About The Author

Banjos

Banjos

Wife of sloopy, mother to three bright, curious, and highly active young girls. Perpetually exhausted.

309 Comments

  1. PieInTheSky

    Infrastructure plan would eliminate local zoning laws, force suburbs to build apartments. – I mean anti nimby can be a good thing

  2. PieInTheSky

    Four dead after hot air balloon crashes into powerline. – did any have covid?

    • AlexinCT

      The balloon did?

      • Bobarian LMD

        Well, now that Biden is in charge, we wouldn’t count those as COVID, even if COVID physically ran wires to the balloon.

  3. The Late P Brooks

    Afederal judge scolded the feds for their “woefully” vague seizure notices to customers of U.S. Private Vaults (USPV), saying the planned forfeitures of safe deposit boxes likely violate customers’ constitutional due process rights.

    “Likely”?

    • juris imprudent

      You can only bite the hand that feeds so hard.

  4. PieInTheSky

    Weirdo does weirdo thing. – I actually wonder to what point plastic surgeons have moral dilemmas about doing this kind of shit. I assume some do some don’t give a fuck. I mean in the end it is everyone’s right to fuck themselves up in their own way

    • PieInTheSky

      Also I do not understand from the article if he gets South Korean citizenship automatically for doing this

    • Sean

      I actually wonder to what point plastic surgeons have moral dilemmas about doing this kind of shit.

      I’d be surprised if any of them care about anything other than the check clearing.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        I know a couple that would never do that sort of thing, but I’ve met some others that would do pretty much anything.

      • Sean

        *shrug*

        I don’t know any, but it’s nice to know that some wouldn’t.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Have you met many plastic surgeons? I’d say there’s a significant percentage of them that are pure sociopaths.

      • AlexinCT

        BIGGER BOOBS!

        That’s their gift to humanity….

      • PieInTheSky

        more of a curse really

      • AlexinCT

        Are you coming at it from the coroner’s perspective?

      • Chafed

        Lol

      • Certified Public Asshat

        Maybe they do, but do breast implants actually increase happiness (to the woman)?

      • AlexinCT

        You are coming at the problem from the wrong perspective….

        It’s like that question some unlucky guys get asked: “Who you gonna satisfy with that little thing?”…

        The answer is always the guy himself..

      • Ownbestenemy

        Generally I would assume yes.

  5. CPRM

    The largest item in President Biden’s originally proposed $2.3 trillion infrastructure bill “is intended to literally eliminate local zoning, single-family zoning,” former N.Y. Lt. Gov. Betsy McCaughey told the John Solomon Reports podcast.

    I’m fine with getting rid of zoning, all zoning that is.

    • juris imprudent

      Sure, if that is the same local decision that instituted it in the first place.

      • Rat on a train

        It is none of the federal government’s business.

      • Sean

        Yeah, but that applies to almost everything.

      • Rat on a train

        But something must be done.

      • Ownbestenemy

        There oughta be a law or something

      • SDF-7

        Hey buddy… stop doing that!

    • PieInTheSky

      Just implement HOAs everywhere.

    • rhywun

      Yeah, the people who live in “snob” zoning will fight its elimination tooth-and-nail whether or not the Feds intend to “force” anyone to build apartments there.

      I haven’t read the plan so I have no idea if Betsy is being entirely honest about this stuff.

    • Drake

      It’s not getting rid of local zoning – its just letting the Feds take it over to make sure they make the right right decisions that the locals don’t want. Then leaving the locals to deal with all the consequences – need for more infrastructure, schools, cops & firefighters, etc… A different form of “unfunded mandate”.

    • WTF

      Other than FYTW, where in the constitution does the Fedgov derive the power to implement local zoning requirements? Do they even bother trying to cite some constitutional authority anymore?

      • Ownbestenemy

        They derive it from decades of weakened and dependent states, duties abdicated freely by Congress and an overall lazy and ignorant populace. They don’t need authority at this point.

      • WTF

        And if anyone tries to bring a suit against this based on its lack of constitutional authority, the court will dismiss it based on “standing”.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Yes I missed that one. That one is the linchpin to it all, a weak judiciary.

      • juris imprudent

        You have no sense of subtlety – this isn’t a command, it’s a bribe. You want this money? Here are the strings.

  6. trshmnstr the terrible

    Infrastructure plan would eliminate local zoning laws, force suburbs to build apartments

    To be clear, incentives have been in place for a decade pushing suburbs towards high density construction. It’s one of the reasons suburbs are turning bluer very quickly.

    • AlexinCT

      Team blue has been looking to a way to capitalize on the fact that they win urban areas with +10% at a minimum, considering these wins to basically be a waste of votes (after all, you just need 50% plus 1 to win) and this is their solution to that vote waste problem.

    • Pine_Tree

      And every medium-sized or small country town is getting new HUD-backed apartments too. Anybody who doesn’t see that there’s a deliberate and hostile kulturkrieg going on is either an idiot, or willfully blind, or both.

      • Sean

        Equity = shitholes everywhere!

  7. The Late P Brooks

    The natives are getting restless

    In the window of a vintage shop in the Sydney suburb of Annandale, a sign expresses the frustration of many Australians with their country’s pandemic strategy.

    “Dear Customers, We will be closed for the foreseeable future because Scott Morrison is a useless dickhead who only ordered enough vaccine to vaccinate 4% of the population 18 months into a pandemic,” reads the sign, shared on Twitter, in reference to the Australian Prime Minister.

    ——-

    Australia was celebrated for its initial response to the Covid-19 pandemic, and for getting its economy more or less back on track long ago.
    But with that security has come complacency, particularly in the federal government, which failed to secure enough vaccine doses to prevent the regular “circuit breaker” lockdowns that come every time a handful of cases emerge, or even the longer restrictions that Sydney is experiencing now. Australia’s borders, controlled by strict quarantine measures, have been all but shut for more than a year.
    Now Australians, who basked in their early successes, are wondering how much longer this can go on.
    “We can’t leave the country, people can’t come in, and we end up periodically in lockdowns, which cost a friggin’ fortune,” said Powditch.
    “People have been accepting that this is a diabolically difficult situation, but once we start watching the rest of the world open up, we’re going to turn to anger over the way things like vaccines have been rolled out here.”
    Already there are signs that Australians are getting weary of these sporadic disruptions to their lives. On Sunday, large crowds were seen on Bondi Beach, despite the stay-at-home orders. While outdoor exercise is allowed, images from Bondi showed people bathing in the winter sun and sitting on benches with drinks.

    Get up on your hind legs, sheeple. You’ll feel better.

    • Ownbestenemy

      “images from Bondi showed people bathing in the winter sun and sitting on benches with drinks.”

      The absolute terror!

    • CPRM

      “Four legs good! Two legs baad!

    • rhywun

      “successes”

      GFY

    • DEG

      I remember that Aussie bigot on the flight from Sydney to Adelaide telling me that even though Aussies don’t have guns (not really true) they can make politicians do what the citizenry want.

      Heh.

  8. Trigger Hippie

    ‘Missouri placed fewer restrictions on activity, including not imposing a statewide ban on indoor dining, said Steven Fazzari, economist at Washington University in St. Louis.

    Restrictions were lightly enforced, especially outside of the state’s bigger cities, and the businesses moved earlier than those in other parts of the country to reopen, he said.

    Still, he said he thinks it was a mistake for the state to end extended benefits, in part because the aid would have given job seekers more time to find a match that best fits their skills and location.’

    Yes, you all should continue to pay for people’s extended benefits until they find their ideal job…sure. God forbid somebody settle for work they may not necessarily want to do in order to survive.

  9. PieInTheSky

    In local covid news Romania had 37 new cases and 1 death in the last day. Currently there are 546 people in hospitals and 86 in intensive care.

    • Sean

      And you went on vacation?

      O M G !

  10. trshmnstr the terrible

    Perez told KOB 4 that he allegedly turned off the balloon’s propane so it would not explode.

    “I allegedly turned off the balloon’s propane so it would not explode.”

    • Ownbestenemy

      Well when KOB 4 employs software to write its articles, this is what you get, allegedly.

  11. Rat on a train

    Buying a Car Improved My Life. It Shouldn’t Have.

    Immediately, it was like I lived in a different city. What seemed impossible to access before was suddenly available, a world of opportunities opening up before me. I made plans to see friends in their backyards and went for swims in lakes hours away.

    My partner and I are going to keep our car for right now, but I wish we had no reason to. In a better world, a car wouldn’t be of much use because we’d have robust bus and train systems to get around and out of the city. Even if that’s not our present, there’s no reason that can’t be our future.

    You hold onto that fantasy.

    • AlexinCT

      The scary thing is that I see this with liberals all the fucking time…

      Whenever reality proves that some trope they hold to be true is absolute bullshit, they never go “Wait a minute: what other shit that I have been told to believe is bullshit?”… No, what they do is desperately find a way to avoid having to think, and more often than not, they will keep believing even the thing that was brutally disproved, because the alternative means they are neither as smart of special as they have convinced themselves they are because of the crap they believe makes them superior to the unwashed masses that don’t belong to that cult of idiocy.

      • EvilSheldon

        Some people really think that ‘thinking’ means ‘believing really really hard.’

      • juris imprudent

        Some people? Fuck, you’re talking about the vast majority of humanity.

      • Ownbestenemy

        It is why I never read the story Little Engine that Could to my kids. Just thinking it doesn’t make it happen.

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        *stops Tony Robbins cassette*

        TBF, the engine was doing the work too. Also, you definitely can’t if you don’t think you can.

      • Ownbestenemy

        I was being a bit glib and unfair I suppose.

      • Akira

        Yea, it was sort of incomplete advice. You do have to believe that your goal is possible, but you also have to figure out how you’re actually going to achieve it.

      • Gender Traitor

        I have a bracelet that says, “Possibility begins with imagination.” Note that it does not say “Inevitability.”

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        100% of humanity. No exceptions. Even those the most immune to this are only thoughtful in a very small subset of their lives.

      • Akira

        what they do is desperately find a way to avoid having to think

        A lot of them seem to do this thing where they deny that it’s true based on the implications. I was arguing some economic point with someone, and they told me “But that just benefits the rich!” As if that makes it untrue.

        (And it wasn’t even true that it only benefits the rich, as is often the case with libertarian ideas)

    • CPRM

      Yes, get a bus line that goes from my town to the one I work in, where I would be the only person using said bus. GENIUS! So Green!

      • db

        Why should you be allowed to live where you want and work in a different location at the expense of everyone else? What a selfish concept, spending energy and resources like that in a world where climate change and poverty are our most important challenges to solve as a society!

        vs.

        People need access to reliable public transportation across metropolitan areas to allow them the life-affirming ability to access services that are not present in their neighborhoods. It is an investment in our communities to publicly fund these important transportation initiatives.

    • rhywun

      I read that as “buying a cat”.

      • Ownbestenemy

        And now I have reread it at that and it is a much more pleasant article.

    • Pine_Tree

      “Even if that’s not our present, there’s no reason that can’t be our future.”

      Oh there’s lots of reasons: Nature is trying to kill you right now and will eventually succeed. Every person you see (including yourself) is totally depraved. The “knowledge problem” is real and will stay true. Malevolent actors are actively using your stupidity and naivete to make serfs of you and your neighbors. You haven’t the slightest idea how the world works.

      That’s a start.

    • Certified Public Asshat

      For awhile, I tried to simply make better use of my bicycle, but I deeply suck at biking. I learned to do it when I was 22 years old, and I still wobble on every turn. Taking my 7-speed onto big roads didn’t seem like a safe option.

      This makes the entire article even sadder.

      • EvilSheldon

        But more understandable. I now truly get why ‘Dharna’ hates herself so much – it’s because she knows deep down, how much of a silly useless asshole she is. I happen to agree with her.

      • Translucent Chum

        The parents must be so proud. No wonder you have to pay for insurance until they’re 26.

      • rhywun

        learned to do it when I was 22 years old

        wut

      • Ownbestenemy

        My guess, helicopter parents that thought such activities were too dangerous or made it so cumbersome that as a kid said screw this.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        I almost have a hard time blaming the author. Somebody’s parents fucked up and even if the author got a clue right this very instant, it would take a decade to undo most of the damage to their psyche.

        Child rearing is much more important to the function of a culture than our culture gives credit.

    • kinnath

      The mere thought of buying a car made me feel guilty.

      My first car was a 69 Camaro. I did not feel guilty about buying that when I turned 18. It was a rite of passage. I was an adult.

      • Animal

        You know, we were planning on buying a pickup anyway, but now I want to buy the biggest honkin’ F-450 DRW Diesel I can find (which, honestly, is the truck we are looking to buy) and send pictures of it to this guy, with a note saying “fuck you in the neck, you pathetic soyboy asshole.”

      • AlexinCT

        This guy is admitting he never grew up and is still a spoiled little pussy brat that needs daddy government to tell em what the fuck to do or not to do…

  12. AlexinCT

    Weirdo does weirdo thing.….

    If you want to hear a Korean telling you scary things, listen to Yeonmi Park with Peterson or Yeonmi talking to Tim Pool. Pay close attention to the parallels she draws with the things the team blue intelligentsia and democrats are doing in the US and life in North Korea from where she was lucky enough to escape….

    • WTF

      The MSM sure Memory-Holed her in a hurry.

      • Certified Public Asshat

        Yep, as she has explained to those who say “why do you go on Faux news Yeonmi!?”…they are the only ones who will have me.

      • Ownbestenemy

        I think I know a few people that would have her IYKWIMAITYD

  13. Scruffy Nerfherder

    Keep in mind that I’m a fairly militant agnostic.

    I’m pretty flabbergasted by an LP atheist who wants to know how John Locke is relevant to a discussion of natural rights and how that has bearing on the role of religion, specifically the Judeo-Christian tradition, in the development of the philosophy surrounding them.

    • Tundra

      Which is more tiresome, the semi-knowledgeable libertarian atheist or the semi-knowledgeable vegan?

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        That’s a hard choice but I’m going to go with the former because they are so off-putting to those that are religious when they are considering the libertarian movement.

        It’s telling when interacting with one of them that they respond to Rothbard’s arguments on the topic with “Well yeah, but that’s just his opinion man.”

      • Agent Cooper

        Semi-knowledgeable Cross Fitter?

  14. I. B. McGinty

    “Thank you for the overwhelming support it was so hard for me to come out as Them/they/kor/ean.”

    I identify as non-planetary and therefore am not subject to the authority of this planet. It’s a violation of my interstellar rights. * insert a bunch of weird emojis here *

    • AlexinCT

      I told them at work that I identify as a multi-gigaton nuclear device and they better treat me with respek or else…..

      • db

        You’re Superfly TNT?

      • AlexinCT

        To the 36th power, yo!

      • robodruid

        You will go off on them?

      • AlexinCT

        BURN BABY, BURN!

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      What the hell is the slash in the middle of Korean for?

      • rhywun

        An expression of mental instability?

      • Trigger Hippie

        Deconstructing the systemic white-centric heteronormative patriarchal oppression of the English language one slash at a time.

      • Surly Knott

        Just a bunch of slashers.

    • db

      inter/galactic planet/ary

    • Festus

      I identify as a rock.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        “ro/ck”

        Get it right.

      • Ownbestenemy

        You are oppressing the silent k and marginalizing its being. The proper identity is roc/k you shitlord.

      • Festus

        Nowhere near as clever. I’m what gets dropped in Charlie Brown’s halloween sack.

      • Trigger Hippie

        I identity as lemon curry.

      • Trigger Hippie

        This guy gets it.

      • Banjos

        You feel no pain?

      • AlexinCT

        From sniffing ground coconut?

      • Festus

        I am an Island.

      • Banjos

        You never cry?

      • AlexinCT

        Hope he doesn’t flip over…

      • SDF-7

        You are an island?

      • I. B. McGinty

        Ad-Rock?

  15. The Late P Brooks

    Society is to blame

    A 10-year-old boy died in Philadelphia on Saturday after finding a gun in his home and fatally shooting himself.

    Police said the boy and his 8 year-old sister found the gun in a cabinet in their home in North Philadelphia while they were a

    ——-

    “It is sad, we as a society got to get it together,” a neighbor of the boy told NBC Philadelphia.

    That kid would never have died if society had taken my guns away. They’re no good to me, anyway.

    • Rat on a train

      If only that kid didn’t have a home he could still be alive today.

    • AlexinCT

      How many gang bangers got shot? Cause it is obvious they ignore the gang deaths and only peddle this shit, because they know damned well that criminals care very little about laws that prohibit them from arming themselves to take advantage of the fact these laws will only disarm law abiding citizens (or “easier targets of opportunity” if you are a criminal).

      • Akira

        Cause it is obvious they ignore the gang deaths

        Well given that the peak age range for gang activity begins at 14 (and tapers off around 25) many of those cases of gang members killing each other get classified as “a child dying of gun violence”.

    • Sean

      I wonder what dirt he had on Hillary.

    • kbolino

      “It is sad, we as a society got to get it together,” a neighbor of the boy told NBC Philadelphia.

      The mantra of the culture of learned helplessness. It’s not your fault your neighbor’s kid found a loaded gun and shot himself, but it isn’t society’s fault either. And who is society anyway? If the police had charged in and shot the kid, would that have been better? You could have been friends with your neighbors, you could have shown them proper gun safety and handling, heck you could have tried to convince them to get rid of the gun. But because you sit around on the sidelines of your own community blaming problems on “society”, your neighbors don’t work together, they don’t feel safe, and they end up isolated from and fearful of each other.

      Big Daddy Government cannot save you or your neighbors from your own irresponsibility.

      • Sean

        But because you sit around on the sidelines of your own community blaming problems on “society”, your neighbors don’t work together, they don’t feel safe, and they end up isolated from and fearful of each other.

        This morning as I was leaving for work (stepping around all the covid corpses), a neighbor, who I don’t know, wished me a good morning. It was quite pleasant.

  16. Rat on a train

    How could our models be wrong?

    “Everyone was shocked at the VMT recovery,” even though fewer people were driving to work, school and the like, she said. “None of our behavioral models would’ve come out right,” which shows transportation experts don’t really have a grasp on driver behavior.

    But don’t let that stop you.

    • PieInTheSky

      hot women are never wrong

    • OBJ FRANKELSON

      I don’t know about you but I take all of my public transportation advice from 1980’s Broke Shields.

  17. PieInTheSky

    In more covid travel news, flying to Athens was business as usual except the stupid masks and the airline no longer serving food or alcohol on the plane. Many people wore the mask under a their nose. I sat next to some local celebrity which did not wear her mask but the stewardess asked for an autograph and then did not bug her about the mask so I also occasionally took mine down to breath.

    The tell people these days to come to the airport early, but check in/baggage drop still opens 2 hours before flight time so no point in coming any earlier.

    Going there I had to complete an online Passenger Locator Form on a Greek government website and provide proof of vaccine.

    In Romania’s airport I showed the proof of vaccination with my passport.

    In Athens airport they did not care about any proof of vaccine and just gave the briefest of cursory looks at my phone screen which had the PLF but I was basically sent on my way.

    In Athens, half the people were wearing masks on the street. In restaurants they asked for masks, mostly. You could not be seated inside and had to wear a mask to go to the rest rooms. Masks were also required in stores, museums etc.

    In the rural part of Greece we stayed, no one gave a shit about masks. I went into supermarkets restaurants mask-less etc and no one said anything. Some waiters had masks, most did not or chin diapered them. No one on streets / beaches had masks.

  18. The Late P Brooks

    My partner and I are going to keep our car for right now, but I wish we had no reason to. In a better world, a car wouldn’t be of much use because we’d have robust bus and train systems to get around and out of the city. Even if that’s not our present, there’s no reason that can’t be our future.

    The day you and the rest of your tribe disappear up your own assholes cannot come soon enough.

    • l0b0t

      Ya know, when I’m driving home with the kids after a morning of errands and grocery shopping that often entails trips into Brooklyn or Lawn Guyland; I think to myself, the only thing that would make this better would be to schlepp all of us and our purchases around for an hour, hour and a half train ride on each end.

  19. Festus

    I like that band but the bass player has silly hair.

    Maricopa will come to nothing, eventually.

    I will work even if the gubmint pays me better to stay home. Some of us were born with a modicum of pride and I care about my clients.

    Mornin’ Banjos!

  20. Surly Knott

    Interesting article. [Social) Death by purity spiral.

    • db

      Yes, a very interesting read. But real libertarians need not worry about purity spirals.

      • Surly Knott

        LOL

      • Rat on a train

        It’s because of the kilts, isn’t it?

      • juris imprudent

        Absolutely – you get those kilts whirling, and well, it’s not a pretty picture.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Woke is poison

    • Suthenboy

      Herd animals.

  21. The Late P Brooks

    Speaking of dysfunctional families…

    Few members of Congress have been as loud in repeating Donald Trump’s false election claims as Rep. Paul Gosar, the Arizona Republican who rallied supporters of the president to overturn the election and has been at the forefront of efforts to downplay the Capitol riot.

    Gosar has been at the center of the national controversy, which has also been very personal for his siblings — six who had been vocal in urging voters not to re-elect him to Congress because of his fringe views. Now, some want him removed from office, and they criticize Democratic leadership for not acting more quickly.

    Two of his estranged siblings told NBC News in interviews the congressman’s conduct around the riot should be deeply probed and that he should face more serious consequences for his ongoing efforts to delegitimize the electoral results and the attack on the U.S. capitol.

    “I consider him a traitor to this country. I consider him a traitor to his family,” Dave Gosar, a Wyoming attorney, said. “He doesn’t see it. He’s disgraced and dishonored himself.”

    Guess what, Dave. The people who elected him are the ones who get to make that call. What are you, some sort of Stalinist authoritarian? Don’t you believe in DEMOCRACY!?

    • Ownbestenemy

      This subject is one I have shown my kids as how the media are just propagandist. This story was ran basically in Jan, April, early June and now again with nothing really new to add to the story except to push a narrative.

      But apparently Gosar and siblings have been squabbling for a number of years anyway.

      • rhywun

        His siblings sound like a bunch of assholes.

      • Festus

        Siblings squabbling? Say it ain’t so! I haven’t spoken with my Brother since 2015. Our parents are both long dead. Fuck him. Davo is assho.

      • Banjos

        They do it whenever they can. Doesn’t Trump have some attention-seeking niece he has no relationship with that they regularly trotted out when the news got slow?

      • Festus

        “Wrote” a book last September.

      • kbolino

        That sounds like the alleged “friend” of Melania’s, who wrote this.

      • Festus

        “Unavailable” but I remember that one.

      • Sean

        Why is this in the sidebar?

        I blame UCS.

      • Sean

        Seems that women’s pole vaulting & long jump videos have been getting scarcer in my recommendations.

    • Hyperion

      “Capitol riot”

      Why do you refuse to call it the ‘insurrection’ like it is!?

      • WTF

        It was clearly a mostly peaceful protest.
        Oh, wait, that’s only reserved for Antifa/BLM riots, looting, and burning.

      • juris imprudent

        And the virus never spread amongst mobs of the faithful, only within gatherings of the unholy.

    • Agent Cooper

      NBC News is actually worse than CNN.

    • AlexinCT

      I actually told someone that was proudly telling us about all their mental disorders that the problem today is that the whole cult of victimhood has made it attractive to people to outcrazy each other… It was not well received and I was accused of being insensitive.. I told them to grow the fuck up already cause life is hard and being stupid and doing stupid shit just makes it worse and harder, even if doing that dumb shit gets some people to pretend to care.

      • db

        It’s probably not a terrible thing to have people talk openly about these issues, so you know to stay well clear of the sphere of influence/blast radius.

        “Attention. Emergency. All personnel must evacuate immediately. You now have five minutes to reach Minimum Safe Distance.”

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Or ignored, since they’re feelings.

      • juris imprudent

        Oh YOUR feelings can be ignored, particularly in favor of paying attention to MY feelings.

  22. Tundra

    Good morning, Banjos!

    I hope everyone had a great weekend!

    Thanks for the lynx. Boy, I sure can’t wait for my town to look like this!

    Finally, we will all be equal! Well, except for our betters who will of course need to have a comfortable, secluded place in which to relax and recharge. They work hard, ya know.

    Fuck off, slavers. I don’t think this is gonna go anywhere, but the meddling is nevertheless infuriating.

    On the positive side, the sun is out, it’s not stupidly hot and my coffee is perfect. A decent way to start the day.

    Sunspots.

    • AlexinCT

      Boy, I sure can’t wait for my town to look like this!

      Not enough buildings burning, bro…

    • invisible finger

      The morons who thought social distancing was the answer to health and hygiene are the same morons who think multiple families living on top on of another is ideal living conditions. In their minds, favelas would be idyllic living if only people didn’t have free will.

      Zoning or lack thereof isn’t going to make one goddamned bit of difference. There’s plenty of vacant single-family homes and mutli-family buildings in Detroit, Baltimore, Youngstown, Harvey, IL etc. And excess taxation is the sole cause for every one of them.

      • The Last American Hero

        Well, taxes and the odds of getting gunned down in a drive by or having your house looted by crackheads and gangbangers does tend to make some of those neighborhoods less attractive.

  23. The Late P Brooks
    • SDF-7

      :grumbles at his invisibility:

    • Festus

      Heh.

  24. The Late P Brooks

    The roots of domestic terror run deep

    Leaked membership data from the neo-Confederate Sons of Confederate Veterans (SCV) organization has revealed that the organization’s members include serving military officers, elected officials, public employees, and a national security expert whose CV boasts of “Department of Defense Secret Security Clearance”.

    But alongside these members are others who participated in and committed acts of violence at the 2017 Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, and others who hold overlapping membership in violent neo-Confederate groups such as the League of the South (LOS).

    The group, which is organized as a federation of state chapters, has recently made news for increasingly aggressive campaigns against the removal of Confederate monuments. This has included legal action against states and cities, the flying of giant Confederate battle flags near public roadways, and Confederate flag flyovers at Nascar races.

    The erasure of history is an essential phase of the creation of our new Utopia.

    Resistance is futile.

    • kbolino

      a national security expert whose CV boasts of “Department of Defense Secret Security Clearance”

      The things they print in the newspapers to scare the normies are funny. DoD secret clearances get handed out like candy. The major requirements are: a pulse, American citizenship, and a clean criminal record. It’s harder to get a sponsor than to get through the process.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        As long as you aren’t blackmailable you’re golden. Even certain crimes you wouldn’t think are allowable are as long as you come clean.

      • Ownbestenemy

        ^^^ I was typing something similar to that, but also think maybe that person has that listed on their Linkdin profile as some badge of honor.

        Also, I thought publishing leaked information as bad and a no no.

        “The national membership data was provided to the Guardian by a self-described hacktivist whose identity has been withheld for their safety.” Its okay when it is something we want.

      • Hyperion

        As long as there’s still someone left to be cancelled, more work needs to be done.

      • juris imprudent

        Fortunately, rooting out the impure is a never ending task – you just have to start cleaning up closer to home.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Also included: Masons, members of insert denomination here churches, the Rotary Club, and AARP. Cancel them all.

    • CPRM

      increasingly aggressive campaigns against the removal of Confederate monuments. This has included legal action against states and cities, the flying of giant Confederate battle flags near public roadways, and Confederate flag flyovers at Nascar races.

      That sounds so aggressive! Violent even!

    • Hyperion

      All we need is a new Shock and Awe campaign against them rednecks. The pentagon needs to sell some of those weapons, they’re going broke. Nothing could possibly go wrong, just trust our fearless leaders and heroes.

    • The Last American Hero

      If they committed acts of violence in 2017, why were they not tried and convicted?

    • Necron 99

      As an Army brat that landed to Texas from Jr. High School onward, I often wondered why the Confederacy was so ingrained in spirit and lore in these parts. When I learned my G^4 grandfather was a genuine soldier in the American Revolution I started thinking maybe my pride in this knowledge holds some insight into the southern reverence of the Confederacy. Would I have been as proud of my family relation had the British won the “War of Colonial Rebellion” and instead view him as a seditious traitor that fought against my country? Probably not. Thing is many people in this part of the country have Great-Grandfathers who fought and died for a cause they view as mostly noble, with the exception of slavery, and are proud of their family history. Sure, the South lost the war, but it wasn’t the fault of the sacrifices made by their family members, and they are proud of their personal history. Now people are telling them these people, the ones that propagated their very existence, should be forgotten and swept into the dustbin of history. I can see why that wouldn’t sit well.

      • juris imprudent

        a cause they view as mostly noble, with the exception of slavery

        The Nazis had quite a few good aspects, if just wasn’t for that anti-semitism. There’s no real glory in the Lost Cause and we shouldn’t pretend there is. That whole pretense is a product of Jim Crow indoctrination.

      • Necron 99

        As an outside observer I agree with you; the south needed to go. I also see how erasing family history won’t sit well with a large swath of the country. I was merely trying to understand the attitude here. Once you sweep the deplorable human rights violations under the rug what “grandpappy” was fighting for was just and noble.

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        Once you sweep the deplorable human rights violations under the rug what “grandpappy” was fighting for was just and noble.

        Very few Confederates fought for slavery. Hell, almost no southerners owned a single slave. They fought for the sovereignty of their state after being invaded by the North. Back then, American didn’t view themselves as American… they viewed themselves as belonging to Virginia or Georgia, etc.

        JI’s Nazi analogy falls flat hard because the Allies pulled out and let Germany keep it’s sovereignty after winning. The Civil War was no more about slavery than it was about the type of oatmeal people ate. The Union didn’t let the South keep it’s sovereignty in return for ending slavery. It was about the conquering of one nation by another. That is why Southerners fought.

      • Necron 99

        Not sure I agree, although almost no soldiers fighting for the Confederacy owned slaves, it was a large part of the the articles of secession for every southern state. It was viewed by the rank and file as a right of all god-fearing white men to be able to own black slaves, even if one couldn’t afford it. I think the period after reconstruction brought forth a lot of southern apologists to redeem the image of the south as JI asserted and downplay the slavery issue.

        Could the US have said fine, keep your Confederacy but no slaves? That is mental experiment I haven’t thought about.

      • R C Dean

        Look at it from the other angle. The Emancipation Proclamation was very late in the war. Its hard for me to say the North was fighting mainly to abolish slavery when it didn’t actually do so until the war was basically over.

        I think it was mainly about sovereignty, but the subsidiary issue of “sovereign to do what” was mainly slavery. If the South abolished slavery and still tried to secede, we would have still had the Civil War.

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        RC clarifies it much better than I did.

        Slavery may have been a prime factor in the South’s decision to secede, but that is not the same as ending slavery being the North’s reason to invade. These two points have been conflated, but they are very different.

      • Necron 99

        True enough – and The Emancipation Proclamation did not even end slavery in Missouri, Kentucky, Delaware, and Maryland. Seem odd to think the whole war was over slavery while the winning side kept slavery legal – at least for a while.

      • juris imprudent

        The EP was a public relations move when things were not going that well for the Union. And as hypocritical as anything the Confederacy had on offer.

      • juris imprudent

        Southern strategy was always predicated on expanding slave territory to keep balance in the Senate – which thus choked off any possibility of ending slavery by peaceful legal means. If you deny that, you just aren’t very smart.

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        Sorry, can’t hear you over your Biden and MSM felatting.

      • juris imprudent

        The history is there for you, anytime you feel like shedding some prideful ignorance.

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        That’s meant in good nature btw just like your quip was.

      • juris imprudent

        The question predominated American politics from the Missouri Compromise on.

      • l0b0t

        I must point out that the plight of European Jewry did not factor one little bit into FDR’s desire to give the Boche what-for, so his pal Joey could have a free hand brutalizing the Continent.

      • juris imprudent

        FDR could never have given the Boche a damned thing if those idiots hadn’t declared war on the U.S.

      • R C Dean

        They were sinking US shipping , and we were providing (half-assed) naval escorts in the Western Atlantic, before the formal declaration of warThe Battle of the Atlantic made war between the US and Germany inevitable. Indeed, it started before the formal declarations, without even counting the escalating material support we were giving the Brits.

      • juris imprudent

        Sure, we were aiding an enemy. That wasn’t going to galvanize American sentiment to fight.

  25. Stinky Wizzleteats

    -Plastic surgery white Korean
    What was that South Park dolphinoplasty episode, ten years ago? Those guys were prophets, things like that are just around the corner you know if they aren’t here already.

    • Trigger Hippie

      Mr. Garrison’s Fancy New Vagina.

    • Hyperion

      White Koreans are a thing now?

  26. The Late P Brooks

    Sorry to hear about the Spit, Tundra.

    • Tundra

      It’s cool. I didn’t drive it much last summer and I want someone to have it that will use it more.

      Besides, if we end up staying out there, I need something with more engine.

      • DEG

        Except for the standard safety package, the 2021 Mustang is nice.

  27. The Late P Brooks

    This morning as I was leaving for work (stepping around all the covid corpses), a neighbor, who I don’t know, wished me a good morning. It was quite pleasant.

    He didn’t make the Holy Sign of Warding Off from behind his farce mask?

    • Sean

      She was not wearing a mask.

  28. The Late P Brooks

    :grumbles at his invisibility:

    You beat me by two minutes.

  29. The Late P Brooks

    She was not wearing a mask.

    Excellent.

    The smiles of strangers are therapeutic.

    • Festus

      They didn’t used to be so much but now they are. We’re like baby birds, just gaping for a little bit of kindness.

  30. The Late P Brooks

    Speaking of flyovers, has the Confederate Air Force been whitewashed, yet?

    • db

      It hasn’t been called that for decades. It’s now the Commemorative Air Force.

    • Sean

      2002?

  31. The Late P Brooks

    It hasn’t been called that for decades. It’s now the Commemorative Air Force.

    Ah. What a surprise.

  32. The Late P Brooks

    As long as you aren’t blackmailable you’re golden.

    “Yeah, I did it. Enjoyed the Hell out of, too.”

    • Dr. Fronkensteen

      But did you get consent from the pangolin?

  33. Q Continuum

    Mammary Monday reminds everyone in the Great Northwest to stay hydrated and use plenty of lube. Chafing is no joke!

    https://archive.li/MZuFU

    • DEG

      Some good choices in there.

    • Ownbestenemy

      MY girlfriend asked me to strangle her during sex to the point where she could faint.

      That is kinky? Huh.

      • DEG

        It’s only kinky the first time you do it.

      • AlexinCT

        After that it is all Cleveland Steamers, Dirty Sanchez’s, and Rufus Turners…

      • Ownbestenemy

        No Portuguese Breakfast in there? I was bored last night and we watch Deuce Bigalow part 2. So so stupid yet so so funny.

      • AlexinCT

        TJ Hicks is the original pimp, yo..

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        What the hell is a Rufus Turner?

      • AlexinCT

        If I tell you, I would have to kill you because it is a “For Your Eyes Only” thing…

      • Trigger Hippie

        It’s when you look at yours and your partner’s genitals and scream at them “Don’t any of you work?!”.

      • Gender Traitor

        Literal LOL. Bravo!

      • AlexinCT

        In my youth I dated a redhead that actually ended up screaming and calling me a homo, after I stopped having intercourse and grabbed my clothes to leave, because I refused to punch her – in the face – during sex. Me, I thought, “yeah tomorrow you accuse me of violent rape, and I am toast, so fuck no”. She was like “you are a homo cause you are skeered to punch me in the face like I want and think slapping me lightly on the ass is serious foreplay”..

        There are crazy fuckers out there, I tell ya..

      • SDF-7

        He’s just establishing his alibi in advance.

  34. db

    Anyone have a source for Swiss GP-11 7.5x55mm ammo or unprimed brass? DEG?

    • DEG

      GunBroker for the GP-11. RUAG makes it, but only for domestic Swiss use.

      Unprimed brass? GunBroker as well, though there might be some folks making it and selling it. I don’t know of any.

      • db

        Midway and Natchez list the brass (PPU and Norma both make it), but it’s out of stock at bothe places.

      • DEG

        Unprimed brass and GP-11 pop up every now and then on GunBroker. Just keep an eye on GunBroker.

      • db

        I didn’t think to check there until you mentioned it, thanks!

        There’s one on there (100 cases for $188). I’ll pass, thanks. Normally the list price is $34/50.

      • DEG

        The last time I bid on GP-11 on GunBroker, I bid on a case with a maximum bid of $750. I was outbid, but not by much. The prices for GP-11 are coming down. I’d like to see it get back down to $1/round.

  35. Hyperion

    “Infrastructure plan would eliminate local zoning laws, force suburbs to build apartments.”

    I want to force Barak Obama and Bill Gates to live in an apartment building. They can be neighbors. Lead by example, assholes.

    • The Last American Hero

      Do ANY members of congress live in an apartment when not in DC?

      • Hyperion

        I’m sure, they are but humble servants.

  36. DEG

    The Republican-led Arizona Senate’s audit of the 2020 election in Maricopa County reached a significant milestone on Friday, but it will probably be weeks before the findings are released to the public.

    I’d like to think some tightening up of election laws will happen, but I think what will really happen is nothing else will happen.

    The largest item in President Biden’s originally proposed $2.3 trillion infrastructure bill “is intended to literally eliminate local zoning, single-family zoning,” former N.Y. Lt. Gov. Betsy McCaughey told the John Solomon Reports podcast.

    I’d like to see zoning go away, but not that way.

    U.S. District Judge R. Gary Klausner issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) preventing the feds from initiating civil forfeiture against four individuals who sought return of their valuables until prosecutors provide the “specific factual and legal basis” for the action.

    He gave the government until Tuesday to explain why the judge should not issue a preliminary injunction, which would halt planned forfeitures until the merits of the case were decided — a process that could take months.

    It’s a black eye for the feds, who claimed USPV intentionally lured criminal activity and that its customers were an undifferentiated mass of drug dealers and money launderers. The government did not charge any customers with crimes, however, as it seized their belongings.

    The judge did the right thing.

    In the aftermath of announcing earlier this month that they identify as Korean, a British non-binary person is receiving backlash for undergoing numerous “transitional surgeries” to appear Korean.

    I tapped out.

    • rhywun

      The largest item in President Biden’s originally proposed $2.3 trillion infrastructure bill “is intended to literally eliminate local zoning, single-family zoning,”

      I’m curious how that is the “largest item”. How much does it cost to “eliminate local zoning”? Unless what they’re really planning is to erect public housing everywhere. It would be nice if the media followed up on obvious questions.

      • Hyperion

        People would stop fleeing dangerous shithole cities if everyplace was a dangerous shithole. Equity!

      • Drake

        Since the deep state would be taking over zoning – right-voting communities would be left alone. Wrong thinking / voting towns would get a big dose of diversity in the form of government housing / “refugee” resettlement, etc., forced upon them.

      • waffles

        5 years ago I would have thought you were crazy for suggesting that such a motivation were possible. Now I am uneasy and far less sure.

      • rhywun

        There are lawsuits against various upstate NY communities for exactly this reason. It was big news during the Obama years. Don’t know what became of them – probably still grinding through the system.

        They were being sued because there weren’t enough poor people living there. <– no joke

    • Hyperion

      “I’d like to see zoning go away, but not that way.”

      Little pink houses overcrowded apartment complexes for you and me!

      • l0b0t

        LOL… the lady previously taught at a school across the street from Brooklyn’s Pink Houses. Not as idyllic as the song implies.

  37. The Late P Brooks

    I have been looking at potential new homes on the computer. Zillow, realtordotcom…

    There’s a place, out in the country, which looks pretty interesting. No shop, but the price is right enough I can put one up, and have just what I want- and then I went to the “satellite view” of the map. There is what looks suspiciously like a small feedlot about a half of a mile away. Further on-the-ground inspection needed. At least it’s not a pig farm.

    It’ll probably be long gone by the time I am in a position to act.

    • waffles

      I’m in a similar situation. Won’t be able to act on property until Q4 of this year at the earliest. Depending on what happens in the local and macro economy my decision could change quite dramatically.

    • The Last American Hero

      Just rent one of those nice new apartments in suburbia.

      • Plinker762

        He should quit working, sell all of his stuff and move into section 8 housing. Owning nothing and being happy, its the future!

  38. The Late P Brooks

    It would be nice if the media followed up on obvious questions.

    You slay me.

  39. Hyperion

    “Judge stops feds from seizing safe deposit boxes.”

    That was already our stuff, we were just letting them borrow it. All your stuff is belong to us! /the feds

    • DEG
    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      So tedious

    • db

      wouldn’t true tree equity be if your neighborhood had zero trees, or perhaps right at the global average, at most?

      • Ownbestenemy

        We should be uprooting trees in Rat’s and GT’s areas and transplanting them elsewhere.

      • Gender Traitor

        NOOOOOOOOO!!!!! ::chains self to remaining tulip poplar in back of back yard::

      • Rat on a train

        I’m hording trees that rightfully should be in urban communities. I have so many, I haven’t counted them. It isn’t equitable.

      • juris imprudent

        Suthen is conspicuously silent on this.

    • Gender Traitor

      Nice! My neighborhood’s score is 99, with 47% canopy (so close to the supposed goal of 48%!)

      It probably would have been higher if we hadn’t had to get my beloved tulip poplar cut down. 🙁 ::gazes woefully at hollow stump now filled with flowers::

    • Mojeaux

      Half the trees in my neighborhood are old, diseased, and/or pest trees (e.g., my sweet gum trees), Nd need to be chopped down.

    • zwak

      The real question is; are the Black walnuts?

      • zwak

        Sheesh. They/the.

      • Gender Traitor

        We had a black* walnut tree in the back yard that had grown up at a tilt because of the gigantic tree (long gone when we moved in) next to it. The walnut tree leaned over the various utility lines, and when it finally got so hollow we could look up and look THROUGH its trunk, we knew it had to go. The pile of chips from its ground-up stump is now the home of The Brave Little Whirligig.

        *Yes, a lower-case “b.” It’s not a person, dammit!

      • Rat on a train

        I have a token black maple.

  40. Scruffy Nerfherder

    LP atheist – We need more people to support freedom.

    Also LP atheist – Religion is inherently evil.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Of course this is not all LP atheists, but JFC those particular guys irritate the shit out of me.

      • Tundra

        Gee, I wonder why people distance themselves from the LP. What a bunch of dipshits.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        It’s actually kind of funny, this particular guy cannot acknowledge that the ideas of liberty and natural rights sprung out of the Judeo-Christian tradition or show any deference to that at all. He’s your classic Randian.

        But it gets absurd when he calls himself libertarian and doesn’t have any clue who Rothbard is.

      • juris imprudent

        The only particularly J-C element to western rights doctrine is the Protestant view on equality before God, from which we derive equality before the law. Citizenship is rooted in pagan Rome and democracy in pagan Athens – these were the values brought forth from the Renaissance into the Enlightenment. FFS, the French were still going on about the divine right of kings until the cusp of the 19th century, and the Holy Catholic church was fine with that as long as the King was subservient to the Pope.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        “The only particularly J-C element to western rights doctrine is the Protestant view on equality before God, from which we derive equality before the law.”

        Which we needed in order to progress to a modern conception of liberty.

      • juris imprudent

        Yes, but it isn’t exactly a long tradition within pre-Reformation Christianity or any Judaic roots before that.

      • R C Dean

        I might add the concept of individual agency, as well. Not knowledgable enough to know how specific it is to Judeo-Christian philosophy. But its pretty essential to individual, rather than collective, responsibility.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Should probably check OMWC’s passport…

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      On my screen, the line splits between the 1s. It took me a second to realize that it was referring to an 11 year old girl.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      CHAV, no doubt

      • juris imprudent

        White supremacist! It could be a good Muslim child, obedient to her husband and the prophet!

    • Rat on a train

      follow through link

      “Around one in every 2,500 births happens to someone who doesn’t know she’s pregnant (or has hidden it).”

      I’d say that is a significant difference.

  41. trshmnstr the terrible

    Question for the IT types. What’s the business proposition for pushing everything to an aaS consumption model? Seems like the business equivalent of leasing a new car every year. “I can make the monthly payments fit my paycheck”

    Am I too cynical, or are businesses going to a renter’s mentality because they can’t plan for a large occasional expense any more? Any other major upsides that explain why so many business are flocking to that model?

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      In general, it’s the outsourcing of the tech support and the limitation on upfront capital expense that matters to the small business.

    • AlexinCT

      The fact the venders did a bang up sell job on security and who would be responsible to fix things when shit broke…

    • CPRM

      I don’t know what that is. But, the year before I left the radio station they were switching to an open source program to run the over the air systems…and paying a company to implement it and…um…take away the ability to locally add files? Where as the old out dated system took less than a minute to upload new audio to all 4 stations, now they were paying a fee for this company, who implemented open source software, to upload all the audio files to this company’s servers, to be downloaded to all 4 stations, which could take 10s of minutes. This lead to me running from station to station with flash drive to try and get things on air in time…

      • CPRM

        And this was an open source software I already had up and running for testing purposes and could have deployed myself, but what do I know, I’m not some fancy pants company that’d charge them for the privilege.

    • kbolino

      In my experience, keeping things on-prem and FOSS is its own shitshow. Nobody wants to do actual capacity planning and they don’t really know how to do it anyway, the business types don’t understand why it’s better to spend more money upfront and in the right ways, and management doesn’t care about building and keeping pools of institutional expertise. The *aaS offerings allow you to buy into an infrastructure that, at least in theory, is maintained by people who know what they’re doing, can be scaled on demand to meet changing needs, and can be quantified very explicitly and precisely (for good or ill).

      Lack of planning is the root of all these issues though, and *aaS can’t climb you out of a hole your management has dug itself into.

    • juris imprudent

      This business is as cyclical as a sine-wave function, oscillating between centralization and distributed computing. The one sure thing is that the new trend is just an updated and renamed version of something that came before it.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Sharecropping comes to mind.

      • kbolino

        Centralize and simplify all of your management with thin clients! Pay no attention to the man over there and his funny sign that says “isn’t this just mainframe computing with dumb terminals?”

      • Rat on a train

        Thin clients, Ahhhhh! I remember blade servers and the horrible bandwidth problems if you had to transfer data over those connections.

      • Ownbestenemy

        You should join the FAA where that is our ‘new’ technology we are receiving just now!

    • kinnath

      In my cynical point of view, it all comes down to the IRS and different colors of money — capital dollars versus expense dollars.

      • Surly Knott

        ^^^THIS!
        Same thing got us cube farms.

      • Rat on a train

        Cube farms versus open office … fight.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Like our presidential elections, it is between a douche and a turd.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Cube farms, and it’s not even close.

        Open office is the worst of cube farms, amplified. Especially the hostelling open office model. Nothing says “we don’t give a shit about you or your productivity” like forcing you to keep your shit in a locker overnight and fight your coworkers for a desk every morning.

      • l0b0t

        (Looks up from a lifetime of service industry/retail work) There are actual office worksites that do that?!? That’s absolute madness. What benefits are attributed to such a scheme?

      • rhywun

        OMG that is a thing?!

      • Rat on a train

        WTF? I’ve only had to use a hotdesk in limited circumstances. I can’t imagine it being a daily thing.

    • Rat on a train

      Watch how high up the aaS chain you use. IaaS isn’t too bad, but PaaS or SaaS can get you into vendor lock-in trouble.

  42. The Late P Brooks

    What’s the business proposition for pushing everything to an aaS consumption model?

    As in, you no longer buy the Photoshop program, you subscribe to it?

    • kbolino

      They’re both renting instead of owning, but Photoshop-as-a-Service would be more like you handing a bundle of images to a server, telling it to run a Gaussian blur on all of them, and then getting back the bundle of transformed images and a bill at a rate of $0.001 per image.

      If you get a real copy of Photoshop, you can run it own your computer, and your own computer does the work, then it’s not the same as *aaS even if you’re getting a monthly bill.

      • rhywun

        Yeah, the latter trend is just a way for Adobe et al. to rake in more $$$.

        I fucking hate the software subscription model.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        It’s awful. I flat refuse to take part. If you don’t have an upfront purchase price, I don’t buy your software.

      • kbolino

        I fucking hate the software subscription model.

        I am mixed on this. I grew up with IBM PC clones and Windows 3 and the Internet still being a novelty. I appreciate the value of owning a piece of software and having no one be able to take it away from you, nor charge you again for what’s already been delivered.

        However, we are now well into the Internet age, and every goddamn thing can be a security hole. The constant churn of new features and vanity projects is only part of the problem, as critical vulnerabilities have been found lurking even in the oldest parts of codebases (indeed, they are often found there, because attention is heavily focused elsewhere). The increase in overall complexity, shorter schedules, and tighter QA budgets also lead to more bugs making it into the wild and needing patches. Then there’s the brutal reality of the 4GHz barrier and the inability to scale single-threaded performance without major engineering efforts and tradeoffs (like speculative execution, which opened up a whole new avenue for security holes), leading to parallelization instead of brute force on a single core, which has forced software to keep up or die off.

        Subscription isn’t the only solution, but it’s the simplest. Otherwise, you’re paying for every update, or the company has to build its support lifecycle into the original price, or some other more complicated/unwieldy solution.

  43. Ownbestenemy

    Gee now why would the UN want to meddle in these two items: Reparations and BLM?

    https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/06/28/u-n-rights-chief-calls-for-end-to-systemic-racism-seeks-reparations-funding-of-black-lives-matter/

    The U.N. human rights chief on Monday called on the world to immediately dismantle systemic racism against people of African descent and “make amends” to the oppressed — including reparation payments, while groups like Black Lives Matter should receive “funding, public recognition and support.”

    The only people that have ever been through an oppressive time in their existence. Ever.

    • Drake

      So how much are the Arabs, Turks, and Egyptians going to kick in?

      Janissaries and Mamluks were a thing.

      • Ownbestenemy

        We are going to bear that burden for them because reasons.

    • kbolino

      The fall of Rome is going to be a minor footnote in history compared to where this shit is headed.

      • Animal

        We’ve been looking at the vacant lots on either side of our property and wondering where we could quickly throw up a couple of temporary structures if things in the 48 ever got shitty enough for our kids and their families to flee. We would like to buy those lots but in extremis I think we’d say fuck it and run up something temporary. Thing is at least two of the kids would want to bring their in-laws along, too, and as their in-laws are pretty solid folks we’d be OK with that.

        I wonder if Something Bad Happens, how many little semi-independent communities like that would pop up out in the sticks.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        I wonder if Something Bad Happens, how many little semi-independent communities like that would pop up out in the sticks.

        As I’ve mentioned a few times, devout conservative Christians are starting to discuss this openly. It’s half-joking right now, but we have our “compound buddies” picked out. This isn’t the first such conversation we’ve had with church friends, and it’s not like we’re the ones starting the conversations.

  44. The Late P Brooks

    They’re both renting instead of owning, but Photoshop-as-a-Service would be more like you handing a bundle of images to a server, telling it to run a Gaussian blur on all of them, and then getting back the bundle of transformed images and a bill at a rate of $0.001 per image.

    If you get a real copy of Photoshop, you can run it own your computer, and your own computer does the work, then it’s not the same as *aaS even if you’re getting a monthly bill.

    Ah. Thanks.

  45. The Late P Brooks

    The U.N. human rights chief on Monday called on the world to immediately dismantle systemic racism against people of African descent and “make amends” to the oppressed — including reparation payments, while groups like Black Lives Matter should receive “funding, public recognition and support.”

    I’ll get right on that.

    • Rat on a train

      I’ve deposited funds commensurate with my participation in slavery, segregation and institutional racism.

    • creech

      Get out of the UN! I debated this back in a high school class. The other team got to pick the side first – they choose “get out” so my team had to defend the U.S. participation.
      On points, the other team creamed mine (I may have held back) but then the class got to pick the winners: they went with “stay in the UN.” UN is too dreamy and popular an idea and even Trump didn’t pull out.

  46. l0b0t

    COUCH POTATO SQUEAL!!!!! Being ankle deep in a Dallas binge, I wanted some hot, spin-off action. I found a cat who encoded the complete Knot’s Landing; all 14 seasons of the most drama ridden cul-de-sac in Los Angeles.

    • rhywun

      Oh, lord. You need an intervention.

      • l0b0t

        Probably so. I usually just play videos in the background while doing chores at home or listen and glance while at work. I find it helps when the tinnitus flares up.

    • Agent Cooper

      You need to find all of the lost episodes of Sunrise Bay.

  47. The Late P Brooks

    the complete Knot’s Landing; all 14 seasons of the most drama ridden cul-de-sac in Los Angeles.

    I used to watch that show. It was good for a few hearty belly laughs every week.

    Also- Nicolette Sheridan.