First Monday of 2021 Afternoon Links

by | Jan 4, 2021 | Daily Links | 274 comments

See you at Aqaba.

 

So we have changed calendar numbers…I still see a vast horde of corrupt, lazy and unaccountable people squatting over us – whether city, county, state or federally employed. The news media acts as the PR flaks for them, knowledge is dribbling away into darkness and manners vanish. Some old, dead white dude would have made mention of the Gods of the Copybook Headings being at the door or somesuch.

But enough gloom, let us have some links to help our spirits!

About The Author

Swiss Servator

Swiss Servator

Currently serving at the pleasure of a Swiss multinational. Previously a Soldier, rugby player, lawyer, bouncer, bartender, substitute teacher, risk manager, and cubicle mushroom. Will work for raclette.

274 Comments

  1. Yusef, Frozen

    ‘Aurance!

    • Tonio

      They were just friends. Really.

      • juris imprudent

        Yes Offendi!

    • KSuellington

      Well and truly the best Beatle.

      • Agent Cooper

        Ugh. It’s akin to Paul’s fucking Grandma music.

        Harrison or GTFO.

  2. Rebel Scum

    Hmmmm. Leverage?

    As long as we aren’t russian to conclusions.

    • Plisade

      Don’t tell me it’s raining when European down my back.

      • Master JaimeRoberto (royal we/us)

        Let me know when you’re Finnish.

      • Plisade

        Irish I could stop.

      • Rebel Scum

        Norway that is happening.

      • Surly Knott

        You’re going to have to Sweden the deal or Swiss is going to narrow his Gaza.

      • Ownbestenemy

        *roaring cheer*

      • Rebel Scum

        Contorting his face like that is, of course, German to the conversation.

      • Master JaimeRoberto (royal we/us)

        He might even take it to court and have us Serbed.

      • Ownbestenemy

        I cannot Belize you guys.

      • Ted S.

        Belize Navidad,
        Belize Navidad,
        Belize Navidad,
        Prospero año y belizidad.

      • juris imprudent

        Norway I can stop.

      • juris imprudent

        Fine, I tally the puns and portugal on report!

      • Gustave Lytton

        When Switzy finally shows up, y’all got some ‘Spaining to do.

      • JMBOO

        What a bunch of Bologna. Sounds like you all are cracking under the Perussia.

      • juris imprudent

        ’bout time you czeched in.

  3. Yusef, Frozen

    They can’t just buy them a new Helicopter, maybe a case of Vodka inside?

    • Plinker762

      The Russian army values its soldiers very highly.

      • Yusef, Frozen

        OK, make it 2 cases….

      • DEG

        Nice.

    • Yusef, Frozen

      ?

      • Ted S.

        !

      • Ownbestenemy

        ~

      • J. Frank Parnell

      • leon

        ??

      • But Enough About My "Essential Retiree" Status

        Yikes.

      • Not Adahn

        Cuneiform, or Klingon?

      • Fourscore

        Thanks, Kinnath, very nice

    • LJW

      Dunno what DNS_PROBE_FINISHED_NXDOMAIN is but it doesn’t sound comfortable.

    • Tonio

      [Edit fairy swishes by, looks at post, shakes head and sashays off…]

      • Ownbestenemy

        Fun but overly formulaic show. The blonde was a little cutie

      • Not Adahn

        Fun but overly formulaic show.

        Burn Notice?

      • kinnath

        The first season, perhaps two, were quite entertaining.

        Eventually, the writers ran out of ideas and the show became a parody of itself.

  4. The Other Kevin

    Closing in on the end of my first day back to work after the holidays. I’m trying to figure out how to quit my day job and make a good living selling online courses teaching people how to quit their day job and make a living selling online courses.

    • LJW

      I just had to request access to a site where I can submit a form to request access to another site. I too would like to quit my day job.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        I’m getting close to having read all of the emails sent to me over the holidays. Probably just another 3 or 4 hours to go.

      • rhywun

        LOL. Someone’s got a case of the Mondays.

    • Bobarian LMD

      TOK has outed himself as Kevin Ponzi.

      • The Other Kevin

        Crap, now I have to re-re-invent myself as some sort of social justice expert and charge colleges and government offices big bucks for my Zoom lectures. The good news is I can probably record once and replay it without anyone noticing.

      • juris imprudent

        There is a weekly powerpoint that comes around to me about various statuses – which mostly don’t change from week to week. One might think this should be a monthly, or even quarterly, report based on how little changes.

    • Fourscore

      Are you selling franchises and can I work from home? I’m in, if so.

    • DEG

      Coming soon to America?

      • Tonio

        I imagine the dems are wetting themselves at the possibility. Remember that resistance to pandemic hysteria theatre strongly skews Red. What better way to stick it to those deplorables early on in the Harris(Biden) admin?

      • Ownbestenemy

        If only they can get Fauci to stay consistent enough

      • Not Adahn

        Fouci’s extremely consistent. Everything he says is to make himself be a Big Damn Hero.

    • leon

      British Prime Minister Boris Johnson said trips outside will be allowed for only essential shopping, exercise, Covid-19 testing, medical help, escaping domestic abuse and work for those who can’t work from home.

      May the man live out the rest of his life in ignominy.

    • limey

      PROTECT THE NHS

      • But Enough About My "Essential Retiree" Status

        . . . and fuck everybody else!

      • limey

        Precisely.

      • Ted S.

        WHY DO YOU HATE HAROLD SHIPMAN???

      • limey

        Malthusian progressive hero. He did the quiet part out loud.

      • Gustave Lytton

        *claps like a lobotomized seal*

    • Brett L

      Coming soon: double secret lockdown.

    • leon

      Another thing i love about western media aching for further leftwing domination is the constant refrain of:

      “[insert the country the media is in] is the only civilized nation to have [insert statistic that you use to beat people into submission]”

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        [insert deceptive and cherry picked statistic that you use to beat people into submission]

        FIFY

      • juris imprudent

        [insert very sharp steel into person wishing to beat you into submission]

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        [insert copper jacketed lead projectile into person at ~2500 fps]

        or

        [insert person wishing to use statistics to curtail your liberty into motorized device for disposing of unwanted lumber]

    • Master JaimeRoberto (royal we/us)

      We shall fight it on the couch. We shall fight it on the commode. We shall fight it in the kitchen. We shall never, never, never surrender.

    • JMBOO

      Queue video of Churchill rolling over in his grave.

    • rhywun

      The Supervid has arrived in NYC. TERROR!

      Thanks a lot, England.

      • Hyperion

        Don’t worry, Super Cuomo will save y’all!

      • DEG

        “Meet the new ‘Vid, same as the old ‘Vid”

      • Not Adahn

        Plot twist: It was in the US first.

  5. DEG

    The reported switch to a murder charge, which could lead to a sentence of life imprisonment for those held responsible, may complicate relations between Moscow and Azerbaijan.

    Just call it an Act of War and being reconquering former Soviet Republics.

    • Bobarian LMD

      That relationship wasn’t previously complicated?

      • Swiss Servator

        The previous relationship was simple – “You leave the Armenians alone.” Vaguely threatening, and worked for a while.

        The Turks messed that all up by supporting the Azeris, who then blitzed the Armenians…if Russia doesn’t get a little something for the Armenians, they will look awful paper tigerish.

      • R C Dean

        I thought the Turks and Russians were all pals now, what with all the Russian hardware the Turks are buying.

        That part of the world gives me a headache.

      • juris imprudent

        11-dimensional chess

      • Swiss Servator

        It was starting to get to at least – “Hey, we both hate America…lets cooperate a bit!” Until Erdogan decided he wanted to be Sultan of the Neo-Ottoman Empire.

      • Bobarian LMD

        Well, it worked for a long time because the USSR left all the military equipment with the Armenians. But that was why the Armenians were able to take Nagorno-Karabagh from Azerbaijan in the early ’90s.

        But I’d never call the relationship ‘simple’. This has been a shitstorm waiting to happen for 25 years.

        Kind of like in the Balkans, where the Serbs got all the military equipment.

        This is a thing now because Erdogan is willing to stir up shit.

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        To add some additional fun to the mix Georgia has been building up their military for the last decade plus, their spending as a percentage of GDP has consistently been in the double digits since the Rooskies got a bit grabby with Ossetia and kicked their tail.

      • Swiss Servator

        2/3rds of the Georgian Army was in Iraq, helping us.

        Even then, the Georgians shot down lots of Russian planes, blew up some ships and even killed the Russian commanding general – they just ran out of munitions, especially the AA missiles. I hope they bought plenty more.

  6. Rebel Scum

    Octopus ‘holds hands’ with diver in magical encounter

    Japanese pr0n is getting weird.

    • DEG

      Trying to maintain the pixelations with all those appendages broke their brains.

      • Bobarian LMD

        If you maintain your pixelations for more than 4 hours, seek medical attention.

  7. hayeksplosives

    Octopus are wonderful creatures. It’s the only animal I won’t eat because of my own conscience.

    I know exactly how dumb and incurious cows are (I still want them to be free range and “happy” while living), but I am unsure of how high the intelligence and emotional development of octopuses goes. I suspect it’s uncomfortably high.

    • leon

      I have other reasons for not eating Octopus.

      • Count Potato

        For some reason the canned pulpo is now “pulpo style” squid.

      • Not Adahn

        Whatever variety of octopus gets served at Japanese restaurants is so much tastier than squid I find it difficult to believe they’re both mollusks.

      • rhywun

        Me too. Well, one reason. They taste yucky.

    • Tonio

      Is that Martin Mull?

      • But Enough About My "Essential Retiree" Status

        Government functionary from the end scenes of Raiders of the Lost Ark. He’s the origin of the phrase

        “Top.
        Men.”

    • Idle Hands

      Octopus is pretty good imho. I have no moral conscience when it comes to eating animals except I don’t care for waste. I’d eat anything no problem.

    • Plisade

      If I were a longevity scientist (if that’s a thing), I’d be working on increasing the life span of octopuses and see if they’re capable of language given enough time.

    • limey

      Cuttlefish, too. I know someone who used to work with a lady (I met her a couple of times) who had a pet octopus, and he (the octopus) figured out that he could climb out into her other aquarium where there happened to be some dinner swimming about. Yummy!

    • OBJ FRANKELSON

      Didn’t we have a link were octopuses were playing the knockout game with fish as their targets?

    • Chipwooder

      They are excellent problem solvers. Go on YouTube and there are many octopus videos demonstrating that they’re a helluva lot smarter than you’d imagine.

      • rhywun

        Someone in Germany must have noticed because they get one to predict the winner of the World Cup every four years. Dunno how accurate they are.

  8. KOVIDKristen

    So sorry, Limey. Feel free to join us on Zooms when you’re not defying lockdown!

    • Yusef, Frozen

      ?

      • KOVIDKristen

        See: all the talk in this thread about new UK lockdowns

    • limey

      Thanks, KK. Maybe one of these days I’ll be drunk enough. I don’t even like being camera/audio with people I know.

      • Bobarian LMD

        Apparently, all you need to do is claim domestic abuse and you can travel all you want.

        Domestic self-abuse is a thing, right?

      • KOVIDKristen

        Plenty of people never come on camera and never talk (though a Brit accent would be awesome!). We’re ALL highly introverted.

  9. Ownbestenemy

    That octopus is holding that diver’s hand is as if a puma is staring at you; both are wondering if you are food. We try to personify too many things.

    • R C Dean

      Prolly thinking “I bet I could bite off and swallow some of these weird, short, stiff tentacles”.

  10. Rebel Scum

    The Swiss government said no additional coronavirus measures are necessary despite the “worrying” situation that has been caused by the pandemic.

    This is what happens when you leave holes in your pandemic response.

      • Ownbestenemy

        I would have thought you were fondue of these by now.

      • Plisade

        I thought it was obvious that they grate on his nerves.

      • Rebel Scum

        First of the new year!

    • Plisade

      If the pandemic response doesn’t make sense, follow the cheddar, Jack.

    • Master JaimeRoberto (royal we/us)

      I don’t know. It sounds pretty gouda to me.

  11. Idle Hands

    https://news.trust.org/item/20210104140005-hnx99

    “UK scientists worry vaccines may not protect against S.African coronavirus variant”

    I’m beginning to suspect this is never going to end until most everyone is destitute and our new corporate overlords own everything.

    • KOVIDKristen

      By this time next year, we’ll only be working for government or Amazon (I mean, I guess they’re one and the same now)

      • Not Adahn

        Remember when the corporations that were going to take over the world were Microsoft and Nike? We were so innocent then.

      • Brett L

        Pssh. Before that it was Toyota and Sony. They were buying the whole West Coast.

        Thankfully, Hans Gruber blew up Nakatomi Plaza around Christmas in 1988 and the Japanese decided investment in the US was unsafe due to terrorism and rising insurance costs.

      • Brett L

        Err… 1987.

      • leon

        A problem i’ve had with Die Hard 3 is the premise of robbing money from the Federal Reserve, and the entiere monetary system. As if you stole money from the Federal Reserve and then… People wouldn’t know that you had taken all the money? How are you supposed to launder all the value when we know “Hey the dude with the money is the guy who stole it all from us”

      • Idle Hands

        I don’t think the gov isn’t going to have any real ability to hire anyone. This is an enormous realignment unlike anything we’ve seen in at least a hundred years possibly since reconstruction. The municipalities are going to legit find a new source of income as their won’t be any business property/licensing to tax.

      • Dr. Fronkensteen

        And the only restaurant left will be Taco Bell. We will need to use the three shells because there won’t be any toilet paper left.

        So which is more prophetic? Demolition Man or Idiocracy?

      • Ownbestenemy

        As long as I can get a handy and a latte, I vote for Idiocracy

      • Idle Hands

        Demolition man is a much darker vision of the future, can’t even fuck.

      • Gustave Lytton

        ^ probably doesn’t know what the seashells are for

      • Idle Hands

        demolition man. idiocracy is just a blue pilled version of dystopia, human society has always been run as described by that movie. We advance till we become so advance we collapse because we have so much vapid bullshit jobs we forget to train people to figure out how to maintain basic functions. This happens over and over and over. One day people just forgot how the aqueducts worked in Rome. Same thing will happen here but with our electric grid.

      • Idle Hands

        I don’t think the gov is going to have any real ability to hire anyone. This is an enormous wealth realignment unlike anything we’ve seen in at least a hundred years possibly since reconstruction. The municipalities, states and local gov are going to legit find a new source of income as their won’t be any business property/licensing to tax as well as the feds.

    • But Enough About My "Essential Retiree" Status

      “You’ll own nothing. And you’ll be happy.”
      (’cause we’re also gonna put Valium into your water supply.)

      • Bobarian LMD

        It was the pax.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Did I just watch a ruined orgasm video?

    • Count Potato

      WTF was that?

    • zwak

      Is this the new conservative comedy I keep hearing about?

    • Bobarian LMD

      Holy shit, I can’t breath…

      I have a new fetish.

  12. Rebel Scum

    The balls on this fucker…

    Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger suggested Monday the Fulton County District Attorney could launch a criminal probe into his leaked weekend phone call with President Donald Trump.

    Trump berated Raffensperger in a Saturday phone call “to find” enough votes for him to win the state, according to a recording obtained by the Washington Post. The president lost Georgia to President-Elect Joe Biden by 11,779 votes during the November election.

    In response to the phone call, the only Democrat on the Georgia State Board of Elections demanded Raffensperger launch a civil and criminal probe into the president. Raffensperger responded on ABC’s “Good Morning America,” claiming “a conflict of interest” would inhibit his office from investigating.

    “I believe that because I had a conversation with the president, also he had a conversation with our chief investigator after we did the signature match audit of Cobb county last week, there may be a conflict of interest,” Raffensperger told George Stephanopoulos.

    But he added, “I understand that the Fulton County District Attorney wants to look at it. Maybe that’s the appropriate venue for it to go.”

    • leon

      I’ve been ignoring the story because my corporate overlords have informed me that any claims of election irregularity should be ignored.

  13. hayeksplosives

    I had to dig a little, but I found this Rick Santorum quote from an npr interview in 2006.

    I certainly hope that the fraction of people who meet his description of “conservatism” is vanishingly small. OTOH, it certainly fits with the “red state” Karen Corps who serve as mask Nazis for their churches and other groups.

    “One of the criticisms I make is to what I refer to as more of a libertarianish right. You know, the left has gone so far left and the right in some respects has gone so far right that they touch each other. They come around in the circle.

    This whole idea of personal autonomy, well I don’t think most conservatives hold that point of view. Some do. They have this idea that people should be left alone, be able to do whatever they want to do, government should keep our taxes down and keep our regulations low, that we shouldn’t get involved in the bedroom, we shouldn’t get involved in cultural issues.

    You know, people should do whatever they want. Well, that is not how traditional conservatives view the world and I think most conservatives understand that individuals can’t go it alone. That there is no such society that I am aware of, where we’ve had radical individualism and that it succeeds as a culture.”

    What a pathetic excuse for a free American. Surely he speaks for less than 10% of the populace on the autonomy issue.

    • DEG

      I’m reminded of G. Gordon Liddy. I saw G. Gordon Liddy give a talk with a Q&A while I was an undergrad.

      During the Q&A, someone asked him about his opinions on marijuana legalization.

      Liddy said something along the lines of “Marijuana being illegal is good because if you are stoned, you aren’t giving society your best. You owe society that best.”

    • rhywun

      Old-school CWAA

      • Count Potato

        “That’s a rate of about 2.3% of vaccine recipients”

        Yikes!

    • Urthona

      summary?

      • Drake

        Skip to the 10:30 mark – since a county was reporting in almost real time you can see the exact moment that somebody switched the votes – a swing of 24k.

      • Urthona

        what does fact checking say about this?

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        False – The facts are true, but the narrative is damning.

        In seriousness, I’ve heard debunks of various fraud accusations, but I’ve never heard any debunks of the data weirdness seen in various states. Negative votes seem like something that would be an enormous red flag in any election system.

      • Hyperion

        They cheated. Even most democrat voters believe it, they just don’t care, their team won, woohoo! While Rome burns…

      • Drake

        It’s a comical level of fraud – they kept the vote totals just switched the names. If it was a Third World country, we’d sent a brigade of Marines and make them vote again.

    • juris imprudent

      New Tang Dynasty TV, and who exactly are these people and if they have such unassailable proof, how did it not end up in court? Trump’s lawyers just fucked up?

      • Drake

        Finding a judge who gives a shit seems to be the challenge.

      • juris imprudent

        The whole world is against St. Donnie. Not an honest judge in the whole country.

        Shouldn’t you be hanging at QAnon?

  14. Rebel Scum

    King Kuomo strikes again.

    If you wanted to make sure that rapidly expiring vaccines distributed in 10-dose vials end up in the trash, this is how you’d do it

    He wants to fine doctors up to a million dollars and revoke their licenses to practice if they do not follow his highness’s prioritization of vax distribution. Driving doctors out of business is probably a good move in a pandemic that I have been assured is super scary and dangerous.

    • Not Adahn

      The only thing these peoplEremember form school is “if you didn’t bring enough to share, nobody can have any!”

    • Master JaimeRoberto (royal we/us)

      He’s just trying to get an Oscar now.

    • rhywun

      Insert video of AOC getting jabbed on stage.

      Un-fucking-real.

    • KSuellington

      So the masks didn’t work?! Shocking.

    • Gustave Lytton

      Jesus Christ. Stop posting crap from DM and the Sun unless they have tits and are less than just overweight. Their lurid exaggerations and convenient omissions are worse than the National Inquirer at the height of bat boy stories.

      • Count Potato

        That was the Weekly World News.

      • l0b0t

        Wasn’t it The Enquirer that tanked the presidential ambitions of John Edwards by being the only outlet willing to publish the fact that Edwards had knocked up a campaign worker and used campaign funds to pay her to keep quiet?

  15. KSuellington

    Octopus ‘holds hands’ with diver in magical encounter

    *Kurt Eichenwald gets a boner*

    • Ownbestenemy

      *Looks up-thread, tallies the octopus jokes/snark, raises KSuellington’s hand in victory!*

      • KSuellington

        Heheh. I toned down the joke for our family friendly rating (that is somehow still on this site after four years).

    • Not Adahn

      Don’t ever say that again. Ever.

    • Sensei

      He was doing “research”.

      • EvilSheldon

        Yes, he was researching what makes his dicklet hard…

  16. Urthona

    can’t believe democrats are now way ahead in polling in georgia.

    we are fucked.

    • Swiss Servator

      By whom? They were trailing plenty last I read anything.

      • Urthona

        just read a poll that came out today but i could be overreacting to one poll.

    • Semi-Spartan Dad

      Pre-2020 election, I didn’t see the connection between polling and election outcomes.

      Post-2020 election, I don’t see the connection between voting and the reported ballot counts.

      We’re fucked. But the GA runoff will have as much impact on the direction of this country as elections do in China or Venezuela.

      • Urthona

        I think you’ll notice when the Democrats pack the supreme court and add Puerto Rico and DC as states.

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        Of course. But that will happen regardless of voting. It doesn’t matter how many more GOP ballots compared with Dems ballots are actually cast in GA. It matters who controls the counts and who controls the media who reports the counts.

      • Urthona

        Everyone always thinks I’m so cynical politically.

        Then I come here and realize I barely have my toe in the pool of cynicism.

    • leon

      _If_ the GOP loses, it’s because they shot themselves in the dick. No way Warnock should be close, but i see Trafalger polling put him at +1

    • Idle Hands

      the republicans can’t overcome the harvesting, dems have a million more people registered now than they did for the presidential election. It’s over.

      • mrfamous

        A whole bunch of residents of Georigia with last names that end in -shvili have now registered to vote in the Georgia Senate election.

  17. Count Potato

    “Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger leaked THAT phonecall in revenge for Donald Trump tweeting that he ‘hasn’t a clue’ – and now says president could face CHARGES over ‘find 11,780 votes’ demand”

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9111271/Brad-Raffensperger-leaked-recording-Donald-Trump-president-tweeted-no-clue.html

    “Investigative journalist Carl Bernstein calls Trump tape a ‘smoking gun’ that’s ‘far worse than Watergate’ after it’s revealed president pressured Georgia Secretary of State to ‘find’ 11,780 votes during recorded conversation”

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9111319/Carl-Bernstein-calls-Trump-tape-smoking-gun-thats-far-worse-Watergate.html

    • leon

      Investigative journalist Carl Bernstein

      Is there anyone who has rested on his laurels more than Bernstein?

      • Agent Cooper

        JIMMY BUFFETT?!?

        Boom!

    • Urthona

      Feels like this has been taken out of context. Clear from the call he thought the results were fraudulent and asked to be vindicated.

      • Rebel Scum

        Trump is operating off the premise that he won if you remove the apparent fraud and that totally equates to asking GA to “find” enough votes to throw it to Drumpfler because he is threatening muh democracy. ///OrangeManBad

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        Yep. PJ linked to the full transcript and provided a synopsis.

        https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/matt-margolis/2021/01/04/the-media-is-lying-about-trumps-call-with-georgia-secretary-of-state-n1304209

        Throughout the conversation, Trump lays out the evidence that there was voter fraud in the state, and demands an honest accounting of the ballots, which he believes would give him more than 11,000 votes needed to win the state. “I just want to find 11,780 votes,” is the key quote cited by the media, but there’s more to the quote.

        “So look. All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have. Because we won the state,” is what Trump said, in context. He also insisted that “there’s no way I lost Georgia. There’s no way. We won by hundreds of thousands of votes.”

        During the conversation, Trump laid out the evidence, explaining how there “4,502 voters who voted but who weren’t on the voter registration list,” and “18,325 vacant address voters” whose votes should not have been counted. He even mentioned 904 votes linked to post office boxes, which is also not allowed. Trump also mentioned the State Farm videotape that corresponds to a late-night vote dump of at least 18,000 votes which were counted after Republican poll watchers were told to leave. Trump brought up nearly 5,000 out-of-state votes, 2,326 absentee ballots sent to vacant addresses, and roughly 5,000 votes from dead people. Then there are the suspicious military ballots that went all for Biden.

      • Ownbestenemy

        So they ctrl+R Ukraine and inserted Georgia…its the same damn charge.

      • juris imprudent

        Do you SERIOUSLY think Trump didn’t just pull those numbers out of his ass? Or did he have a script, because he can NEVER get his fucking facts straight, not once in 4 goddam years of his stream-of-ego-consciousness administration. I totally call bullshit on him having command of that set of numbers – presuming they were derived from… what sources exactly? And how is it that that didn’t make it into the court pleadings?

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        These numbers are part of Trump’s lawsuit in GA. As has been stated several times. To which you’ve been your fingers in your ears and ranted about PA every time.

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        And I went back on saying I wouldn’t respond to anymore of your “Cleanest Election Ever” posts. Just ignore the above reply.

      • juris imprudent

        I will stand corrected – he had the script and he stuck to it.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Bernstein for the past four years, has equated any action by Trump as “far worse than Watergate” Can’t find the article right now, but someone documented them all…

    • Not Adahn

      NPR reported as Trump attempting to “steal” the GA election. They literally used the word steal.

      • Urthona

        So the forbidden description we are not allowed to use is used by the media to talk about him.

      • juris imprudent

        Rhetorical jiu-jitsu!

    • Ted S.

      Stop it; you’re giving Juris Impudent a stiffy.

      • juris imprudent

        Fuck yourself and your dog.

  18. Rebel Scum

    Setting the tone for a brighter future.

    To set the tone for his inauguration the next day, President-elect Biden will lead a memorial to remember and honor lives lost to COVID-19, with church-bell ringings and light shows across the country on Tuesday, Jan. 19, at 5:30 p.m. ET.

    The Presidential Inauguration Committee is announcing this morning that a D.C. ceremony, led by Biden, will feature lights around the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool — the first time lighting around the Reflecting Pool has memorialized American lives lost.

    “PIC is inviting cities and towns around the country to join Washington, D.C., in illuminating buildings and ringing church bells at 5:30 p.m. ET [15 minutes after sunset] in a national moment of unity and remembrance,” the committee says.

    PIC communications director Pili Tobar said in a statement: “The inauguration of President-elect Joe Biden and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris represents the beginning of a new national journey.”

    I’d prefer to be left alone to have my own personal journey.

    • Plisade

      You’re getting a 6′ radius of mandatory isolation, what more could you need?

    • Master JaimeRoberto (royal we/us)

      Is he going to thank them for their sacrifice that helped him get elected?

    • Chipwooder

      hahahahahahahahahaha go fuck yourself, Grampy

  19. Count Potato

    “All 10 living former Defense Secretaries have delivered an extraordinary warning to President Trump in an op-ed denouncing the possibility of the military becoming involved in the current election dispute.

    The piece was published in The Washington Post on Monday, following calls from some Trump supporters to invoke martial law in a bid to block Joe Biden from becoming the next Commander-in-chief.

    The 10 Defense Secretaries, who are both Republican and Democrat, did not mention Trump’s name in the editorial, but clearly intended for the President to heed their message.

    ‘Our elections have occurred. Recounts and audits have been conducted. Appropriate challenges have been addressed by the courts. Governors have certified the results. And the Electoral College has voted. The time for questioning the results has passed,’ the group wrote.

    ‘Efforts to involve the U.S. armed forces in resolving election disputes would take us into dangerous, unlawful and unconstitutional territory,’ they warned.

    The 10 living former Defense Secretaries listed as authors of the piece are Ashton Carter, Dick Cheney, William Cohen, Mark Esper, Robert Gates, Chuck Hagel, James Mattis, Leon Panetta, William Perry and Donald Rumsfeld. ”

    https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9110117/All-10-living-former-Defense-Secretaries-deliver-extraordinary-warning-Trump-scathing-op-ed.html

    • leon

      Ashton Carter, Dick Cheney, William Cohen, Mark Esper, Robert Gates, Chuck Hagel, James Mattis, Leon Panetta, William Perry and Donald Rumsfe

      ld.

      Off hand i know both of these men served as heads of the CIA.

      Anyway where were these guys whenever we hear about the military being needed to push Trump out of office?

    • Urthona

      It’s great that they warned him not to do that fascist thing he was never gonna actually do.

      • Master JaimeRoberto (royal we/us)

        And they will pat themselves on the back when he doesn’t do it, because without their firm stand he totally would have.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Yep that was my prediction after inauguration with media flooding with articles on how they protected Democracy!

    • Gustave Lytton

      Yeah, the US shouldn’t be intervening in election disputes. Oh, just domestically?

    • Q Continuum

      You don’t wanna know what straff does with it when he takes it home after the date.

  20. Rebel Scum

    I, for one, welcome our new Gender Cult overlords.

    Democrat victories in the Georgia Senate runoff elections would allow Joe Biden to follow through on his promise to sign the Equality Act in his first 100 days as president, a measure that would codify gender ideology into federal law. …

    The legislation, as introduced in Congress, states its purpose is to “prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex, gender identity, and sexual orientation, and for other purposes.” If enacted, the bill would essentially codify gender ideology into federal law.

    Prohibiting discrimination and promoting equality sound virtuous, but many serious opponents — including a coalition of conservatives, feminists, lesbians, and Christians — warned Americans prior to the House’s vote on the measure that the Equality Act is dangerous legislation that will do anything but create equality. In fact, the legislation would likely force American women to relinquish their rights to privacy, safety, and the ability to compete in sports “equally”

    • leon

      I like how there are lots of “The GOP is just about owning the LIBs” when the signature legislation put out by the dems is just “OWN THE CONS” for no appreciable benefit to anyone.

    • Not Adahn

      Ugh. Lesbians are sooo transphobic.

    • R C Dean

      prohibit discrimination on the basis of sex, gender identity, and sexual orientation, and for other purposes

      Why, that’s not vague, arbitrary, open-ended or an invitation to abuse at all.

  21. Not Adahn

    Lol.

    Being the only engineer onsite for the past couple of weeks, I’ve helped a lot of people out with things that have gone wrong, including our Vermont fab when their ICP-MS crashed.

    Today my boss let me know that I was being investigated by security becasue of receiving a suspiciously high number of “appreciation awards” that include cash. Fortunately he let them know that I was legitimately doing good deeds, and not not trading awards or anything like that. And he only demanded a 25% kickback for doing so.

    • leon

      hehe. Nice! It always feels good to hear good things from your boss.

      Unless you hate your boss, i guess. Maybe then it doesn’t feel good.

  22. Rebel Scum

    It wears the mask or it gets house-arrest lockdown again.

    “Are we looking at a campaign when President-elect Biden becomes president, are we going to need to do another 15 to 30 days, stop the spread, maybe do a partial lockdown — between that issue and obviously what’s happening now?” NBC News host Chuck Todd asked. “And it looks like hospitals — they were overwhelmed in November. Dr. Fauci, what’s going to happen at the end of January?”

    “Yeah. Well, I hope we don’t have to do the lockdown because of the — we all know, Chuck, how much Covid-19 fatigue there is of people just really being worn down with this,” Fauci responded. “But we certainly need to enhance and make more uniform our public health measures. President-elect Biden has called for 100 days of everybody wearing a mask uniformly throughout the country. That’s really a good start.”

    “The idea about locking down is something that you might have to do, but you want to avoid,” Fauci continued. “In certain areas of the country, such as in California, which is really being stressed with regard to the hospital beds and the personnel who are really getting exhausted with the number of cases that are coming in, you may have to have, and they already have decided, on some form of lockdown in specific areas of the state or specific regions of the country. So that’s not out of the question. We hope we don’t have to do it countrywide, because we feel that if you adhere to the public health measures, you can turn things around short of a uniform lockdown.”

    • Ownbestenemy

      That guy just cannot decide what is what can he. Like a leaf in the wind, whatever will get his jollies off and screen time.

    • OBJ FRANKELSON

      Lots of Real Dolls (TM) in that batch, 14 on the other hand…

    • DEG

      Blech. Face diapers.

  23. DEG

    I just received an e-mail from Reopen NH. The planned protest of the governor’s inauguration will happen. The outdoor inauguration was cancelled, but it will be held indoors at the State House with some officials witnessing the event, but not the Legislature like the state constitution requires.

    The protest will be at the State House in Concord, NH on Thursday, Jan. 7th, 2021 from 11-noon. Several other groups will join Reopen NH for the protest. The plan is to make a lot of noise so that folks in the State House can hear the protest. Reoepn NH recommends bringing hearing protection.

    Reopen NH also released its list of bills they are tracking. The page unfortunately does not include links to bill text. I looked up some of the proposed legislation on the state legislature’s page. Not all bill texts are publicly available at this time. Prout, Blasek, Notter, Nunez, and both Lekas are solid pro-liberty folks, so those bills involving those folks are probably good bills.

    • OBJ FRANKELSON

      If there is anywhere that this movement has a chance of getting any traction its New Hampshire. Unfortunately, New Hampshire is located in New Hampshire.

    • Hyperion

      I heard about that. Ma may have said something critical to the CCP. That’s practically a death sentence there. They don’t need MA, they have 2 billion people in the country who would love to be his replacement. And there is no mechanism in China to stop the CCP from disappearing Ma whenever they want. They do whatever they want with their ‘comrades’, whenever they want. It’s like a democrat dream come true. Like the Lightbringer once said ‘It’s easier to govern in China.’.

    • creech

      Except Bezos and Zuckerberg are the government.

  24. Hyperion

    fuck the Wut?

    I need to stop watching the intertoobs, because now the assholes just outright tell you what they are going to do next. Thanks, Hitler, I guess we’re all getting off the grid soon anyways. And to thinks we made fun of those preppers and off-gridders.

    *goes back to off grid Youtube watching*

  25. leon

    Just because it would bookend the duplicitiy of the Media, i’m going to predict a GOP win for tomorrow and then the Media and congress spending countless hours talking about how the Election needs to be investigated for fraud caused by Trumps phone call

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      That would be the first sign that 2021 will suck less than 2020

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        (not because of the election result but because of all the tasty, tasty schadenfreude)

      • Hyperion

        No, it would be because, for another short period in time, we’d be spared from outright communism and tyranny. Because if the dems get the Senate, they will go completely batshit and the Republic is over, forever.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Look at the optimist over here!

        This is why I’m #collapsitarian. We’re on the verge of a second Progressive Era. One senator isn’t gonna stop that from happening. At best, it buys a few years while more and more public school drones get dumped into the voting pool and more and more people who remember freedom and family and God keel over and start voting democrat.

        These are the good old days. 20 years from now, we’ll be begging for mask mandates and election fraud.

      • Q Continuum

        “keel over and start voting democrat”

        My grandparents were Republican till the day they died, then they became Democrats.

    • Hyperion

      Nice wishful thinking. But I don’t believe it. They just succeeded in the biggest election fraud in US history and the mechanism is still in place, and no one did shit about it. Why would they stop now? They’ve had a lot of time already to produce fraudulent ballots and the same machines and poll workers are still there.

      Expect both GOP candidates to be winning by a nice margin until about 4am, when they stop counting and in the morning both dem candidates will be winning. How I know this, well, I’ve seen this one before, it’s a rerun.

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        I hate it when they run the crappy later seasons in syndication.

    • Dr. Fronkensteen

      I’m just waiting for someone to declare that the Democrats got 100,000 fewer votes in the Senate race than in the presidential elections due to voter suppression and demand an investigation into the vote.

    • R C Dean

      I’m predicting a big win for the loony Dems. The Dems have added a huge number of newly registered voters. That, plus mail-in balloting, is game over. I suspect the only meaningful fraud will be at the registration level.

  26. But Enough About My "Essential Retiree" Status

    Huh.

    Our provincial Premier, Jason Kenney, has fired or demoted seven MLAs / staff members for traveling against health directives during the Christmas holidays:

       https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/alberta-cabinet-minister-chief-resign-1.5860869

    This sort of thing needs to happen much more often, but it’s a good start.

  27. grrizzly

    I’m back from Florida: Jacksonville and Tampa areas. It’s so nice there now. Warm. Also, much closer to normal. We had a very pleasant lunch there with Shpip and Mrs. Shpip. He has a tremendous knowledge of all the things to do and see in Florida!

    • Hyperion

      Get him one them strapons, I guess they make those real big, and make needledick to his tongue exercises.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Moments later, she fell in Willie Brown’s lap.

    • Hyperion

      Dude, Camela is more genuine than Hillary and she keeps two bottles of hot sauce in her purse! I can’t wait to hear HER southern accent.

      • creech

        Can’t wait to for Kommiela to tell about the time she drove down the street in Oakland dodging incoming fire from all the white supremacists who infest that city.

      • Hyperion

        Marshawn Lynch saw it and recognized her, and actually saved her, because she’s such a huge football fan, and also soul food.

    • Master JaimeRoberto (royal we/us)

      Imagine not being embarrassed for printing that.

      • Hyperion

        You mean like being a shameless useful idiot?

    • Dr. Fronkensteen

      How many holes in one did she make the first time she played golf?

      • Rebel Scum

        I heard Willie Brown got it in on the first try.

      • Bobarian LMD

        All three holes on that course?

    • R C Dean

      Of course, the story she plagiarized for it is also made up out of whole cloth.

    • Rebel Scum

      0_o

      *ponders*

      Her parents were irresponsible as fuck.

      Also, that is total, complete, utter bullshit.

      • EvilSheldon

        If she’d claimed to have said, “I wanna be in charge!”, I would have believed it without question.

    • Urthona

      What’s the recent famous lie she got caught in? I already forgot. Before this but after Tupac.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Kwanzaa?

  28. l0b0t

    Someone linked to the Seo Linn /Lurgan cover of Wake Me Up. It’s beautiful and I wanted to see the lyrics. HOLY MACKEREL! The Gaeilge must be the root of Lovecraft’s Cthulhu language. Is there another language where the pronunciation varies so wildly from the spelling?

    https://youtu.be/gUeIq9h6FLk

    • rhywun

      Welsh would like a word.

      But yes, Irish spelling got stuck around the year 1500.

      • Hyperion

        “Welsh would like a word.”

        I really do not have a goat.

      • rhywun

        “Nid oes gen i afr mewn gwirionedd.”

        *shudder*

    • leon

      I’ve been studying Scottish Gaelic and the spelling and sounding is actually pretty regularl, compared to English, the thing is that they use a lot more fricatives denoted by adding an ‘h’ to the consonant, (like t -> th in English) and the vowels have different sounds in English, which makes it look hating for English readers to look at.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Yet they will continue to support that fuckstick.

      • Rebel Scum

        Nobel. Peace. Prize.

    • juris imprudent

      SFing the link is kinda perfect.

      • Rebel Scum
  29. westernsloper

    I hope you will all be watching.

    Ya, not my thing.