Comments or suggestions: Gerard Van der Leun
"The new mock-spiritual Hallowe’en is like the new city, in its childlessness."

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"My dream, I might mention, ended in terror.

As I was waking the curtain of night pulled away, and light was shed on the nocturnal vision. These were not living children, I was somehow told, but rather the souls of the dead, walking in the costumage of holy saints. They were the spirits of all those little folk, massacred in the abortion clinics, restored mysteriously to flesh. And back from limbo they had come, prowling the city, in search of their own faces.
And so I had been watching their processions through the city, to the homes of their mothers and their fathers, asking only to be recognized as their own." - - Read the rest by David Warren -- All Hallows’ Eve

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Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 31, 2015 9:41 AM | Comments (2)  | QuickLink: Permalink
We are all.... "RUNNING OUT OF TIME!!!!"



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 31, 2015 12:53 AM | Comments (3)  | QuickLink: Permalink
DSM-IV 301.95 Progressive Personality Disorder: A Classic by John Moore

aa_bullets-1029.jpgA. A pervasive pattern of progressive political and inter-personal thought and action, rooted in discredited leftist (neo-Marxist) beliefs, beginning in early adulthood and present in a variety of contexts, as indicated by at least five of the following (individual must be at least 18 years of age to qualify for the diagnosis of Progressive Personality Disorder, as many of the criteria are age-appropriate for adolescents). This disorder often coexists with Narcissistic Personality Disorder.

  1. Utopian thinking, e.g. a delusional belief that there exist simple, linear, side effect-free solutions to all social problems.

  2. Lack of historical knowledge and perspective, and repression of personal memories dissonant with this belief system. e.g., the national mood post 9-11, including that of PPD patients, is suppressed in order to avoid conflict with subsequent reversal of beliefs as the PPD delusions were reinstated - hence the downplaying of terrorism as a threat and the obsessive concern for the "rghts" of temporarily feared and hated terrorists. (Note to clinician: please differentiate between mere historical ignorance, e.g., a doctorate in history from an elite university, vs. neurotic or psychotic delusions necessary to sustain these beliefs. )

  3. Anthroplastic delusion, e.g. The delusion that behavioral conditioning performed by the government or some other collective will cure all behavioral and social problems, rooted in denial of fixed human nature. Implicit in this delusion is the idea that human beings are infinitely malleable and subject to behavioral manipulation leading to perfect control and predictability. Free will, personal conscience, and objective morality are denied, devalued or denigrated.

  4. Anti-theistic rebellion: An emotional antagonism to the Judeo-Christian tradition, rooted in an abnormal persistence of adolescent rebellion (may also be related to the need to avoid counter-arguments that would question utopian, anthroplastic ideation). This behavior ranges from a mere antagonism to Christianity to a hatred of all forms of religion. The rejection of religion leads to a deep longing for a substitute religion, or in extreme cases, a messiah. The more Western a religion is, the more it is despised. Thus, these patients may openly accept more primitive pantheistic, neo-pagan, or animist belief systems, such as Wicca or fraudulent "new age" philosophies, e.g., Deepak Chopra, Tony Robbins, etc.

  5. Animist delusion: The belief that mankind is evil and nature is benign. The incidence of this symptom is inversely related to practical knowledge and experience of nature. Collective self-hatred is a feature in this area, paradoxically existing side by side with egomaniacal omniscience, e.g., ability to accurately predict climate 100 years into the future. Typical thinking includes the self-hating belief that mankind is a cancer on earth and that the planet (subjectively felt as a "feeling being") will "retaliate." The animist delusion includes considerable cognitive dissonance, since the typical Progressive Personality is a believer in natural selection, which has resulted in untold suffering and cruelty, mitigated only by mankind's presence.

    • a. For example, the belief that an eagle egg or four-toed salamander is entitled to more legal protection than a human baby.
  6. Environmental spasm: Chaotic, unreasonable, or incoherent episodes of manic activity on behalf of the environment or "mother nature." The delusional nature of this activity is evidenced by misanthropic attacks on works of man, and also by a manic focus on visible or totemic biological objects of little rational value. The patient is typically obsessed only with cute or cuddly creatures, often a displacement of the nurturing urge (often unfulfilled due to abortion).
  7. Control obsession: A tendency to strive for excessive control over others through state intrusion. A contemptuous projection of unconscious envy which is subjectively experienced as "compassion." Through the magic of this unconscious mechanism, PPD patients typically want the state to appropriate your wealth while imagining themselves to be generous and "compassionate." Use of state coercion often substitutes for true acts of generosity; a low rate of charitable giving is often present.
  8. Racist/feminist hypocrisy: Passionate advocacy of government-enforced discrimination based on sex or race, with aggressively proclaimed opposition to policies which are "racist" or "sexist." Obsessive conformity of thought within a racially diverse population. For example, a PPD patient might favor seating a racist on the Supreme Court, so long as the person is of the "correct" race. Often the cognitive dissonance normally associated with such beliefs is rationalized by the delusion that the "oppressed" cannot themselves be racist.
  9. Overemotional perception: Excessive concern with how a social action "looks" or "feels," to the exclusion of actual resulting benefits or harm; in particular, any effects beyond the immediate. Resistance to, and denial of, objective evidence proving the adverse consequences of progressive policy. Superficial cognition about most matters of significant import, as the progressive personality relies on the "feel" of issues rather than truly understanding them. Obsession with "fairness" or "social justice" as opposed to what actually works.
  10. Sexual dysfunction: Significant anxiety about sexual matters, manifested as:
    • a. Obsession with sexual and gender roles.
    • b. Passionate celebration of nontraditional sex roles and preferences.

    • c. The compulsion to define individuals by their "sexual preference" and to design social policy as if all individuals share the obsession.

    • d. An inordinate interest in preserving inappropriate, lewd, perverse, or antisocial forms of sexual expression.

    • e. Fascination with immature or deviant expressions of sexuality; reduction of human sexuality to animal sexuality.
    • f. The projected belief that the contradictory beliefs are a result of fear (e.g. "homophobia".

    • e. Obsession with contraception and abortion ("reproductive freedom").

  11. Replacement of patriotism with matriotism: Unwillingness to defend country when attacked or threatened, allied with inability to name or recognize evil and General devaluation of the masculine virtues.

  12. Cultural and moral relativism: The fervent belief that all cultures are beautiful except one's own, and that it is immoral to judge another's morality unless they are conservative.
Original at By John Moore Progressive Personality Disorder

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 30, 2015 2:11 PM | Comments (16)  | QuickLink: Permalink
If We Believed in Omens: It looked as if a night of dark intent / Was coming, and not only a night, an age.

The shattered water made a misty din.
Great waves looked over others coming in,
And thought of doing something to the shore
That water never did to land before.
The clouds were low and hairy in the skies,
Like locks blown forward in the gleam of eyes.
You could not tell, and yet it looked as if
The shore was lucky in being backed by cliff,
The cliff in being backed by continent;
It looked as if a night of dark intent
Was coming, and not only a night, an age.
Someone had better be prepared for rage.
There would be more than ocean-water broken
Before God's last Put out the light was spoken.

-- Robert Frost



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 29, 2015 9:55 AM | Comments (1)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Gavin McInnes on How Anna Stubblefield personifies the Left

"I fucking LOVED the New York Times Magazine cover story last Sunday about the Social Justice Warrior who fell in love with a severely handicapped black man with the IQ of a toddler. "

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Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 28, 2015 10:09 AM | Comments (8)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Good Morning: The Coffee Tutorial Because You've Been Doing It Wrong
Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 28, 2015 1:33 AM | Comments (10)  | QuickLink: Permalink
The Nation That Controls Magnetism May Lose a Few Fingers

bigmagnet.jpg
Supermagnet #33, The Obliterator. Pull force: 800 pounds.

What is there to say except, "I really, really want one for my next walking tour of Microsoft!" And to perfect my "levitation device," not to mention answering the door at Halloween! Plus they would be just the thing for a visit to my local polling place on election day. A clear case of going beyond my vote cancels your vote. And those of your little dog, too!

United Nuclear - Neodymium magnets Pitch Sheet, emphasis added:

If you really need unbelievably powerful magnets, here they are.

Uses include magnetic steering of nuclear particles in accelerators, levitation devices, magnetic beam amplifiers, scrap iron separators, etc.

Beware - you must think ahead when moving these magnets.

If carrying one into another room, carefully plan the route you will be taking. Sensitive instruments like computers & monitors will be affected in an entire room. Loose metallic objects and other magnets may become airborne and fly considerable distances - and at great speed - to attach themselves to this magnet.

If you get caught in between the two, you can be severely injured.

These magnets will crush bones in the blink of an eye.

Two of these magnets close together can create an almost unbelievable magnetic field that can be incredibly dangerous.

Of all the unique items we offer for sale, we consider these items the most dangerous of all. Our normal packing & shipping personnel refuse to package these magnets - our engineers have to do it.

This is no joke or exaggeration - and we cannot stress it strongly enough. You must be extremely careful - and know what you're doing with these magnets.

Two Supermagnets can very easily get out of control, crush fingers and instantly break ribs or even your arm if opposing poles fly at each other.

A small child recently lost his hand when his father left two # 31 supermagnets unattended. The child picked one up and when he approached the other magnet on a nearby table, it became airborne and obliterated his small hand.



Posted by Vanderleun Oct 27, 2015 2:21 PM | Comments (4)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Something Wonderful: Biisuke Ball's Big Adventure

Yet another entry in our ongoing series, "The Japanese: Nuked Too Much or Not Enough?"



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 27, 2015 11:15 AM | Comments (4)  | QuickLink: Permalink
"We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;" St. Crispin's Day #600

It is essential to preserve not only history, but the myths of history as well: Agincourt600 – Commemorating 600 years since the Battle of Agincourt

WESTMORELAND. O that we now had here
But one ten thousand of those men in England
That do no work to-day!

KING HENRY. What’s he that wishes so?
My cousin, Westmoreland? No, my fair cousin;
If we are mark’d to die, we are enow
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men, the greater share of honour.
God’s will! I pray thee, wish not one man more.
By Jove, I am not covetous for gold,
Nor care I who doth feed upon my cost;
It yearns me not if men my garments wear;
Such outward things dwell not in my desires.
But if it be a sin to covet honour,
I am the most offending soul alive.
No, faith, my coz, wish not a man from England.
God’s peace! I would not lose so great an honour
As one man more methinks would share from me
For the best hope I have. O, do not wish one more!
Rather proclaim it, Westmoreland, through my host,
That he which hath no stomach to this fight,
Let him depart; his passport shall be made,
And crowns for convoy put into his purse;
We would not die in that man’s company
That fears his fellowship to die with us.
This day is call’d the feast of Crispian.
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home,
Will stand a tip-toe when this day is nam’d,
And rouse him at the name of Crispian.
He that shall live this day, and see old age,
Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours,
And say “To-morrow is Saint Crispian.”
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars,
And say “These wounds I had on Crispin's day.”
Old men forget; yet all shall be forgot,
But he’ll remember, with advantages,
What feats he did that day. Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words-
Harry the King, Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot, Salisbury and Gloucester-
Be in their flowing cups freshly rememb’red.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispian shall ne’er go by,
From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered-
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me
Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,
This day shall gentle his condition;
And gentlemen in England now-a-bed
Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks
That fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 26, 2015 11:19 AM | Comments (5)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Something Wonderful: Natalie Grant - Hurricane

"Is it too late?
Is it too far?
For Him to reach you
And come to where you are

"Step out on the edge
Don't be afraid of it
And when you feel the rain
Call His name
He'll find you in the hurricane"

Mark 6 - And he went out from thence,

47And when even was come, the ship was in the midst of the sea, and he alone on the land.

48And he saw them toiling in rowing; for the wind was contrary unto them: and about the fourth watch of the night he cometh unto them, walking upon the sea, and would have passed by them.

49But when they saw him walking upon the sea, they supposed it had been a spirit, and cried out:

50For they all saw him, and were troubled. And immediately he talked with them, and saith unto them, Be of good cheer: it is I; be not afraid.

51And he went up unto them into the ship; and the wind ceased: and they were sore amazed in themselves beyond measure, and wondered.

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 25, 2015 6:51 PM | Comments (8)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Boomer Anthems: "Eve of Destruction"

Created and recorded over 50 years ago, it is not a good thing to be able to say it remains fresh and prophetic today.

"Eve of Destruction" is a protest song written by P. F. Sloan in 1965.

Several artists have recorded it, but the best-known recording was by Barry McGuire. This recording was made between July 12 and July 15, 1965 and released by Dunhill Records. The accompanying musicians were top-tier LA session men: P.F. Sloan on guitar, Hal Blaine (of Phil Spector's "Wrecking Crew") on drums, and Larry Knechtel on bass. The vocal track was thrown on as a rough mix and was not intended to be the final version, but a copy of the recording "leaked" out to a DJ, who began playing it. The song was an instant hit and as a result the more polished vocal track that was at first envisioned was never recorded.... Barry McGuire became a born-again Christian, and as a result renounced the song for many years, refusing to perform it.[citation needed] Though he is now known primarily as a singer of contemporary Christian songs, McGuire has resumed singing "Eve of Destruction" in recent years, often updating the lyrics to refer to such events as the Columbine High School massacre.
Barry McGuire updated the lyrics when he performed at a reunion of folksingers, with the line about the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches replaced by the words "Columbine, Colorado", referring to the student massacre of 1999. On March 12, 2008, McGuire appeared on the Australian music comedy/game show Spicks and Specks, performing an updated version of "Eve of Destruction", with new lines such as "You're old enough to kill/ you just started voting" and "...can live for ten years in space". The reference to "Red China" was also removed, and in its place were the more generic "Now think of all the hate, still living inside us/ its never too late, to let love guide us"....
The American media helped popularize the song by using it as an example of everything that was wrong with the youth of that time.[5] The song also drew flak from conservatives. A group called The Spokesmen released an answer record entitled "The Dawn of Correction". A few months later, Green Beret medic Sgt. Barry Sadler released the patriotic "Ballad of the Green Berets". Johnny Sea's spoken word recording, "Day For Decision", was also a response to the song.
Due to its controversial lyrics, some American radio stations, "claiming it was an aid to the enemy in Vietnam",[6] and Radio Scotland[7] banned the song.[8] It was placed on a "restricted list" by the BBC, and could not be played on "general entertainment programmes".....The song, like many other popular songs of the day, gave its name to a gun truck used by United States Army Transportation Corps forces during the Vietnam war. The truck is on display at the U.S. Army Transportation Museum and is believed to be the only surviving example of a Vietnam era gun truck. [See Revelation 6, Prophecy, and Gun Trucks @ AMERICAN DIGEST] - - La Wik

The eastern world it is exploding
Violence flaring and bullets loading
You're old enough to kill but not for voting
You don't believe in war but what's that gun you're toting
And even Jordan river has bodies floating

But you tell me
Over and over and over again my friend
Ah you don't believe we're on the eve of destruction

My blood's is so mad it feels like coagulating
I'm sitting here just contemplating
I can't twist the truth it knows no regulation
And a handful of senators don't pass legislation
Busing alone can't bring segregation
When human respect is disintegrating
The whole fucking world is just too frustrating

But you tell me
Over and over and over again my friend
Ah you don't believe
We're on the eve of destruction

Well look at all the hate there is in Alhambra
Then look around to Selma Alabama
You may leave here for four days in space
But when you come back it's the same old place
The pounding of the drums pride and disgrace
You can bury your dead but don't leave a trace
Hate your next door neighbour but don't forget to say grace

But you tell me
Over and over and over again my friend
Ah you don't believe
We're on the eve of destruction

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 24, 2015 9:51 AM | Comments (4)  | QuickLink: Permalink
The Sacrifice and the Reckoning: Sleepwalking

BullWomanChild.jpgWe have made a dark bargain with ourselves to let one of our cities die.

First published: October 2004 Read Part II below or at The Sacrifice and the Reckoning: The Event

"We haven't had a real-time nuclear demo since Japan, 1945, and that was with one of the prototypes. We've never had a real-time nuclear demo live on TV, but it is on their schedule. What we can't face is that the next time, many more than 3,000 will die and a lot of the dead will be our children. Just what do you think our mood will be the morning after they slaughter not only thousands of adults at their desks like they did on the 11th, but thousands of our children as well?" -- In conversation, July, 2004

THE RUTHLESS DEDICATION OF OUR ENEMIES TO OUR DESTRUCTION was written across our sky with two pillars of flame and smoke in our largest city. We've seen that dedication continue, punctuated by car bombs, mortars, and random attacks against our soldiers. We've seen it continue in Iraq, Iran, Syria, Spain, Russia, Italy and England.

Our unluckiest citizens have had their heads severed from their bodies as pilot episodes of what promises to be a long running reality television series in which American heads are held up, to our horror and for the delight of those many millions that support those that take the heads. The message beyond this madness is that they would be pleased to extend this television series to 300 million beheadings in which each of us would have his "star" turn. Our enemy has not yet taken a woman or a child for a beheading, but both clearly on their programming schedule.

All these things we know. We know the nature and goals of our enemy well. Our army is at the ready and in the field. And yet we hesitate.

We hesitate because we believe our search for a moderate, modern outcome will somehow determine what actions our ancient enemy will pursue. We are a foolish people grown fat and fearful during the long peace.

We stay our hand and hobble our warriors and walk on wrapped in our suburban slumber.

The party in power shambles about speaking in color codes and hushed words of warning. It mumbles of "they" and it seeks love from where there is only hate. It is a party of quislings led by a traitor.

We are soothed on the days when our media feeds us only thick streams of pap concerning grisly murders of obscure women by their husbands, the latest fornication festivals of the lightly talented in music and the cinema, and estimates of how long a woman famous for finger-bowls will spend in jail. We are relieved because the media's relentless focus on the tripe and detritus of our culture tells us that the day of the sacrifice is not to be this day.

And so we dream on. We imagine that the cliff is not really directly in our path, believing on some persistent level that merrily, merrily our life is but a dream, rather than a somnambulant march through the gates of history that is all too real and, for as yet unknown thousands of us, all too lethal.

But this world is not a dream and our awakening will be into nightmare.

Continued...

Posted by Vanderleun Oct 23, 2015 12:56 AM | Comments (101)  | QuickLink: Permalink
"October 21, 2015:" The Day We Learn the Future Ain't What It Used to Be

Yes, indeed. Today marks that depressing moment when you realize all of back to the future is officially in the past.

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 21, 2015 5:36 PM | Comments (8)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Burning House

What have the righteous Americans been doing these last, long, and lost years?

"Been sleepwalking
Been wondering all night
Trying to take what's lost and broke
And make it right
Been sleepwalking
Too close to the fire...."



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 20, 2015 1:37 PM | QuickLink: Permalink
Sleepwaking in the Narrows

aapathbridge.jpg

I.
The first time down the path
The cave is hidden from your eye.
You wander in a deep ravine
That frames a slice of sky.

Your unsure step will stumble
Where lizards prance on leaves,
But still the stream will waltz you on
Through the shadow-stippled breeze.

You'll come to where the bathers bare
Sun themselves on steaming stones,
And one child's laughter scintillates
Like water flowing over bones.

Oak roots reach down across the rock
And map the drift of streams.
The bathers loll within their sleep,
And reflect the shape of dreams.

Snakes and crickets search the seams
Of granite aeons made,
While leaves slide down the air to spin
On water stained with shade.

The solid rock betrays your feet.
Your steps become unsure.
The raven on the boulder stands.
His wings begin to stir.

The grass bends down before the wind.
The ferns bow in the fading light.
The clouds retreat, the stars emerge,
The ravine is draped with night.

aaacreek_above_second_narrows.jpg

II.

But in such night what light awaits
This dust of dreams on bone?
The path leads back to the place of men
Through a forest turned to stone.

A rush light glows within the dark
On the far side of the stream.
It is the cave, unnoticed then,
Containing now this life of dreams.

A figure -- phosphorescent, frail --
Will bid you to assume
That all within is as without,
As tunnel echoes tomb.

You'll see within large shifting shapes
Of cities and of scenes
Remembered only as a film
Shown but oncea behind a screen.

You'll hear the songs of sailors,
Songs of women, songs of war.
Your step will freeze, your head will turn,
Your hand will find an ancient door

That leads you to a steaming room
Where pale shapes writhe and wheeze,
While from below a gray mist floats
Upon the fetid breeze.

The chink of money, lure of love,
Will fill your straining ears,
And you will hear your own voice whisper,
"All is all as it appears."

awakeupcalleverymorning.jpg

III.

Awake! A far bell coming closer
Along the paths of night,
In passing lights the lamps of stars
To guide you from this sight.

All is not as it appears.
All is as made and nothing more.
Within the cave confusion reigns
Upon the stained and skull-strewn floor.

Step back beneath the stars, step back.
Reclaim your second sight,
And stride out straight upon the path
Towards the lantern and the light,

To where the sunlight falling sings,
Where the wind is woven with the trees,
Where the thought that thinks of thought is drowned
In the mansions of the sea.

aglittpathshand.jpg

-- Tassajara Zen Monastery, Carmel Valley, California



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 20, 2015 12:14 PM | Comments (3)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Donald Trump's First Day in Office


Donald Trumps the Establishment: Why Walker and the rest hate Trump Trump is a quintessentially American success story and the country has watched his rise with pride, envy, and fascination.
It wouldn’t be much of a stretch to say millions of Americans have literally grown up with him — along with his hotels, his casinos, over a dozen seasons of The Apprentice, and a well-worn track on the talk show circuit, he’s appeared in everything from Pizza Hut commercials to Home Alone 2. He enjoys a easy rapport with the American people born from a very real, very human personality defined by sass, humor, candor, and a consistently no-BS attitude. Let’s face it, The Donald is cool. In other words, it should be obvious why the guy is currently giving Republican insiders conniptions. What he values is not what they value, and — even more importantly —what is he is not what they are.HT: AbigailAdams


Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 19, 2015 12:42 PM | Comments (17)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Democratic Debate Reloaded

Bernie: “I don’t have a Super PAC, I don’t have a backpack. I carry my stuff around loose in my arms like a professor between classes. I own one pair of underwear. That’s it! Some of these billionaires, they have three, four pairs. And I don’t have a dryer! I have to put my clothes on the radiator. So who do you want as president? One of these Washington insiders, or a guy who has one pair of clean underwear that he dries on a radiator?”

Hillary: “I think you’re really going to like the Hillary Clinton that my team and I have created for this debate. She’s warm, but strong. Flawed, but perfect. Relaxed, but racing full speed towards the white house like the T-1000 from Terminator.”



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 18, 2015 9:40 AM | Comments (2)  | QuickLink: Permalink
"People are sick to the back teeth of being told what to think."

Conservatism is the New Counter-Culture.



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 17, 2015 4:13 PM | Comments (13)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Boomer Ballads: Joni Mitchell -- Both Sides Now

October 16, 2015: Joni Mitchell Is ‘Walking, Talking and Painting’ as She Recovers From Brain Aneurysm Judy Collins writes: “I have just heard from a close mutual friend that Joni is walking, talking, painting some, doing much [sic] rehab every day, and making good progress — I have another friend who went through something similar – it does take a long time, three years for my friend, who has really totally recovered professionally and personally. I will try my best to see our songbird when I am in LA in the coming weeks – So – some good news!!”

From the year 2000. Filled with decades of experience. Never performed better.

Tears and fears and feeling proud
To say "I love you" right out loud
Dreams and schemes and circus crowds
I've looked at life that way

Oh but now old friends are acting strange
They shake their heads, they say I've changed
Well something's lost but something's gained
In living every day

I've looked at life from both sides now
From WIN and LOSE and still somehow
It's life's illusions I recall
I really don't know life at all



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 16, 2015 4:05 PM | Comments (18)  | QuickLink: Permalink
2 Desk Drawer Horror Stories

Horror Story Number 1

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Horror Story Number 2

american-horror-story-hotel.jpg

Some years ago I was visiting an old friend in Florida. This pal (A large man who is actually "a sensitive little forest flower.") loves boats and boating and maintained two, count ‘em, two homes in Florida set up for boating.

The first home was his main base in Ft. Lauderdale. It was a three bedroom two bath operation with a swimming pool, an office, and a long boat dock where he kept “the big boat.”

The second home was a smaller house set up on stilts down in the depths of the Florida Keys twenty miles above Key West with two bedrooms, one bath, and a boat dock on a canal where he kept “the little boat.”

Since he used the Keys only here and there throughout the year he decided at some point to rent it out. He did rent it out for a year to a well-vetted man. When I visited him that lease was up and he and I went to the Keys house to check it out. A day or so before we arrived my pal had a house cleaner go in and change all the bedding and spiff up the rest of the house.

When we got there I went into the guest bedroom to unpack my things into the chest of drawers. As I opened the bottom drawer I found the renter or one of his guests had left some underwear and t-shits in the bottom drawer. Under them the same person has left behind a large, realistic, and battery-powered dildo in a plastic bag with some suspicious smears on the inside. Moving the switch around inside the bag without touching the dildo I determined that the batteries were, to say the least, fresh. Like Elvis's King Creole it was "jumpin' like a catfish on a pole."

Even though he is a manly man my pal is also a very sensitive little forest flower. The least hint of some sort of object that had spent party time somewhere inside a person’s body fills him with shivering, visceral loathing. My pal took one look at my “discovery” and walked shivering into the kitchen. He returned with his hands in dishwashing rubber gloves and a pair of kitchen tongs.

He gingerly picked up the bag containing the dildo with the tongs and then, holding it as far away from himself as possible, walked down the stars to the car port and dropped the offensive package into the garbage can. He then dropped the tongs into the garbage can. He then removed his rubber gloves, dropped them in the can, and then - still shivering with loathing and muttering to himself -- went back upstairs and took a long hot shower followed by an emergency cocktail.

Because I was an old friend who understood and deeply respected his “issues,” I promptly snuck down to the garbage cans, retrieved the dildo in the bag, switched it to off, and hid it in my luggage.

Several days later, with the dildo incident forgotten (except for my pal's repeated declaration he would NEVER EVER rent out the Keys house again), we returned to Fort Lauderdale. After arriving my pal announced he was going to run to the store to pick up some groceries. I nodded and waved from my perch on the couch in the living room and watched him drive off down the street.

Then I got up and took the bagged dildo out of my luggage and went into his office. I slid open the drawer on the right hand side of his desk and emptied its contents, hiding them in the next drawer down. I then placed the bagged dildo into the empty drawer and turned it on. Closing the drawer I was pleased to note a faint but perceptible hummmmm and vibration from the desk.

Then I went back out to the couch, picked up a magazine and waited.

Soon my pal returned with a bag of groceries. Nodded to me as he came in.

“Hey, man, there was phone call on your office line. Probably left a message.”

“”Oh, okay, thanks.” Walks into the office.

My mind says, “Wait for it.... Wait for it...”

Suddenly a most unmanly scream comes wafting out of the office into the living room. My pal appears, trembling, pale, and shocked. “Out..... get it out..... now..... please.... I’m begging you.

Weeping from laughter, I walk into the office and glance down into the open drawer where I can see the powered up dildo shaking and slowly moving in a circle on the bottom of the drawer. I pick up the bag by the corner and display it to him. He is standing by the back door pointing to the garbage can. I go out and ceremoniously drop it in.... vibrating all the way down.

He’s back in the kitchen. Boiling water. It will take three quarts of water and two scrubbing with Brillo soap pads until he’s satisfied that the drawer in his desk is finally purged of Dildo Cooties.

In a couple of days I leave. The next year I’m back. In his office one day I absently pull open the right hand top drawer of his desk. There’s a liner on the bottom and nothing else in the drawer.

Like I said, my pal is a very sensitive little forest flower.

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Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 15, 2015 10:22 AM | Comments (2)  | QuickLink: Permalink
"Conventional wisdom has had a pretty bad run these last 15 years."

For that reason there is little purpose to trusting conventional wisdom further. Instead it might be better to predict a future based on observable trends rather than scenarios that politicians offer. If those trends continue one would expect to see in 2025:


  1. The self-destruction of the Muslim Middle East;

  2. The rise of ethnic and national politics in Europe;

  3. The widespread resurgence of religion and cultural identity as a consequence of (2);

  4. Mass expulsions or segregation in large parts of the world to deconflict incompatible communities

  5. Everyone packing personal weapons like the Wild West

  6. The collapse of multi-ethnic countries into simplified pacts based around of national defense, with most social law generated by local communities and affinity groups;

  7. One or more large regional wars with casualties in the tens of millions.

  8. Several, possibly many WMD attacks on major cities involving radiological weapons, low yield nukes or biological agents.

  9. The collapse of any realistic expectation of Peace on Earth, with the remaining hope of mankind vested in the new space frontier.
Excerpted from Looking Back At the Turning of the Century | Belmont Club



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 15, 2015 9:23 AM | Comments (1)  | QuickLink: Permalink
A Scene From The Coming Diversity Wars by Blake Neff

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General Staff Building, Western Military District Headquarters, St. Petersburg, Russia

9:34 PM, Sept. 19, 2036. The Darkest Days of World War 3

*A young cismale officer bursts into the war room*

Lt. Sergei Ivanov: General! Terrible news from the front!

Gen. Mikhail Petrov: What do you mean, Lieutenant?

Ivanov: The Americans … they’re sending their most diverse units to attack Smolensk!

Petrov: Just … just how diverse do you mean?

Ivanov: It’s the Fourth Marine Division … the Fighting Jenners. Astonishingly, they’re almost equally split between blacks, Hispanics, Asians, and American Indians.

Petrov: Terrible news … but we’ve held off racially balanced units before. As long as they’re still mostly straight men …

Ivanov [interrupting]: That’s not all commander. They’re 75 percent women. 30 percent identify as gay, 12 percent as bisexual, 7 percent as assorted queer sexualities.

Petrov: My God … Trannies?

Ivanov: Two whole rifle companies. Crack troops. Best of the best.

Petrov: Blyad! Prepare to evacuate to Moscow. We cannot hope to contain such a strong enemy with our regular white, cishet divisions.

Ivanov: Wait, commander! We shouldn’t give up yet, we mustn’t give up!

Petrov: You’re a good soldier, Ivanov, but you need to know defeat when you see it. Ray Mabus caused a military revolution when he discovered the strength-multiplying effects of diversity within a military force. And it’s not just raw strength, either. Diversity made the Americans more innovative too, Mabus discovered. Their weapons and tactics have never been more advanced relative to ours. We’re seeing the fruits of Mabus’ brilliant discovery now. Vladivostok, Murmansk, Rostov, they all have the rainbow flag flying over them now because of the diversity principle.

Ivanov: But sir! We could still counterattack! If the enemy force is 75 percent women, then maybe we can hit them when all of their menstrual cycles are lined up. They’ll be too cramped and bloated to fight back!

Petrov: Watch your language, lieutenant. Not all women menstruate, and not all those who menstruate are women. We can’t assume anything.

Ivanov: I’m sorry, sir. Is … is there any hope?

Petrov: At this point, I’m afraid not. We should have accepted President Malia Obama’s ultimatum to legalize gay marriage and recognize all 17 genders while we had the chance.

Ivanov: Wait, sir! I have another idea. It’s not too late to adopt the Americans’ military doctrine. We could start identifying as trans* as well!

Petrov: By God, Ivanov, you’re a genius! Fetch some scalpels from the surgeon’s tent, and tell Col. Kozak to requisition the supply of hormones we captured from the French at Kursk. Send a message to Moscow and tell them we need to concentrate every racial and ethnic studies professor we have in Smolensk, so we can make our forces there as transracial as possible. We’ll lick those Americans yet!

That night, Gen. Mikhail Petrov re-identified herself as Sofiya Jackson, a black trans* woman of size, and led her newly diversified soldiers into the decisive battle at Smolensk. While Jackson fell in the battle, she did so having given birth to a new, more diverse Russian army, one that could battle the Americans on an equal footing. The war, so close to ending in an easy American victory, would continue for many years to come… but that is a story for another time.

Satire from| The Daily Caller



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 14, 2015 9:18 AM | Comments (6)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Matt Drudge: A Rare Interview with Alex Jones

"I’ve had a hell of a run. It’s 20 years next year or 20 years about now. Hell of a run. I couldn’t have gone any farther."

Gets moving at around 13 minutes.


On the media’s treatment of Hillary: “You’ve got to be the greatest you can be now–now. Before this country is so completely altered and we’re left with Hillary’s brain in the Oval Office in a jar. Cuz that’s what we’re getting. She is old and she’s sick. She is not a contender. They’re making her a contender with these propped up Saturday Night Live things; it’s like a head on a stick. And then on the Today show with [Savannah Guthrie]–a head on a stick. She is not a viable, vibrant leader for this country of 300–including the illegals, 380 million–Americans. So the media is trying to put us to sleep.”

On the American public: “How sick are the American people right now? I’ve been saying that they could put Hillary Clinton’s brain in a jar in the Oval Office and she would be elected. People are really sick… People are willing to be made over in the image of these corporations.”

On relying on others’ online platforms: “The reason there’s so much anger online, also, is a newspaper like the Washington Post will leave a comment section. They don’t care what you’re saying. They don’t care what you’re thinking. That’s why you get this anger, that, ‘oh, I’m out here as a citizen and I’m operating in their playground.’ Make your own playground! The reason I’m here, Alex, is you’ve made your own playground.”

“You get famous on YouTube… you’re playing in Google’s hell pit. Make your own place. The Internet allows you to make your own dynamic, your own universe. Why are you gravitating toward somebody else’s universe? And this is kind of, again, where Drudge, to me, when I look at it right now, is a correction to this groupthink that has–there’s no difference from any of these websites. You go up and down, we talk about this. What’s the difference between the websites? Between a Slate or a Salon or a BuzzFeed or a HuffPo–what is the difference? There isn’t any. And this is a travesty. It’s almost like a weird conglomerate of groupthink that has developed in a dynamic era that should be vibrating. It should be vibrating, it should be controversial.”



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 13, 2015 10:23 AM | Comments (3)  | QuickLink: Permalink
The Road Home

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Photograph by by Carles -Vilarrasa

Have the gates of death been opened unto thee? or hast thou seen the doors of the shadow of death? -- Job 38 17

When people find out I dropped dead on October 13 of 2011, they often ask me if I saw "the white light." They are disappointed when I tell them I did not. They’ve come to believe in the light, believe in it in a very literal way. They’ve heard it is seen and they’d like continuing confirmation of this sighting. My report always, as I said, disappoints. For some it would seem that even though I was dead, I was not dead enough. Still, I was dead and I am sorry to disappoint in not being able to report anything other than a timeless blank between two moments; a dark with no dimension or duration between a light and a light.

The light of life left me in one swift instant much as the light goes out when you flip the switch to "off." The light of life returned to me in the very next instant as if someone slowly turned up a dimmer switch in a small room.

In one moment I was standing on my front porch looking at children running about in the playground across the street. The very next moment I was looking up from my bed at the sound-muffled ceiling of the ICU in Harbor View Hospital in Seattle. A voice like footsteps coming closer down a long hallway was repeating and repeating, “You are in Harbor View. You’ve had a heart attack. It’s daytime....

Thus, after being held in a coma for 11 days, I was returned to life.

Thus, tick became tock.

Between those two moments I have no information to report since, to my mind and memory, there are no moments between those two. They are found side by side in my mind; an enjambment bracketing a caesura. The 11 days between them have no duration at all. In a sense the only clue they provide in their utter nonexistence would be one to the true dimensions of eternity.

Some people seem to think that, with no light to report, my cut-rate resurrection is something rather modest, a common outcome of our enlightened, medically advanced age available to all. They express thanks that the 911 medical crew got to me as fast as it did and knew how to, in effect, jump start my heart. To those who don't get a comic book resurrection mine seems only a mundane report on a modern ability. They don’t find it miraculous. But that is only because they are deaf, dumb, and blind to the miraculous. I am not. It was my miracle. And a miracle it was.

The roots of my miracle go back many years and begin, as so many things do these days, online in a long correspondence that became, in time, a deep and abiding friendship and love. Part of that friendship entailed that, although we lived in separate towns, we spent some parts of each year visiting. In this particular autumn she was visiting me. And on this particular day she had -- for obscure reasons -- postponed her regular daily walk and, upon return, postponed her regular post-walk shower. This meant that during the time she would normally be either out of the house or under running water she just happened standing nearby when my heart stopped. The result was that she started the 911 response within seconds after I stopped breathing. Because of this the three units dispatched to help me came within minutes and returned me to life and transported me to the hospital where I spent the next 11 days suspended between a light and a light.

Some seem to feel that miracles only happen in the center of a bright light with a large boom and a loud voice out of a whirlwind; Imax miracles in Surroundsound. Perhaps they do. I’ve no experience with them. My experience has only been with the miracle of a long chain of small events, happenings, and abiding love that have given to me this extra year of being alive in the midst of the miracle of creation; creation as it is, both miraculous or mundane.

My formal birthday is the day after Christmas. I’ve never liked the 26th of December. It’s hard to try to have your birthday party on the day after the biggest birthday party of the year.

Today though, it strikes me that I have a new birthday -- a 'rebirthday' if you will. And that’s what I am going to celebrate for as many years as are left to me, my Rebirthday.

After a long, long string of dry sunny days this day, Saturday the 13th of October in the year of our Lord 2012, is overcast and raining. In previous years I would have shrugged and grumbled at the inclement weather. Today I am going out in my back yard and shower in it. Because today I know I am both blessed and, as we all are on every day in this mysterious life within the light, reborn within the miracle.

[First published October 2012]

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 13, 2015 12:48 AM | Comments (71)  | QuickLink: Permalink
In the Town Hall's Graveyard

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In the hayed field thick with dusted mist,
As the noon whistle of the village hissed,
We noted how the dead were neatly placed,
How all lay labeled, how all were given space.

We remarked the craft of marble wreath,
And proposed that those who lay beneath
Were clad in the fashion of their day,
Some fitting shroud in which to greet eternities of clay.

Nearby we saw the fruits of Arbor Day and said
How lovely were the trees; how well pruned and fed.
The trees ignored our gaze, as was their right,
And spawned a host of shadows, imitating night.

The hill before us, like some weathered tomb
Passed by in spring, above us loomed
With high and wind smoothed walls of slate
On which the trees' sharp branches scraped

An etching of themselves slashed into sky.
But we were late into our day and a bird's cry
Made us spy the gray and shaken sheets of storm,
That sheathed us soon and drove us down

Into the brambles where the ancient Indians lay,
Sheltered by the weeds from the weather of the day,
And resolved beneath to, sightless, calmly wait
Upon the last night's opening of the gateless gate.

"The weave of roots took our eyes away.
The seeping rain removed our clay.
Our husked dried skin is steeped in sleep.
If you would awaken us, you must dig deep

"Beneath the earth of whittled leaves
Beneath the grief that no longer grieves;
To awaken us you need a careful touch,
For dig you must, but never dig too much."

We turned from the field and its rustle of birds,
Where sunlight had played on summer words,
Playing now to winter's chiseled stones,
To the hissing silence of abandoned bones.

Their stillness slashed dry grass with scythes of wind,
And made us wish we could a thousand acts rescind,
But we knew our wishes were for naught,
For what is easily sold is dearly bought.

Instead, we startled life in a whirr of wings,
And in that moment came to present things.
We went home, made tea, and sat together,
Held hands at evening and talked about the weather.



Posted by Vanderleun Oct 12, 2015 12:01 PM | Comments (2)  | QuickLink: Permalink
The Media Narrative Chart

I created a chart to ensure that budding journalists

understand how to properly frame a story involving any type of shooting, terror attack, or other violent crime. Remember that the job of the Objective Journalist™ is not to tell the audience what happened, but to expand the event into an indictment of Western culture. -- Jon Gabriel, Ed.| Ricochet

media-narrative-chart.jpg



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 10, 2015 11:15 AM | Comments (8)  | QuickLink: Permalink
How is Our Strategy in the Middle East Working? "What strategy?"

From the opening episode of this year's Homeland: "They're there for one reason and one reason only, to die for the Caliphate and usher in a world without infidels. That's their strategy and it's been that way since the 7th century."

Asked what he would do, Quinn suggests 200,000 soldiers on the ground and an equal number of doctors and teachers. Told that that is not feasible and asked for another solution, Quinn says, "Hit reset -- pound Raqqah into a parking lot."

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 9, 2015 11:06 AM | Comments (14)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Want to create a gun-free America in 5 easy steps? Here’s all there is to it:

From Reason Magazine viaAll Good Men

Step 1: Elect. For a gun-free America, the first thing you’ll need is two-thirds of Congress. So elect a minimum of 67 Senators and 290 Representatives who are on your side.

Step 2: Propose. Then, have them vote to propose an amendment to the Constitution which repeals Second Amendment gun rights for all Americans.

Step 3: Ratify. Then convince the legislators of 38 states to ratify that change.

At this point, the Second Amendment is history, but you’ve done nothing to decrease gun violence. All you’ve done is remove the barrier for Congress to act.

Step 4: Legislate. You need to enact “common sense” reform.

You can try to do what Australia did and…ban all guns? That’s not at all what they did, but whatever, fuck it. Go big or go home, right?

It will have to be passed by Congress and signed by the president.

Great! The law is passed and guns are now illegal. The only thing left to do is…

Step 5: Enforce. Guns won’t just disappear because you passed a law. You need to confiscate some 350 million guns scattered among 330 Million Americans.

Sure, you can try a buy-back program like Australia, but like Australia that will still leave behind anywhere from 60 percent to 80 percent of privately owned firearms.

The rest you have to take.

You’ll need the police, the FBI, the ATF or the National Guard—all known for their nuanced approach to potentially dangerous situations—to go door-to-door, through 3.8 million square miles of this country and take guns, by force, from thousands, if not, millions of well-armed individuals. Many of whom would rather start a civil war than acquiesce.

So inevitably gun violence, which is currently at a historic low, will skyrocket.

But that is how you get a gun-free America in five easy steps.



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 9, 2015 9:18 AM | Comments (7)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Carmageddon: This Is What 750 Million Chinese Hitting The Road Looks Like

If you've ever complained about your commute, or the traffic jams on your way to vacation destinations, here is some context from China...



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 8, 2015 9:10 PM | Comments (7)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Boomer Anthems: Are You Experienced?

Jimi Hendrix~~ ~~ lyrics on screen - YouTube



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 8, 2015 7:28 PM | QuickLink: Permalink
Boomer Anthems: "Won't Get Fooled Again"

"Meet the new boss.
Same as the old boss."

Sitting down? There is no sitting down when The Who crank it up.

"The song was originally intended for a rock opera Townshend had been working on, Lifehouse, which was a multi-media exercise based on his followings of the Indian religious avatar Meher Baba, showing how spiritual enlightenment could be obtained via a combination of band and audience. The song was written for the end of the opera, after the main character, Bobby, is killed and the "universal chord" is sounded. The main characters disappear, leaving behind the government and army, who are left to bully each other. Townshend described the song as one "that screams defiance at those who feel any cause is better than no cause" -- LaWik

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“….Following the lead car (in which I sat), the caravan traveled at Pete’s speed — that is to say, at 100 miles per hour and above.

When the car would run into a squall it was as if it had suddenly been thrown into a lake, so dense was the water when encountered at that speed. Visibility would drop to nothing, for even German engineering cannot create a windshield wiper to deal with that stress. Pete would slow down to 60 or so and wait for the squall to pass.
It was quiet in the car, the morning after the gig of the night before. I was still wondering what we were going to do about a cover, and, as with the journey north, a good deal of my attention was consumed in wondering if I’d survive, when I look out the window and saw some huge cement blocks thrusting randomly out of acres of mottled gray sludge. A totally surreal sight, it reminded me of the monolith — the slab — from Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey. But we were traveling so fast that the shapes vanished almost immediately. I turned my head quickly to catch a last glimpse…
At the next roundabout, Pete says, “Well, do you have any ideas?” And 1 say, “Well, there were these shapes back a few miles, and. . .” Townshend spins the wheel of the Mercedes, and the entire caravan follows, and again at 130 we careen back toward these shapes, screeching to a halt. The Who and entourage step out of their cars. (We are looking — I am later to discover — at a slag heap, a collection of almost solid industrial waste into which concrete pillars are thrust to keep the waste from shifting.)
I pick up my cameras and we all walk out onto the dark reef of the slag. The sky is still gray as occasional drops of rain fall. At first I direct them to react to the slab as Kubrick’s apes and astronauts react in 2001: approaching cautiously, arms upraised, almost touching it. But this is too much a re-creation, and somebody, probably Pete, walks up to the slab and starts to piss on it. The others follow suit. Those unable to urinate on cue are aided by little film cans filled with rainwater.” From Ethan Russell, An American Story



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 8, 2015 12:31 PM | Comments (5)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Enormous Changes at the Last Minute

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A disturbance in the Narrative as reflected on Memeorandum.


Kevin McCarthy dropping out potentially puts Donald Trump only 218 votes short of becoming Speaker of the House.



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 8, 2015 10:40 AM | Comments (4)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Remove the Mask of the Media

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Via HappyAcres and taken from The Menace of Egalitarianism @ Mises Daily

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Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 8, 2015 9:43 AM | Comments (1)  | QuickLink: Permalink
In Which Senator Cruz Eviscerates Sierra Club's Token Moron Aaron Mair

In which Mair is revealed to be so blindly stupid and so locked into rote answers that one would have to question just what, exactly, was this man's prime qualification for his job as head of the Sierra Club.


Cruz: Well, I would not that even the phrase “preponderance of the evidence,” having been a practicing lawyer for many years, means 51%, that means 49 . . . at least 51% is what the preponderance means. You know, I would ask, for example, if you want to end debate, if you don’t want to address the facts, how do you address the fact that the last 18 years the satellite data show no demonstrable warming whatsoever?

Mair: Sir, I would rely upon the Union of Concerned Scientists, and I would rely on the evidence, again, of our own NOAA officials, the data are there.

Cruz: Is it correct that the satellite data over the last 18 years demonstrate no significant warming?

Mair: No.

Cruz: How is it incorrect?

Mair: [Confers with staff.] Based upon our experts, it’s been refuted long ago, and there is no longer, it’s not up for scientific debate.

Cruz: I’m curious . . . If . . . So it’s . . . I want to understand . . . I do find it highly interesting that the President of the Sierra Club when asked what the satellite data demonstrate about warming, apparently is relying on staff. The nice thing about the satellite data is that they are objective numbers. . .

Mair: Correct.

Cruz: Numbers over the last 18 years. Are you familiar with the phrase “the pause”?

Mair: [Confers with staff.] The answer is yes. And, essentially, we rest on our position.

Cruz: And to what . . . you said you are familiar with the pause, and to what does the phrase “the pause” refer?

Mair: [Confers with staff, turns back around to look at Cruz, does not speak.]

Cruz: I’m sorry you said you are familiar with that term, so I asked to what does it refer?

Mair: [Confers with staff.] Essentially it’s the slowing in global warming in the ’40s, Sir.

Cruz: During the ’40s. [Mair nods in agreement.] Is it not the term that global warming alarmists have used to explain the inconvenient truth, to use a phrase popularized by former Vice President Al Gore, that the satellite data over the last 18 years demonstrate no significant warming whatsoever? Global warming alarmists call that “the pause” because the computer models say there should be dramatic warming, and yet the actual satellites taking the measurement don’t show any significant warming.

Mair: But Senator, 97% of the scientists concur and agree that there is global warming, and anthropogenic impact with regards to global warming.

Cruz: The problem with that statistic that gets cited a lot is that it’s based on one bogus study. And indeed your response . . . I would point out your response is quite striking. I asked about the science and the evidence, the actual data, we have satellites, they’re measuring temperature . . .

Mair: Right.

Cruz: That should be relevant. And your answer is pay no attention to your lying eyes, and the numbers, that the satellites show. Instead listen to the scientists who are receiving massive grants, who tell us, do not debate the science.

Mair: Sir, this is the . . . one of the national pastimes in America. And while we’re debating what 97% of scientists have already settled, the 3% that, as they say, have investment in regard to carbon industry, our planet is heating and cooking up and warming. So this is one of the reasons . . .

Cruz: So it is the Sierra Club’s position that right now the Earth is cooking up and heating and warming. Is that the Sierra Club’s . . . I mean I just want to quote you and understand your position.

Mair: I’m saying I concur with 97% of our, of the world’s scientists, with regards to global warming and the anthropogenic effects of mankind with regards to climate.

Cruz: But Sir, would you answer the question. Is it the Sierra Club’s position, as you just testified, that the Earth is cooking up and heating and warming, right now. Is that the Sierra Club’s position?

Mair: Global temperatures are on the rise, Sir.

Cruz: And I assume the Sierra Club would issue a public retraction if confronted with the facts that the data are precisely as I described that over the last 18 years there has been no significant warming, and indeed that is why global warming alarmists invented the term “the pause” to explain what they call the pause in global warming because the data demonstrate what you just said, that the Earth is cooking and warming, is not backed up by the data.

Mair: We are concurring with 97% of the scientists who absolutely say the opposite, Sir.

Cruz: So if the data are contrary to your testimony, would the Sierra Club issue a retraction?

Full transcript is HERE AT: Sierra Club President’s Testimony Reveals It’s Worse Than We Thought. Climate Change? No. Group Think About Climate Change.



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 8, 2015 8:49 AM | Comments (12)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Regarding "The Discovery of Freedom"

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Full book in PDF form is to be found at The Discovery of Freedom | Mises Institute

HappyAcres



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 7, 2015 5:50 PM | Comments (6)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Something Wonderful: Selections from Early Entries Into 2015 National Geographic Photo Contest

Via Alan Taylor's In Focus at The Atlantic

But first, a little traveling music Professor.


Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 6, 2015 6:21 PM | Comments (1)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Note: That Bear Is Not Your Puppy

AKA: "Obama's Foreign Policy in two and a half minutes."

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 6, 2015 10:49 AM | Comments (16)  | QuickLink: Permalink
DO IT FOR MOM! Denmark Is Really Desperate For Their Young People To Start Boning

adooitfoermom.jpg

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 5, 2015 12:12 PM | Comments (10)  | QuickLink: Permalink
A Hitler They Missed

By Son of Brock Landers at 28 Sherman:

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What are some of the things or traits known about Hitler?
1. Joined a socialist party.
2. Meteoric rise despite no real executive or administrative skills.
3. Proficient speaker, great speaker in the eyes of his crowd, meh to non-believers
4. Rather weird personal relations to the opposite gender. Romantically linked to a niece who killed herself. Kind of weird relationship with Eva Braun; fraudulent marriage at the end. She complained of no sex to Speer often.
5. Played up being single and a stand in mate for a sliver of lonely female voters.
6. Anti-gun.
7. Faggy about his diet.
8. Medical history is a mystery. His personal doctor was known to specialize in venereal diseases. Did he have Parkinsons at the end? Was the shaking and mania just due to syphilis?
9. Didn't like Jews.
10. Was everything to everybody during his rise. Altered what he pushed to the audience he spoke to, which is smart politics, but reveals the fraud of democracy.
11. Pro-violence if it served his political needs.
12. Weird family issues. Parents were both dead before he was 20.
13. Had a lot of gay mannerisms. No one was going to accuse him of being butch.
14. He had financial difficulties until he was elected into office and Mein Kampf started to sell like hot cakes.

Now why not use the above traits and find a different Hitler. One they missed. One that hits close to home. Let's look at the list but with notes for comparison.

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 5, 2015 10:34 AM | Comments (10)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Unbelief and Its Consequences: "God gave them over"

bosch_the_prince_of_hell_with_a_cauldron_on_his_head.jpg

22 Professing to be wise, they became fools,

23 and exchanged the glory of the incorruptible God for an image in the form of corruptible man and of birds and four-footed animals and crawling creatures.

24 Therefore God gave them over in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, so that their bodies would be dishonored among them.

25 For they exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.

26 For this reason God gave them over to degrading passions; for their women exchanged the natural function for that which is unnatural,

27 and in the same way also the men abandoned the natural function of the woman and burned in their desire toward one another, men with men committing indecent acts and receiving in their own persons the due penalty of their error.

28 And just as they did not see fit to acknowledge God any longer, God gave them over to a depraved mind, to do those things which are not proper,

29 being filled with all unrighteousness, wickedness, greed, evil; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, malice; they are gossips, 30 slanderers, haters of God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents,

31 without understanding, untrustworthy, unloving, unmerciful;

32 and although they know the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, they not only do the same, but also give hearty approval to those who practice them.

Romans 1:24-32

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 4, 2015 10:39 AM | Comments (8)  | QuickLink: Permalink
The Retrosexuals (From Somewhen on the Internet)

aretrosexmargin.jpgEvery time my TV is on, all that can be seen is effeminate men prancing about, redecorating houses and talking about foreign concepts like "style" and "feng shui."

Heterosexual, homosexual, bisexual, transsexual, metrosexual, non-sexual; blue, green, and purple-sexual!.... Bogus definitions have taken over the urban and suburban world!

Real men of the world, stand up, scratch your butts, belch, and yell "ENOUGH!"

I hereby announce the start of a new offensive in the culture Wars, the Retrosexual movement.

The Code :

A Retrosexual man, no matter what the woman insists, PAYS FOR THE DATE.

A Retrosexual man opens doors for a lady. Even for the ones that fit that term only because they are female.

A Retrosexual DEALS WITH IT. Be it a flat tire, break-in into your home, or a natural disaster, you DEAL WITH IT.

A Retrosexual not only eats red meat. He often kills it himself.

A Retrosexual doesn't worry about living to be 90. It's not how long you live, but how well. If you're 90 years old and still smoking cigars and drinking, I salute you. If you are still having sex, you are a God.

A Retrosexual does not use more hair or skin products than a woman. Women have several supermarket aisles of stuff. Retrosexuals need an end cap.

A Retrosexual does not dress in clothes from Hot Topic when he's 30 years old.

A Retrosexual should know how to properly kill stuff (or people) if need be. This falls under the "DEALING WITH IT" portion of The Code.

A Retrosexual watches no TV show with "Queer" in the title.

A Retrosexual does not let neighbors screw up rooms in his house on national TV.

A Retrosexual should not give up excessive amounts of manliness for women. Some is inevitable, but major reinvention of yourself will only lead to you becoming a froo-froo little pussy, and in the long run, she ain't worth it.

A Retrosexual is allowed to seek professional help for major mental stress such as drug/alcohol addiction, death of your entire family in a freak treechipper accident, favorite sports team being moved to a different city, favorite bird dog expiring, etc.

You are NOT allowed to see a shrink because Daddy didn't pay you enough attention. Daddy was busy DEALING WITH IT. When you screwed up, he DEALT with you.

A Retrosexual will have at least one outfit in his wardrobe designed to conceal himself from prey.

A Retrosexual knows how to tie a Windsor knot when wearing a tie -- and ONLY a Windsor knot.

A Retrosexual should have at least one good wound he can brag about getting.

A Retrosexual knows how to use a basic set of tools. If you can't hammer a nail, or drill a straight hole, practice in secret until you can -- or be rightfully ridiculed for the wuss you be.

A Retrosexual knows that owning a gun is not a sign that your are riddled with fear. Guns are TOOLS and are often essential to DEAL WITH IT.

Plus it's just plain fun to fire one off in the direction of those people or things that just need a little "wakin' up".

Crying. There are very few reasons that a Retrosexual may cry, and none of them have to do with TV commercials, movies, or soap operas.

Sports teams are sometimes a reason to cry, but the preferred method of release is swearing or throwing the remote control.

Some reasons a Retrosexual can cry include (but are not limited to) death of a loved one, death of a pet (fish do NOT count as pets in this case), loss of a major body part, or loss of major body part on your Ford truck.

When a Retrosexual is on a crowded bus and or a commuter train, and a pregnant woman, heck, any woman gets on, that retrosexual stands up and offers his seat to that woman, then looks around at the other so-called men still in their seats with a disgusted "you punks" look on his face.

A Retrosexual knows how to say the Pledge properly, and with the correct emphasis and pronunciation. He also knows the words to the Star Spangled Banner.

A Retrosexual will have hobbies and habits his wife and mother do not understand, but that are essential to his manliness, in that they offset the acceptable manliness decline he suffers when married/engaged or in a serious healthy relationship - i.e., hunting, boxing, shot putting, shooting, cigars, car maintenance.

A Retrosexual knows how to sharpen his own knives and kitchen utensils.

A Retrosexual man can drive in snow (hell, a blizzard) without sliding all over or driving under 20mph, without anxiety, and without high-centering his ride in a snow bank.

A Retrosexual man can chop down a tree and make it land where he wants. Wherever it lands is where he damn well wanted it to land.

Except on his truck--that would happen because of a "force of nature," and then the retrosexual man's options are to Cry, or to DEAL WITH IT, or do both.

A Retrosexual will give up his seat on a bus to not only any women but any elderly person or person in military dress (except 2nd Lt's).

NOTE: The person in military dress may turn down the offer but the Retrosexual man will ALWAYS make the offer to them and thank them for serving their country.

A Retrosexual man doesn't need a contract -- a handshake is good enough.
He will always stand by his word even if circumstances change or the other person deceived him.

A Retrosexual man doesn't immediately look to sue someone when he does something stupid and hurts himself.

We understand that sometimes in the process of doing things we get hurt and.... we just DEAL WITH IT!"

I hereby announce the start of a new offensive in the culture Wars, the Retrosexual movement.

Via Chasmatic in The Top 40: 27 Ways to be a Classic Man

[ Note:"I got this from the internet, perhaps from this very site. I didn't compose it but will gladly give credit where credit is due." -- Chasmatic]



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 3, 2015 11:00 PM | Comments (10)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Something Wonderful: "Paper"

Very, very, very, very, very, very clever.



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 3, 2015 7:57 PM | Comments (4)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Boomer Anthems: "All Along the Watchtowers"

Presented for your approval: Our new national anthem.

“There must be some way out of here,” said the joker to the thief
“There’s too much confusion, I can’t get no relief
Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth
None of them along the line know what any of it is worth”

“No reason to get excited,” the thief, he kindly spoke
“There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke
But you and I, we’ve been through that, and this is not our fate
So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late”

All along the watchtower, princes kept the view
While all the women came and went, barefoot servants, too

Outside in the distance a wildcat did growl
Two riders were approaching, the wind began to howl

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 3, 2015 6:21 PM | Comments (12)  | QuickLink: Permalink
"The Modern Man" Fisked.... By Hand

Via Karen L. Myers and Ed Driscoll at Instapundit, a NYT column defining “The Modern Man” with replies in red ink. Never Yet Melted

Sample:

excerptmodmanfisk.jpg

Full list if you...

Continued...

Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 1, 2015 1:32 PM | Comments (15)  | QuickLink: Permalink
Deafening Silence



Posted by gerardvanderleun Oct 1, 2015 12:44 PM | Comments (11)  | QuickLink: Permalink
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