Tuesday Morning Links

by | Dec 28, 2021 | Daily Links | 238 comments

Staying alive in Miami

The Dolphins stayed alive in the playoff hunt. The Saints are done.  College teams are playing musical chairs to fill bowl slots. I understand the NBA is still playing, but I couldn’t care less. Hockey is still on hold. And they’re playing soccer in Europe when they can fill out teams. ManUre drew with Newcastle yesterday in an entertainingly sloppy affair.  Several games on tap today.  And that’s sports.

Gotta spin that headline, don’t you? Can’t you just say how rough they’ve got it without lying? Because I can very much assure you these size typhoons have been happening on and off since the planet formed.

Tis the season

And if you thought that headline was absurd, wait til you read this one! “An unusual year off”. Sure thing, pal. Sure thing.

No, the taxpayers are going to lose. At least get that part right.  Also, this is how civil trials work, like it or not.

They keep changing this, which makes me believe they have no idea what they’re doing. Of course I’ve believed that all along.  So I’ll just be happy it’s going down.

Idiot cops

“That’ll keep the roads safe!” Bunch of fucking idiots chasing this kid.I hope every single one involved loses their job.

Well, they’re right. Either he’s completely incompetent or he lied.  Just kidding, it’s both.

Now if only they’d give “civilians” the same ability to carry when they want. This couldn’t become so common that criminals might give pause before robbing people.

That’s one hell of a storm. I hope everybody stays safe.

LOL, this is just absolutely retarded. So of course I had to share it. Yo want to take afternoons off? Find a job that lets you. Problem solved.

OK, those links were just dreadful.  Sorry about that. So let me make it up to you. Hope that helps, friends.

Now go out there and have a great day!

About The Author

sloopyinca

sloopyinca

238 Comments

  1. Stinky Wizzleteats

    What do y’all think happened with the flu last year, just got rolled into the covid numbers? That’d be my bet.

    • Brawndo

      That is exactly what happened

      • R C Dean

        Testing for flu was down, also. You got the ‘Vid test if you had flu symptoms, and if it popped positive, that was that.

        There is also a theory that the ‘Vid displaced flu from its niche. This is controversial, in part because the lack of flu is being touted as proof that masking works. Everything for the Narrative, nothing outside the Narrative, nothing against the Narrative . . . .

      • Not Adahn

        Meh, I’d say it proves that masking doesn’t stop the ‘vid, and that therefore vid spreads differently than the flu.

      • invisible finger

        We already knew flu spreads differently than CoV (surfaces/droplets vs. aerosols). Incompetent bureaucrats (but I repeat myself) just forgot for a while.

      • Bobarian LMD

        The surface/droplets was an early theory that was later shown to be false or at least incomplete.

        That’s why masks don’t work.

      • R C Dean

        Maybe, but it is being touted as proof that masking stops the ‘Vid. Somehow.

        And, of course, also as why we will need to mask forever, because masking works, damn you. IT WORKS!

        Just ignore the decades of studies showing it has no effect on the flu in the real world.

      • Gustave Lytton

        When I last looked at it last winter, testing volume was about half but the flu positivity was way way down, well out of proportion to testing reduction.

    • Gender Traitor

      It took a sabbatical to work on its pottery.

      • SDF-7

        A siesta, if you will?

        But yeah — my bet is that the symptoms got interpreted as covid — and as flaky as the tests are, that the tests also consider flu as covid. Part of why the numbers were so inflated.

      • invisible finger

        Flu never got diagnosed until after the fact. If they gave you a z-pack and you got better, it was assumed you had a bacterial infection and not viral so therefore not flu. If you didn’t get better OR you got better after Tamiflu, then it was flu. Close enough for CDC work.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        “Sophomore Dies in Kiln Explosion”?!

    • invisible finger

      When you’re only testing for one pathogen, that is the only one you can find.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        ?

  2. Brawndo

    Fuck cops and all their enablers.

    • SDF-7

      I wouldn’t go that far (and I don’t consider myself an enabler). I’ve had reasonable interactions with them over the years, and do believe that they serve a fundamental purpose.

      But they are WAY over due for a serious sweep of reforms, starting with getting rid of asset forfeiture and the highway robbery it encourages, moving through a very strenuous reminder of the basic civil rights of the citizens and that they are *hired help*, not Gods Among Men or soldiers where the citizens are the enemy, then into a serious draw down on immunity [which likely means a serious reform of DA offices, I know — which also moves this firmly into Fantasy Land] so they can be held accountable.

      At that point, the good ones that are left would hopefully have a chance to show it — and the wannabe thugs looking to bully the populace would be forced out or slapped into line. And yes, I’m sure I missed several nuances / steps – Thomas Freaking Jefferson I ain’t.

      • Dr. Fronkensteen

        Getting fired for a questionable shooting would be good even if they’re not criminally liable. Having some skin in the game personally or pension fund if they’re sued so the taxpayers aren’t the only ones paying. There are a number of things to be done to ensure accountability.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Kim Potter’s verdict may be the start of what you are talking about.

        The two manslaughter convictions of former Brooklyn Center police officer Kimberly Potter brought a singular reaction from the Minnesota legal community: Most were surprised if not outright stunned.

        “That’s not to say the evidence wasn’t there,” said St. Paul-based criminal and civil attorney A.L. Brown, who said he was a “bit surprised” by Thursday’s verdicts.

        “I think the state made the case for manslaughter but that they convicted this cop with a clean record. White. Female,” he said. “We may be watching the shift. … This may be the age of accountability, and maybe the age of accountability can lead to reform because everybody’s got something in the game.”

        I’d be a bit more confident about real reform if that story wasn’t full of “another black man killed by cops” shit. Duante Wright didn’t deserve to die, but he wasn’t some angel who was simply standing there when he was cruelly shot down.

      • db

        It doesn’t help that the prosecutors had to confuse the meanings of negligence and criminal recklessness in the minds of the jury to get a conviction. I think any police officer that makes a mistake like Potter did should not be a police officer, and she’s open to serious civil penalties, but I can’t see that what she did rises to the level of criminality. Police reform is depserately needed, but please don’t hold the Kim Potter trial up as an example of how it should happen. It was a scapegoating exercise. Serious incompetence, certainly. It’s tragic that someone’s dead because she made a terrible mistake–a mistake that, like the traffic stop in the first place, was brought about by a mountain of bad policy.

        I think it’s likely that the Potter verdict will be overturned on appeal because of the judge’s mistake in allowing the prosecutors to muddy the jury’s understanding of the law regarding recklessness and simple negligence, which she could have easily corrected. I think that the judge will give Potter a very light sentence in order to reduce Potter’s incentive to appeal the case to a higher court, overturning her decision. If she does appeal, I think Potter has a good chance of making the argument in appeal that the law was incorrectly applied.

        The public narrative surrounding the Potter case was “pulled over for an air freshener, pulled over for expired license tags, treated differently because he was a minority, and now he’s dead.” As everything in life, it’s way more complicated than that, but in a libertarian world, Duante Wright would never have been pulled over for silly rules infractions like that because those rules wouldn’t exist.

        In a libertarian world, however, Duante Wright would already have been dead because the intended victims of his prior crimes would have been armed and would have killed him during his commission of them. Or he would have been captured and brought to a speedy trial for those violent crimes and would have been otherwise occupied on that day in April.

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        I think any police officer that makes a mistake like Potter did should not be a police officer, and she’s open to serious civil penalties, but I can’t see that what she did rises to the level of criminality.

        Would you consider it criminal if Potter was a shop-owner instead? Given the power bestowed upon them, police officers should be held to the same standard as non-LEOs, at a minimum, if not more strict.

        Haven’t seen a non-LEO get to use the excuse of “oops, didn’t mean to draw and fire my gun”. A LEO shouldn’t either.

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        Well except for Baldwin.

      • R C Dean

        After reading what the actual statutes say about the two kinds of manslaughter she was convicted of:

        The more serious is manslaughter in the course of committing a misdemeanor. There was no misdemeanor charged or convicted, as far as I know. This charge should never have been made, should have been thrown out before trial, and should be thrown out on appeal.

        The less serious charge has similar fundamental problems, but I can’t recall them off the top of my head.

        This was a political prosecution and conviction, and the entire justice legal system was in on it. I think the judge is going to hammer her on the sentence, for just that reason.

      • Pope Jimbo

        I don’t know if the legal system was in on it, as much as they were running scared.

        When a mob showed up at the judge’s condo (they even broke into the actual building) and demanded she allow streaming of the trial, you’d think the legal system would push back hard. Nope, judge immediately changed her ruling on cameras in the court room and claimed she was always going to do that.

        The jury also had to know that if they didn’t convict there would be repercussions. Even if not directly against them, then the mob would start rioting again.

      • Semi-Spartan Dad

        The revolving door of felony rioters being captured and released in Portland and other liberal strongholds leaves little doubt to me that the legal system isn’t in on this. The judges and prosecutors have their marching orders.

      • R C Dean

        Distinction without a difference. Bowing to the mob = political prosecution.

        And that slope is slippery. Oh, yes it is.

      • WTF

        It seems to me she was foolish to say the shooting was a mistake. The guy was in the process of resisting and driving away with the other officer still reaching into the car. Had she said that those circumstances made her fear for her and her partner’s life so she used deadly force to stop the threat, she probably would have been better off. Especially given that a use of force expert testified that deadly force would have been appropriate in that situation.

      • R C Dean

        Not an option, since she said “Taser! Taser!” before pulling her gun and perforating him.

        She effectively declared her belief, at that point in time, that lethal force was not necessary/justified. While cops are allowed to shoot people based solely on their purely subjective belief that there is an imminent threat, etc.*, even cops have to actually hold that belief. She declared, in effect, that she did not. The expert testimony supported a predicate that was not in evidence – her belief that lethal force was justified.

        Unlike us untermeschen, who have to prove the belief is “reasonable”.

      • Bobarian LMD

        The default should be that if you shoot someone, you are no longer employed until proven innocent.

        Currently, protections work completely backwards.

    • sloopyinca

      Wow, that’s an ass-kicking.

      • Not Adahn

        Um, ash-kicking.

      • SDF-7

        Groovy.

  3. Brawndo

    I’m surprised the super typhoons weren’t blamed on the ‘rona

    • WTF

      Although I’m pretty sure they tried to blame the ‘rona on climate change at one point.

      • R C Dean

        It’s been run up the flagpole, yes.

      • SDF-7

        Easy — Climate Change created the conditions for tin pot dictator bureaucrats to think they can actually change the weather and run people’s lives, therefore the NIH drones and their idiot-in-chief figured they should do their part to figure out how to whittle down the “surplus population” and contracted the work out to the Chinese.

        Hence, Climate change empowered Fauci to work with the Chinese to create the ‘rona.

        Simple enough… 😉

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Poor misunderstood King Canute.

    • sloopyinca

      Typhoons: climate change
      California snowfall: climate change
      Warm in Texas: climate change
      Cold in Utah: climate change

      And if all those are the exact opposite a month from now, it’s also climate change. Because there’s literally nothing it can’t do, so long as the solution to it is to tax people more and usher in more socialist bullshit.

      • WTF

        And if all those are the exact opposite a month from now, it’s also climate change. Because there’s literally nothing it can’t do

        Which is why they stopped using “Anthropogenic Global Warming” and substituted “climate change”, because that way it can’t be falsified. Of course something that can’t be falsified isn’t actually science, but that’s kind of the point, I suppose.

      • Lackadaisical

        Exactly right.

      • Fourscore

        Snowed in MN yesterday, now it’s cold. Climate changes every day, “Some body’s gotta do something”

        It’s ’cause no one is wearing a mask anymore.

    • Chafed

      I’m surprised CNN didn’t shame the guy in the photo for not wearing a mask.

  4. R C Dean

    Their new rules for masking and quarantine are pretty much the opposite of what you would expect if you believed both that masking and quarantine work to reduce infections (per the Narrative), and that Omicron is much more infectious than previous variants (also, per the Narrative).

    And no, I won’t be pointing this out to the True Believers I work with.

    • Toxteth O'Grady

      Re link 4: Calvinball minus the “Very Sorry Song”.

    • Gustave Lytton

      The reduction for quarantine of healthcare workers based on staffing alone belies the policy is based on any sort of logical foundation.

    • Pope Jimbo

      Just before T-giving, I went to the local govt testing center and after that I don’t believe anyone in the medical fields is actually scairt of the Rona.

      The way that they ran that clusterfuck was enough to demonstrate to me that this whole thing has devolved into a parody of a pandemic. The people working at the testing center didn’t care a bit if people clumped up into lines. Instead of emailing the results to you, they insisted you wait around (in a big group of other recently tested people) for them to call out your name and manually give you the results.

      If they were really worried about the Rona, they would have done things so differently.

      1) Had the testing center somewhere with souped up air filtration/conditioning. (The one I went to was a gutted K-mart).
      2) Only allowed people to come in when it was their turn to be tested. Before that, stick to your car
      3) As soon as you were swabbed, get the fuck out. We’ll email you results.

  5. Raven Nation

    Pretty much that whole siesta article is “America sucks.” Livable wage, consumerism, bad public transport, blah, blah, blah

    I did find the author who takes siesta when everyone else does amusing though.

    • Fourscore

      When I worked in Houston years ago about 1/2 of my employees started their siesta as soon as they got to work.

      • sloopyinca

        Government contract?

      • Fourscore

        Retail

    • rhywun

      this system could never work back home — U.S. workers were still rallying for a universal livable minimum wage.

      Yeah, this had me LMFAO.

      Those poor, stupid Americans. Don’t even have the basic niceties.

      • sloopyinca

        The whole piece reads better as satire.

    • Rat on a train

      Everyone should be able to enjoy a middle class lifestyle working as few hours as they want at a job the is fulfilling.

      • sloopyinca

        Lol, these people actually believe that. That’s what makes it all so hilarious.

      • SDF-7

        Next Generation “We work to better ourselves!” versus Idiocracy “Go away! ‘Batin!”

        I think we have a pretty clear idea of which is more likely.

        One of the reasons I prefer the Original Series in many ways — you could tell that everyone who didn’t want to put up with the Happy Happy Joy Joy pushed on Earth had moved out to the frontier planets. Like the Old West these days, apparently in Picard’s time the Karens caught up with them.

      • Dr. Fronkensteen

        I imagine the replicators were a game changer. But in real life wouldn’t that just leave most people wanting to veg out and play in a holosuite their whole life.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Sorry, you can’t go in there right now, Scruffy’s booked the holosuite for the next month, He’s set Banging Bolshoi Ballet Babes to repeat.

      • Fourscore

        “I’d quit but then I’d have to go to work”

      • Tres Cool

        We make that joke at work about an older (union) guy. When its a particularly busy night, he’s immediately aggravated.
        “Look, I didnt get up and come into this job to have to work.”

      • Tres Cool

        She’s my favorite dopey blonde next to Alice on ‘Vicar of Dibley’.
        As you can imagine, I had quite the thing for Dawn French before her weight loss.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        RIP Emma Chambers.

    • Grumbletarian

      Wouldn’t adopting the siesta be cultural appropriation anyway?

      • Tres Cool

        The narcoleptics would riot but they’re too sleepy.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Only if you insist on wearing a sombrero while napping.

    • Lackadaisical

      Did they forget that we invented air-conditioning? Siestas only make sense if you’re working outside.

      • WTF

        Euros aren’t big on air conditioning, it’s why hundreds of old folks die there whenever they get a heat wave.

      • Tres Cool

        Just like Cleveland.

      • Fourscore

        But I’ve seen the pictures of the giant fans. That’s why they don’t need AC.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Too hard to retrofit, or what?

      • R C Dean

        Don’t underestimate how poor most Euros are.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Why would that be? (VAT et al, cough cough)

  6. rhywun

    And they’re playing soccer in Europe when they can fill out teams.

    7:30 slot already cancelled.

    I wonder if the next slate will happen at 10:00.

    • Ted S.

      Sensible leagues take a Christmas break.

      They also don’t have 20 teams.

  7. Not Adahn

    For BEAM:

    I don’t think you need to go to NYC to catch the QE2 since I’ve seen it in QC.

    • Tres Cool

      QED
      -HMFIC

      • Not Adahn

        YSWIDT

    • SDF-7

      I was expecting this for some reason.

      Hey! So *that’s* why the military thinks climate change is the bigger threat…

    • rhywun

      Yeah but were there any before 1980? Huh? Huh??

    • Timeloose

      I feel for the people of the Philippines. This Typhoon was terrible. However it is nothing unusual over the long term.

      The stats uses quote over the last 40 years there was a increase in duration in typhoons. How much better has detection become over 40 years. How many more and how accurate are weather satellites now compared to the 1970’s?

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        You wouldn’t notice a difference in duration.

        The spatial and measurement resolution is much better, but you’re still looking a the same thing.

    • Pope Jimbo

      If my wife wasn’t so narrow minded, I would be willing to resettle several young Philippina ladies at my house.

  8. WTF

    So, Speilberg’s woke-adjusted West Side Story, where he refused to subtitle Spanish dialogue, is officially a box office bomb.
    Gee, what a surprise. The critics think it must be that movie-goers don’t like musicals.

    • Toxteth O'Grady

      Uh, don’t they not?

      I hear the Spanish dialogue is only a couple of minutes. IDK, don’t even care to see the original again (too long).

      • Not Adahn

        They must love musicals. Cats was a smash hit!

      • Gender Traitor

        I see your point about the length of the original, but I’d happily fire up the soundtrack any day of the week and raise a glass to Lenny and Steve (who much later expressed regret for “Today the world is just an address.”)

        No desire whatsoever to see the remake.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        I like a lot of the soundtrack; don’t get me wrong.

    • Not Adahn

      I’ve never actually seen it. I’ve played the concert suite a bazillion times. Did the original have any Spanish in it?

      The most surreal version of it I’ve heard was when I was touring in England and one of the churches we played at had the choir welcome us by performing America complete with Anglo-Puerto Rican accent and church organ.

      • WTF

        the choir welcome us by performing America complete with Anglo-Puerto Rican accent and church organ.

        How did you not die laughing? That is just awesome.

      • Not Adahn

        Consummate. Professional.

      • R C Dean

        That actually sounds on point for the America I wish I lived in.

    • rhywun

      The critics think it must be that movie-goers don’t like musicals Spanish.

      You know that is what they are thinking.

  9. Evan from Evansville

    Firstly, HELL YES on the Talking Heads. Stop Making Sense has to be the best live music show ever put on film. Someone asked about that a few weeks ago and someone ELSE mentioned Stop Making Sense. I mention it again now.

    I got an article about ex-pat life (mostly around language) that should drop tomorrow! It was fun to write. (There’s a picture of 30-year-old med to lead it off. A note one that one: I absolutely hate getting my picture taken. Always have. I hate the faked, forced, long-lasting ‘smiles’ that people put on. I’m envious of the ones that actually can do it naturally.)

    That is my second favorite pic of me. (My first is the one right after I got the shit beaten out of me in Germany in ’08. I no-joke love that one. Bad shit happened and I got up and, with Eddie’s help, made it home and never saw a doc nor ever complained about it. Pic honestly gives me pride.) WHOOPS! Long side-bar. In the Seoul pic I’m legitimately smiling. Not just something for the camera. That was just the moment as it happened. I had even been up there several times before, but me and my friend were just having a great time. It’s the only adult pic of me (and maybe even not before that) where I am legit smiling and the moment’s captured.

    I had no intention of writing that out. I just finished my day’s share of a bigass work project here at home. So I got high. Which…I managed to score. And I don’t have morning classes this week so I can just rock out pretty much as long as I want. I was up til 4am yesterday. I’ll probably do that again. Don’t got work til 3pm tomorrow. Fuck it.

    GAH! Wow I didn’t mean to type this much. Again. Just smoked a bowl. Rare shit over here. Feelin’ fine. I hope you guys enjoyed the holidays and soon-to-post ex-pat living. I highly doubt I’ll be around when it actually posts, but I’ll read and check in with y’all.

      • Evan from Evansville

        “If you’re the kind of person that feels compelled to travel…chances are that desire is actually embedded in your genetic code with this wanderlust gene…

        ___

        I kinda address that in the article. I definitely got it from my parents, and especially my dad. The reality/joke/rumor in the family is that I am genetically WAY more similar to my father than my brother is. He has 50% of him and I push more 75%. I also got the drawbacks to him. He’s got Asperger’s and I’m nowhere near him on that, but I’m vaguely on the smallest end of that spectrum. My middle nephew Ben is absolutely somewhere on it as well. Everyone in the family knows about it.

        “…is associated with impulsively seeking happiness levels in your brain. The gene responsible for this behaviour can also be linked to an urge to travel and a variant of the gene, DRD4-7R, is nicknamed the “wanderlust gene” associated with curiosity and restlessness.

        ___

        YEP. I doubt the longevity part, but my dad’s got all the fitness in the world for a 72-year-old. My issues are obviously more external than his.

        “This suggests that a lifestyle rich with experience, risk and adventure is a healthy and wholesome one.”

        ___

        Rich with risk and adventure, for sure. Best bday present was my dad taking me tandem skydiving for my 18th birthday. I doubt mine is very healthy, for obvious reasons and my myriad own personal issues.

  10. pistoffnick

    Same as it ever was.

    • Tres Cool

      This is not my beautiful house.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        This is not my beautiful wife.

      • pistoffnick

        My GAWD! What have I done?

      • Not Adahn

        I’m wearing my fur pajamas.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        LOL. I forgot about that one.

  11. Rebel Scum

    Thousands left homeless and hungry at Christmas as Philippines faces up to climate crisis reality of super typhoon

    Tropical cyclones didn’t happen until anthropogenic global cooling global warming climate change. It is known.

  12. Rebel Scum

    The U.S. flu season has arrived on schedule after taking a year off

    It never went away. Every case of cold/flu symptoms has been treated as convid since the scamdemic began…

  13. Lackadaisical

    “That’ll keep the roads safe!” Bunch of fucking idiots chasing this kid.I hope every single one involved loses their job.”

    I must be missing it. What did the cops do wrong exactly?

    • R C Dean

      They engaged in a high speed pursuit of a kid on a dirt bike. The risk/reward there is way, way in the red.

      • Pope Jimbo

        Yeah, that sucks.

        Any word on whether they new who the kid was? Half the time the cops know who the offenders were. Instead of just driving over to his house they chase them and cause problems.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Applicant must like smoking, drinking and cavorting

      While I’m a little rusty in these areas, I’m certain that with a slight adjustment period I’ll be able to more than adequately brush up on my skills.

      • Not Adahn

        “When I was much younger, we had some amazing nights in the pub, and I must have slept on every blade of grass, drunk and sober, in rain, wind and snow. Over the years, I’ve staggered out of that pub looking for a tent that I couldn’t remember where I put. And then, I just curl up in a corner somewhere for the night,”

        …and you get paid for this?

    • Rat on a train

      I’ve always wanted to be master of my domain?

    • Shpip

      “So a decision was made that any landlord or any landlady, in turn, will be knighted king.”

      I’d go for it, if I thought for one second that I could get the missus to go along with calling me King Shpip.

  14. Rebel Scum

    Americans who test positive for COVID-19 but do not have symptoms can stop isolating after five days as long as they continue wearing masks, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced on Monday, halving the agency’s previous isolation period down from 10 days.

    So much of the convid measures are so arbitrary. And no, I will not be engaging in the religious observation of covering ones face.

    • Toxteth O'Grady

      We always *could* have…

  15. Rebel Scum

    GOP slams Biden after he said ‘there is no federal solution’ to combating COVID despite previously promising to ‘shut down the virus’ as cases hit highest level since January despite mask and vax mandates

    I seem to recall that he said something about presiding over a certain number of deaths attributed to the commie cough and how one should resign for doing so. Imagine my shock that this standard has changed.

    • WTF

      I eagerly await the MSM holding him accountable on this.
      *crickets*

      • Ownbestenemy

        They are more interested in how the Republicans are going to pounce.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      It’s actually humorous. Hospitals are incentivized to classify deaths as COVID related because $$$. So now those programs are working against the interests of the Dems because they inflate the numbers but they can’t just turn them off.

    • R C Dean

      GOP slams Biden after he said ‘there is no federal solution’ to combating COVID

      And you wonder why I won’t vote for Republicans any more.

    • Pope Jimbo

      I liked his books a lot too. I have no idea what the bullshit ratio was, but they were fun.

      • Drake

        His autobiography was pretty good but I’m sure it excluded lots of classified stuff. “Red Cell” was his second book and supposedly fiction. It sure seemed to contain a lot of real stuff – trying to guess what was complete fiction versus thinly disguised real war stories was part of the entertainment.

  16. Lackadaisical

    “well, they’re right. Either he’s completely incompetent or he lied. Just kidding, it’s both.”
    Don’t forget grade-A asshole, crook and kiddy sniffer.

    Let’s go Brandon.

  17. Rebel Scum

    Now if only they’d give “civilians” the same ability to carry when they want.

    Some people are more equal than others, peasant.

  18. Pope Jimbo

    Well the Canucks have figured out something more powerful than snow or rain or heat or gloom of night. Postal worker quits because of Canada’s vaccine requirement, now residents of Minnesoda’s North West Angle won’t be getting mail.

    I’m linking because of this totes non-biased bit of journalo-ism:

    On Jan. 14, Caravetta, of Warroad, likely will make his last deliveries to the residents of the Northwest Angle. He is leaving his contract with the U.S. Postal Service because of a requirement that essential workers be vaccinated for COVID-19.

    In November, the Canadian government announced that on Jan. 15, essential workers will only be allowed to enter the country if they are fully vaccinated. Until this point, essential workers have been exempt from any testing or quarantine requirements by the Canadian government.

    Caravetta decided early on in the pandemic that he would not get vaccinated for COVID-19, and has long been concerned a requirement like this would come up. He thinks the messaging from the government has been unclear and believes, against all medical and scientific consensus, that potential hazards of vaccinations are underreported.

    Against the consensus! Can you imagine?

    • WTF

      Once again, SCIENCE ISN’T DONE BY CONSENSUS.

      • Fourscore

        Wait, wait, wait! Don’t more doctors smoke Camels than any other cigarette?

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCMzjJjuxQI

        That’s good enough for me. Who am I to question the science?

    • Rat on a train

      He may be able to deliver mail Vickaryously.

    • Q Continuum

      Christopher Columbus believed AGAINST CONSENSUS that he wouldn’t sail over the edge of the Earth.

    • rhywun

      It’s the new “without evidence”.

      • Pope Jimbo

        It just boggles my mind that something that blatant made it into a “straight news story”. Maybe I’m hopeless, but I can’t believe some editor didn’t delete that and tell the reporter to keep their opinions to themselves in the future.

        I might be more inclined to believe that there was a coordinated campaign in the media to use phrases like that if I thought they were competent enough to pull it off.

      • invisible finger

        Based on speaking with two people I know who worked at newspapers, you should assume it was the editor that put the opinion into the story.

    • Rebel Scum

      fully vaccinated

      This is a moving target.

    • Not Adahn

      NPR had someone on this morning saying that omicron is a “step on the road” to the pandemic “being over by the end of 2022. ”

      Though I suspect that it depends on how well the democrats do in the midterms.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Cynical me sees Biden’s “no Federal way out of this” as a means to salvage the mid-terms at the state and local levels. I think Congress is gonna flip, but then again, it is the stupid party.

      • Plisade

        “Double-vaxxed. Janssen-fueled, Moderna-boosted,” Tejada said on Instagram on December 17. “Hey, Omicron: Hit me with your wet snot.”

        Dude. I don’t even buy into the covid paranoia and I wouldn’t tempt fate like that.

      • invisible finger

        The paranoia about the vaccines seems more warranted every day.

  19. Rebel Scum

    I-80 into Tahoe closed indefinitely due to Sierra snowstorm, avalanche blocks 89

    Time for Tahoe to face up to the climate crisis reality.

    • Rat on a train

      People can just hang out at Donner Lake until the snow melts.

      • JaimeRoberto (shama/lama/ding dong)

        I suggest the beef.

  20. Rebel Scum

    If siesta is practiced all over the globe, why does the idea seem so distant from the U.S?,

    Because we are more productive than the Spaniards and don’t need to engage in stupid European practices.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Gotta find a way to get China up over our economic output, so siesta and 4-day work weeks make sense.

      • pistoffnick

        When I worked in China, there was a siesta after lunch for manual laborers.

    • Urthona

      I think the only European country that practices it is Spain. Also the least productive country in Western Europe.

  21. Rebel Scum

    Thou shall not insult dear leader.

    @NicolleDWallace on the Oregon dad who said “Let’s Go Brandon” to Biden on Christmas Eve: “This is the slow-motion insurrection”

    • Ownbestenemy

      Dissent and displeasure labeled as insurrection is scary.

      • Rebel Scum

        I wonder what that makes doing a photoshoot with the likeness of Donald Trump’s severed head and a version of a play where Trump is the emperor slayed by the Roman senate…

    • Fourscore

      We’re always 6 months behind the coasts. We’ll get on the ball in June, when it’s warm enough to insurrect.

      • R C Dean

        I can just see it (in that distinctive upper Midwest accent):

        (Two portly, middle-aged guys, beers firmly grasped, grilling brats)

        “So, I been thinking about insurrecting.”

        “Yah? What aboot the hay?”

        “Ooh, it’ll be fine. I should get it all in by the week.”

        *nods* “So, insurrecting how?”

        “Well, if you’ve got time, I thought we might drive down to the capitol and wave American flags. ”

        “Yah, sure. Let me check with the missus, but I think Monday next maybe?”

    • Urthona

      Remember when they proposed giving awards to the jogger who flipped off Trump’s motorcade?

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        Pepperidge Farm does.

      • Pope Jimbo

        The cardinal sin of The Insurrection is that they are laughing and mocking. This makes the Resistance looks stupid. The Resistance just screamed at the sky and looked mad and miserable all the time.

        If you haven’t bought into one of The Parties, the side that looks like normal people who like to heckle The State while living their lives looks a lot more attractive than the side that demands that you be miserable all the time. Even though they have the White House and Congress none of them look happy.

  22. Ownbestenemy

    Mission Accomplished: Destroy one of the safest drugs known to man, Ivermectin by lying about overdoses and ‘deaths’ from use. Meanwhile, other antivirals produced that conflict with medications and not a peep from the news about it.

    Pharma is really making their push here for some serious power.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      They have serious power. They’re just using it out in the open now.

    • Semi-Spartan Dad

      Pharma The Cathedral is really making their push here for some serious powerand financial payback.

      The upper levels of pharma is just a revolving door with high level FDA and CDC positions. The 2002-2009 director of the CDC left in 2009 to become president of Merck’s vaccine division. We’re watching fascism play out in the open with huge pay days for certain players and the government consolidating further power under the all-encompassing “public health” label.

  23. l0b0t

    Y’all might enjoy this analysis of the sniper scene in Full Metal Jacket; I sure am – https://youtu.be/VHiUv4zsiRE

    • Drake

      It was one of the stupidest scenes ever in a war movie, particularly in the context of the Battle of Hue City. One of the few Regiment vs. Regiment slugfests of that war with armor, constant air support, arty, etc.

      • l0b0t

        It’s a schizophrenic film for which Kubrick had no ending planned or written until it was time to shoot the final scenes. Interestingly, the boot camp portion was filmed after the Vietnam portion. Certainly not my favorite Kubrick film, but not his worst work.

        As for Hue, yeah… One tank?

      • Pope Jimbo

        The boot camp stuff was awesome right up until that last scene in the head.

        Sorry, but by the last day of boot camp, Joker would have beaten the shit out of Pyle with his nightstick before he ever got a chance to lock and load.

      • Drake

        By my last day of Boot Camp, my rifle had been turned into the armory. After we did the graduation march, we all left for leave and/or MOS school.

      • Pope Jimbo

        #MeToo.

        I guess my point was that by the end of boot camp, you wouldn’t have seen someone with an unloaded rifle and not beaten the shit out of them. Especially when they start going through the manual arms with it unloaded.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Worst would be Eyes Wide Shut.

      • l0b0t

        That’s why it’s the only Kubrick film I haven’t seen. Barry Lyndon and Dr. Strangelove are tied for my favorite.

      • Yusef drives a Kia

        Dr. Strangelove far and away his best

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Jejune, as Woody might say.

    • Pope Jimbo

      The writer said it was the second marriage for both of them. Maybe her first tip off should have been that his first marriage was to another guy?

  24. Rebel Scum

    Papers please.

    What a lovely new world we are living in when you go out for a meal and a squad of police barge in, persecute a little boy then demand to see everyone else’s papers. This is the vax passport world so many are begging for.

    • gbob

      Unpossible. I was told by the right that the thin blue line would be there to protect our liberties. It would shock me to the core if it turns out that psychopaths with guns and legal immunity could have lied to us.

  25. Pope Jimbo

    Fucking librarians sure are a pissy lot. Here in Minnesoda the county librarians got their grundies in a bunch just because their boss moved to California and worked remotely.

    Not those whingers have gotten the county administrator to issue a new directive saying that people who run county departments need to work in Minnesota. Ain’t no siesta long enough to make up for such unreasonable work demands!

    Chad Helton, whose decision to direct the Hennepin County Library system from his home in Los Angeles has rankled librarian staff and taxpayers alike, may have to move back to Minnesota under a policy on remote work issued last week by the county.

    The new policy, sent to county employees on Dec. 17 by County Administrator David Hough, states that county supervisors whose workers interact directly with the public must live in Minnesota. It takes effect Jan. 31.

    Helton, who was hired in 2020, moved to California this summer saying he could perform his job through video conferencing and that he would return to the Twin Cities as needed.

    The only other high-ranking Hennepin County official who lives and works outside of Minnesota or Wisconsin is Michael Rossman, chief human resources officer, who has been living and working in Palm Springs, Calif., since the beginning of 2021.

    I sort of admire these leeches. Why not take advantage of the morons running the local government if they let you? I just wish I had the guts (and lack of a conscious) to do so myself.

    • R C Dean

      Not those whingers have gotten the county administrator to issue a new directive saying that people who run county departments need to work in Minnesota.

      See, I would have gone with “need to live and work in the county.”

      • Pope Jimbo

        What a shitlord! How can you even suggest such intolerable working conditions. I bet you get a whole chapter devoted to your shit in Back To The Jungle.

        The dirty secret is that this guy pretty much has to live in the county. I mean if he tried to live outside Hennepin county, he’d have to live next to rubes who don’t care about pronouns or equity.

  26. Rebel Scum

    The guns are sentient.

    An Avondale man who illegally carried a firearm to a family Christmas party wound up shooting two attendees, including an 11-year-old, when he fumbled the gun and it discharged — twice — prosecutors said. The family took his gun away and told him to leave the party.

    Tyquan Scott, 23, headed to his girlfriend’s family’s home on the 5400 block of North Austin in Jefferson Park to celebrate Christmas Eve with a gun tucked into his waistband, prosecutors said.

    Scott began drinking and, around 11:30 p.m., his gun began to fall out of his waist, according to the allegations.

    He grabbed for the weapon to keep it from falling, but it fired, striking an 11-year-old boy, prosecutors said. Then, it fired again, striking a 25-year-old man. Both victims were shot in their legs. Police said they were listed in good condition after the shooting.

    • Pope Jimbo

      A couple minor gunshot wounds are a small price to pay for an awesome Christmas story!

      “You’ll shoot your knee out” would be what my family would keep telling each other if we ever got that lucky.

    • Scruffy Nerfherder

      Does that qualify as a Plaxico?

    • Not Adahn

      An Avondale man who illegally carried … with a gun tucked into his waistband

      It’s illegal to carry without an appropriate holster? That actually would be a common sense gun safety law.

      The family took his gun away and told him to leave the party.

      That is an amazingly chill response to having two of your guests shot.

    • EvilSheldon

      What they mean to say is that Tyquan got drunk as fuck, took his gun out to play with it or to show off to his pals, and bang-pow, ambulance time.

      Funny how my gun stayed in its holster all through Christmas Eve and Day, despite a fair amount of wine, whisky, and egg nog. I wonder what the difference could have been?

      • R C Dean

        You’re a braver man than I. I rarely carry, and never have a gun on me if I am drinking.

    • Pope Jimbo

      I don’t know why she doesn’t think our wonderful TSA wasn’t to blame.

      My niece had several hundred dollars stolen from her luggage when she came to visit us. The bastard even had the temerity to leave a “Your bag was inspected” card on the inside of her bag. We filed a complaint, but we never heard a word back about it.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Er, sorry, but how young is she? She left it in checked luggage?

      • Pope Jimbo

        She was pretty young. 11? 13? Somewhere around there. She’s also Japanese so she can’t fathom outright theft like that.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Ah, pobrecita.

      • R C Dean

        Life lessons never come cheap, it seems.

      • Toxteth O'Grady

        Are the Japanese grudge-prone? Plenty of time to tutor her in the ways of righteousness.

  27. Scruffy Nerfherder

    Tard Tuesday: Christo-Fascists Are Back Baby

    The greatest moral failing of the liberal Christian church was its refusal, justified in the name of tolerance and dialogue, to denounce the followers of the Christian right as heretics. By tolerating the intolerant, it ceded religious legitimacy to an array of con artists, charlatans and demagogues and their cultish supporters. It stood by as the core Gospel message–concern for the poor and the oppressed–was perverted into a magical world where God and Jesus showered believers with material wealth and power. The white race became God’s chosen agent. Imperialism and war became divine instruments for purging the world of infidels and barbarians, evil itself. Capitalism, because God blessed the righteous with wealth and power and condemned the immoral to poverty and suffering, became shorn of its inherent cruelty and exploitation. The iconography and symbols of American nationalism became intertwined with the iconography and symbols of the Christian faith.
    The mega-pastors, narcissists who rule despotic, cult-like fiefdoms, make millions of dollars by using this heretical belief system to prey on the despair and desperation of their congregations, victims of neoliberalism and deindustrialization. These believers find in Trump, who preyed on this despair in his casinos and through his sham university, and these mega-pastors, champions of the unfettered greed, cult of masculinity, lust for violence, white supremacy, bigotry, American chauvinism, religious intolerance, anger, racism and conspiracy theories that are the core beliefs of the Christian Right.

    • db

      Shut up, Christfag.

    • Toxteth O'Grady

      Wall o’ text!

  28. Rebel Scum

    “Muh-racisms” has gone way beyond absurd.

    It’s arguably one of the most popular holiday songs in the world, however, it will no longer be sung at Council Rock Elementary in Brighton.

    First reported by the online publication, the Rochester Beacon, the school has decided to remove ‘Jingle Bells’ from it’s repertoire due to the song’s ‘questionable past’.

    The Rochester Beacon says principal Matt Tappon confirmed the song, and several others, have been replaced with different songs that don’t have the “potential to be controversial or offensive.” …

    In her research, the song’s first public performance may have occurred in a minstrel show nearly 150 years ago, where white actors performed in black face.

    The district assistant superintendent for Brighton also told the Rochester Beacon that some suggest the use of collars on slaves with bells may be connected to the origin of the song and that even though they are not taking a stance of whether or not that is true, that line of thinking is not in agreement with “district beliefs.”

    “Oh what fun it is to ride on a one slave open sleigh!”

    • R C Dean

      some suggest the use of collars on slaves with bells

      Was that a thing? Because I’ve never heard of it.

      even though they are not taking a stance of whether or not that is true, that line of thinking is not in agreement with “district beliefs

      The word salad is borderline incoherent, but I’m pretty sure banning the song because of “that line of thinking” is taking a stance that its true (enough).

    • Ownbestenemy

      Destroy all that was to usher in their sad pathetic world views.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        ?

    • rhywun

      Never change, Brighton.

      It is the Westchester County of Rochester, i.e. exactly where you would expect this kind of thought process.

  29. KSuellington

    The Sierra Nevada in the Tahoe region has seen record snowfall this December, it crushed the previous record set in 1970 and will likely be over 200 inches after the next couple days of the remnants of this storm. The good news is (besides the awesome skiing I will get) is that I won’t have to hear about the worst drought evahhhh!!! for at least one more year. In my lifetime the population of this state has more than doubled and our water storage capacity has hardly had any increase. This despite every frigging bond measure passing every frigging time.

  30. Pope Jimbo

    From the Everything is Political dept.: Church Cookbooks

    At a time when many middle class women couldn’t start businesses, and many stayed at home, these cookbooks were both a way to exchange recipes and a sort of social performance, according to Elias. In that way, their function wasn’t entirely dissimilar from the way people today exchange recipes and post them for likes on Instagram.

    In decades past, though, a community cookbook might be the only place women were able to publicly express themselves.

    Historians say there are fewer church cookbooks from Black communities. That could be due, in part, to structural inequality that made it harder to raise money in some Black communities and also different fundraising traditions, Elias said.

    • Ownbestenemy

      Or…they had different goals for their fundraisers…but yeah its cause they were black.

    • Ed Wuncler

      “Historians say there are fewer church cookbooks from Black communities. That could be due, in part, to structural inequality that made it harder to raise money in some Black communities and also different fundraising traditions, Elias said.”

      Buuuuuullshit. It’s because most of the recipes where passed by word of mouth and modified. My grandfather taught my Mother how to cook and the dude was illiterate but my Mom was able to retain that information in her head.

      • Ed Wuncler

        My Mom, grandfather, and grandmother wrote nothing down but they were somehow able to cook some of the best dishes based on only what they were told by others.

      • ron73440

        I’d seen that one before, one of these days I’m gonna try to make it.

  31. Rebel Scum

    Stay away from the unclean.

    Dr. Anthony Fauci says he recommends that people “stay away” from large New Year’s Eve gatherings where they don’t know the vaccination status of guests.

    “There will be other years to do that, but not this year,” he says.

    • Gustave Lytton

      By other years, he means the ones before 2020.

  32. ron73440

    Just saw an ad for The 355.

    It’s a female ensemble spy movie.

    I think they misnamed it, should have been Girl Power, the Movie.

      • Dr. Fronkensteen

        Good (entertaining) terrible or just plain terrible?

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        I’m guessing the latter.

        Flash Gordon is entertaining terrible. Rocky Horror is entertaining terrible.

        This looks like Star Wars Grrrrrl Power Edition terrible

      • l0b0t

        Waifish, 90lb, lady, super-spies beating the stuffing out of multiple armed male opponents twice their size… just plain terrible.

      • Swiss Servator

        I wish they could reprise Mythbusters to have a waif kick a large man (my size) and see if he goes flying. I’d grab one of them by the arm or the leg and use them as a club.

      • Scruffy Nerfherder

        LOL

      • ron73440

        But, it’swomen, and they’re diverse.

        If you don’t like it you’re a racist misogynist.*

        *The probable reactions from the cast and crew when it flops.

      • WTF

        Oh good, another ridiculous movie with 120-pound women trading punches with 200-pound athletic men and coming out on top.

      • Rebel Scum

        So like Charlies Angles (not the new one) but awful.

      • rhywun

        Saw a couple Charlie’s Angels recently. It’s awful but entertaining.

      • Rebel Scum

        The ones with Cameron Diaz, Drew Barrymore and the Asian chick are fun.

      • Ownbestenemy

        It was eye candy for my teens (and me for sure)

      • rhywun

        No idea.

        To me the only “Charlie’s Angels” is the seventies TV series.

  33. Rebel Scum

    Old and busted: Equality
    New hotness: Segregation/Discrimination

    The Mankato School Board in Minnesota in a blatantly racist move has unanimously voted to pay non-white teachers “additional stipends,” not on their merit or content of character, but solely based on the color of their skin, and for teaching staff to be segregated by race.

    Board members hotly defended the policy vote earlier this month claiming it wasn’t “segregation,” according to AlphaNews on Tuesday.

    “When you’re one [minority] of a [white] majority it can be very isolating and lonely,” declared board member Erin Roberts. “To have a support system in place for them is not to segregate them, it is absolutely to support them … It’s not about trying to throw the few [BIPOC] individuals we have into one building. It’s about showing them they aren’t alone.”

    “It creates global citizens at the end of the day,” Vice Chair Kenneth Reid ridiculously stated.

    • Sean

      Literally illegal.

      • WTF

        Like the actual rule of law has any meaning these days.

      • Ownbestenemy

        Yeah would love to see what bullshit they lay that one.

    • ron73440

      Come on, stop posting The Bee like it’s real.

      • Dr. Fronkensteen

        Times like these I feel sorry for the Bee writers. How can you satirize a satirical reality?

    • R C Dean

      Let’s see if they’re voted out.

      • pistoffnick

        Forget it, R.C., it’s ‘Kato-town.

        True Blue Believer country.

      • R C Dean

        So is Loudon, VA. So I’m not completely resigned to woke racist school board members holding their seats.

  34. rhywun

    It’s Dec. 28th, I’m still sick as a dog, work this morning was “interesting” – dammit, I’m taking a siesta today.

    • Swiss Servator

      *weakly raises fist in solidarity*

    • Ghostpatzer

      Right with you. Lovely vacation I am having with this bug, at least I don’t have to work.

      • Ownbestenemy

        We had 4 cancelations for dogs today and tomorrow for sickies.

  35. Ozymandias

    For what it’s worth regarding vaccine mandates for military folks. The NDAA for FY22 passed and – amidst all of the usual grift and bloat – was this Christmas present. So, even if we lose our case, fi nothing goes our way in the courts, people can refuse and get no worse than a GUHC or Honorable. That’s a shitton better than what my clients got as a result of the anthrax purges of ’99-’01.

    SEC. 736. LIMITATION ON CERTAIN DISCHARGES SOLELY ON THE BASIS OF
    FAILURE TO OBEY LAWFUL ORDER TO RECEIVE COVID-19 VACCINE.
    (a) Limitation.–During the period of time beginning on August 24,
    2021, and ending on the date that is two years after the date of the
    enactment of this Act, any administrative discharge of a covered
    member, on the sole basis that the covered member failed to obey a
    lawful order to receive a vaccine for COVID-19, shall be–
    (1) an honorable discharge; or
    (2) a general discharge under honorable conditions.
    (b) Definitions.–In this section:
    (1) The terms “Armed Forces” and “military departments”
    have the meanings given such terms in section 101 of title 10,
    United States Code.
    (2) The term “covered member” means a member of an Armed
    Force under the jurisdiction of the Secretary of a military
    department.

  36. Mojeaux

    Looks like this Omicron variant is sweeping through Glibs like wildfire.