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Open thread 6/6/23 — 52 Comments

  1. On the 79th anniversary of D-Day, here is the Cadet Glee Club of West Point singing “The Longest Day”– with lots of brass and percussion in the accompaniment:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cVU75AZ5gJU&ab_channel=StandYeSteady

    Most of the video is footage of the Normandy landing itself, ending with an aerial view of the American military cemetery at Colleville-sur-Mer.

    One note about the interior of the West Point Chapel: If you look closely at the reredos above the altar, you will see a representation of St. Michael the Archangel, patron saint of police officers and paramedics as well as soldiers. He is shown striking down a dragon representing evil. God knows we need protection against evil more than ever in the perilous days ahead.

  2. Democrats are a cult.

    https://www.manhattancontrarian.com/blog/2023-5-31-are-there-any-democrats-left-who-are-not-fully-on-board-with-the-agenda-of-the-radical-left

    “if you vote for any Democrat for public office, do you inevitably get someone who will go along with every single element of the most radical agenda of the Left?

    I think that the answer is yes.”

    “whatever the reasons, the lesson is clear: every single Democrat in a legislature will vote for whatever the radical Left wants.”

    Every Democrat voter knows this. They vote D knowing they are supporting the most extreme and outlandish policies in American history. Because being part of the cult is more important than the nation’s survival.

  3. Stan, it sure seems that way. Many of my friends, successful, smart people with families, vote D, or at least purport to. Political discussion is strictly forbidden, despite that domestic politics is the most significant matter facing us. When Trumps home was raided by the FBI, I briefly flew my Gadsden flag, and my next door neighbor was triggered. Brought back those horrible memories of the January 6 “insurrection,” I was told. Heart be stilled. How bad must things get before they open their eyes?

  4. Mike K,

    Our trip to France and England in 2019 was mainly due to attending the Women’s World Cup. However, for me, the highlight was the 3 day side excursion my wife and I took to Normandy; the 75th anniversary celebration had just ended. We stayed in Bayeux, which is a wonderful town, and so much nicer to Americans than Paris or Lyon. We did the complete D-Day tour starting in St Mere Eglise and ending at Omaha beach. An amazing and very moving experience, made more so by the couple we did the tour with (from Michigan). His uncle was killed in the invasion. The tour guide arranged for him to place a flag on his uncle’s grave in the Omaha cemetery. The lady who guided us to the grave had a small bucket of sand from the beach. She had him rub the sand into the engraving on the headstone cross which made the engraving stand out in gold. He then placed a French and US flag on the grave. I was moved to tears.

  5. Saudi Arabia and Opec+ are raising the price of oil.

    Most of the US companies, + the US’ civilians’ cars, need that oil for industry and transportation, and they need that oil for gasoline.

    We, The US people, will now have to pay [more] for: gas, food, and nearly everything, because our nation runs on that oil.

    Thank You, President Biden, for destroying [the US oil industry, + the US gasoline industry], so that 1) we have to pay high prices for foreign oil, and 2) those oil prices have wrecked the US economy.

    Because of this bad economy- two of my friends have had their rents raised very high, [and now they must move from their homes], because they can’t afford their rents anymore.

    Please, would you help the US [oil + gasoline industries, and fuel industries] now, Mr. Biden?

    https://www.bbc.com/news/business-65804768

  6. Hi miguel cervantes,

    Is Pres. Biden in that article, or does the article talk about Biden?
    If the article talks about him, I can’t find where the article does talk about him.

    I’m just curious about that.

  7. that was his prmise to phase out fossil fuels, why he took the bribe from gazprom to shut down the pipelines, the off shore drilling, crucified the refineries, need I spell it out further,

  8. miguel cervantes,

    You sound angry or upset at my reply.

    Please pardon me if my reply made you angry or upset, that was not my intention. I was attempting to further the discussion, that was all that
    I had intended.

    Cheers,
    TR.

  9. miguel cervantes,

    Yes miguel, spell it out. Are you saying that the whistleblower has evidence that Biden took a 5M bribe to shut down American oil independence? If true, we are now in Benedict Arnold territory

  10. UFOs are in the news. A friend in college told me that he did a report on UFOs in fifth grade. He used The National Enquirer as his source, not knowing what it was. His classmates laughed him mercilessly. Nowadays, the UFO reporting is mainstream and acceptable. Exactly what *is* going on up there and all around us? Who knows?

    I was thinking the other day about the latest claim: that the US government has pieces of spacecraft not of human origin. What if we made contact with some beings not from Earth? More specifically, what if we were able to communicate with them and we asked them how they got here and there answer was “God sent us; He wanted us to report back to Him on His creation”? What would the left do?

    Aside from that little dig at the left, what would I want to ask an alien? Perhaps the questions we ask of ourselves? Who are you? How did you get here? Why are you here? Where are you headed?

  11. Physicsguy, I took three teenaged girls and we spent a week in a very nice B&B while we did day trips, not guided. Omaha Beach was one plus Utah beach and the Caen Canal where we saw a nice museum and the Pegasus Bridge where the British 6th airborne landed. We had lunch in the cafe described in “The Longest Day” served by the woman whose father owned it on D Day and where she was a child at the time. I pretty much used “The Longest Day” as a guide. We did see the Bayeux Tapestry, however.

    Some photos of the Pegasus Bridge and the museum plus the cafe.

  12. Mike, Physicsguy – My Wife and I stayed in Bayeux for a week, had a car and a guide for the Beaches. Since then I have, with my Best Friend – My Other Brother, spent over a week two different times. Once on our own and once with a Historical Tour. Bayeux is a lovely town and the Tapestry is amazing. Mulling over going next yr for the 80th Anniversary, but the crowds will be enormous.

  13. And now the Dneipro River dam, which Russia has control over since they were captured (or “especially liberated” Boned Looser) has been blown up (liberating the water). The largest nuclear power station in Europe will soon loose its source of cooling water.

    Russia now seems to be a fully rouge state.

    Kerch Bridge soon to feint?

  14. Hi Xylourgos,

    Exactly, but while the word, “if” stays in the phrase, “if true”, then Biden hasn’t been proven to have taken a [$5 million bribe].

    I guess we’ll have to wait and see. Cheers.

  15. Vlad may not like where this Escalation Ladder takes him. See Perun on YouTube 6/5/2023 for “Escalation Ladders.”

  16. the dems took 750k including 20 K to the big guy, how much china or other parties have given is beyond measure, biden or whoever pulls his strings, is the clear and present danger, to every extant institution

    michael tracey points out the ukrainians attempted this very maneuver, back in december, the area affected is russian controlled terrirtory,

  17. That’s a very nice rock, Neo!

    We’re getting a lot of ambient haze here today from the wildfires north of here, in Quebec. I recall something like this happening a couple of years ago as well in this area, when there were notable fires out in California.

  18. miguel cervantes,

    If your article on Biden receiving funds is [proof that will stand up in court], that Biden has done a crime or crimes, then please give this article to: The DOJ, The FBI, The US Marshals, or to [one or many] law enforcement groups that have [Federal, police powers].

    If this article proves that Biden has done crimes, then Federal law enforcement groups need to see this information, so that arrests and trials can be done.

  19. the ministry of love, which has locked up hundreds of peaceful americans, in the bastille, the modern day plantados don’t make me laugh, drove matthew pernas to suicide, enable every terrorist and cartel out there, in their infiltrations and territories,

  20. RE: My comments on another thread about whistleblower Air Force Intelligence Officer David Grusch’s claim that there have been and are rogue UFO crash retrieval and reverse engineering programs buried within other classified programs—hidden from both the Congress and the President—and that these programs have retrieved debris and whole craft which have been made by Non-human Intelligencences, NHIs (and note the use of the plural).

    Grusch also says that alien bodies have sometimes been retrieved.

    Since this story broke on Internet platforms NewsNation and The Debrief last night, there have been all sorts of dissections of the brief comments Grusch has made so far, including so called body language experts chiming in.

    I think it should be noted that the Intelligence Community Inspector General, to whom Grusch made his whistleblower complaint has said that his complaint should be investigated as an “urgent” matter.

  21. is he another like the one who made extraordinary claims about reverse engineered craft, rob something or other,

  22. More Unicorn stories; reverse engineering sure sounds “sciency” thus credible. In the 1980s it was alien abductions and farm animals being dissected by aliens. Oh, nevermind.

    Well, people gotta have something to fill their time ….

  23. Om said:

    “More Unicorn stories…”.

    Yep, Yep.
    …And some people believe that the Beatles guy, Paul McCartney, died in 1969.

    Why?

    Because: In 1969, someone took a picture of Paul…when Paul was BAREFOOT! (Oh right. THAT makes sense!) O.o

    Gosh. What some people will believe! 😀

  24. P.S.–RE: UFO Whistleblower Grusch

    I should have mentioned that not only did the Intelligence Community IG write that Grusch’s complaints were of an”urgent” nature, they also wrote that these complaints were also “credible.”

    I’d imagine that the Intelligence Community IG would have sufficient knowledge of the classified world to judge the credibility of Grusch and his allegations, more so than people on the outside looking in, say,like om and I .

  25. @TR:If this article proves that Biden has done crimes, then Federal law enforcement groups need to see this information, so that arrests and trials can be done.

    Poe’s Law: without a clear indicator of the author’s intent, any parodic or sarcastic expression of extreme views can be mistaken by some readers for a sincere expression of those views.

    If only those Duke boys could have gathered evidence of Boss Hogg’s corruption, Sheriff Roscoe P. Coltrane would have had him arrested and would have cleaned up Hazzard County.

    And if only Comrade Stalin had known that loyal Communists were being sent to gulag for petty or personal reasons, he’d have set everything to rights.

    And if only local law enforcement had been notified in time, all those lynchings in the Jim Crow days could have been prevented! Why oh why didn’t they get the word to the sheriff?

  26. the bureau who had the laptop, covered up the criminal malfeasance of the whole scranton clan, not to mention the 51 ronin of the intel community,

    michael tracey, greenwald, taibbi have been more on point on certain topics then the run of the mill right pundit,

  27. RE: Grusch and his allegations about UFOs

    What makes this whole situation even more complex is that while the DOD Office that reviews statements and writings by those having clearances for conformity to classification regulations has, in a written memo, cleared Gresch to say what he is saying, in the same memo they forbid him from offering any concrete proof in the form of pictures or documents.

    So, is the DOD playing a game here?

    They allow Gresch to make his claims—hang himself out there, in the breeze—so that the DOD can say that it is being “forthcoming “ about the UFOS issue while, at the same time, making it almost impossible for Gresch to prove those claims, thus discrediting Gresch and his claims.

  28. Snow on Pine:

    And 51 luminaries of the intelligence community signed a letter about Hunter’s laptop and Russian disinformation.

    So some IG of the Intelligence Community is reported to say something that fits your yearnings. Well some yearn for fairies and Unicorns too.

    Wheels within wheels, a conspiracy …

  29. @TR:Can you please show me how my comment is wrong?

    Assuming you are not being satirical, you seem to be saying that Federal law enforcement somehow has the official power to act independently of the head of the Executive branch. You seem to be assuming that it is even Constitutionally possible to arrest and try a sitting President (he’d have to be removed from office first by being impeached and convicted by Congress, when the Senate is in his own party’s hands). You seem to be assuming that Federal law enforcement isn’t already aware of any criminal activity and isn’t actively covering it up or at minimum turning a blind eye to it. You seem to be assuming that Federal law enforcement isn’t politicized at best, corrupt at worst.

  30. Frederick,

    You said: “You seem to be assuming that Federal law enforcement isn’t already aware of any criminal activity and isn’t actively covering it up or at minimum turning a blind eye to it. You seem to be assuming that Federal law enforcement isn’t politicized at best, corrupt at worst.”

    I’m not assuming anything about Federal law enforcement.

    But if you believe that the Fed. Law Enforcement units are corrupt and cannot be relied on, then – please take your proof that will hold up in court that 1) Biden is breaking laws and that 2) if Biden is doing such actions- and Fed. police are allowing these actions, and deliver such proof to your Federal Congress-people, and leave it to the congress people to make our courts function.

    On another matter- if you feel that- Biden, the Federal police, and the Congress people can’t be trusted to hold- [Biden + the Federal police] to task- then the Federal government is lost, and that also means there is nothing more [on this matter] for you and I to discuss…meaning- if you feel that way, then there is no hope to check, or fix, the government.
    Cheers.

  31. RE: UFOs—The head of the DOD’s AARO program testified to Congress that AARO had yet to find any credible evidence of extraterrestrial vehicles, and in response to Grusch’s allegations, he reiterated that in a statement today.

    Whistleblower Grusch says that AARO was not “read into,” was deliberately not given any information about the existence and substance of the secret UFO crash retrieval programs whose existence Grusch is revealing.

    In its recent 4 hour public panel discussion about how it is going about defining what NASA will need to study the UFO issue, it was pretty clear that those scientists assembled did not believe in UFOs as extraterrestrial vehicles.

    I believe that, in the near future, we will find out who is right and who is telling the truth.

  32. How do you determine if an object is of extraterrestrial origin?

    I’d imagine, first, from its function— if it does something which we humans cannot do with our current level of technology, something seemingly “magical”— see Arthur C Clark.

    Next, from it’s composition—

    As I understand it, every element native to our solar system, including those which comprise the Earth, having condensed from the same conglomeration of stellar material, has the same isotopic ratios.

    Find something whose isotopic ratios are different in major ways from those standard in our solar system, and you’ve found something “Alien ,” very likely “not of this Earth.”

  33. Not of this Earth or this Universe, its just special Alien stuff, aka, Fairy dust, Unicorn skittles.

    Sounds really “sciency” those isotopic radios (or ratios).

    Transistors, integrated circuits, quantum mechanics, nuclear weapons, all Alien technology to those of the 17th century. Must have come from Aliens.

  34. First the wooden post rots, down the middle and/or at its base.
    Then the nails holding the boards rust through, and the boards fall off.
    Then the tree on the left dies and eventually falls over, and decays back into the soil.
    Then the rocks in the stream bed continue to erode.
    Then the wind blown dust and sand and rain erode the rock. Perhaps at some point a storm is strong enough to actually push it over.

    And THEN we rediscover the principle that “all men are created equal”, an idea that was long extinct from most or all human habitations. However, that principle is not recognized as self evident unless the residual of a Judeo-Christian Westernized culture somehow continues to exist. That could erode as well.

    Or it is equally possible that the aliens in the UFO’s eventually take control of humanity, find our DOI, bible, and related documents, and discover for themselves the core principles that had led to the civilization that had signaled our presence to them in the first place. Then they establish the cult of neo-SETI, transmit their findings to the rest of the galaxy, and a Star Trek Federation is born. Now that would be an intriguing, thrilling, and challenging Enterprise!

  35. NEO — Knowing your love of the Bee Gees, I figured this Professor of Rock piece had to be called to your attention:

    About to FAIL Out of Music, Legend Stumbled On FALSETTO that SAVED Career & Hit #1
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfBEgUz6Tts

    You may or may not agree with what he says, but he does have a deep love of music and music history that is generally interesting.

  36. @ stan > “Democrats are a cult.”

    This old post from el gato malo is supportive of the Manhattan Contrarian’s thesis. (Yes, the lack of capitals is deliberate.)

    Examples included.

    It’s a plausible proposition.

    https://boriquagato.substack.com/p/gatos-postulate

    i’ve been musing of late about just how it came to pass that the entirety of western governance seems to have become bereft of reality and competence and generally run by people who appear to be about as smart as a soup sandwich and yet have managed to accrue not only such intense confidence in their own planning ability and vision but in addition gained access to the levers of power to impose their addled ideas upon the rest of us while aided and abetted by a cheer-leader class that eggs them ever onward.

    it’s really quite a thing.

    i’ll start with a proposition with which many of you are familiar.

    gato’s law:

    “as soon as you allow politicians to determine that which is bought or sold, the first thing bought and sold will always be politicians.”

    as i have never really heard this refuted in meaningful fashion, let’s presume it to be true.

    what can we derive from this?

    proposition 1: if politicians are bought and sold, the sort of people attracted to politics will be grifters.

    this seems a natural outcome. politics becomes a goody room and the kinds of people that excel at conning others and compromising morals will chase the gold rush.

    proposition 2: grifters gonna grift

    sure, this is basically tautological, but it contains a meaningful implication that ought be drawn out: grifters are con and confidence people. they need a song and dance, a schtick, a story, something to not only pack the rubes into the tent but to separate them from their wallets. they need a reason to take big actions, take your stuff, and to give it to someone else (or at least to make you do it for them). they need a malady for which to sell you their magical elixir.

    proposition 3: grifting turns politics into “story time”

    the story does not have to be true. in many ways it’s better if it’s not as you get a lot more optionality. but the story needs a villain and the story needs a plan. but most of all, the story needs a sucker and that sucker is the demos. the confidence conclave needs to convince the audience to go along with the grift, and they either manage to do so or, if they cannot, are rapidly replaced by more compelling carnival barkers who can. those who buy politicians pay for performance.

    proposition 4: story time makes the people into rubes.

    as they fall for these stories, the people become rubes. they genuinely believe the grift and clamor to pay for the shiny products on display even and especially when this is just lining the pockets of con men that they have mistaken for leaders. they become true believers. and here is where it takes a bit of a turn:

    proposition 5: true believers are more believable than grifters.

    people are, at subconscious levels, good at spotting lies. this makes grifts hard to keep going for long periods. it’s also why the hegemonic huckster class is wont to surround itself with zealots and activists. these people add a patina of credibility to the whole affair because their sincerity shines through. and this is how it gets out of control.

    proposition 6: the demos starts to prefer true believers to grifters and elect them to office

    once the “story” is sufficiently set in the public consciousness, the public starts to seek out its most devout and vivid tellers and these are nearly always of the “true believer” class. they simply have more energy, honesty, and intensity than the carnival barkers ever could. they are singing the gospel and meaning it and they come to power as a sort of trickle then a torrent that changes the crooked circus midway into something more like an old timey revival tent. and so the intensification cycle begins.

    proposition 7: the more fervent new leaders tell more intense stories.

    the true believer tells a more strident and demanding story. they are no longer grifting, they are evangelizing. this brings new levels of vehemence, less tolerance for any other ideas, and proselytizing zeal.

    proposition 8: more intense stories make the public more committed to the story.

    and this in turn further arouses the public to greater belief and commitment which in turn increases demand for stridency in leaders and round and round it goes until some sort of intensity maximization is reached, usually when the wheels start coming off. and this is a huge problem because, as we flash back to old axioms, one must realize:

    proposition 9: the true believers do not know that the grift is a grift.

    what began as crony corporatism and scam has become a secular religion/activism cult. its false and facile tenets designed to separate fools from their money and enrich special interests have become sincerely held ideological dogma and those who will preach it to you have been strained and selected until only the most gullible and zealous remain.

    and so we arrive at gato’s postulate:

    a democratic government powerful enough to dictate that which is bought and sold will inevitably devolve into rule by rube.

    and this is how you wind up with government where the people running the scam not only have no conception that they are running a scam but have subsumed their entire identities into it.

    and they have no idea how anything works.

    they were flat out selected for not knowing how anything works.

    if they did understand any of it, they’d see the scams and wise up instead of becoming some kind of final form pokemon chump rapturously selling themselves down the river.

    but they don’t. and they won’t.

    it’s rube upon rube upon rube.

    and they lack the ability to even assess much less resolve the escalating cascades of problems they set off.

    the grifters, at least, knew how things worked. they knew it was a scam. this both keeps them somewhat in check as they assuage their avarice and also keeps them away from pulling the really dangerous levers because this is a group that actually knows that those levers are really dangerous to pull.

    but those made a rube by the grift and then elevated from the audience by the other rubes because of how strongly they conveyed devotion to a set of plunder they mistook for progress have no such check and no such knowledge.

    and so they become the agents of dissolution not because they wanted to but because they really truly expect unicorns and rainbows to pop out when they push a button that anyone who knew how anything worked would immediately recognize as something altogether different.

    many have pointed out that a government powerful enough to give you anything you want is also powerful enough to take everything you have, but if such a state will also inevitably be overtaken and run by the most zealous of the bumpkins and yokels, then there is no long term beneficent case or smarter people and benign technocratic stewardship that will save you.

  37. @ cb > “Remember Tucker ? He’s back : )”

    Carlson devotes most of his (Tweet? podcast? post?) to the recently bombed bridge in Ukraine, but gives a shout-out to Snow’s UFO whistleblower, as an example of the media resolutely ignoring anything news-worthy outside of their determined narrative.

  38. AND the comments at Francis Menton’s post are quite good, as usual. “Manhattan Contrarian” may be the only worthy “rival” of Neo’s salon.

    I found this one particularly insightful, with the caveat that the beginning of the original Democrat party was not exactly as stated in the comment, it having been the party supporting slavery in the 19th century, but its ideology as described here has been foundational since at least the time of Wilson.

    David Hoopman

    First, let’s stipulate that this is in no way intended to argue that one party is the party of “truth-tellers” or of general integrity, or of fidelity to principle. It is not intended to suggest that the Republicans are uniformly admirable and virtuous or that the Democrats are uniformly monstrous. It is intended solely to make an argument that the ideas undergirding the beginnings of each of the major parties were different right from the start, and that today’s reality was therefore inevitable right from the start.

    The core of Republican thinking is that individual responsibility and free enterprise are the central requirements of ordered liberty under the law. Whatever else Republicans may be guilty of, that fundamental belief has been proven true whenever, and to whatever extent, it’s been applied.

    The core of Democrat thinking is that people should look to government as the deliverer of all things good, and therefore that allegiance to the party must be the preferred tool for obtaining one’s material needs and advancing one’s aspirations. Whatever discrete successes have been delivered by this thinking have been counterbalanced by its countless shortcomings, to say nothing of its most fundamental flaw, the inherent need for pandering to the worst aspects of human nature.

    In short, one party’s belief system rests on proven truth, and never mind how faithful that party’s advocates may be in applying it—that’s not what this discussion is about. Meanwhile, the other party’s belief system rests on proven lies.

    If everything you stand for rests on a lie and you somehow haven’t grown tired of it, you are overwhelmingly likely to keep on lying—which means you will be forced to tell bigger and more obvious lies as you flail about, trying to make the earlier lies seem plausible. Moreover, you have no choice but to endorse other people’s lies, knowing that to refute them might risk toppling your own house of cards. Reaching this sad state of affairs takes a long time, but we’ve been watching it for a long time, and now, the Democratic Party’s slide into depravity has become so obvious it’s painfully evident even to people who have never bothered before to pay attention to any of this.

    If you agree, you might think the ultimate outcome is just as inevitable as the slide into depravity always was. You might be badly mistaken.

    If he means that the conservative factions will eventually triumph, I certainly hope he is correct.

  39. Indeed, the Manhattan Contrarian is superb…

    Very good to see you’re back! (And back with a vengeance! Making up for lost time, no doubt…)
    – – – – – – – – – – – –
    WRT “Aliens”…just another MASSIVE (other-worldly?) DISTRACTION required by “Biden” and “his” own alien force…to cover up “his” coverups of “his” coverups of “his” coverups of “his” atrocities and “his” atrociousness…and “his”, grotesque, if ingenious, far-reaching, multi-level criminality.

    (IOW, why now?)

    File under: Keep yer eye OFF da boidie…

  40. Allegations that Joe Biden partook in a $5 million bribery scheme involve Ukraine where his son scored a lucrative energy job and were first presented to the FBI by a reliable and well-paid informant back in 2017, House Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer told Just the News on Tuesday evening.

    Joe Biden bribery allegations involve Ukraine, first raised with FBI in 2017, key investigator says

    The details are new, but the stench of corruption from both sides of this partnership were known many years, and well before the fraudulent renewal of the Biden crime family’s corruption license in 2020.

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