Actually there was a move to revive this monstrosity during Biden's tenure of office by saying they merely had to get a couple of states to authorize it; they claimed there was no expiration date on the original amendment. So all you have to do to change the Constitution is get as many states as possible to approve it then wait and pick them off over decades?
Thank God for Phyllis Schlafley, who managed to help kill this thing. BTW Schlafley's nephew Dan was my counselor in college; he was the Russian history professor at St. Louis University. Oh, and his brother Tom founded the St.Louis Brewery aka Schlafleys, the first microbrewery in Missouri and still one of the largest in the state.
A Federal judge ruled states acted too late to ratify it now, as the deadline for passing it expired (in 2020 the final state needed to pass it did, but this was decades after the amendment was first voted on and well pst the deadline.) The Federal archivist has to register it as passed, and if he does then it becomes an amendment, although there will be a court challenge, no question.
Anyway, Biden is simply declaring victory over the NRA and hoping people believe it and act accordingly. No doubt some Democrat-appointed judges will try to implement it as law. Everyone is laughing at Biden as a senile fool, but I suspect something more nefarious is happening here.
They are trying to ram this piece of crap down America's throats in the waning days of the Biden Administion. The National Archivist is appointed by the President with the advice and consent of the Senate, but has no fixed term, and can stay in office as long as he cares to do so. On August 13, 2022, President Joe Biden nominated Colleen Joy Shogan, who currently controls the records. I think she's going to confirm the ERA as an official amendment to the Constitution. Biden knew what he was saying.
There is talk afoot about using the ERA as Constitutional grounds for circumventing the Supreme Court ruling on abortion.
This is going to wind up being up to the courts, make no mistake about it.
Be warned.
But they are the defenders of "democracy" they tell us.
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
01:38 PM
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Timothy Birdnow
This would be the beginning of WWIII.
Germany may send troops to Ukraine.
Of all the NATO countries the Russians hate and fear Germany more than any. There is a centuries-long antipathy between Germans and Russians, going back to the invasion by the Teutonic Knights in 1242 in response to a call for help from Russia to Christendom to defend against the Mongols. (This was the famous Battle on the Ice when Alexander defeated the Germans on the frozen Neva river and thus came to be called Alexander Nevsky.) The Germans have invaded on other occasions too, most notably during WWII when they lost roughly 24-27 MILLION people! Letting Germans go into Ukraine is a non-starter for them, and they will use atomic sterilization to rid themselves of the teutonic "infection".
Thes war-mongering Ruling Class types have gone batcrap crazy.
Russians are paranoid, but with reason. They have never had national barriers to protect them and thus have always had to think about any nation near their borders as an existential threat. Part of this invasion of Ukraine stems from fear of NATO and the U.S. sniffing around their border. When we had troops in Afghanistan and in Iraq we had them completely encircled, something that made them terribly nervous. The Russians invaded Georgia in 2008 for much the same reasons; they feared Georgia was going to join NATO and that couldn't be allowed. (Yes, there are other reasons, such as the gas and oil pipelines, but we're talking about the Russian psychology and the average person's support for military action. If the public hated what Putin is doing he wouldn't do it, even if he IS an autocrat.) I would add the U.S./NATO has deployed missile defense systems in the whole Warsaw Pact countries, and we've even "invaded" the old Soviet Union in the Baltic states. Russia feels like it's in the grips oa a giant anaconda.
At any rate it would be very bad to have American or British troops in Ukraine, but Germans are just not going to be tolerated. I'm pretty sure Trump understands this. I hope he does.
The Russians will do anything to keep Germany away from their borders. Anything.
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Timothy Birdnow
This is what a willful refusal to enforce the law winds up doing.
A deaf 62 year old woman was mauled to death by dogs in her back yard here in St. Louis, and her husband was seriously injured trying to fight them off. The dogs were not strays, but belonged to an irresponsible neighbor.
Why do I blame this on lack of law enforcement? Simple; the neighbor had these hell-hounds to protect him or herself from criminals. When the law refuses to protect people they have to take matters into their own hands. That means guns and, yes, vicious dogs.
Crime has skyrocketed in the last few years here in The 'Lou because of Black Lives Matter and the election of both Kim Gardner, their poster child prosecutor, and Tishuara Jones, who has never openly embraced BLM but is likely a fellow traveler. (Her father was Virvus Jones, a corrupt city pol who went to prison for corruption.) Couple their misrule with the fact the City got control of the police department (the state had maintained control of it and so it never became PC or corrupt) and we had the perfect storm.
But the City is reporting fewer crimes over the last couple of years. Why?
You know why; the city just stopped reporting the crimes. SLPD, now run by the Democrat establishment here, has no interest in reporting crimes. For that matter they had little interest in stopping or even responding to them.
At any rate crime is still rampant in this city and people have to take steps to protect themselves.
Also, the city is emptying out and so there are fewer atttractions for criminals.
This dovetails with the FBI claims that crime went down across America under Biden. It did no such thing; it just stopped being reported.
Be that as it may St. Louis has long had an animal problem. Years ago a child was killed and eaten by a pack of wild dogs on the north side (the hood). All of the vacant buildings attract homeless canines.
When I worked in real estate I would step very gingerly in some areas out of fear of dogs. You never knew.
At any rate St. Louis is too busy spending their taxpayer's money on frivolity and not really concerned with public safety. Some dog-catchers would be nice (although that wouldn't have prevented this tragedy.)
I've always said this place is going to the dogs. Now we are in the doghouse apparently.
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Timothy Birdnow
Are neocons taking over the NSC? Tablet Magazine thinks so but Mike Waltz disagrees.
I don't know but I certainly hope we aren't getting the same tired old swamp rats back into positions of influence.
I am not an isolationist by any stretch. In fact I may be the last person in America to think the Iraq invasion was not a terrible thing. But enough is enough;we have no clear definitions of our goals or our exit strategies in most of these conflicts. Usually we have no direct national interest involved, but are merely working the will of Europe or the big plutocrats in the international Ruling class. It's got to stop.
I am worried about staffing and have been all along. Trump did a dreadful job of it first time around, and while I suspect he's going to do better (his picks have been pretty good, by and large, this time) I fear the second-tier guys may be the same Burmese Pythons squeezing the life out of us.
So I truly hope Waltz is right and the report is wrong. We need SOME neocons, certainly, to provide a balanced viewpoint,but they need to be a minority. What America needs right now are people who will think outside of the box. The Cold War is long over.
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Timothy Birdnow
Don't forget; Gavin "Smokey" Newsom bragged about reducing California's water supply not so long ago.
Now folks are using bottled water and beer and milk to try to extinguish the blaze since the hydrants are all empty. Great job Smokey the Hair Gel!
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Timothy Birdnow
So Jonathan Capehart, MSNBC host, says Americans have "given up on democracy and embraced authoritarianism".
David Brooks, the alleged "conservative" who invariably agrees with Democrats on almost every issue, agreed, saying the jobs were all coming back thanks to Joe Biden and that his job was to "preserve democracy" and resist "totalitarianism", neither of which are in the job description of the President as far as my copy of the Constitution suggests.
We don't have a democracy; we have a constitutional republic with limitations and a democratic component. Oh, and that component was originally only applicable to the House of Representatives and was limited to white male landholders. So where is Brooks and Dumb (Capehart) getting his information from?
I would call these two idiots but that is an insult to idiots everywhere.
Might I remind Brooks and Dumb that it was Joe Biden who implemented a government agency to suppress free speech, and in fact his own FBI demanded that social networks suppress free speech, going so far as to delcare Hunter Biden's laptop story "Russian fake news" when they had it in their possession all along? This was election tampering. How is THAT defending democracy?
I would remind them that it was Mr. Biden who sicked the DOJ on everyone present at the Capitol riot on January 6, and not just violent rioters but people invited in by the Capitol Police (as video proves) who merely walked around and took pictures. Some are doing DECADES in jail. These were political opponents. How is THAT "defending democracy"?
I would remind the boobie brothers that they launched a series of legal attacks on Mr. Trump from multiple angles, and we now have proof there was coordination among the various legal authorities in New York, Georgia, and with Mr. Smith in Florida. How is THAT "defending democracy"?
I would remind them of the sweetheart deal negotiated in the dead of night to get Hunter out of legal trouble with a plea agreement giving him a get out of jail free card for any crimes committed or that he would commit and that Hunter was clearly working on behalf of his father, sucking up foreign money like a vacuum cleaner. And when that failed Joe did the unthinkable and pardoned the cokeheaded whoremonger. How is THAT "defending democracy".
I would remind them of the cocaine found in the White House which nobody seemed able to figure out who brought it in.
I would remind them of the attack on Donald Trump with a shot missing his skull by less than an inch; the Secret Service clearly failed to do their jobs and that is almost certainly by design. The incompetence was not credible. How is THAT "defending democracy"?
I would remind them of the pro-life folks rotting in jail for simple, constitutionally protected protests.
I would remind him of the multiple IRS audits experienced by MAGA folks.
I would remind him of the MAGA folks who also suffered lawfare, such as Rudy Giulliani, many of whom went to prison over issues that were never prosecuted in the past.
I would remind these jerks about the Federal raid on Mar-a-Lago with orders to "shoot to kill" if anyone interfered.
I would remind them of Trump's arrest and perp walk and mug shot.
There is so much more and I've forgotten half of it or better. But if these two imbeciles think this is what democracy looks...
Meanwhile what of Trump's "authoritarianism"?
Trump never sent in the National Guard to quell any of the riots in Democrat states during his Presidency despite the fact they were burning down whole neighborhoods; he wasn't asked by the state Governors, and Trump was obedient to the separation of powers and Federalism. He couldn't act. Had he acted he would have been in much better shape politically as that would have been very popular, but he knew his limits.
Trump didn't force the reopening of the nation's economy after Covid despite the fact it was seriously hurting his political prospects. He obeys Federalism.
Trump did not prosecute a single Democrat despite having campaigned on "lock her Up" and Hillary had obviously broken multiple laws (letting her off the hook was a huge mistake, in my book, and emboldened his enemies). You cannot point to a single Democrat Trump went after with the law.
So what was Trump's terrible authoritarianism? Apparently challenging the election results in what at least to him (and to me as well as half the country) appeared to be a rigged election. Do notice Trump did nothing more than, say, Democrat Stacey Abrams had done, or that Al Gore, or multiple other Democrats in times past. But Republicans aren't supposed to do such things (in fact there was a consent decree by a judge banning any challenge to vote fraud for Republicans before Trump took them out of it). And Trump asked people to come to Washington to PEACEFULLY AND PATRIOTICALLY protest. Those were his exact words. I would add it seems like Nancy Pelosi set this up to frame Trump. She was in charge of security there, and she knew it was coming. Trump offered the National Guard and she refused it. He even gave the order to deploy but the guy charged with implementing the order feared the incoming Democrats and their wrath more and simply ignored Trump. It was just another setup by the undemocratic Democrats.
Oh, and who is undemocratic and authoritarian? The Democrats just removed Joe Biden from the ticket when it became obvious he was going to lose and replaced him with someone their own party had no say over. But these two stupid men can't see that this was the authoritarianism and not anything Mr. Trump has done.
One of the tools of propaganda is the Big Lie; repeat a lie often enough and make it crazy enough and people will start believing it. That was the genius of Hitler's Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbles. That is what they have done, with the complicity of media morons like Tweedle Dumb and Tweedle Dumber here, to smear Trump as "authoritarian". But it's the Big Lie to hide the fact it is their people who are the true authoritarians. Trump is just a go who won't roll over for them.
The Left always accuses their enemies of that which they themselves are most guilty. And they always find stooges like David Brooks to carry their water for them. Fellow travelers.
I hope and pray a conservative buys MSNBC; we need another Conservative outlet and clowns like these two deserve to be pink-slipped. Maybe they can learn what the average working class American has been suffering all these years from their favored policies.
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
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Timothy Birdnow
I'll drink to that!
California Fire Chief Saves Two Homes Using Milk and Beer After Finding No Water in Hose
Sounds like something out of the Bible, doesn't it! Insttead of a land flowing with milk and honey it's a land cooled with milk and Pilsner.
Using beer is alcohol abuse, plain and simple, but it got the job done!
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Timothy Birdnow
Vivek is going to run for Ohio Governorafter DeWine picked someone else to take J.D. Vance's Senate seat. Sadly DeWine is term limited so Ramaswamy can't remove him from office.
Dewine is a huge RINO and we need fewer like him. He won't be missed.
While I generally like Vivek, his attitude towards H1B visas and legal immigration leave something to be desired. He has openly embraced such visas for Silicon Valley on the theory that Americans are lazy and stupid and we need "the best and brightest". What that really means is we need people who are willing to work for less. And if Americans don't have the skills? There was a time we used to TEACH the skills; that was how companies obtained skilled labor. Now they want people ready to do the job at lower pay. If America is lazy whose fault is that? The people who won't give Americans good jobs in the first place come to mind.
But besides that I think old 'Swamy would be a good Governor. Governor is a much better job for a political future than Senator as it gives executive experience to a politician. Senators make terrible Presidents (look at Joe Biden) and they aren't good for much else. Most American Presidents came from governorships.
Which former Presidents were Senators? Biden, Obama, Warren Harding, John Kennedy (who was a huge failure, although he gets good press) were sitting Senators when elected to the Presidency. There were others who once served in the position, notably to become Vice President then President. But only 17 senators have ever served as President and there is a reason for that; it's a job where you delegate all your work to your staff and simply enjoy the fruits of being the Great Man. And you caucus with a group of like-minded folks. The buck doesn't stop at your desk. So Senators turned Presidents end up like Joe Biden, screwing up royally then blaming others. It worked for them in bygone times, after all. A Governor learns to accept responsibility; he has no choice.
So this is the smart move for Vivek. But we'll see what he does with it if and when he goes to Washington.
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Timothy Birdnow
Multiple counties in southern Illinois have voted to secede from the Land of Lincoln and Indiana has made them an offer to annex them into their fair state.
Illinois is entirely dominated by Chicago, that great People's Republic, and while southern Illinois isn't conservative it's not so leftist as the north, and the people there want out.
Can't say I blame them; high taxes, high gas prices, heavy regulations, and an open invitation to illegal aliens have all added up to sour the folks down south.
Southern Illinois is actually a delightful area. There are essentially two regions - the south and the Deep South, which includes "Little Egypt", the delta area where the Mississippi and Ohio rivers meet. Southernmost Illinois is the Ozarks, part of the ancient mountain chain that once was the biggest thing going a billion years ago. A beautiful region of streams, rolling hills, forests, and other natural wonders.
The wife and I discovered this area years ago and used to visit it on a regular basis. There is the Shawnee Hills Wine Trail, full of small, boutique wineries and a few microbreweries tucked in the hollows and forests of the Illinois Ozarks. There is Bald Knob, with the Cross of Peace sitting on the highest hill in the region, a giant white crucifix which they light at night. It can be seen over a six hundred square mile area! There is also a very artsy, intellectual community nearby. They have a boardwalk with a wonderful surprise - a metal art shop's back yard, which you discover is an amazing wonderland of stone forts and pirate ships and other pre-adolscent dreams, like something out of Peter Pan and Neverland. You would never know it was there; there are no signs or advertising. Just a sign "please say on trail" and then you enter this little hidden garden.
There is a root beer saloon too, with swinging doors.
And Giant City state park. A place full of enormous boulders, the size of homes, and with the remains of a native fortification from way back. Oh, and some of the best fried chicken you will eat.
There is the Garden of the Gods. Nuff said. There are fishing lakes and a natural bridge and the Little Grand Canyon.
That's southernmost Illinois. There are many other things is southern Illinois to delight. An old French fort - Ft. Des Charrtes - just south of St.Louis. There are delightful small towns, true Americana although they have a decidedly German flavor. (My own Grandmother's family lived there, German immigrants who left Alsace when the Prussians took it from France.)
It's very different from what most people think of Illinois, which is either an industrial wasteland or a flat prairie full of corn. That's middle and northern Illinois. Northernmost Illinois is Mexico. I went to Rockford years ago and it looked like a border town, on the Mexican side.
I wish at least Southernmost Illinois would request annexation to Missouri. But the Mississippi acts a a huge psychological barrier; east is one side, west another. Missouri is west and never the twain shall meet.
I'm o.k. with Indiana taking south-middle Illinois; they get stuck with East St. Louis and the mill towns like Granite City. They would get Alton and the quaint little resort town of Grafton, an old community built into the bluffs of the Mississippi river, as well as Brussel's Island, the land between the Mississippi and Illinois rivers (which itself is delightful; a land of few people that is only accessed by a ferry or a bridge 20 miles to the north. Once called "The Apple Kingdom" the island was the second largest apple producing area in America and still is full of orchards and great, country-cooking restaurants.)
Hate to lose those, but Indiana would do a good job with them. But I want Little Egypt and the Ozarks!
I don't want them to become a new state; it would be entirely up for grabs and the Democrats could well win control of it. This is labor Democrat country (as well as being devout drinkers of Stag Beer, perhaps the worst beverage ever devised by the mind of man, but they seem to like the horrible stuff.)
At any rate the people of Southern Illinois should not be slaves to the city of Chicago, the feudal lords of Springfield, or any of the rest of the creeps who have run the state into the ground.
J.B. Pritzker, Illinois billionaire leftist governor and heir to the Hyatt fortune, sits upon an empire he has purchased with his money and with the power of Cook County. Outstate Illinoisans want out. If Democrats really do care about democracy, as they claim, they would honor this choice. But when did Democrats ever really care about democracy? Only when it serves their interests.
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January 18, 2025
Timotthy Birdnow
What does anyone expect from the party of Bill Clinton and Joe "want some candy little girl" Biden?
145 Democrats Vote Against Deporting Illegal Alien Sexual Predators from U.S.
So where is the National Organization for Women (NOW)? Why aren't the feminists up in arms over this? The #metoo crowd? Strange how active they are when Republicans seek to protect the unborn but they simply vanish when it comes to protecting actual women.
If feminism was about women and not lefitism they would be FURIOUS at this. Their silence speaks volumes.
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Timothy Birdnow
Tthis is an interesting essay about the collapsing leftist movement worldwide. I largely agree, although he misses the point in some ways I fear.
His fundamental argument is leftism is failing across the globe (and he's right) and that the cause, in his view, was leftist overreach. Can't disagree but he misses the big picture; that overreach is policy, standard operating procedure for the Leftist revolution.
It has been called the dialectic; thesis meets antithesis leading to synthesis. Marx included this Hegelian dialectic in his model of Communism (although Marx' acolytes lacked patience to do it in many cases). It is sometimes referred to as "two steps forward, one step back". It's a PLANNED PLAY, like the flea flicker in football. The Left has revolutionary periods where they go all hell-bent-for leather then they have consolidation periods where they secure their ill-gotten gains. They know they will lose a few things but these things will simmer on the back burner while the Right labors to reverse the gains made by them. But the Right will not dive deep into their territory, in all probability, being too busy reversing some of the crazier stuff (which is why they promote crazy stuff like trannies in women's locker rooms in the first place) to actually attack the left in their citadels. As a result we are eternally on the defensive - even when we are winning. We never mount attacks to really roll back the ride of socialism.
So they have gone as far as they could go without an explosion and now are consolidating power. They will still be quite active, especially in social and cultural aspects of society while in the political wilderness. We saw this in the Reagan era; remember "the gay nineties" when homosexuality started really being accepted and we had "don't ask, don't tell" replace dismissal for homosexual acts in the military and the like? That came on the heels of the Reagan Revolution and that was no coincidence; the left was laboring in universities, in publishing houses, in Hollywood and other entertainment centers, etc. to mainstream what had been considered aberrant, perverted behavior. Now we think of "gay" as being an "alternate lifestyle" when just forty years ago it was something either mocked or whispered about. Now we have dudes getting married and compulsory parades in honor of sexual deviancy.
THAT happened while we were fighting over temporary things like tax codes.
There are plenty of other examples of this, and strangely this stuff happens in all parts of the world simultaneously, and that should tell us it's coordinated and planned.
So every now and then the Right needs to be given a victory to act as a pressure relief valve. If the Left didn't pull in their horns every now and then there would be an explosion; if they get apparent victories then the pressure declines and the left can assume their rightful place in time. They know we aren't going to wipe them out as they would do to us.
And they profit even in the worst of circumstances. As Rahm Emmanuel said "never let a good crisis go to waste" and when they aren't in charge they have plenty of good crisis, as anything bad can be blamed on those holding the illusory power. It's how they wind up back in charge soon; demagogue every scandal, every mistake, every act of God, and the public soon forgets and puts them back in charge.
And thus the Revolution continues. Lather, rinse, repeat.
The author of this piece doesn't seem to get that fully. He does mention the Overton Window (which is essentially the dialectic - the window is a set of parameters for polite public discourse and thinking. The Left is always slamming one window shut and opening another to the left and our side always fears reopening the shut window lest we be called racist/sexist/bigot/homophobe etc) but I think he believes these are just movements "people power" things. I don't think he grasps the coordination and careful planning involved with most things we see.
What we see is a stage production, but occasionally the curtain slips and we see the crew hiding behind it. This production is managed; it's not organic. It doesn't just happen this way, but rather someone is pulling the strings. We know many of the names - George Soros, Warren Buffet, Tom Steyer, etc. Many we don't know. But suffice it to say there are vast sums of money and huge amounts of talent employed to drive what we see as the narrative. It doesn't just happen that, say, every media outlet is leftist and follows the same script.
But, I hear you say, "what of Fox News"? I refer you to my pressure valve theory above; Fox is there to blunt Conservative anger and to steer the conversation away from actually taking action. I'm not saying it was started with that in mind but that it is allowed to prosper to facilitate the fiction of "plurality" in our national discourse. Fox is a tool of the left, wittingly or unwittingly. But a tool most assuredly.
Do I think Trump a part of the stage play? I did when he first burst on the scene. In fact I thought he may well have been there solely to split the conservatives. I didn't trust him then. But something is different about the man, and the apoplexy from the left over him suggests he's a non-scripted actor in our little play, like a janitor who wandered on stage and said "hey, you guys are just pretending".
So I think now they are trying to coopt him, steeer him away from being TOO damaging to them, while riding this outbreak of independent thought on the part of the American People out. I think Trump is like a wildfire; their only option is to burn off some of their underbrush and hope he burns out. In times past this has worked, notably the Reagan era. They bided their time and waited Reagan out, putting the Bush family in position to blunt Reaganism and eventually strangle it. I suspect they will do likewise - or try to - with Trump.
I believe that they realize they have pushed as far as they can at this point. The public in every nation is angry, yet, but that anger is easily assuaged, and it will cool in an election cycle or two.
Bear in mind it is a shallow anger. Why do I say that? Why didn't the GOP win eight or more seats in the Senate? They were defending half as many seats as the Democrats yet the Senate remains nip-and-tuck. That is in no small part due to the fact the Senate leadership didn't even try to win big - they tried to maintain control of their own caucus first. I've long argued the Senate (and to a lesser extent the House) doesn't want any sort of landslide; the incumbents maintain their privileged position by the chamber being tight as a nun's backside. No one dare oppose them if there is any chance of losing a seat and flipping control of the Senate. So I believe McConnell - who has been at the helm longer than anyone in history and who once wrote an autobiography "The Long Game" where he discussed politics like a grift, a "long con" where you look several moves ahead - consciously labored to keep the Senate close. He certainly refused to fund MAGA people, and sat on a huge war chest the last couple of elections rather than risk losing his grip on power by supporting a MAGA guy. And we've seen this behavior in the House as well, by Boehner, McCarthy, Ryan, and now Johnson. These guys just can't seem to win, even when the public is furious and want a change. Trump's election should have produced huge coattails in the House and Senate; it didn't.
But pkubj-https://www.multistate.us/insider/2024/11/6/post-election-republicans-add-to-strong-hold-of-state-governments]it did at State and local levels.
We call this the Uniparty. Two apparent enemies who are actually working hand-in-glove. Like Wiley Coyotte and the Road Runner, a casual observer sees them as bitter enemies but a thinking person knows they are just cartoons for entertainment, a distraction. (Actually Wiley Coyote appeared in another WB cartoon with a sheepdog which is appropo; they went to work at 9 a.m. punched a time clock, then punched each-other out until 12 when they took their lunch break, eating together and making friendly small talk, punched back in until five then wished each-other a nice night.) The GOP is no more an opposition party than that coyote was to that sheep dog.
My point is that the Left still controls the tools for the dissemination of information. They own the schools and academia, they own the media still, they control the internet, they control publishing houses and entertainment citadels. This is worldwide, which is why their program always appear simultaneously across the globe. A campaign just pops up out of the blue and it catches fire immediately. Why? They own vast networks full of cash and use it to make these things "popular" when in fact normal people hate them.
I don't think we are in the throes of a revolution so much as a hiccup on the way to the global socialist paradise. Yes, we are seeing corporations dump the more aggregious things like DEI or transgenderism, but this is for a season. I suspect this was planned; a necessary loss, like sacrificing your queen in chess to checkmate your opponent in four more moves. I suspect the Right will fail to move on all fronts, but concentrate on government as these monsters continue their march through our institutions and our beliefs. Any really capable military general knows how to make a useful, tactical retreat. George Washington beat the greatest military in the world by running away in a smart way. Occasionally everyone must pull back for a time.
We need to stop being so cocky. I enjoyed this Trump win too but the real work is coming, and Trump can't do it alone. We have to go after them where they hide, strike them in their sanctuaries. As Sun Tzu said, one must seize that which the enemy holds dear. We need to do that, going after the left's most cherished things. We need to take back the culture. Elon Musk helped a lot by buying Twitter and hopefully other, like minded types will continue this (like buying MSNBC or Tiktok). We need revival in the Church, to ask God's forgiveness and renewal. We need to revive the institutions the left have destroyed - like the Boy Scouts or many of the social service clubs like the Lions or Elks or whatnot. We need to return to gender specificity and segregation of the sexes in some instances (like the Boy scouts which is now open to girls and transvestites and everyone else.) We need to repeal gay marriage.
At any rate, if anyone thinks this is over he is deluded. Sadly our side always believes "we won the war, time to go home" while the left sees no end, ever, to the game.
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Timothy Birdnow
Apparently Government Motors (GM) has been collecting data on drivers and selling it to credit bureaus and insurance companies and whatnot in what can only be called a gross violation of the privacy of their customers.
And amazingly the FTC is suing them over it.
From the article:
The issue stems from GM encouraging customers to sign up for its OnStar connected vehicle service and the OnStar Smart Driver feature through a "misleading enrollment process,” the agency said. The company claimed that these tools help users "assess their driving habits.”
However, GM did not "clearly disclose” that the collected information—including data related to speeding, instances of hard braking, and late-night driving—would be sold to third parties such as consumer reporting agencies, the FTC claims.
Agencies "used the sensitive information GM provided to compile credit reports on consumers, which were used by insurance companies to deny insurance and set rates,” it said.
The FTC pointed out that tracking or collecting geolocation data was an invasion of privacy because it reveals details such as daily routines or an extremely specific event such as visiting a medical facility."
Americans have become entirely too comfortable with the surveillance state. It amazes me the folks who invented the Fourth Amendment and jealously defended protecting their privacy rights have so easily surrendered them to any Tom, Dick, or Harry who comes along. But we let fear rule us, especially in the Cold War and then in the War on Drugs and then the War on Terror and at each step we gave government greater surveillance power. Couple that with the cult of celebrity, where everyone wishes they were famous public figures and are happy to just give away their life's secrets, has led to an American fishbowl. Natturally people will profit off the stupidity of the public...
A former CIA guy once said they had spent decades trying to find ways to get data on people and all the while all they had to do was ask them for it. We know the CIA was involved heavily in the creation of a number of internet platforms, notably Google and probably Facebook (via Peter Thiel). Certainly they figured out early on how to utilize social networking and the like. Just watching Google searches says a lot about your person of interest.
So if the government can do that, the thinking undoubtedly went in the GM boardroom, why can't a carmaker spy on their customers? Fair is fair, right?
My wife once had a dream where she had a commercial halfway through it; we laugh about that all the time. But in our future that's going to be coming. Certainly Elon Musk and others want to implant chips in our brains. How long before they use such chips for data mining and implanting commercials? You know it's coming. And while civil libertarians such as myself will resist it many will happily accept it as just what you have to do to get free stuff.
We used to call that selling your soul. If you made this deal with Beelzebub you would have been burned at the stake for witchcraft in bygone days; now you are just an average American.
Ben Franklin said:
"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
It's true too of giving up your privacy for free stuff - in spades.
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
01:16 PM
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Timothy Birdnow
And she dared accuse others of election fraud!
Stacey Abrams Slapped With Largest Fine in State History for Election Law Violations
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
01:14 PM
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What the devil is going on with Ben Affleck?
First FBI, Then Cops, Now a Military Humvee was Spotted Outside Ben Affleck’s Home?
I know he's a creepy leftie, but this suggests a national security issue.
— TMZ (@TMZ) January 17, 2025
This article insists Affleck isn't the focus of any investigations, but that conclusion is only drawn from the fact he's seemingly not concerned and authorities have said as much. But it's quite odd, to put it mildly.
I'm not a great believer in strange coincidences especially involving famous people.
BTW Affleck was married to Jennifer Lopez until recently. He turned over tapes of her with Sean "Diddy" Combs, the rapist pedophile sex slaving rapper, to the FBI recently. Given the scope of Diddy's criminal activities one wonders if the two are not connected?
Perhaps Affleck is turning state's evidence and facing a credible threat? Maybe more?
Another interesting tidbit about Affleck; he had Hillary Clinton's private e-mail address. While this story goes back to 2015, it does suggest he knew things that perhaps he should not have. This was the same e-mail account Hillary was using to circumvent the official government channels.
I reiterate; Affleck is a huge Democrat and donated money to Kamala Harris this last election.
I suspect all sorts of dirt may be under his fingernails - or at least he's fairly close to a lot of dirt, what with this Diddy business and his ties to the Clintons, and some wild rumors swirling about America's premier mob couple.
So there may be nothing to this, but there could be a LOT to this. Keep a sharp eye.
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
01:13 PM
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According to Mo. Senator Eric Schmidt, the FBI experienced a major security breach which involves agent e-mails and discloses confidential informant information.
If the FBI cannot even protect it's own security, why do we entrust them with protecting ours?
I wonder if this breach was in fact not intentional. A poison pill, perhaps, to hamper the incoming Administration?
I may be paranoid but paranoids have enemies too!
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
01:12 PM
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China loses population for the third straight year in a row.
I suspect we are going to see a downward spiral as China's population continues to shrink. This is a classic Bell Curve; now they are on the downward leg of things. If the West has taught us anything it is that once you start losing population even though you wanted to do so you have a hard time arresting the decline. Look at Russia.
And with population decline you often get economic malaise. Nations need enough people to support the older generation. Even in countries where there isn't really a welfare state it is done through unofficial channels i.e. families. Reduce the number of people and you can no longer afford to care for the elders, and so you get deficit spending and at the same time not enough taxes to support a welfare system. The end result is frequently economic decline.
We've seen this in many places in Europe and in Russia. Now it's coming to China.
But China's economy is entirely based on economic growth, and managing a shrinking economy will lead to chaos. The Chicoms can't use the very poor method employed in the West, namely importing new people; they would lose control of the country. There is no People on Earth as xenophobic and race-conscious as the Chinese.
So they are in a pickle. This could well destroy them in the end.
I've long argued China is a paper tiger and population decline has always been one of the factors I've considered in making that assessment.
At any rate it would be good to have fewer Chinese, no question, for both ourselves and the long-term future of China. But it will lead to profound chnages there, and China may well seek foreign adventurism as a distraction. The Chicoms will be most unpleasant in their death throes.
BTW I would add the One child policy gave China a unique situation; too many boys, too few girls. Chinese would abort girl children because their culture was always patralinear. So you have a bunch of men seeking women with none to be found. That is ripe war. The Chinese men are going to have to seek abroad to find women. If they have to conquer to do so so be it.
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
01:11 PM
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Joe Biden's warning of a tech-ocracy rings most hollow; he was just fine cozying up to tech companies when they were serving his own interests. Take this for example.
FTA:
The hundreds of meetings with White House officials not only highlight Microsoft’s proximity to the Biden administration but also reveal how the company strategically targeted the most sensitive areas of government. Roughly one-third of these meetings involved officials from the National Security Council (NSC), with Microsoft executives engaging directly with top national security figures such as Jake Sullivan and Jon Finer.
As Wired reported this week, Sullivan and the Biden White House served as Microsoft’s lackeys in brokering a $1.5 billion deal in which the company acquired a minority stake in G42, an Abu Dhabi-based AI company founded by Tahnoun bin Zayed al Nahyan, the United Arab Emirates’ intelligence chief. The deal has raised fears among the U.S. intelligence community given G42’s close ties with China.
On May 12, 2021, Microsoft President Brad Smith met with senior NSC advisors on the same day Biden signed an executive order addressing the SolarWinds cyberattack — a breach that exposed vulnerabilities in Microsoft’s systems and compromised federal agencies. Microsoft’s lobbying efforts during the SolarWinds fallout were designed to shield the company from scrutiny while promoting its security products to federal agencies. These products generated billions in revenue from government contracts, with national security-related agencies contributing over $12 billion to Microsoft since 2018.
The timing of several key White House meetings suggests that Microsoft leveraged the crises stemming from SolarWinds and the Exchange Server breach to expand its federal footprint. For instance, on May 24, 2021 — just days after Biden’s executive order on SolarWinds — Microsoft executives Jason Zander and David Pritchard met with Deputy National Security Advisor Anne Neuberger. Zander, responsible for Microsoft’s federal engagements, met with White House officials on at least six occasions during Biden’s term in office.
Only now, with Elon Musk and the platform formerly known as Twitter cozying up to Trump, as well as Zuckerberg's craven crawling to the Donald, Mr. Biden suddenly awakens to the perils of autocracy. Hypocrite.
If I were God and wanted to fix the nation I would destroy Silicon Valley with fire and brimstone and turn anyone who looked back at it into a pillar of salt. Get rid of SV, along with Hollywood, San Francisco, New York, and Washington and America would return to a path of decency. These places (and Chicago) have warped this nation into something wholly unrecognizable. They are the levees controlling the direction of the river of America. Break 'em and the country flows back to it's original course.
At any rate we always knew Biden was a hypocrite. This is just more proof.
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
01:09 PM
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Here is a story about how government twists and distorts everything, then has to clean up it's own mess, only it inevitably cleans it with more filth.
Apparently a lot of parking lots in downtown Detroit are gouging sports fans during Lions playoff games, charging as much as $1000 to park. Usurious? Sure. Rotten? You bet. But what business is it of the City of Detroit to set pricing for private parking lots?
Those lots exist for a reason. That reason is, in no small part, because the city, like most cities in America which are run by Democrats, is gouging people by having public meters and forcing them to pay to park on the streets, under the threat of being ticketed and perhaps having your car towed. And since most meters are time limited (often to two hours) a person cannot go to a pro football game and park at a meter; it will expire before he gets out to feed it (which is often illegal anyway, refeeding the meter).
Basically these Democrat cities found a lucrative stream of revenue by screwing over people going downtown. As a result private parking lots opened to serve the needs of these folks. Those lots would be more lucrative to the owners if developed. A Loft condo complex or office building make a lot more money than some stupid parking lot.
The cities don't even have a clue in that they won't offer free parking in public-owned lots either, or even low-cost parking in public-owned lots.
The end result is a scarcity of parking in most downtowns across the country.
In a sane world a lot charging $1000 would be empty and other, cheaper ones full. But these prices are set by the city too as the article points out.
So the answer the Democrats who run these cities is to crack down on "windfall profits" by lot owners rather thanfix the parking problem through true free market systems or even through direct public planning.
According to the article:
"This is totally ridiculous,” Bell said. "I don’t know of anyone who thinks that paying $900 or $1,000 to park and go see a game is reasonable. If we find any parking lot illegally charging folks to park, we are going to use every tour in our arsenal to let them know this is a bad idea. We are going to shut them down, we are going to ticket them, we are going to haul them in front of a Wayne County Circuit Court Judge, and we’re going to take steps to suspend their license. This is totally unacceptable.”
The owners of the three lots shut down by police have to appear before a judge to see when they will be allowed to reopen.
Oh, that's genius! Shut down the few lots actually serving what is obviously a public need because you FEEL it's unfair! Then when these guys go out of business you will cry foul.
There is nothing more stupid than a big city Democrat.
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
01:07 PM
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Politicians and VIP's only at the Trump inaugural.
It was moved inside because of the cold weather, but was there perhaps a second motive? Security will be WAY easier this way.
I'm sure a lot of security people were not unhappy about moving this inaugural indoors.
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
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A big part of why California is burning stems from their bewildering unwillingness to remove dry brush and deadwood from rural areas, thus providing far too much fuel to feed a fire. Removing the debris reduces the fire and saves homes - and lives.
Now California officials are twisting and squirming to deny this little detail, but it's easily proven. All one must do is look at other states prone to wildfires and compare and contrast.
Take Florida, for example. Now, when anyone says Florida people automatically think of the beach and Disney World but the reality is Florida is a big, flat plain subject to high winds. And while parts of the state are swamp, large swaths of it are grassland and scrubland. In fact, Florida was once a great cattle state, rivaling Texas (which also is a big fire state) and the term "cracker" for a southern hick comes from Florida cowboys who used whips to drive cattle. At any rate, Florida has a fraction of the wild fires seen in California and there is a reason for that; they do controlled burns in Florida on a regular basis before fire season.
There were 2,338 wildfires reported in 2024, according to the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, burning 64,170 acres. Yet we did not see anywhere near the devastation as we have seen in L.A.
By the end of 2024, a total of 8,024 wildfires burned a cumulative 1,050,012 acres in California. One quarter of the wildfires in Florida. So why didn't we hear much about the Florida fires? Because they caused so much less damage. Florida does controlled burns and debris removal.
And Texas? As of August of 2024 (the latest I could find records on) Texas had seen
over a million acres burned by wildfires, yet the property damage was far less than in California. Texas does controlled burns and brush removal.
This isn't rocket science. There are places that burn - it's natural for them. You either have to let them burn and simply stay out of those areas or you have to take fire-prevention measures.
The Leftist moonbats who run California don't want to do that, then complain about the fires and blame "climate change" when it's just bad policy.
Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at
01:03 PM
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