Open Thread

State of the Open Thread

Mark Noonan50 Comments

There were two things the Left settled on after last night’s senile rant by Pudding Brain:

  1. He’s SOOOOO vigorous!
  2. He shouldn’t have called Laken Riley’s killer an illegal.

Point one was, of course, pre-set; they were going to say that no matter. It was a chorus clearly scripted. It mostly drew chortles.

The second point was just as universal but came out a little later as the Left absorbed the performance. Biden mangled the poor girl’s name in his scripted attempt to defuse the issue and that did generate a lot of negative comment but the “don’t call them illegals” thing is more telling. The Laken Riley issue is highlighting the broader issue of border security and the Democrats want it gone. That is why they are demanding we stop saying “illegal” when referring to illegal immigrants. They don’t want the American people thinking in those terms, because that terminology cuts against them.

Call them Dreamers or Newcomers or Migrants or any other positive-to-innocuous term you can think of, but don’t call them illegal! They don’t want the outrage of the American people getting focused here. I don’t think it’ll work; the cat, as they say, is out of the bag – and anyone with a daughter or granddaughter sees Laken Riley. It could have been ours on the slab in a morgue…and set there because Biden’s people maliciously opened the border and cruelly refuse to close it. It does sometimes work like that – things can be horrible and everyone knows it is but there is no focus…until something happens that provides the focus. Riley’s murder has done that – she really just was a nice, young girl starting out her life and a miserable excuse for a human being killed her for no reason. And it wouldn’t have happened if illegals weren’t here.

One thing that especially disgusts me: pro illegal people saying, “illegal immigrants commit fewer crimes”. This is obviously untrue drivel but even if it is true, does that matter? For heaven’s sake, Riley would be alive if the illegal wasn’t there. If that was the only crime an illegal committed this year, it would still be an outrage. An entirely preventable death. It is like people just don’t care about other human beings dying – except when its fictional Palestinian deaths, of course. Anyways, I’m not about to take moral lectures from people just back from the “shout your abortion” rally.

Among the diseased mental droppings last night was a program to have the US military build a pier in Gaza to ship supplies in. Among the history of dumb ideas, this one is right up there. First off, all we’d be doing is providing supplies to Hamas, thus prolonging the war. Second, it puts a wedge between the USA and Israel and thus encourages Hamas to resist in the hope that the USA will eventually pressure Israel to leave Hamas alive. Third, and worst, there is zero chance Hamas won’t take a shot at us. If a Hamas militant is any way within range of US troops, he will open fire. He can’t do otherwise; we are the enemy to Hamas. They hate us; and it is likely a tie between hating us and hating Jews. This means there is a very good chance that one or more American will be killed by Hamas in our effort to supply Hamas.

And all of this because Team Biden wants to shore up support among pro-Hamas Muslims in Michigan. Americans are to die in an effort to secure some electoral votes. Disgusting doesn’t begin to cover it.

Side note: the father of one of the Marine’s killed in Biden’s botched Afghan withdrawal heckled Pudding Brain last night. He was arrested. A gold star father; arrested for saying words. That is Biden’s America.

Meanwhile, Islamists continue to attack defenseless Christians in Africa and our government doesn’t give a damn. Never let the vile people running our government claim any mantle of morality.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan36 Comments

The Crimson Blade goes live on March 10th! You can pre-order Kindle now. Having just done the very last review of it: gotta say, its awesome. There’s a growing conflict in the family, as it were. The Enemy is moving! But in ways that our heroes don’t fully understand. Everyone who likes a bit of history will enjoy the interaction between Fred and Celeste where it comes out, big surprise (/sarc), that Celeste is an ardent Monarchist!

So, the Michigan primary was a blowout win for Trump – and quite impressive numbers rolled up, including in traditionally Democrat areas. That plus the number of Democrat primary voters who voted “uncommitted” has Team Pudding Brain in a panic – that’s why they’re now overtly repeating Hamas lies and putting ever more pressure on Israel to quit. They are desperately worried they simply will not have enough votes in Michigan even given the invariable ballot box stuffing in Detriot.

To me, Israel continues to go far too slowly and carefully. I understand: they want to keep their own casualties low in addition to be chary of the blood of the Palestinians. These are noble sentiments, but celerity is key to success in war. You take too long and you can end up spilling more blood than if you just rammed through. And here’s the cruel truth: in war you must be willing to pour out whatever amount of blood is necessary to win. Nobody was more keen to keep casualties low than Wellington…but if the situation called for it, he would ruthlessly engage in quite bloody actions.

The vileness of our opponents becomes ever more clear, and it is finally costing them support. They were able to hide it for so long with their friendly media and, lets face it, some clever propaganda by Team Clinton and Team Obama…but with a senile Biden in charge, there’s no clear message and so the very worst aspects of the Left keep emerging where a Clinton or Obama would have skillfully hid them. The murder of that poor girl in Georgia is especially galvanizing…the Democrat attempts to sweep her death under the rug are leaving a very bad taste everywhere. We all know: she’s dead because illegals have been blithely released by the people specifically charged with keeping the people safe. You can’t work your way around that.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan42 Comments

So, what’s the over/under on Haley getting crushed in South Carolina? I’m going with 40.

She’s still in the race because a lot of big money people keep handing it to her. So, her staff has no reason to quit: they’re still getting paid. And that she hasn’t pulled the plug regardless tells me she’s a creature of her staff. Regardless of what happens in 2024, she’s off my list for 2028. I just don’t trust her.

Team Pudding Brain is now set to call the Israeli settlements in the West Bank illegal. Basically asserting the Islamist position on the matter. Why? Gotta be Michigan – his people must be seeing disaster there and are desperate to shore up his support there among the Muslim community. But it probably won’t work: by and large the Muslim community anywhere in the world takes a strongly anti-Israel position.

But even if they kowtow to Islamist demands, I don’t think it is going to do the trick. The murder of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley by an illegal immigrant is, by itself, just another in a long list of crimes committed by illegals who aren’t supposed to be here…but her death seems to be resonating far more widely than most. People are sick of it. Sick of illegals. Sick of the fact that once an illegal commits a really big horror we invariably find out he was in custody before and could have been deported.

It is all just getting to be too much. It is shifting the political dynamic, including in blue areas. It is such an easily fixable problem and everyone can see that government and business are conspiring to keep the illegals flowing. It makes people feel, correctly, that our Ruling Class hates us. This can lead to very odd things happening. Buckle up.

Some House Democrats are apparently working on ways and means of not certifying the 2024 election if Trump wins. They’ll only do this if they control a majority of House delegations next year – which may be different from who holds the overall House majority. Remember: when the House votes for President, it is one State, one vote. So, whoever has control of 26 or more State delegations wins. Currently the GOP controls 26 State delegations with 2 delegations split (so, essentially, no vote) and 22 under Democrat control. The Democrats would have to have a really good night in November for this to shift significantly. But, there you go: they are going to fight for democracy by denying the result. They are just lying, corrupt hypocrites determined to gain and retain power.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan37 Comments

Some Russian dissident gets offed in prison and we’re supposed to get all weepy-eyed about it.

Know what? Father Petros Mwale, a parish priest in Malawi (that’s in Africa, for any of you liberals who learned pronouns rather than geography in college), has been asking for our prayers for the farmers of Malawi as they endure a terrible drought. I do hope you will pause for a moment here and offer up those prayers.

The people there make $579.00 per year per capita. You know: your monthly car payment. They’ve got lots of problems, of course, just like the rest of post-colonial Africa and they have struggled to chart a course. Not nearly as bad as some African countries have had it. They work: 80% of the population engages in subsistence agriculture. They are pretty much free though there are abuses and corruption, just like everywhere. But, its mostly ok because they are pretty traditional and most issues are settled by local councils. And here’s the thing: the country borders Lake Malawi; its 11,400 square miles of water area with an average depth of 950 feet; so, big lake. Holds 2,000 cubic miles of water.

What I’m pointing out here is that Malawi has water. In, fact, quite a lot of water. Yes, other countries border the lake so it isn’t all Malawi’s, but they get their fair share right? Now, imagine if for a moment we had spent 10% of the Ukraine budget helping Malawi build a first rate water retention and irrigation system? The poor farmers there would have access to water even when the rains don’t come.

But, hey: nobody in Malawi passes out $50,000 a month no-show jobs to Westerners.

It is crucial to remember that what is a crisis in the world is usually what the Ruling Class wants to be a crisis because they can rake off money or power over it. There’s no rake-off helping hard working dirt farmers feed their families.

But, do get weepy over a dead Russian if that floats your boat.

I guess the latest thing for the Cartels is just to toss the drugs over the border wall where they are immediately picked up and driven off. We’ve talked about this before: you can’t stop a criminal cartel. Here’s a Wikipedia list of them – if you dig through it, you’ll note that Cartel follows Cartel. As soon as we take one down, another immediately steps in…because you can’t take them down. Not really. We might get the boss of a Cartel, but there’s a whole system of moving drugs from production to user. It probably employs hundreds of thousands of people and there are billions of dollars to be made. You can’t stop that by knocking off a boss.

OTOH, if we could catch the driver of the truck that picked up the drugs and hang him, that would stop it.

So, too, hanging the street pusher. The guy who is buying money orders to transmit them south. In short: the small fry. We can stop them because we don’t have to stop all of them: guarantee you the supply of small fry to actually move the drugs and money dries up when you start hanging them. To be sure, it won’t stop it entirely: even Singapore’s draconian laws against drug trafficking don’t stop it. But Singapore arrested a bit more than 3,000 people for drugs in 2023. New York City had that many deaths just from drug overdoses. Additionally: Singapore isn’t plagued by drug addicted zombies defecating on the streets.

Here’s your choice: execute 300 street pushers or have 3,000 addicts die next year. Choose.

How’s the election going? Well, Pudding Brain’s people are now starting to push a ceasefire proposal at the UN to stop Israel from taking the southern part of Gaza. In other words, what they’re trying to do is save Hamas. Why? Michigan: has a large Muslim community which has been rock solid for the Democrats. Plenty of Muslims are upset that Pudding Brain hasn’t taken a forcefully anti-Israel stance. Recent polling shows that Michigan in play, with some polls showing a Trump lead. So, screw the Jews: we need Michigan!

But think about it: Democrats encouraged the migration of a large population of anti-Semites in order to get their votes and now they’re moving to being overtly anti-Israel in order to retain the anti-Semitic votes.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan43 Comments

Now that the whole football thing is over with, we can fully concentrate on the sport that matters: Hockey!

We here in Vegas fell in love with our Golden Knights during the inaugural season 7 years ago and the love affair has just grown since then. Going from Misfits to Champions in 6 years just cemented it. I had never watched more than a couple minutes of hockey in my life until that first season…but as the Knights started to shock the world by winning and getting into playoff contention, I started to watch. It took a little while to grasp the rules and tactics of the game but I’m pretty well grounded now…periodically shouting at the TV “shoot, dammit, there’s a lane open” and “for crying out loud, don’t turn it over at the blue line” and other such hocky-fan things. It is the last, remaining un-woke sport, anyways. And I like the element of luck in it. In all major sports the worst can beat the best but in hockey just a little more so…because you’re trying to get a little black thing to go into a net off ice. The skills are there, the shot is there and its perfect…but it hits a post or goes just slightly wide. You never know how a game can go…how at times you’ll go 40 minutes of play without anyone scoring, and then in five minutes 4 goals are scored collectively. So, hoping my Knights repeat! To make up for the national humiliation of the Chiefs repeating.

Everyone in Pudding Brain’s world is out there asserting that Biden is vigorous and sharp as a tack…while he’s got no official actions scheduled for the next three days. You know: the middle of the work week. That presser he gave was a catastrophe…and his Super Bowl rant about potato chips didn’t help. Everyone knows: he’s senile. He’s probably lucid no more than a few hours a day and can’t possibly map out a strategy. We’re now governed by a collection of West Wing staffers and Jill who try to work the Joe Oracle to get a decision…its why everything is a mess right now. The only way out, now, is a Trump vote in November.

And that is why with very few exceptions I’m getting harsh with Never Trump. To be fair, I know a few who have consistently opposed Trump on policy grounds since 2015. That’s fine. I disagree but if someone is giving me an honest opinion based on facts and their interpretation of same, I can’t really complain. But the broad mass of Never Trump are just mind-numbed Orange Man Bad cretins. There is no moral or intellectual world where Biden is better than Trump. Getting Biden out is crucial to the basic safety of the United States. And these Never Trump guys are on and on about how they have to keep Biden in because Trump is worse. That isn’t just dishonest, it is stupid. It isn’t about Trump. It is not even about Republican or Democrat – it is about getting a clearly, mentally incompetent man out of office. Even Kamala would be better in that at least she’s not senile (other than that: disaster). Right now, if the 3 am call comes, we have no idea who will make the actual decision…and we might get no decision (which is vastly worse than even a bad decision) because nobody wants to take responsibility for it. Biden must go.

The Senate GOP is backing the Ukraine aid bill (naturally) but Senator Vance (R-OH) found within the text a requirement that the money remain available for Ukraine until September, 2025. Meaning that if Trump wins and carries out his pledge to end US support for the Ukraine war, he can be impeached. Rely on it, the Ruling Class knows it is at least even money that Trump wins in November and they’re trying to hamstring him in advance. The border bill was like that, too; all sorts of provisions which would de-facto tie Trump’s hands on border security.

Of course, poison pill or no, I think Trump should go for it. It is unlikely that there are 67 Senate votes to remove Trump. Just let impeachment after impeachment fail, if that is what it takes. Trump’s main task, if he wins, is to clear out the bureaucracy, anyways – that is where the danger really lies to himself and to any future GOP President. We now know that various officials of the Executive branch were not only refusing direct, legal Presidential orders, they were actively breaking the law to take down Trump. Massive housecleaning is necessary. An end to Civil Service protections, at least in all senior Executive Branch positions. Executive Branch people have no power – the President is the only person vested by the Constitution with Executive power. Anyone who exercises Executive power does so at the discretion of the President and simply cannot, except in cases of obviously illegal orders, refuse a Presidential order.

Canadian Leftist groups in cooperation with the Canadian government cooked up a story about how Catholic Church schools in Canada had mass graves for Native children murdered by Catholic Church schools. It was quite a big issue in Canada and they even got the Pope to issue an apology about it. Trouble is, there were and are no mass graves. Of course there weren’t: hey, the Church has a lot of faults but they don’t mass murder people. It was just a ridiculous accusation…but the Ruling Class ran with it because it was an attack on the Church and they’ll always go for that. It has all been exposed as a hoax but that doesn’t matter: to the Leftist, to original, flaming headline is always the dogma. “Hands up, don’t shoot”, “was just buying skittles” and “I can’t breath” are obligatory beliefs even though there isn’t the least bit of truth to them. So, too, with the “Church mass graves” story – the Left still asserts it is true, and so very often these days Leftist terrorists are burning down Catholic churches. Naturally, the police don’t get them: they’re busy looking for people who are misgendering.

So a perhaps-trans shooter with “free Palestine” on Xir gun tried to do a mass shooting, fortunately stopped. But you’ll be pleased to know the shooter is an illegal immigrant in country for 19 years and voted in the 2020 election.

Volkswagon has their Super Bowl ad and it was pretty good…left out something, though.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan24 Comments

I’ll have it out hopefully very soon – still shooting for a February 14th release date, but that might slip.

If you haven’t started the series, you can easily pick it up with Book VI: Heirs. But even The Crimson Blade is a rather stand-alone part of the Narrative. Anyways, they’re getting better as I go along. The upcoming Home World is very high end, I think. In The Crimson Blade I delve into both the honor and the guilt of the combat veteran, how children can feel about their parents, the stumbling block of bigotry. With lots of love, laughs and battles, of course!

It didn’t really matter but Nevada had a GOP Primary (the delegates are awarded in a week via caucus) and Nikki Haley managed to come in massively behind “None of these candidates” in the vote. Word is that she’s still rolling in campaign money; that’s why she’s staying in. Perhaps with a hope that something, anything will happen to Trump and she’ll be the only alternative. But she’s about to get wiped out in South Carolina and then Super Tuesday is she sticks.

The White House is threatening to reduce deportations if the border deal isn’t passed…which proves conclusively that the border is under the control of the Executive and they can secure it any time they want. They are really garbage people running our country right now. Essentially trying to blackmail Congress.

Tucker did an interview with Putin and heads exploded – from Neocons to Commies, everyone in the USA and the larger West is furious. Why? Because Putin might say something the American people find reasonable. That is, Putin might not come off as Hitler II. Can’t have that! Gotta keep the money rolling in. Sure, 650,000 military-aged Ukranian males have fled rather than serve, but any day now the Glorious Ukrainian Offensive will push the Russians out. Just need $60 billion more!

All of that is jeopardized if people see Putin as someone reasonable. Of course Putin is going to lie…but the Ukrainians lie, too. Perhaps if we bounce lie against lie we might get to truth? That’s why we’re not allowed to talk to Putin…because the truth might not justify $60 billion.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan64 Comments

The other day I read of a proposal in Canada to allow “mature minors” as young as 12 choose “MAID” – that is Canada’s hideous “medical assistance in dying” program. We’ve also seen proposals to let “mature minors” engage in sexual activity with adults and, of course, it is considered a given that a 12 year old (or even younger) can decide that biology got it wrong on their gender.

You have to think about what this is: this is not something that is in any way compatible with what we call Civilization. This is all objectively evil stuff. Anyone who adheres to it – and very soon if not already the global Left adheres to it all – is not someone who can be argued out of it. We have no frame of reference which would allow us to make the attempt – we’re aghast at the hideous, Mengele-like immorality of it all while the proponents as certain they are doing good.

Just as good, in fact, as Mengele felt about his experiments. Himmler about his Holocaust…and Soviet NKVD agents in sentencing people to 10 years of slavery for nothing. That is, they believe they are right and we are wrong. That to cut off healthy body parts of a child or allow him to kill himself is right. That, in fact, anyone who disagrees with this is the evil person. There’s no way for minds to meet on this – and no way to compromise. Neither they nor we will agree that some children should be able to cut off body parts and that some children can choose to kill themselves. We say, “not at all”, they say, “anyone who asks for it”. And with encouragement to ask, of course.

At the end of the day, compulsion will rule the day and decide the course. Either they will compel us to accept their views, or we will compel them to accept ours. We aren’t getting out of this by being nice. Libs of TikTok put out yet another video of a middle school teacher who is aggressively pushing the woke agenda on her students. It is a typical video – the earnest but very crazy-eyed lady calmly explaining how she’s pushing her ideological views. Unless and until we on our side see this as worthy of ten years in jail, this won’t stop. We can’t be in every classroom. We can’t monitor everything that is said. Only outright prohibition enforced by stiff jail sentences gets it to stop…all the while with the MSM reporting the propagandists as saints and us as wicked persecutors. But it has to be done. Or we will all be destroyed.

The liberal group “Vote Vets” has determined that the three American soldiers murdered by Iranian proxies the other day were killed…by Trump. It is Trump’s fault that it happened, you see? If Trump hadn’t been tough with Iran then none of this would be happening.

I don’t know. The polls are generally good but they also say lots of different things. Conventional wisdom is that the Democrats will be able to keep a solid Electoral majority behind Biden. Maybe so. We’ll find out: but I can’t help thinking that a campaign of “Orange Man Bad” combined with “Shout Your Abortion” is going to be unsuccessful. If it does work, then we’re just plain and simple doomed. But I suspect it is going to fall flat on its face.

I guess Harvard’s director of diversity has been caught in plagiarism. No surprise. A lot of people are ripping into her but I can’t work up any anger against her: she just worked the system. It is those who built and maintain the system that need to be destroyed. But make no mistake about it: prestige credentials issued in the last 25 years or so are worthless. If someone who has such credentials and is educated and intelligent it is in spite of the college, not because of it. This has happened for two reasons:

  1. Ideology – they want Leftist apparatchiks and that is what they produce.
  2. Colleges make more money if they pass out degrees than if they demand academic performance.

I don’t think our education system can be reformed. I think the rot is so deep that the whole structure is broken. To have education in this country again, we’re going to have to build a new, parallel system of education and allow time to whither away the existing system.

Seems that Pudding Brain reposted an Elmo post. Yes, Elmo from Sesame Street. That Elmo. In case you wonder how things are going.

Open Thread

Mark Noonan23 Comments

The Woke Legions determined to remove the statue of William Penn from Welcome Park in Pennsylvania. Nobody was 100% sure what the specific reason was though it was surmised that some Native American drivel was used to justify it. In general, of course, the reason is that the Woke hate Western Civilization as a whole…so even an anti-Slavery, pro-Native Quaker had to go. Looks like enough people got outraged and the removal is cancelled. Rely on it, that is only temporary. Joe Biden’s approval rating in Pennsylvania is in the sewer and Democrats are fearful of a blowout loss in the State come November. But if Pudding Brain gets back in, Penn will go…and even if Pudding Brain loses, the next Democrat Administration will try to get rid of the statue. They hate us; that is their prime motivation.

As of this point, I’m now insisting that we retain all statues – don’t care what they were placed for. I’d make the rule that if the statue or other public art has been there for more than fifty years, it stays forever. We’ll need local, State and federal legislation on this – but I am bound and determined to prevent the Woke occupation army from erasing American history. I’d rather be selective but I can’t – if I am not universal about it, they’ll eventually tear down the Washington Memorial.

The Fulton County, GA DA who is prosecuting Trump hired her boyfriend as special prosecutor…and paid him more than 600 grand. The lovely couple has already taken a couple cruises. There is no level of vile the Left won’t sink to. They lack all sense of morality.

The Establishment is still trying to get us to be shocked and horrified by what the IDF is doing in Gaza but it isn’t working. I don’t think we care what they say any more. As for the pro-Hamas demonstrations – that is clearly some Antifa/BLM astroturf…most Americans couldn’t point to Gaza on a map and simply don’t care about it. That they’re having thousands out almost daily disrupting normal life means they’re paying them…and we should be trying to find out who is funding it all.

As for the Gaza campaign – from what I understand the entirety of northern Gaza is in Israeli hands and they are systemically wrecking all of Hamas’ infrastructure before they move to the south part of Gaza to clear that out. My guess is that they’ll allow Gazans to move north as the IDF moves south…carefully screened at IDF checkpoints, to be sure. This is taking a lot longer than I thought it would but so far there seems to be no shaking in Israel’s resolve. I assume that is because as the full story of 10/7 has come out, it is so horrific that Israel is willing to take a lot of casualties to make sure it doesn’t happen again.

The Democrats – led by Pudding Brain – are still trying to triangulate their way out of this: that is, still trying to talk out of both sides of their mouth, on one side assuring Progressive Jews that they are for Israel while also assuring BLM types that they want Israel to stop. I don’t think it is working – more than one hard core Leftist out there has said he can’t back Biden for 2024 over this. And they’re right to do that – pick a side and go with it. Trying to straddle both sides here is weak and pathetic.

Getting Old

Mark Noonan15 Comments

I turned 59 this past November and I can already feel that 60 this coming November is going to be a major event. I realize that 60 isn’t all that old but it is, nevertheless, old. You’re definitely on the backside and heading down fast. Things like retirement and death do loom ever larger. There just isn’t all that much time in front of you.

My dad lived to 82 and there’s no particular reason to think I can’t match that – though mom passed at the age of 70. Neither parent took care of their health and while both smoked (as do I) mom smoked like a chimney and some of the harshest tobacco I ever came across. She smoked these hideous little cigars called Erik’s; I did try them and nearly choked they were so harsh. So, 70 to 82…somewhere in there. That’s 11 to 23 years from now. That’s it. And I know any youngster out there of, say 25 years or so will think that 20 or so years is a long time, those of us past 40 know just how fast 20 years go by. It is a blink of the eye. And, yes, with modern medicine I can stretch that out…to, what?, 85? 90? Not much a difference there.

I’m not afraid of dying. I used to be; round there in the ages from 35 to 45 when the fact of mortality came into view I did have a fear of it. Long past that now. As Salisbury said, one might as well be afraid of falling asleep. It is going to happen – sooner or later in a more or less painful manner. As a Christian I do believe in the resurrection and I do work out my salvation in fear and trembling (per Philippians 2:12). Of course, no matter how strong our faith, none of us really know what is going to happen. That is why death is a fearful thing even for saints: you are stepping through a door which you will only go through once. But, no matter: God is with me. Salvation awaits. And if I’m wrong then my surprise at it will be much more short-lived than the surprise an atheist proved wrong will be.

What brought this all up was a bizarre video of Madonna taken on New Year’s Eve. She was wearing some strange, skin-tight suit and dancing like a maniac…but the skin under the suit wasn’t the skin of 25 year old Madonna and it showed. And she had to steady herself with a railing and she just looked absurd. A 65 year old woman trying to live as if it were 1984 forever. I felt sorry for her. I like getting older. No, I don’t like my bum knee. Nor do I like that I have to take pictures of things and use the zoom function to read them. But getting older has many advantages – not least of which is that I’m no longer expected to compete. I am what I am; take me or leave me. And I don’t care what anyone thinks of me. If you don’t like me, that is a you problem, not a me problem. I’m under no obligation to fit myself into your concepts of what I should be. It is nice to have very pretty, young girls smile at me and know that they’re smiling because they know I’m harmless – that I’m a man they can interact without any worry that I have an ulterior motive.

And I like being able to tell young people about the past. Sometimes you can really surprise the kiddies. One of my best surprises was calling the ‘fridge an “ice box” and my granddaughter asking me why and then explaining it. It gave her a glimpse into a different world, especially when I explained that one of her great-great-grandfather’s delivered ice for a living. She connected it with the movie “Frozen” which opens with men cutting blocks of ice from a lake – until that moment she didn’t know why they were doing that. This was just a cool thing – and it is something she’ll remember. Long after I’m gone; and maybe one day she’ll explain to her granddaughter what an “ice box” is?

And that is another fun part of getting old: thinking about what will be after you’re gone. My granddaughter will be my age in 2071. Think about that. We’ll all be long dead by then. She’ll still be here. And probably a mother and grandmother. I pointed that out to my granddaughter the other day when she was once again making fun of my white hair. And then I really got her thinking – and I could tell she was – when I pointed out that my grandfather was born in 1896. She’s only 11 and so time frames like that are still hard for her to comprehend but I think putting it like that got it driven home – about time, and how it passes.

Anyways, just me thinking about it as I enter the last section of my life. Not the end! Not yet! But I’m out of the rat race; I’m just living and seeing and enjoying those around me. The best part about getting old.

Welcome to 2024: Nightmare or Liberation?

Mark Noonan33 Comments

Not sure. Could go either way. But someone noted on X the other day that the actions of the Ruling Class (DNC/MSM/Corporate America/Deep State/GOPe, etc) are the actions of people who are losing control, know it, and are now lashing out irrationally.

As all of us have agree for a long time, polls are not to be trusted but we have had poll after poll now indicating that the only core, Democrat constituency – that is, core, Ruling Class constituency – who are staying on side are white, college educated women. In all other areas there has been erosion of Democrat support. Not necessarily resulting in gains of GOP power, but certainly ebbing away from the Democrats. And voter registration trends in places like Pennsylvania and Delaware are favoring the GOP. Yes, Delaware. Perhaps there is a limit? Perhaps there’s a point where things are so bad that even the deepest Blue areas start to shift?

We’ll have to see how the year goes but if it ends of a collapse of Democrat support then I’m going to identify the “stunt” of shipping illegals to sanctuary cities as the catalyst. The pebble that started the avalanche. Remember, the MSM simply wasn’t telling anyone about the invasion at the border. If any reports were made about illegal immigration it was couched in “poor, suffering Jose who just wants a better life”…not hundreds of thousands of fit, military-aged males surging across the border unchecked. Certainly nothing about the human costs this disastrous migration has caused. And absolutely not a word about the amount of taxpayer money, funneled through NGOs, paying for the migration. But start sending a few thousand of these illegals to blue cities and the lid was ripped off…mostly because the idiot leaders of the blue cities dumped the illegals in black and other working class/poor neighborhoods as if these people would be pleased (and I guarantee you the upper class liberal whites thought they would; nobody is more racist than a white liberal). It became something nobody could ignore and it placed in sharp relief just how lousy the Biden Administration is. At this point, whether its corruption or incompetence is irrelevant. It is just bad; people hate how things are going and have lost any faith that Team Pudding Brain can fix it.

The really important thing is going to be whether or not our civilization still can be saved. Sure, we might well elect a trifecta MAGA government this November. It could happen. In fact, probably 50/50 right now that we will. But supposing we do, will we then do what is necessary? Like most on the Right I hailed the rise of Georgia Meloni as Prime Minister of Italy in 2022…but we found out by the end of 2023 that she had pretty much entirely sold out. Now we’re all praising Javier Milei…and I strongly suspect he won’t sell out. He’s really taking a hatchet to the system…attacking the very founding ideas of the Progressive Social Democratic State. My thinking with him is that the global Ruling Class will try to have him killed. But if we win, we have to be like Milei…but even more so.

Milei has the good fortune to be in a country where the President has far more unilateral power over government than the USA. He’s able to just shut down things without so much as a by your leave from anyone. But, here’s the thing: we’re going to have to do that anyway. Sure, there’s laws saying that certain classes of bureaucrats can’t be fired without a tedious, time consuming process. Fire them anyway. Even if its initially just telling them to stay home while still getting paid. There was a ridiculous federal judge which ruled a State law banning medical mutilation of minors is unconstitutional: enforce the law anyways.

It is going to take that level of determination. That level of courage. It will take actions that might provoke an extreme reaction. What it will come down to is: do we want to win? I mean really win?

We’re going to find out.