Midweek Morning Mittwoch Morgen Links

by | Jul 14, 2021 | Daily Links | 382 comments

“It’s Wednesday, the Old Man is otherwise occupied until the weekend, it’s safe to let the kids out.” Sucker! Here I am!

Birthdays today include a guy responsible for millions of shitty postcards; a presciently named character actor; one of the greatest animators to ever put pen to cel; one of the worst animators to ever put pen to cel; a commie piece of shit who could write a decent song; a president who was born a King; a great scientist I could never take a cotton to; an icon of symbolism, or something like that; a guy who always seemed to show up in my favorite cult films; and one of the icons of my youth, who took a path later that we can all understand.

Now we can dive into the Links pool.

 

More pork than an Iowa slaughterhouse.

 

Keep quiet and obey, Citizen.

 

Yet more annoying performance art.

 

Did I ever mention that it was impossible to find decent Chinese food in Chicago?

 

Harvard: right wing nest of white supremacists.

 

Now we know why Joe loved the trains.

 

Old Guy Music is young guys doing old guy stuff. And wonderfully.

About The Author

Old Man With Candy

Old Man With Candy

Suffer little children, and forbid them not, to come unto me. Wait, wrong book, I'll find something else.

382 Comments

  1. waffles

    Good morning. Last night I encountered some handwringing about “multiracial white nationalism”. Imagine that, multiracial white nationalism. Now that is terrifying.

    • Sean

      “multiracial white nationalism”

      I got nuthin’

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      They do not argue in good faith, so it is fruitless to argue with them.

    • Tonio

      It is the last desperate gasp of race hustlers trying to keep their grift going.

      • AlexinCT

        There is a lot of money & power in this shit and it is hard to give it up….

    • trshmnstr the terrible

      multiracial white nationalism

      Also known as anybody opposing international communism.

    • EvilSheldon

      Remember that to the Woke Progressives, being white isn’t a matter of skin color; rather it involves having the habits and character traits that allow one’s family to live a decent life, free of public assistance payouts.

      From their repulsive standpoint, ‘multiracial white nationalism’ makes perfect sense.

      • zwak

        This.

      • Akira

        Remember that to the Woke Progressives, being white isn’t a matter of skin color; rather it involves having the habits and character traits that allow one’s family to live a decent life, free of public assistance payouts.

        They reveal who the true racists are when they say things like that. Kind of like that SJW who was debating Sargon of Akkad, and he said “freedom just means that white people dominate everyone else”.

    • The Other Kevin

      I’m proud to live in a country that has the most diverse white nationalism in the world.

      • waffles

        This is good. I’m stealing this for future use.

  2. l0b0t

    Who is the greater offender, Hannah or Bakshi? Also, Harry Dean Stanton is the best. He made Big Love worth multiple rewatches.

    • Old Man With Candy

      Hanna, through sheer volume and longevity.

      • l0b0t

        IDK, I’m enjoying implanting subliminal semiotics lessons in my 7 year year old when he groks that so many HB titles are naught but easily self-identifying outgroup (teens, band, teens in band, racing team, etc.) allied with supernatural deus ex machina (talking shark, muggled dog, caveman, talking dune buggy, etc.)to thwart authority figures. Conversely, Crumb was so incensed by Bakshi’s treatment of Fritz the Cat that he promptly killed the character off.

  3. The Late P Brooks

    “How sad it is to see our beloved Harvard Divinity School in such decline and decay,” he wrote. “The disarray of a scattered curriculum, the disenchantment of talented yet deferential faculty, and the disorientation of precious students loom large.”

    West, who added that Harvard has become “market-driven,” tweeted, “Let us bear witness against this spiritual rot!”

    Truth to Power, brother. Don’t let The Man subjugate and oppress you.

    • Agent Cooper

      He’s not wrong.

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        He has identified the fact that it is happening, Harvard has allowed Marxists to rot their institutions in exchange for woke points, as have most of our institutions at this point. He might be a little off on the causality though.

      • Festus

        I’d hardly ever put Cornell West and Divine in the same sentence unless he agreed to star in a John Waters movie or helped me change a blown tire on the highway. That guy is human slime-mold.

      • The Hyperbole

        Other than that he looks like he stepped out of a 70’s blaxploitation movie I know little about him, Is he a race hustler like Jesse and Al?

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        A race hustling acedemic, totally different thing.

      • Not Adahn

        Different sort if race hustler. Less politics and shakedowns of corporations, more academic and shakedowns of donors. Instead of writing a PhD dissertation, he rapped. That sort of thing.

      • juris imprudent

        I believe the proper phrase here would be “He’s right for all the wrong reasons”.

  4. Scruffy Nerfherder

    If I’m reading that correctly, Cornel West is complaining because Harvard didn’t cede total control to him. He’s claiming Jim Crow policies at arguably one of the most leftist institutions in the country.

    • Nephilium

      Well, that shows you how bad it is. If racism and Jim Crow rule even the bastions of leftest halls, how can the rest of the country survive?

      • Rat on a train

        I am shocked to hear that Democrat bastions are rife with racism.

      • Festus

        Democrat bastions rife with racism. Well, they are.

      • Akira

        A lot of my Leftist relatives express shock at homelessness, “income inequality”, crime, shitty schools, police violence, and other dysfunctions in cities that have been run almost entirely by Democrats (often black Democrats) but nevertheless come to the conclusion that white racist Republicans are the cause of those issues.

        Or, if I get them to acknowledge that Democrats control those places, they say that “those are very deep-seated problems that don’t have easy solutions and can’t really be blamed just on one political party“. But of course, this standard goes right out the window when they observe something bad in a Republican-run jurisdiction.

    • invisible finger

      About 12 months ago, Harvard started a massive faculty downsizing. Anyone who has been at Harvard for more than a decade knows this happens about every ten years or so. And it is usually a two-step (and two-year) process. The goal is usually to reduce headcount by 1500-2000. (Which should give you an idea that they hire about 200 faculty a year whether they need them or not.)

      Step 1 is they send out voluntary – and generous – retirement packages to about 3000 people on staff. Typically about a third take the package. (Almost all of the takers are in their mid-60’s or older, but they send out packages to people about 50+.) This has been so routine that voluntary retirements are rare at Harvard because why not wait until Harvard offers you a great retirement deal.

      Step 2 is to find another 500 people and lay them off. Typically this is structured as a another retirement but the retirement package offered is not as generous as the initial offer. If you don’t take this offer, one of two things happen: either your position is eliminated (less common) or your budget is reduced by whatever your salary is (or slightly more) which means YOU have to lay off people that report to you.

      I get this info from my sister who was on Harvard faculty for 30 years and took the initial retirement package in November. I could give more detail, but the bottom line is faculty has to earn. If you’re in the top 25% of earners, you are gold. If not, they will push you out (with a pile of money). Revenue comes either from getting donations or grants. And if your budget gets cut, it makes it harder to get those donors and harder to get those grant applications written.

      Which tells me that West wasn’t bringing in the money and he was getting his budget cut. The reality is he’s old and can’t hustle for money like he used to. And it wasn’t going to get any easier. Because Harvard will absolutely hire younger faculty and they will chase the same donors and apply for the same grants as someone already on faculty, and the lesser earner gets thrown into the retirement-package-go-round.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Makes sense. And West is responding by playing the political/media angle. Figures.

  5. limey

    Good afternoon*, everybody!

    *my truth, literally

    • Sean

      *waves*

      • Festus

        *flutters handkerchief*

  6. The Late P Brooks

    “Harvard has actually done very well in terms of bringing different peoples of different colors and gender at a high level into the administration,” he said. “But it does not yet translate on the ground in terms of faculty. It does not yet translate in terms of being able to speak to the seeking of truth among the students.”

    Perhaps because tenure makes faculty turnover a near impossibility?

    Naah, that can’t be it.

    • Surly Knott

      “The change I want hasn’t happened instantly. Somebody is to blame for this!”

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        Narcissism is a hell of a drug.

  7. Not Adahn

    Did I ever mention that it was impossible to find decent Chinese food in Chicago?

    There is literally no decent Chinese food here. Living in Houston and Austin may have spoiled me, but I swear the food was better in Tulsa.

    • AlexinCT

      Euphemism?

    • Old Man With Candy

      Mesa is the center of Asian food here, and the Dobson Road corridor is amazing.

      • Not Adahn

        We imported a thousand Chinese people here, and yet the market has not responded. It’s enough to make someone doubt Adam Smith. Fortunately, I can always blame it on the various barriers to entry.

    • Jerms

      Same out in Long Island. Grew up in Brooklyn with a great spot right down the block. Nothing decent for miles out here.

  8. CPRM

    It wasn’t until law school that she discovered the Chinese were banned from the US under the 1882 Chinese Exclusion Act, which was not repealed until 1943.

    I’m pretty sure we covered that in middle school.

    • Rat on a train

      A white privilege school, I am sure.

    • juris imprudent

      Pre-woke California middle school taught that. So much indoctrination in white male supremacy!

  9. Not Adahn

    The fact that divinity schools see nothing problematic about hiring atheists speaks volumes about academia.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      The divinity schools are largely leftist institutions anymore. Duke would be another prime example of such.

      Kill, gut it, skin it, wear it like a trophy.

      • db

        Also, strut around in it, and demand the respect it used to command be paid to you.

      • juris imprudent

        While rolling around with your skinsuit in all of the shit and piss you relieved yourself of.

    • AlexinCT

      The fact that they are still peddling Marx’s shit after it killed between 100-150 million people and held 3 billion hostage in prison nations last century and the worst shitholes today are still places doing that shit hard, tells you all you need to know about how fucking retarded these people are…

      And a ton of their resentment comes from the fact others don’t see them as important and accomplished as they see themselves because people actually are more impressed with people that actually accomplish something (like being successful and making money, which is why I suspect they are fucking marxists)…

      • Agent Cooper

        That wasn’t real socialism, bro.

        Also, the wrong Top Men were in charge.

      • Suthenboy

        What are wreckers, hoarders and kulaks? Chopped liver?

  10. The Late P Brooks

    Imagine that, multiracial white nationalism. Now that is terrifying.

    People who just want to be left alone? Who don’t want to be drafted into serving the interests of the progressive narrative?

    What a world, what a world.

    • juris imprudent

      “Sure as I know anything, I know this – they will try again. Maybe on another world, maybe on this very ground swept clean. A year from now, ten? They’ll swing back to the belief that they can make people… better.”

      [For the life of me, I will never understand how a prog can write that dialogue and NOT FUCKING UNDERSTAND IT.]

  11. Not Adahn

    Following up from last night’s thread:

    Whether or not you believe that “dark matter” is an actual thing that exists or is just a flaw in the current theory, it’s a wonderful example of the difference between real and pseudo science. There is an actual measurable effect that lead to the postulation of dark matter, and there are ongoing experiments to detect it based on 1) predicting an observation that should occur if dark matter has the properties they think it does and 2) actually observing the predicted behavior.

    Compare that with systematic racism or global warming.

    • AlexinCT

      White Dwarfs! Black Hos! Red Giants! Blue balls!

    • waffles

      I love, love, love astronomy youtubers like Anton Petrov who have the time to condense academic papers into pleasant videos I can listen to at work. I also love how space is 99% free of politics, observable, and generally doesn’t cause me excessive existential dread.

      Climate science annoys me for the same reasons.

      • Penguin

        Petrov is good. I like Dr. Becky as well, although Petrov’s selection of subjects seems better for lay people.

    • Rat on a train

      There is always the creationist theory. God created the universe. God created man. God created the laws of physics to fuck with man.

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        God: What if I make it seem like there is a standard model and then make it so that the experiments result in null hypotheses… lol.

        God, trolling us since 15 Billion Years BCE.

      • AlexinCT

        That was a joke with a long leadup.. He had to wait some 15 billion years for us to get there…. Then again, when you create the concept of space-time just to set up the joke, it might not mean much to you to have to wait because of that system you created…

      • juris imprudent

        …The Aristocrats!

      • Not Adahn

        make it so that the experiments result in null hypotheses… lol.

        A major plot point in Three Body Problem

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        Interestingly, it seems to be written in traditional Chinese, and since one of the plot points involves a decidedly non-flattering take on the Cultural Revolution, I would assume that the author is from Taiwan.

        However, the Wiki article only refers to him as ‘Chinese.’

        Things that make you go hmmm.

      • Not Adahn

        Yeah, the underlying attitudes are pretty alien to me. “People need to be ruled” is taken as a given. The Cultural Revolution is used to demonstrate that people can’t rule themselves so the (only) other two options are “humans should be exterminated” and “aliens need to conquer and rule humanity.”

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        That is interesting but I was alluding to the fact that Wikipedia seems to have fallen in line with the PRC’s official line regarding the ROC.

      • Not Adahn

        Wikipeda is run by commies? Why, I never!

      • Not Adahn

        Oh, and I found the third book (Death’s End) to be the most interesting, since it was written in reverse — not chronologically, but narratively. The hero fucks everything up, then the background characters/inertia dig themselves out of the mess, the the hero makes everything even worse. And it escalates — the enslavement and extermination of the human race is is only the third worst thing the hero “accomplishes.”

        Kind of an indictment of technocratic rule.

  12. waffles

    More than 200 shopping malls had been looted by Monday afternoon, Rioters looted and destroyed shops, leading to severe shortages of basics. Yooooo I think SA could use some of that multiracial white nationalism right now. Because the tribal infighting and destruction seems far, far worse.

    • AlexinCT

      This is Antifa’s vision of the new America too, right?

      • waffles

        I think we are too squeamish to make the connection. But essentially, yeah.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Antifa thinks that by destabilizing the communities they can create political room for an implementation of their utopian vision.

        What’s happening in South Africa is directly related to tribal affiliation.

        So yes, what will happen if Antifa gets their way is a return to tribalism as people retreat to the safety of who they know and trust.

    • Festus

      They are going after warehouses and factories, now. Soon they’ll be burning the crops and slaughtering livestock and farmers (some more). Fucking feral people.

      • db

        Are they just burning warehouses, or are some smart folks emptying them out to their own pre-planned stashes?

      • AlexinCT

        Saw a video of some enterprising police officers making sure they took the merchandise out and home before the place was burned down, if that’s what you are asking about…

      • db

        I guess more of what I’m suggesting, is that the warehouses may be being properly looted by organizations/people who have an idea where all this is going, and are hoping to build a safety stock, or alternately, a stash from which to supply their militia or dole it out to develop a dependent and pliant constituency.

      • waffles

        I think the latter. No official source will really let you know one way or the other. Not that official sources can be trusted. NPR told me yesterday at noon that order was restored and things were getting back to normal. That is almost definitely not the case.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        One might think NPR has difficulty acknowledging that post-apartheid South Africa is still a shithole.

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        They might have to admit that the ANC failed to bring about a socialist utopia too.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        It will go the same way all of these things do. Mandela was the great hope, but Mandela is dead and his heirs screwed it up. But the idea remains.

      • ignoreLander

        NPR told me yesterday

        Well there’s your problem.

      • waffles

        The last video I saw showed hundreds of vehicles lining a road and people filling them with the contents of a warehouse. Could be amazon or similar. It’s no longer opportunistic looting. It’s coordinated destruction. Looks 100x worse than our BLM/antifa scourge.

      • Drake

        It sure has a permanent look to it. Kind of like the transition from Rhodesia to Zimbabwe.

  13. The Late P Brooks

    In addition to mentioning the lack of tenure, he noted the administration’s “hostility toward the Palestinian cause.” The school has reportedly invested nearly $200 million in companies linked to Israeli settlements in Palestinian territories.

    The lack of support and well wishes from the administration after his mother died were also mentioned in his resignation letter. “In my case, a serious commitment to Veritas requires resignation — with precious memories but absolutely no regrets!” he wrote.

    West said Tuesday that he was surprised by the reaction to his resignation letter, which he made public to start a “substantive public conversation about the prospects for excellence in higher education.” He emphasized that the problems he laid out are not exclusively confined to the halls of Harvard.

    Go pout in a corner, you prissy attention whore.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      I didn’t catch that bit about his mother. What an arrogant twat.

    • Gustave Lytton

      Surprised? BS. That was his attempt to start a forest fire.

  14. Not Adahn

    There really needs to be more smiting

    • waffles

      God has spoken. No idols before him.

      Bravo based 1st commandment poster.

    • Tonio

      Yeah, we already did “plague.”

  15. The Late P Brooks

    Compare that with systematic racism or global warming.

    Cornell West is deeply dissatisfied and unhappy. If that’s not systemic racism, what is?

    • AlexinCT

      Prissy marxist whoremonger feels marginalized, stop the world and give him his due!

  16. Swiss Servator

    “an icon of symbolism, or something like that”

    *narrows gaze*

    • I. B. McGinty

      I just got it. Needz moar caffeine…

      • Not Adahn

        I wonder if they’re going to rename their “China Crash” model.

  17. Cy Esquire

    “Amtrak, a for-profit rail company, receives federal and local subsidies and is subject to oversight by its inspector general.”

    LoL! That was a good one. Tell me another!

    Railroads have been keeping single mothers well paid for almost 2 centuries now. $1 at a time.

  18. The Late P Brooks

    “Any responsive records are currently part of an open and pending criminal investigation,” an attorney for the Amtrak watchdog wrote in denying The Post access to the documents.

    “Premature release could afford a virtual roadmap through the government’s evidence … which would provide critical insights into its legal thinking and strategy and could jeopardize the proceedings by more fully revealing the scope and nature of the government’s case,” the lawyer added.

    We have to sterilize the evidence.

    • Plisade

      Strip clubs and “premature release”. Hmmm…

  19. Timeloose

    From the Amtrak article.

    This stood out for me: Amtrak, a for-profit rail company, receives federal and local subsidies and is subject to oversight by its inspector general.

    Have Amtrak ever made a profit or has it basically made up for shortfalls with Gov money?

    Also the Amtrak people really blew their careers for a few suits and nights out at a strip club? It’s like they were negotiating for a small town garbage contract. Talk about the best and the brightest.

    • OBJ FRANKELSON

      It is a little surprising. My dad retired from Union Pacific a few years back. The railroad unions are still very powerful. Propped up by the government, but very powerful all the same.

      So it is surprising that they got fired to begin with and that these guys would risk a stupidly generous pension for nonsense. It is also a little odd that this information even saw the light of day.

      • Timeloose

        It is probably just the blatant stuff they got caught for. Some underling might have found out and ratted to their superiors or the media. Instant promotion!!

  20. Tonio

    “British Jews to get Apology 800 years after…”

    I want the position of official homo spokesperson for the purposes of government apology receiving for sodomy laws. Limo ride, maybe fifteen minutes of standing around in a suit while other speechify, five minutes accepting the apology graciously yet chidingly, then a nice reception with free food. I could probably get away with the odd grope, you know, for reparations.

    • leon

      I was not aware that Jews had been expulsed from England. I’m not surprised as it was common occurance, but didn’t know about this instance.

      • l0b0t

        IIRC, the word Holocaust was coined to describe the expulsion (and rampant wholesale murder) of England’s Jewry.

      • UnCivilServant

        It was coined to describe a burnt sacrifice in antiquity.

      • l0b0t

        You are correct sir! I was recalling an Alan Ereira or Simon Schama program where they presented a letter from the Pope to Longshanks describing his behavior (murdering the heads of Jewish households, making Jews wear a yellow Star of David on their clothes, confiscating all of their property, and finally expulsion) as Holocaustum.

    • AlexinCT

      Dude, I spewed my drink all over the monitor reading this… You should put warning labels on your posts with this sort of real hard snark to protect us hard laughing folks…

      • Tonio

        Thanks, bro.

    • Festus

      You know that Henry I is just a stepping stone to get to Oscar Wilde, right?

      • Festus

        Wasn’t he the first #metoo?

    • Nephilium

      I think Alan Turing used up the official apology. Of course, it came just a “couple” years after his death.

  21. Cy Esquire

    Any beard guys have a recommendation for a type of beard oil or moisturizer. Trying to reduce my dander.

    While I’m asking, recommendations for after shave for sensitive skin?

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Castor oil, cheap and it works

      Add a scented oil like eucalyptus to it if you so desire, but go lightly.

      I shave with castor oil and do not require an after shave because of it. The downside is it makes a mess of your razor.

    • UnCivilServant

      I wish I had advice. I tend just to deal with it. I know, lousy strategy.

    • db

      I just let mine grow out in a bristly expression of my inner chaos.

    • Nephilium

      I’ve found lotion based after shave works best for sensitive skin.

      For beard oil, I blend my own (here’s a quick primer).

      • Festus

        I shave clean now but it makes me look like an angry old man. Who knew that frown lines are genetic? I sure don’t miss the trimming, though. I’ll embrace the elder look. Wasn’t like I was gonna get lucky anytime soon.

    • Pine_Tree

      I used one called Honest Amish back when I let it grow.

      • R.J.

        I also use Honest Amish. Works well on short trimmed beards.

    • OBJ FRANKELSON

      My wife has very curly hair and she uses vitamin E oil that you can find in the ‘ethnic products’ aisle. I have used it on my beard and it worked pretty well. A fraction of the price of the beard oil they sell in the men’s grooming section.

      • Festus

        Mane and Tail. No joke.

    • Sean

      I’ve used Proraso aftershave. I’m not currently using any though since I went electric.

    • Cy Esquire

      Gracias! back to my shopping and research!

    • EvilSheldon

      I have really soft skin and a really tough beard. My best shaving results (for my face, anyway) have been with Cremo and an old-fashioned adjustable safety razor.

      • Agent Cooper

        I use the cheapest Barbasol I can find. It also helps that I only really need to shave like 2-3 times a week.

      • Agent Cooper

        I also shave in the shower. The hot water/steam combo is more essential than the cream.

  22. db

    British Jews to get apology 800 years after antisemitic expulsion

    “…back in 1290 when the Jews were expelled from England,”

    The way I read that, *all* the Jews were expelled from England. So, did the same Jews sneak back in, or should England be apologizing to the descendants of Jews anywhere but England?

    • UnCivilServant

      You always miss some people, and others will have wandered in later.

    • leon

      I’m waiting for the apology to the Welsh, Scots, Cornish, Manx, and Irish

      • UnCivilServant

        I’m not appologising to myself!

        Irish/English hybrid.

      • leon

        Hateful

      • Agent Cooper

        You just have to half-apologize.

      • Not Adahn

        Then English are just wankers. You were colonized by wankers. You couldn’t even find a decent civilization to be colonized by!

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        *The Romans clear their throat*

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        I have actually not seen that film. I have heard good things though.

      • Not Adahn

        It is hilarious, right up to the point where the baby dies. Then it’s only hilarious half the time.

      • Breet Pharara

        “We apologize to the Welsh, Scots, Cornish, and Manx. Fuck the Irish, they deserved it.” ~the correct British response

      • UnCivilServant

        Would you like your car bomb in original or extra spicy?

      • Nephilium

        Irish extra spicy? So it’ll have bell pepper in it?

      • Not Adahn

        Curry powder.

      • UnCivilServant

        That reminds me, I wanted to make deviled eggs today.

      • Not Adahn

        There was an Irish pub that made a yummy curry boxty. Alas, it’s gone stereotypical “pub” under the new ownership.

      • Spartacus

        Letting you out of the tin mines long enough to sleep is as much apology as you’re going to get.
        You should be grateful.

    • blackjack

      Apologies are meaningless when the come from decendents 16 generations removed from the wrongdoers. I am not remorseful for anything i have not done. Not even a little.

    • Rat on a train

      British Jews to get apology 800 years after antisemitic expulsion

      “…back in 1290 when the Jews were expelled from England,”
      So they have to wait another 69 years?

  23. The Late P Brooks

    Stop politicizing everything, and do exactly as we say

    The National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO) told CNN in May that more than 250 public health officials had left their jobs since the pandemic started — many of them against their will, and others under pressure from people opposed to public health efforts to control the pandemic.

    Fiscus said she is worried about the safety of the people of her state. “I am angry that public health is political in this state,” she told CNN. “Public health should never, ever, ever be political,” she added.

    Damned disobedient Morlocks. They should know heir place.

    • Not Adahn

      National Association of County and City Health Officials (NACCHO)

      *racism detector goes incandescent, then detonates*

      • blackjack

        Looks like the NACCHOs want some cheese to go with their wine.

      • Grosspatzer

        These comments are getting quite cheesy.

  24. The Late P Brooks

    Earlier Monday, three health policy experts published a commentary in the Journal of the American Medical Association’s JAMA Pediatrics arguing that teens should be allowed to decide for themselves whether to get vaccinated.

    “Children and adolescents have the capacity to understand and reason about low-risk and high-benefit health care interventions. State laws should therefore authorize minors to consent to COVID-19 vaccination without parental permission,” Larissa Morgan of the University of Pennsylvania Carey Law School, Jason Schwartz of Yale University and Dominic Sist of the Department of Medical Ethics and Health Policy at the University of Pennsylvania wrote.

    “In the context of vaccination, some older minors may possess a more accurate understanding of the risks and benefits of a vaccine than their hesitant guardians.”

    It’s the undeveloped, pliable brains.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      They are seriously playing with fire here. There are a lot of parents who will not tolerate being fucked with when it comes to their kids, myself included.

      • leon

        Kids are smart enough for their own choices on Abortions, vaccines, sex changes and hormone inhibitors, and any other policy the left wants that is opposed by parents.

      • Agent Cooper

        Now do gun ownership.

    • PutridMeat

      Are they also allowed to refuse the vaccine over a parents request that they be vaccinated? Or is this just another example of asymmetry?

      I also look forward to ‘policy experts’ filing an amicus brief with the 4th circuit en banc; I mean if “children and adolescents have the capacity to understand about low-risk and high-benefit health care interventions” [whistle blows; stolen base, assuming the conclusion in the postulate. 15 yard penalty, loss of position and retirement benefits], surely an 18 year old is developed enough to buy a handgun before heading off to Syria to have his legs blown off.

      • Old Man With Candy

        Hey Putrid, I wasn’t around last night, so I’ll take this opportunity to give kudos on a fine article. “Chemical Applications of Group Theory” was a life-changing read for me. Yeah, I know, it’s that dull 1/r physics rather than high energy or cosmology, but still.

        Of course, that ties in with one of the birthdays today. Circles, man, circles, it’s all circles.

      • PutridMeat

        Mercy-Buckets. I’m actually more and more partial to the applied side of things as time goes on. There’s a practicality that has value.

      • db

        Let me add my appreciation for your article last night. It’s a lot to digest, and I didn’t have the time to write an appropriately thoughtful comment on its content. It’s definitely something to think about.

    • EvilSheldon

      “Children and adolescents have the capacity to understand and reason about low-risk and high-benefit health care interventions.”

      Only if their parents have taught them that kind of reasoning. They fucking well ain’t getting it in the schools. And far too many parents are totally on-board with teaching their kids to be panic-stricken wimps.

  25. Festus

    Although the links are appreciated I think one of our resident (((hosts))) owes me a few spinners. I’m a completist and your birthday links are cat nip. It’s mid-week and Wapner is on in ten minutes!

    • Old Man With Candy

      Spinners? My understanding of that word may be different than yours.

      • Not Adahn

        Spinners for his dubs.

      • Old Man With Candy

        I recognize that as English but have no idea what it means.

      • Festus

        There can be both!

      • Agent Cooper

        Well, it will be working its way back to you, babe.

    • Animal

      I think more information is needed. Panther Martin? Mepps? What’s your preferred brand? What size?

    • Timeloose

      The Rubber Band, band man?

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      How did I not know this existed?

    • Sean

      Eeeeeew.

    • l0b0t

      Sigh… As much as I am an unabashed fan of The Lego Group, they can fuck right off on this. Until they go after Mega-Blocs, Best-Lock, and all the other greasy ChiCom knock-offs, they can keep their virtue signaling mouths shut.

      • Not Adahn

        Yup. That patent has expired.

    • Agent Cooper

      I like how the tweet tries to conflate 2 things.

  26. Pope Jimbo

    Well you know that that Asian history material is going to be seriously slanted.

    • Grosspatzer

      Now there is an angle I had not considered. Thanks, Your Eminence.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Notice how I kept things low keyed and reasonable? No yellow journalism here!

    • OBJ FRANKELSON

      Well, you know they won’t get to the point they are driving at.

    • DrOtto

      This is a slippery slope.

      • PutridMeat

        I think I watched that video once….

    • Rat on a train

      You need to reorient your thinking.

      • Swiss Servator

        Boo! Boo I say!

        *narrows gaze at the lot of ye*

      • juris imprudent

        Are you flexing your occidental privilege there?

  27. The Late P Brooks

    Zero risk is what they want

    “We need to reduce infections because we don’t know what long COVID does,” says Kelley Lee of Simon Fraser University in Vancouver, British Columbia, who leads a pandemics and borders research group. That group is advocating for tougher quarantine rules in Canada, raising the specter of new shutdowns. But other experts suggest that such severe moves are unlikely.

    What is it about the former Crown colonies that leads them to be dominated by such hopeless cowering pussies?

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      I think it has been posited before that all the subjects of the Crown that had any stones died in the two world wars.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Suck my long Covid you panicmonger.

    • Spartacus

      I learned a new word today. Thank you Q.

  28. The Late P Brooks

    Prime Minister Justin Trudeau indicated last week that vaccinated travelers will be admitted before those who are not vaccinated, but the government has said a full reopening could require 75% of Canadians — or more than 85% of the eligible population — to be fully vaccinated.

    “The goal that has been set is extremely high,” says Nathan Stall, a geriatrician at Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto. “We hope we get there, but we may never actually get there.”

    Meanwhile, some Canadians have been making their own decisions about acceptable risk.

    When Mayor Dilkens’ niece recently married in Michigan, his own mother was unwilling to miss the ceremony. She flew from Windsor to Toronto and then to Detroit — an eight-hour journey that ended less than an hour’s drive from where she’d started.

    Decisions like that do not surprise Stall, though the policies that drive them merit reexamination, he believes.

    In Canada, there’s a sense that “we’re all in this together,” he says. “I think there’s a huge hesitation to move ahead and allow certain members of society to move ahead and [be] able to have social privileges and freedoms that others don’t yet have.”

    It’s better for everyone to be equally miserable. Misery equity will bring society together.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Misery equity is usually how it works. It’s hard to build people up but it’s easy to tear them down.

      • AlexinCT

        Marxist Utopia is basically this as a practical application: you have to bring everyone down to the same low level to guarantee that concept of equity…

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Just about everybody, the Central Committee members live like kings. Of course they have to worry about being shot so there’s drawbacks there too.

    • Q Continuum

      “we may never actually get there”

      And what then? Canada just turns into the Iron Curtain.

      Fuck. Off. Slaver.

      • Rat on a train

        Maple Curtain

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        Moose Curtian

  29. Pope Jimbo

    Finally someone at the TSA is doing something useful.

    MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) — A TSA worker is accused of taking dozens of photos of women passing through MSP Airport.

    Prosecutors say 37-year-old Bjorn Broms used his phone to take pictures of the airport’s surveillance video. Investigators found 42 photos, all of young women wearing revealing or tight clothing.

    • AlexinCT

      They could be planning bad things and the FBI told us to keep our eyes open for that!

    • UnCivilServant

      Surveillance images are not public, and Broms is charged with breaking government data rules.

      I was wondering what the actual offense was. Since these people were in public spaces having chosen to dress that way. So if he’s directly filmed, photographed them, there wouldn’t be an issue?

    • leon

      I know it’s not fashionable, but wearing revealing clothing and then expressing outrage at being oogled by creeps is duplicitous. The guy deserves what he gets, but I consider this like posting things on the internet. When walking in public you have little expectation of privacy.

      • Nephilium

        /goes and puts on cycling kit

        leon… my eyes are up here!

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Add me to this unfashionable pile. Don’t want to be a victim of [insert crime or offense here]? Don’t make yourself look like an easy victim.

        Doesn’t mean you deserve to become a victim or that the offender deserves any reduction in blame, but it certainly undercuts your complaint when you put a big flashing neon sign over your head that says “really great [insert crime or offense here] victim right here”.

      • Animal

        I don’t think a man looking at a pretty girl automatically makes the girl a “victim.” I’d say it’s just an inescapable fact of human nature. Guys are gonna look at girls, and that’s that.

        If looking at pretty girls is now going to be a crime, they’re sure as hell going to have to lock me up.

      • trshmnstr the terrible

        Guys are gonna look at girls, and that’s that.

        UNMUTUAL!

        *cancels Animal*

      • Animal

        If I was “unmutual” (whatever the hell that is) in a major Midwestern city, would I be…

        Unmutual of Omaha?

      • Swiss Servator

        Unmutual of Omaha is people, you count on to cancel us…

      • waffles

        Hey Aqualung

      • banginglc1

        The crime here isn’t taking pictures of people in public. It’s that he did it while I was paying him to assault me for safety.

      • db

        It isn’t assault if you consent that coerces your consent as a condition of exercising your right to freedom of travel.

      • db

        It isn’t assault if you consent to it under a regime that coerces your consent as a condition of exercising your right to freedom of travel.

    • UnCivilServant

      I’m torn. I admire the skill but hate grafitti

    • Festus

      Always enjoy those. Thanks, Sean!

      • Sean

        I gotta balance out some of the derp I drag in here.

  30. Grummun

    I like the totally gratuitous stock pole dancer pic in the Amtrak article. Super classy, Post.

  31. Pope Jimbo

    Can anyone explain what this gibberish is?

    “A nonprofit wants to bring a food-business incubator to Minneapolis’s Northside — and it may have recently made a significant step toward that goal. U.S. Rep. Ilhan Omar, the Democrat from Minnesota’s 5th district, announced during a July 2 press conference that she advanced a proposal for $1 million in federal funding to go to the development of Northside Economic Opportunity Network’s planned Food Entrepreneurship Incubation Center.”

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      It’s a grift.

      The incubator will be staffed by Omar’s cronies. They will do nothing except a few media releases and campaign for more money because the problem won’t get solved.

      • db

        B-I-N-G-O

      • Pope Jimbo

        Sigh. I truly thought cash was the water that would make those food deserts bloom.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        It’s the old saw about when your job security is dependent on the problem not being solved, then the problem will never get solved.

    • Plisade

      She’s got a useless wannabe-chef relative who needs a job?

    • Animal

      Show me in the Constitution where the Imperial government is allowed to spend money on any such thing.

    • AlexinCT

      It’s cover for an Asian prostitution ring?

    • Spartacus

      Now that’s getting re-elected the old fashioned way.

    • Nephilium

      I’ll gladly explain it to you, but I’ll need good faith money from your part that you are truly interested in it. But you’ve got to make a decision soon, there’s only so many openings.

    • OBJ FRANKELSON

      It would be entertaining to see the Chicoms blunder into Afghanistan. It is called the ‘graveyard of empires‘ for a reason.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        They’re filled with hubris and the right people can make it work syndrome. Of course that’s what they’re going to do given the opportunity and I say we let them.

      • leon

        Yes but they can commit genocide and no one will call them out.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Do you know who else committed genocide and had it not work out as intended?

      • leon

        Thanos

      • juris imprudent

        The Isrealites in Canaan?

      • l0b0t

        I think i may have mentioned this before – I’ve spent a few afternoons drinking with some old fellows in Brighton Beach who turned out to be veterans of the 40th LCOF (Limited Coalition Of Soviet Forces) and they were quite sanguine, yet amused, about US efforts in the region. I would love to see how giggly they get if China blunders in.

    • db

      How funny would that be, if China made the same mistakes the Americans, Soviets, British, and others have made so many times before.

  32. Festus

    Re: the photo at the top – Cute white girl always draws a crowd…

    • Pope Jimbo

      I think that is the opening scene of “Jukakke – The Leavening”.

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        So she is the Goyim the have come in and ‘turn on the water’ during the sabbath?

      • Swiss Servator

        OK< I will give you that one - that was good.

    • Old Man With Candy

      She’s close to being a spinner.

    • R C Dean

      Cute white girl needz moar SQUATS!

  33. The Late P Brooks

    I also look forward to ‘policy experts’ filing an amicus brief with the 4th circuit en banc; I mean if “children and adolescents have the capacity to understand about low-risk and high-benefit health care interventions” [whistle blows; stolen base, assuming the conclusion in the postulate. 15 yard penalty, loss of position and retirement benefits], surely an 18 year old is developed enough to buy a handgun before heading off to Syria to have his legs blown off.

    Also sufficiently “grown up” to be served a beer in a public restaurant.

    • OBJ FRANKELSON

      If you can take a bullet, you can take a shot.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      A HANDGUN?! Prepareth thee ye olde fainting couch!

  34. prolefeed

    From the dead thread about symmetry:

    “From first principles I can’t see why physical symmetry should say anything about reproductive fitness, if I can step outside the absolute conviction in my bones that drives me to appreciate symmetry.”

    Your working off the wrong first principle – such an almost universal, strong preference in humans for physical symmetry, especially in the face, is extremely strong evidence that such symmetry does enhance reproductive fitness. The evidence thus puts the burden of proof on you to show that symmetry doesn’t actually do much to enhance physical fitness.

    Most of reproductive fitness derives from immunity from the smallest predators, the ones that cause disease, because they are far and away the largest cause of mortality during childhood and the prime reproductive years. The best way to maximize immunity is to avoid inbreeding, because having two different sets of genes for immunity to specific diseases gives you protection against a broader swath of such diseases than someone who in effect only has one set of genes.

    The theory, the details of which I won’t go into here, is that being attacked by diseases when a fetus or young causes the body to express those developmental genes in an asymmetric way. Thus, our notions of beauty is strongly influenced by symmetry.

    • PutridMeat

      I get that bilateral symmetry (in humans and others) is a signal of health and reproductive fitness. My question is why? What is the origin of evident property of more advanced animals? I can imagine an amorphous blob that is just as resistant to disease as a ‘perfect’ human [quickly takes a few glances back at Q’s link, returns 2 minutes later…], but has no physical symmetry. So I don’t question the fact that symmetry indicates physical fitness, I wonder however if there’s an underlying casual connection. Or are they both the result of some underlying principle? Or just an accident of simple processes naturally leading to symmetry AND Darwinian selection in that process leading to fitness? IOW, I’m not trying to show that symmetry doesn’t enhance physical fitness, or at least signal it if not be casual, I’m wondering what is the underlying basis of that evident connection?

      • Agent Cooper

        Because we have 2 eyes, 2 nostrils, 2 nipples, 2 arms, 2 legs, etc. It’s as if the human body was designed for a symmetric universe. So, to not have symmetry would be an automatic signal to others that something is wrong?

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        “Because we have 2 eyes, 2 nostrils, 2 nipples, 2 arms, 2 legs, etc.”

        Speak for yourself.

      • AlexinCT

        You have the same problem Two-pack had when he ended being renamed One-Pac?

      • db

        Perhaps symmetry in larger animals is important for mobility and situational awareness. For instance, a land animal that is asymmetric might not be able to detect and respond to threats from all directions as effectively as a symmetric animal. Which brings up the question why we don’t actually have 360 degree vision and be tripedal in a way that allows easy change of direction.

      • db

        Probably one reason for our bilateral symmetry stems from the need to have a serial processing of food–which leads to a relatively linear alimentary canal, around which everything else is built. Most central nervous systems seem to have evolved from a main nerve that got big at one end where the main senses ended up being located. So the dual linear natures of the alimentary canal and central nervous system have evolved into a rough cylinder. An interesting question would be why not a trilateral or radial symmetry. My guess at an answer for that question is “gravity,” i.e., there’s an up and a down even in water, and since the big animals evolved initially in water, gravitational acceleration made certain patterns more effective.

        It’d also be interesting to see what evolution would produce in a minimal or absent gravitational field.

      • Old Man With Candy

        An interesting question would be why not a trilateral

        The Ramans do everything in threes.

      • AlexinCT

        God dang noodlers!

      • Animal

        Soyu, Shio, and Tonkotsu?

      • db

        One of my absolutely favorite sci-fi books. The sequels got tedious, as much of Clarke’s later writings did, but they still had decent parts.

      • Old Man With Candy

        It’s a great book, maybe my second favorite Clarke fiction (first being Childhood’s End).

        When I was in college, I weaseled my way into a graduate seminar course on SETI. Maybe 10 students. Different guests each week. One week, the guest was Clarke, who was highly annoyed that every question he got after his talk was about what the Ramans looked like.

        Yeah, the sequels were pretty pedestrian.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Why “Childhood’s End”? I read that book as an indulgence of Clarke’s communist and new age hocus pocus tendencies.

      • db

        Childhood’s End creeped me out so much I only ever read it once.

    • creech

      All you Darwinist heathens: it is because we were created in God’s image and that’s they way He wanted things. Q’s friends just were first in line when the boobs and bootys were handed out.

    • Old Man With Candy

      Koufax nods.

    • Agent Cooper

      “He does play during the Sabbath and on Jewish holidays,”

      Sounds more like an Unorthodox Jew.

      • creech

        There’s probably some rabbi somewhere who can interpret the Talmud to allow it. If the Amish have clever ways to skirt their rules, then (((they))) do too.

      • juris imprudent

        Sounds more like an Unorthodox Jew.

        But enough about his delivery.

  35. Festus

    Good Day sweet Glibbies, wherever you are…

  36. The Late P Brooks

    Back to this:

    “Children and adolescents have the capacity to understand and reason about low-risk and high-benefit health care interventions. State laws should therefore authorize minors to consent to COVID-19 vaccination without parental permission,”

    What monumental hypocritical condescension. “Children should be allowed to do things we approve of.”

    But if those same “wise beyond their years” children want to do something the nannies do not approve of? What then, do we suppose?

    • db

      What, like buy a handgun before the age of 21?

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Or, and I’m just spitballing here, children are pliable and easily manipulated and they want to take advantage of that reality which is exactly what they want to do. As for the low cost, maybe/maybe not but unless a child has some kind if serious preexisting condition the benefits to the individual child receiving the shot are dubious at best.

    • Gender Traitor

      “But their parents should keep these poor children on the folks’ health insurance until the kids are 26.”

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Good point. The cognitive dissonance and hypocrisy is so expansive that it’s hard to keep up.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Well there is still pushback from kids having to get mommy and daddy to sign off on chopping off bits and pieces and sewing on/in other bits and pieces. So roll the narrative with something that people would probably be okay with, regardless that it is contradictory to anything.

      Once that foot is in the door, normalize it.

  37. The Late P Brooks

    Muh LEGACEEE

    Former President George W. Bush on Wednesday offered fresh criticism of the withdrawal of American and NATO troops from Afghanistan, as the U.S.-backed government in Kabul appears increasingly imperiled and Taliban fighters continue to make rapid gains across the country.

    Asked whether the drawdown was a mistake, Bush told German broadcaster Deutsche Welle in an interview: “I think it is, yeah. Because I think the consequences are going to be unbelievably bad and sad.”

    Bush, whose administration launched the U.S. military invasion of Afghanistan in October 2001, specifically cited the plight of Afghan women and girls whom he said could “suffer unspeakable harm” at the hands of the Taliban.

    Bush expressed similar concern for the fate of thousands of Afghan translators — as well as their families — who aided U.S. and NATO forces throughout the two-decade war effort.

    “It seems like they’re just going to be left behind to be slaughtered by these very brutal people,” Bush said. “And it breaks my heart.”

    The remarks from the former president come as even senior Biden administration officials have acknowledged what Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby described as a “deteriorating security situation” in Afghanistan, where the Taliban claims to have overtaken 85 percent of the country’s territory.

    STFU you incompetent hack.

    • AlexinCT

      ^^^THIS ADVICE^^^

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      He is correct in that we royally fucked over those who cooperated with us.

      Everyone else in the world should take note.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        We’ve been doing that ever since we played the Indians off of each other and screwed the winners and we continue to do so now, just ask the Hmong and the Kurds.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Speaking of, the Hmong have a community in Northern California that specializes in growing weed. With the recent fires they’ve been out there self-organizing and fighting the blazes with irrigation trucks. Guess how our noble authorities have responded?

        https://youtu.be/cM0r6mpqwzU?t=477

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        The gubmint could fuck up a wet dream, it is known.

      • Gustave Lytton

        As expected?

        During last years wildfires where the state didn’t have adequate resources on scene, there were lots of people wanting to help (and a bunch of local residents did in the more accessible fires). The state directed them to this

        https://www.oregon.gov/odf/fire/pages/firefighting.aspx

        Got a D9 and want to doze some fire lines pro bono? Sure, we can use it. Just do the following

        All other equipment/services

        Complete and submit the ODF Incident Resource Agreement (Fillable application PDF) and submit pages 12 – 13+ with the required current training and insurance documents.

        Vendors will receive an email notification when completed forms have been received.

        Applications will be reviewed, and resources may be pre-inspected (for) prior to execution of an agreement.

        All IRA Vendors, regardless of resource type, must complete and submit a current W-9 form with their application documents and must be registered in the OregonBuys system to enable payment.

        Vendors that currently have equipment on a U.S. Forest Service (USFS) Virtual Incident Procurement (VIPR) agreement will not be granted an IRA for the same piece(s) of equipment. ODF intends to utilize VIPR resources when practical, therefore eliminating the need for duplicity.

      • OBJ FRANKELSON

        I do not get too wound up about that. It is as some Englishman said, “The Empire does not have allies, it has interests.”

      • invisible finger

        The people left behind do not have to be slaughtered. If the Taliban slaughters those left behind, it is the Taliban that is responsible for their slaughter. If there is going to any indirect blame laid, it should go to those who are funding the Taliban.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Of course the Taliban are directly responsible. However the US government bears some responsibility for not assisting those who assisted us. I don’t know who’s to blame here, probably the State Department, but I find it darkly humorous that they’re pushing a liberal southern border policy but are abandoning actual political refugees to get slaughtered.

      • invisible finger

        When you have no political value, politicians and bureaucrats couldn’t care less what happens to you. That goes for US citizens, too.

    • Gustave Lytton

      Breaks his heart, but he’s not going to lose any sleep over it because it’s not his problem anymore.

    • Urthona

      I mean he’s right.

      The consequences are gonna be sad for thousands of Afghans.

      I guess next time he could not fail miserably?

    • Akira

      The one good thing I had to say about George W. Bush was that he was a great ex-president – he fucked off to his ranch in Texas and stayed out of the spotlight for the most part. I heard he chimed in on the rowdy unguided tour that took place in the Capitol on January 6th, and how he has to open his yap about withdrawing from Afghanistan. Way to fucking blow it again, Dubya.

  38. Gustave Lytton

    Back to normal. Assholes can’t cover their fucking nose and mouth when they sneeze again. And who serves biscuits and gravy with the biscuit unsplit? Animals.

    • Animal

      And who serves biscuits and gravy with the biscuit unsplit? Animals.

      Leave me out of this.

    • Nephilium

      Better then one place I went to that went with brown sugar glazed biscuits… under sausage gravy.

    • juris imprudent

      Hmm, I usually get served two full biscuits under the gravy rather than one split in half.

  39. Stinky Wizzleteats

    The Space Force former commander who got shitcanned has a long form interview out:

    https://youtu.be/vTRSom1Ssgs

    I haven’t watched the whole thing yet but it’s interesting so far. Seems like yet another decent and conscientious huy who got fucked by telling the truth.

    • AlexinCT

      Yeah, read his book and it is frightening to me how fucking bad it seems to be in the military now. It’s like the U.S. military has adopted the old Soviet Zampolit (political officer) policy with this shit. It’s not a coincidence that as we discover how much of this shit the military personnel are forced to deal with we also see reports on accidents and real morale and fighting capability problems explaining this gap in real fighting vs. bullshit PC indoctrination crap….

      It’s almost like they want to make sure the US military can not fight a near peer enemy…

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        We haven’t fought a true near peer (directly at least) since the ‘40s. That capability’s not needed for the populace though.

      • AlexinCT

        The capability they seem to be trying to create is one where they have a military loyal to one party rather than the country and the constitution, and there has to be an end goal for that agenda that has something to do with using them on someone they see as the real enemy…

      • juris imprudent

        That problem pre-dates the wokeness rage, and it isn’t purely a matter of the military. This society couldn’t do what it did in WWII – no fucking way.

  40. Raven Nation

    Just saw a headline (but can’t find the story) that claimed the head of DHS has told Cubans attempting to flee by boat that they will not be allowed into the US.

    • Urthona

      They did indeed according to what I saw.

      No that it matters.

      All outside internet has been cut off in the country and the media is state run.. so…

      • Raven Nation

        True. I was just noting the, umm, inconsistency. Fleeing Central America for better opportunities, welcome! Fleeing a socialist dictatorship, fuck you.

      • Urthona

        They might vote Republican!

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        ^This

      • AlexinCT

        It also puts a massive hole in democrat party agenda of moving us towards marxism/fascism so the ruling class can get their globalist agenda where they stay in charge of the country and report to their masters in Beijing, back on track.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Speaking from a purely political perspective, they just fucked their chances in Florida. This will not go over well at all.

      • invisible finger

        Assuming the elections are on the up-and-up

      • Urthona

        Florida actually has among the more decently run elections now that there were so many issues in the past and they worked hard to fix them.

        And they’ve all gone to Republicans since. Heh.

      • db

        Also from a purely political standpoint, could be an opportunity for deSantis.

        How would it play out if the governor of a US state granted sanctuary to foreign nationals in opposition to national policy?

      • Raven Nation

        Ooo, that would be awesome: sanctuary state.

      • waffles

        That would be incredible. But is it too smart and savvy for the stupid party? I think so, hope I’m wrong.

      • Gustave Lytton

        A bunch of states already do so.

      • db

        GL: So you’re saying ICE would *not* drag deSantis off in chains…

      • Gustave Lytton

        Of course not! That would never happen. Hypocrisy is like election fraud. It doesn’t exist.

    • Animal

      Well, there’s this.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Mayorkas is a goddamn Cuban FFS. What the hell?

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Concerned for the safety of the potential boat people or worried about a further cementing of rightist political leanings in Florida I wonder.

      • Urthona

        Honestly yeah. I saw it and my stomach got a bit sick.

        So many people use bullshit scams of oppression to get into this country. Yes this is “you’re gonna be sent back to Cuba for fleeing fascism”.

        Fuck the Biden administration.

      • Urthona

        *yet

      • Suthenboy

        We got rid of the Big Cheeto so it is all worth it.

      • AlexinCT

        If the media and the marxists put in 10% of the effort they did to make rule under the Cheeto guy was portrayed as chaotic and destructive, this administration would be in serious trouble and completely unable to pretend they have things under control.

      • Raven Nation

        I was thinking about this the other day. Imagine if groups like the CATO Institute had said to themselves, “OK, we hate Trump’s positions on immigration and trade. BUT, his positions on military adventurism and de-regulation are really good. Let’s figure out how we can work with him and move at least those ideas to more liberty.”

        But, instead, they went down the “Trump is evil and we must never say a positive word about him. Ever.” They also jumped on board the Russia-conspiracy train early and stayed for a long time.

        Yeah, Trump was a poopy-head but there were so many missed opportunities that could have been taken if a lot of groups had just held their noses (see also hyrdroxychloroquin and ivermectin).

      • db

        There’s a good reason it is called Trump Derangement Syndrome. The visceral hatred for Trump, the man, blinds so many to the possibilities that could have been. The man was a deal maker, and a deal maker works with people who want to work with him. Insult him and say you’ll never deal with him, and you become background noise.

        I’m not saying he was the greatest deal maker in the world, but he thought of himself that way, and would behave that way. I certainly didn’t care for a lot of what he did and the way he comported himself, but his straightforwardness was refreshing, and people who knew how to work with him got him to support some good policy, regardless of his bad policies.

      • PutridMeat

        and a deal maker works with people who want to work with him

        Looking on the bright side of TDS, I was sincerely worried that the Democrats would see an opportunity to deal. I’m almost positive that, if they had swallowed their pride, not gone off the rails on Russian Collusion and impeachment, and decided to deal with him, we would have had a lot a gun control get through at the federal level. So… win?

      • db

        That was my exact fear as well. I never for once thought that Trump had a firm ideological or moral stand on RKBA. I figured he’d see it as a holy grail to deal to the Democrats for something they really didn’t want to give up.

    • Not Adahn

      Did they repeal the wet foot/dry foot thing?

      • AlexinCT

        They have been trying to get rid of this since they realized they would never convert people that fled marxism and its evils into voters for the marxists in the US, all while inviting pro marxist welfare seekers to storm our southern border…

    • db

      Let’s try to square that with the humanitarian need to let people in across the Mexican border.

      Maybe just give all those boat people a shove to the west toward Yucatan.

  41. Suthenboy

    1. Brrrrr bluhhhhh angle barrel! Congratulations to everyone that thinks OMB. You are incapable of learning. Odumbles told you to your face that he was going to fuck you to death. You applauded and voted for him. If the rest of us were not along for the ride I would be applauding the left sticking it in these idiots and breaking it off.

    2. “Mississippi’s health department is aiming to combat misinformation on COVID-19 ”
    So they are censoring Fauci?

    3. It isn’t just late, it’s hollow.

    4. And who is responsible for that Mr. W.E. Dubois medal?

    5. You know who else loved trains?
    I know, I know….Stormy Daniels….

    4. No toad asshole, bat wing or fish gut restaurants? What a shame. I guess I will have to force myself to eat deep dish in the unlikely event that I find myself in the Windy City.

    The stupid is so thick it is hard to breath. I think I am going to make a drink.

    • Suthenboy

      Angle barrel? Really Spell check? *facepalm*

  42. db

    OT: I found a box of Sierra MatchKing 240 grain HPBT #2250 bullets that I had moly coated probably about 10 years ago and forgot about.

    Sierra doesn’t make these anymore (they don’t make any 240 grain .30 cal bullets anymore). Do I load them up and risk developing The One True Load that Makes My Rifle Shine, only to despair of ever replicating it? Or do I keep them around as a collector’s item?

    • Gustave Lytton

      Sell on auction website and buy some lumber?

    • waffles

      240 gr will never be the one true load. Big heavy bullets will have funky trajectories and appreciable drop when shot over a variety of distances. Unless you only take game at 100yards or less and need to punch through heavy brush all the time, 160-180gr is just better. So do what makes you happy.

      • db

        I’m not sure about that. Brian Litz has some interesting stuff on very long range shooting with heavy .30 caliber bullets. I’ve been experimenting along those lines with the 230 grain Berger Hybrid OTMs in .300 WM.

      • The Bearded Hobbit

        Years ago, when Dad gave me his reloading stuff, he gave me a table with “ideal” weights for the various calibers. Ideal for .30 cal is 165. He didn’t recall where he got that info but I generally see that manufactured cartridges tend to fall in line with this table.

      • db

        If you read up on some of Brian Litz’s work, he has a paper showing an analysis of what he calls Weapon Effectiveness Zone (which is a combination of accuracy and terminal energy) that puts .300 Win Mag close to par with .338 Lapua, with the accuracy of the .30 cal being superior at very long ranges. He’s doing this with the Berger 230 grain hybrid ogive OTM bullets.

        165 might be ideal for a .308 or a .30-06, but the bigger you go in terms of case volume, you can push heavier, high ballistic coefficient bullets to longer ranges with greater energy retention.

      • R C Dean

        I would think ideal weight would also take into account what the actual round is. A .300 Win Mag. could well have a heavier ideal weight than a .308, or that “underpowered” .30 carbine round we were talking about the other day.

        I prefer 180 gr for my .300. I don’t take looong shots, so the bullet drop compared to a lighter round doesn’t bother me, and I like a heavier bullet in general for terminal ballistics. I want to say my .308 rounds are in the 165 gr. range, but I’d have to check.

      • R C Dean

        Or, what db said.

      • db

        I definitely stay in the 165-175 grain range for my .308 Winchester loads–that seems to be the best accuracy. For the magnum, I try to push the biggest BC I can. By the time I have the best load worked out, I’ll probably need a new barrel.

        Part of the desire to run the heavy bullets in the Win Mag is to run slower bullets and keep the barrel alive longer. Push over 3000 fps in a cartridge that runs at the pressures and temperatures of a big magnum for too long and you’ll be lucky to get 2000 rounds out of a barrel before the groups open up unacceptably.

      • R C Dean

        “Ideal” begs the question of “for what purpose”? Very long range may point to a lighter bullet. Shorter range, larger game, a heavier bullet.

      • db

        Heavier bullet begets higher BC within a given diameter, so the performance is improved. If you want a flat trajectory, by all means, faster is better, but those fast bullets don’t retain energy at long ranges, and, perhaps counterintuitvely, have a greater drop overall at those ranges. High BC wins long range.

      • The Bearded Hobbit

        My understanding is “ideal” is in flight characteristics and sectional density.

      • db

        It’s possible that’s true. I’m not enough of a ballistician to say. Maybe the higher BC/higher sectional density are just squeezing marginal bits out of the .30 cal package and that a better big-bore cartridge is what’s needed to go the extra mile, so to speak.

        If you’d be at all willing to share that table, I’d bet it would be really interesting to the shooters/handloaders here. Might be an article!

      • Animal

        When I was loading .30-06 I used the 165 grain Barnes X-bullets and got pretty good results; good accuracy and velocities within 100fps of my buddy’s 7mm Remington Mag loads, with 25 grains more bullet. Mind you I was loading into a big, heavy commercial Mauser action that was as tough as an M1 tank.

        The only .30 I load for these days is the .30-30, and I’m still using the same cast 170-grain flat nose bullets I’ve used for decades.

        Running the Barnes 250-grain TSX in my .338. Also good results.

    • Suthenboy

      That is very heavy for that caliber. I am guessing the idea was for sub-sonic loads for suppressed rifles. I think 300 Blackout was developed to fill that niche.
      Save ’em.

      • db

        Which caliber? I’m considering using them for either .300WM based on some good stuff I’m seeing with high BC bullets in that cartridge, or for a Blackout load.

      • R C Dean

        I hesitate to disagree with Suthen on these matters, but ammo is for shooting. Shoot ’em!

        And post something here on how it goes, how they compare to other rounds, etc.

    • EvilSheldon

      If you’re familiar with Brian Litz’s work, you’re well beyond needing my advice.

      But I doubt they’ll make much of a collectors item, and I doubt they’ll fly better than the Berger 230s. I’d shoot them up.

      • db

        You’re probably right. Surely there’s a reason Sierra doesn’t make them anymore. I bet they’ll work well in the Blackout, though.

    • Animal

      I have, as a keepsake, a box of .224, 55-grain “Herter’s Wasp-Waist Sonic Bullets.” Old George Herter (about whom I should write an article one day) fancied himself quite the marketing genius. As I understand it, a batch of bullets went through a swage once with a setting wrong, and ended up being squished into a weird wasp-waist configuration. George, not wanting to toss the batch, put them in the catalog as the “Wasp-Waist Sonic Bullet” and claimed that the smaller bearing surface and the “improved air flow” over the bullet made them especially deadly. They ended up making them on purpose in a variety of calibers, and as I recall they sold fairly well. I never tried them myself. I saw the unopened box of .22 caliber ones at a gun show and bought them as a bit of nostalgia.

  43. The Late P Brooks

    I mean he’s right.

    The consequences are gonna be sad for thousands of Afghans.

    Absolutely true. After twenty years of our “help”.

    Kinda makes you think, don’t it?

    • AlexinCT

      “We’re from the US government and we are here to help you” has a completely new meaning…

      • Ownbestenemy

        Needs to be updated: “We’re from the US government and we are here to give you the illusion of choice and freedom”

    • Bones

      Oh hell yes!

  44. PieInTheSky

    Fresh arrest made over social media racist abuse of England footballers
    It follows the arrest of a man on Tuesday by police investigating a racist tweet aimed at Marcus Rashford after England’s penalty shoot-out defeat to Italy in the Euro 2020 final

    https://www.google.com/amp/s/news.sky.com/story/amp/fresh-arrest-made-over-social-media-racist-abuse-of-england-footballers-12355701

    See civilized countries know there are limits to bad speach not like you backwards barbarians

    • OBJ FRANKELSON

      I have been following this a bit. They arrested a twelve-year-old for being edgy on the intertoobs.

      Who has ever heard of such a thing?

      • Raven Nation

        It’s kind of hard to gauge what’s going on most of the time. None of the news outlets reprint the statements in question (which I kind of understand), but it means we have to take everyone’s word that these things were egregious.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Unless it’s a credible threat it shouldn’t be arrestable. I’d imagine you agree but it needs to be said.

    • Stinky Wizzleteats

      Fuck the English football players and their league. From the commentary I’ve seen, slanted of course, they’ve politicized it similarly to what the NFL has done. Of course there’s a backlash to the skinsuiting.

      • PieInTheSky

        That sounds like hate speech to me. You should be banned from England

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Meh, if I visited I’d probably just get drunk and publicly insult the Queen anyway.

      • PieInTheSky

        Well you will miss out on the best food and beer in the world if you dont visit. Your loss

      • ruodberht

        Every kind of food that exists is found somewhere in the US, as is every beer style, brewed locally. It might be hard to find the beers amid the rash of IPAs, but some craft brewery, somewhere in the US, makes anything you could want.

      • Stinky Wizzleteats

        Considering the English food reputation I think he’s being sarcastic. Either that or he loves kidney pie.

      • PieInTheSky

        brewed locally – there is you problem. There is magic in europe that just makes beer better. Except belgium. Belgian beer sucks.

      • PieInTheSky

        Either that or he loves kidney pie. – more like blood pudding

      • ruodberht

        Blood pudding is unironically great, tho

    • R C Dean

      I take that back – there is a picture of the destroyed mural further down.

    • PieInTheSky

      See this is why some black folk dislike the jewish people. They use their special connection to god to do stuff like this

      • ruodberht

        They had insurance?

      • PieInTheSky

        Always