What we need is a decent rain. The grass is turning brown. There are not that many weeks left in the year where conditions will support thunderstorms. At this point, though, I'd take a good plain old rainshower.
Ah, well.
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How does a man hang himself in a hanging-proof cell? Vox Day is skeptical.
Karl Denninger is also skepitcal.
Francis Porretto is also skeptical.
In the comments at the latter link, however, comes something that I had not considered. If indeed the Epstein case is playing out like a Hollywood thriller, why not another trope: Epstein's death was faked by the feds specifically so he could be kept alive?
Wouldn't that be something?
Not the way to bet, and I'm not holding my breath, though. If there is one thing which is emblematic of our society's leadership since 1988, it is the sort of rank incompetence displayed by the "suicide" of Jeffrey Epstein. Let's face it: there is a lot of money and prestige riding on him not testifying; that's why he was given the sweetheart deal in 2008 and allowed to go free. There is a vast panoply of rich and powerful people who don't particularly feel like having their perversions aired before the public and who certainly don't want to find themselves doing a turn in prison. And it really doesn't take a lot of effort for anyone so inclined to find out who, in an organization, needs a little help from those with clout, and who are desperate enough to agree to doing a little favor in exchange for that assistance. Not much. Just take an extended bathroom break at 8:30 and you'll get that mortgage. Or, fudge an access pass for my friend John Smith and that hospital bill goes away. Or, mess up archiving the video from that cell and your son will get that scholarship to the expensive university you can't afford. Your sister that needs a new kidney? We can make that happen. No one will ever know. No one will ever be able to make any connection between you and this. It's a little thing. It won't cost you your job; you won't even be reprimanded. It's just a little mistake.
There don't have to be threats. Just favors, things the elites can easily do as a trifle for them, but which are impossible for the hoi polloi. Who wouldn't? "Hell, all I need to do is make a 'mistake' and my biggest problem is solved!" Handled correctly, there's no connection between the elite person and the person in question, no sign of anything overt or outright that could or would catch the eye of an investigator.
The reason I can't accept Epstein's death as a suicide stems from the fact that there are so many--too many--rich and powerful people who profit by it. Bill and Hillary Clinton top that list, but they are by far and away not the only ones on it.
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Um...no. Yet another example of "lunatic fringe". Wow.
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Sauce for the goose. It's "Indian-occupied Kashmir" but strangely it's not "British-occupied Ireland". *snerk*
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Release of "The Hunt" postponed. According to a commentor:
According to rumors based on a supposedly leaked script of The Hunt, all of the Deplorables die, and all of the Progressive hunters die. The only survivor is an Action Woman as powerful and competent as Captain Marvel who was mistakenly included in the kidnapped Deplorables, and she--surprise!--is a Progressive.That makes sense. I wasn't going to bother with this movie regardless of circumstance (mainly because I detest this kind of story) but to learn that of course an omnicompetent progressive womin would be the sole survivor does not at all surprise me. After all, you could not have any of the bad guys survive, nor could you have any of the "deplorables" survive. So in the end it becomes "murder porn" fetishizing violence against "Deplorables" and "toxic masculinity" and I've got a nickel that says it's totally unwatchable horseshit.
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The Illinois pension situation. I know that the Democrat machine thinks that the taxpayers of Illinois "will simply have to pay it" but that doesn't work; it can't work, not in a country where people can move out if it suits them. And Illinois can't charge people exit fees, either--to stem the tide of departures--as that's flatly unconstitutional.
Something has to be done. There are two ways to handle it; one is to bite the bullet now and do what needs doing. The other--which is the method preferred by the Illinois Democrat party--is to do nothing and simply stop paying the pensions when the money runs out and hope the federal government bails out the state.
I don't think that very likely, though.
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Understand that there is absolutely nothing off the table for these people. Democrat politicians doxxing people who donate to their opponents is the least of our worries.
People act as if Trump Derangement Syndrome (and Bush Derangement Syndrome before it) is something new and shocking, but it really isn't. In 1992--going on three decades ago--I was cautioned not to put a bumper sticker on my car saying "MEAT IS TASTY" because it would lead to the car being vandalized--and I already knew that, had said that I wanted to do it, not that I would, and for that very reason.
The left has always been emotionally incontinent when it comes to opposing viewpoints, and that goes so far back it predates the categories "left-wing" and "right-wing". They called themselves other things but they were still just as intolerant of dissent as they are now and their remedies were always violence, intimidation, and murder.
The final paragraph of the post sums it:
For the Left, the end of totalitarian tyranny justifies any and all means, and they'll inflict casualties and stack bodies just as high as they think they need to so as to accomplish our subjugation irreversibly. When it comes to gaining, securing, and expanding power and control for themselves, the Left recognizes no limits whatsoever. That is the only rule they follow, the only morality they have, and the only rationalization they need."The leftists in Dayton are free to intimidate an Emergency Room nurse with impunity, while the Organs of the State go after gun owners."
Civil war--an actual for-real civil war--is not going to do anyone any good at all. While I think the right wing would inevitably win it, I do not expect it to be a pushover and the left wing will not willingly go into "that good night." It would be very bad, even--or maybe "especially"--for those who weren't actually fighting.
The left desperately wants it because to them, that's "revolution" and it's their tried-and-true path to seizing control of a country. Examples: Russia. China. Cuba. The left seems to think that in the case of a civil war, they win, automatically. I'm not so sure; in such a situation I imagine the left gains the cities pretty easily (and much of the surrounding suburbs) but there's a vast area they won't and cannot control--and from those areas, most of the food and energy comes.
This is what the left gets:

And there is no way they can hold it. Almost everyone not on those islands can interdict or intercept anyone trying to enter them, hamper their operations, and melt away into the scenery, undetected. New York then cannot connect to California, except via satellite, because if you think there aren't people between NYC and LA that know their way around a fiber optic relay you are sorely mistaken.
It's true that D.C. controls a pretty mighty military--but how many units side with the left? Will the commander of a ballistic missile submarine willingly nuke Des Moines or Helena or Topeka? You can drop half a megaton on Smallville but that won't get the guys next door in Tinytown or across the state in Littleberg, and in the process you're going to strengthen their resolve. "Remember Smallville!" will start showing up in spray paint on the wrecked hulks of your APCs and tanks.
It's not good for anyone. It's bad. It won't lead to a glorious workers' paradise. It'll just be years of misery and privation and needless violence. And even if the left was successful, most of the people advocating for the left will find themselves executed by whoever emerged on top of the leftist heap.
* * *
Karl Denninger analyzes what happened to Gilette. Basically he says what everyone else says: "Get woke, go broke." It's not that difficult to understand and it happens every time it's tried.
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The left absolutely cannot tolerate any satire because their position is too weak to withstand it.
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By not enforcing immigration laws, the US government is aiding and abetting slavery.
This is the reason that employers hire illegal immigrants: They can abuse them with impunity in acts that amount to slavery or involuntary servitude, under threat of deportation or imprisonment if they complain about it.He's not wrong.
The abuses are as long as you can find a roll of paper to write them on.Paying people less than minimum wage.I can go on and on and on and on. Every single employer using illegal immigrants does so for one or more of the above reasons. The group of employers doing so encompasses a massive percentage of the landscapers, construction firms and agricultural interests in this country including both corporate and so-called "family" farms.
Not paying people for time worked.
Forced overtime, under threat of dismissal, without time and a half in pay.
No 24 hour break per week, as mandated by federal law.
You can't leave the line to take a crap.
You can be groped, grabbed, even raped.
You can be verbally or physically abused.
You can be forced to work under conditions that OSHA says are unacceptably dangerous.
If you get hurt on the job there's no Workman's Comp to take care of the injury -- it's on you.
There is no unemployment if you get fired or laid off, since you never paid into it.
You're under constant threat of a tax audit (since your employment taxes were not paid and no federal taxes were withheld), which can and is used as a means of threatening you in order to force you to shut up.
You're under constant threat of deportation or imprisonment, which is also used as a means to make you shut up.
* * *
It is "slightly more efficient" than just driving a diesel-fueled car. Supposedly the guy has the figures to back it up. I am skeptical.
* * *
Once again, I got a laugh out of Pixy Misa.
YouTube moderators, who couldn't tell which side of their bread was buttered with a gas chromatograph and an easy-print copy of the Chemical Rubber Company's Buttered Bread Handbook, were shocked and appalled that a hugely popular channel wasn't immediately and permanently banned for tasering a dead rat.Emphasis his, but the funny part was the bit about the gas chromatograph.
Also, it appears that tasering a dead rat is against YouTube's community guidelines, so there goes my new channel before it even got started.
* * *
Weekend is just about over, and thanks to my getting the grass cut on Thursday I didn't have to lift a finger other than to cook meals. I did go to the store today for some necessary sundries, but I would have had to make that trip in any event. So, no biggie.
Nice to have a weekend where I didn't have to do much of anything. It feels like it's been ages.