Category Archives: Culture

Culture for the cultured and uncultured alike.

Rule Five Tyranny Friday

Over at Law & Liberty the other day, authors Daniel Klein and Michael C. Munger had some things to say about a possible U.S. descent into totalitarianism.  Not surprisingly, I have some thoughts.  Excerpt:

It is tempting to think “it (tyranny) can’t happen here.” But Americans are more concerned about that than they have been in decades. In July, a CNN poll indicated that 48 percent of respondents think it is “likely” or “somewhat likely” that state actors will successfully overturn the results of a US election because their party did not win.

We, the present authors, are worried that putatively upright countries today are in danger of descending into tyranny. A tyranny—once capacities for control and despotism are constructed, in some cases including expansive government employment, dependency, and largesse—can be nearly impossible to reform. The key to the descent into tyranny, and the stability of tyranny once it is achieved, is this: Tyrants use tyranny to fortify their keep and to protect themselves against the sanctions due them for their crimes.

Calling tyranny “stable” may seem paradoxical. Tyrannies suffer from chaotic upheavals and violent paroxysms. But the state of tyranny itself is stable, like a capsized canoe. Ordered liberty is better for everyone—aside, perhaps, from the despotic faction and their affiliates. It is difficult to restore the rule of law once it is debased. Rectification would call for changes in personnel, operations, and attitudes. The relative power and privilege of the despots would disappear with rectifications. Tyrants use the tools of tyranny to protect themselves against the sanctions due them.

Does that last bit sound familiar at all?  Say, Nancy Pelosi refusing to name any details as to how she and her drunk-driving husband grew so monstrously rich while Queen Nancy was in the House of Representatives, and exempt from insider-training laws?  Or Hunter Biden’s inexplicable escapes from prosecution for any of a number of obvious, well-documented crimes?  Equal protection under the law is a dead letter in this country, and has been for some time.  Thus have the would-be tyrants used tool of tyranny to shield themselves and their corrupt relations from any consequences of their crimes.

Here’s the onion:

It is not just dystopian fiction—Orwell’s 1984, Richter’s Pictures of a Socialistic Future, Huxley’s Brave New World, Vonnegut’s “Harrison Bergeron”—that has furnished us with the image of a once-liberal civilization now capsized. Some of the great liberal writers have warned us against the very real march toward a capsized civilization, writers including Alexis de Tocqueville, Hilaire Belloc, C.S. Lewis, and F.A. Hayek. May we heed their warnings. They told us that the governmentalization of social affairs is a tool of would-be despots, and that it hatches despotism even if not by design. We must bravely speak out against the governmentalization of social affairs and against the unjust sentiments and beliefs that forward it.

OK.  Speak out.  Got it.

How?

It has become apparent, over the last few years, that the time where ‘speaking out’ has likely passed.  Plenty of us are speaking – but nobody in the Imperial City is listening.  We vote, but every year it seems a few more of us lose faith in the electoral process.  As with the tax code, more and more stupid twists on the “one man, one vote” principle open more and more elections up for more and more shenanigans.  Look at our own Alaska, where ‘ranked-choice’ voting has resulted in our deep-red state being represented in the House by a liberal Democrat.

I’m getting more worried by the day as to what might happen next.  Only a couple of years ago I dismissed the possibility of major civil unrest or even a dissolution of the United States as the longest of long shots.  Since 2020, I’m beginning to change my way of thinking on that.  I see the odds as increasing, week by week, month by month.  The trigger?  If the shellacking the Left is due to take in the 2022 mid-terms doesn’t set it off, a GOP Presidential victory in 2024 very likely will.

I’d advise everyone reading these virtual pages to note those dates, look around you, and prepare accordingly. 

Goodbye, Blue Monday

Goodbye, Blue Monday!

Thanks again to The Other McCain, Pirate’s Cove, Whores and Ale and Bacon Time for the Rule Five links!

RIP, Queen Elizabeth II.  I abhor the concept of royals (seriously, fuck all ‘nobles’ and all such assorted horseshit) but I will say that the Queen always handled herself with style, class and grace.  Her reign began in 1952, when Harry Truman was President (!).  Imagine that – serving as head of state for seventy years.  The Brits I have been friends with over the years all admired her personally, even those who were opposed to the concept of royalty.  My mother was fond of pointing out that “Lilibet,” as she was known to her family at the time, was a WW2 veteran of sorts, having served in the Auxiliary Territorial Service.

Setting aside the whole outdated concept of royalty, she was a remarkable person that the British people – and others – admired, and we note her passing with respect.

Now, to drop the other shoe:

It’s official:  King Charles III.  There’s no way this jug-eared bonehead won’t fuck this up.  The crown, were they to keep it – and obviously they are – should have been passed on to Prince William, who inherited the better genes from that family, having his mother’s looks and his grandmothers’ brains.

The less said about that ingrate fuck Harry the better.

It’s fortunate for the formerly-Great Britain that the Royal Family has little real power any more.

Animal’s Hump Day News

Happy Hump Day!

One of the bountiful late-summer harvests around here are berries.  While Alaska has a rich assortment of edible berries, we have on our own property a good supply of raspberry brambles.  The advantage in these is twofold, in that 1) they are delicious and useful in preserves, pies and muffins, and b) we don’t have to go anywhere to get them.

So far we have gathered in between a gallon and a gallon and a half of the rich, luscious fruit, with more to come.  Come the depth of our sub-Arctic winter, Mrs. Animal plans to use some of these to bake fresh raspberry muffins, so that we can enjoy a little taste of summer.   I’m looking forward to that.

And so…

On To the Links!

How bad are the emissions from green activists private jets?  Pretty bad.

The Return of Trump.

Sanctuary Cities… aren’t.

I love a happy ending.

Gutfeld shuts down Geraldo.

Ahead, Troll Factor Six!

Florida isn’t making Democrats look bad.  Democrats are making Democrats look bad.

How much of the US have the Chinese infiltrated?  More than we’re comfortable with, that’s for sure.

Four reasons Brian Stelter was sent off to prepare for his second career as an actual potato.

No shit, Sherlock.

George Orwell chortles from the grave.

Frankly, we can’t afford either party in Congress.

A fish rots from the head.

Fucking savages.

He’s on vacation – again?

This Week’s Idiots:

A bumper crop this week.

Slate’s Nitish Pahwa is an idiot.

CNN’s Adam Sobel is an idiot.

Salon’s Amanda Marcotte (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.

Salon’s Chauncey DeVega (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.

The Nation’s Elie Mystal (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.

Paul Krugman (Repeat Offender Alert) is still a cheap partisan hack, and an idiot.

CNN’s Casey Michel is an idiot.

This is the stupidest damn thing I’ve seen in quite a while.

Time’s Philip Elliot is an idiot.

The Guardian’s Richard Wolffe is an idiot.

The Grio’s Michael Harriot is an idiot.

Probably not, Juan.  Sorry about your continuing TDS.

MSNBC’s Hayes Brown (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.

Amanda Marcotte (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.

OK, that’s enough of that.

This Week’s Cultural Edification:

The name Stuart Leslie Goddard may not mean much to you, but if you were watching the music scene in the early Eighties, as in back when MTV was still playing music, you’ll recognize his pseudonym, Adam Ant.  In those early days of music video, Adam and The Ants were a thing, combining a sort of semi-punk sound with Adam’s trademark flamboyant, swashbuckler style.

As should surprise no one, I have a favorite from Adam’s discography, that being the 1982 single Goody Two Shoes.  It’s not a tune you should be taking too seriously, and it’s not a rigorous example of the craft of music, but it’s peppy and fun, and the accompanying video is entertaining.  Here it is, then – enjoy.

Animal’s Hump Day News

Happy Hump Day!

I’m thinking of bear hunting.

Specifically, I’m thinking of hunting a certain area about sixty miles north of here, where a walk-in-only trail system leads down to the brushy banks of the Chulitna River.  The problem is, it’s really brushy.  The few people I’ve talked to familiar with this particular area have said that both blacks and griz are abundant in the area, and that you may well smell them before you hear them.  So, I’m thinking the BullWhacker (Marlin 1895G, .45-70) is in order.  The BullWhacker has been customized with a large lever loop, ghost ring sights and a forward-mounted IER scope – colloquially known as a “Scout Scope.”  Seems like the appropriate piece for sneaking through dense brush after big, tough, toothy critters at short range.  Thoughts?

Now that I’ve placed that before you all…

On To the Links!

“We’ve really got him this time!”

City of Broken Windows.

Yes, nuclear is the key to our future.  I’ve been saying this for years.

What would you do?  Granted state lotteries are essentially a tax on stupidity for the most part, but there’s probably no  harm in spending a couple of bucks for the chance to fantasize about what you’d do if you got a few hundred million bucks dropped in your lap.

What could possibly go wrong?

“Please, B’rer Fox, don’t throw me in that there briar patch!”

They’ll want to tighten security on this find.  Contact Chief Inspector Clouseau immediately!

“Heterosexual men seeking to introduce themselves to women should be direct and maybe even a tad vulnerable, while heterosexual women approaching men can essentially say anything they want. “  No shit, Sherlock.

Nothing can fix Twitter.

DeBlasio already did that job for you, you Bronze Age assholes.

Tulsi Gabbard is a sane Democrat, which is like finding a unicorn these days.

When seconds count, the cops are only hours away.

Watch your taxes go up.

GEICO bails on California.

I love a  happy ending.

This Week’s Idiots:

NY Magazine’s Jonathan Chait (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.

Yes, you idiot, that means we’re in a recession.

USAToday‘s Jill Lawrence is an idiot.

Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.

MSNBC’s Joy Reid (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.

MSNBC’s Michael Cohen is an idiot.

MSNBC’s Zeeshan Aleem (I’m sensing a pattern here) is an idiot.

Robert Reich is still a sawed-off runt, and an idiot.

California is run by idiots.

This Week’s Cultural Edification:

Mrs. Animal and I have seen the Blue Man Group twice, once at their regular venue in Las Vegas, and once at their traveling show in Denver.  On that latter show they shared the stage with VenusHum, a ‘synth-pop’ band that saw some success in the early Aughts.

We saw this song on the traveling show; it was later released on the Blue Man Group’s 2003 album The Complex, and it’s probably the best cover of Donna Summer’s I Feel Love ever done; to tell the truth, I prefer it to the original.  Anyway, here; make up your own mind, and feel free to let us know in the comments.

Rule Five Path to Manhood Friday

Law & Liberty’s Rachel Lu recently had some things to say about the worrisome state of manhood in Western society today.  A couple of key excerpts, with my comments, follow; be sure to go read the whole thing.  It’s worth your time.

Sax and Farrell are interesting both for their similarities and for their differences. As social scientists, they both present a lot of data, giving rise to shared concern about boys’ mediocre performances in school. Worldwide, boys are falling behind girls, especially in reading. Their test scores are lower, and they are less likely to enroll in universities. The structure of modern schools seems uncongenial to boys’ developmental needs.

Sax and Farrell agree as well that fatherlessness is a huge problem in our time, in general but especially for boys. The statistics on this subject are harrowing. Fatherless boys fare worse in virtually every measurable way. Of course, when that cycle of family breakdown is perpetuated, that means another generation of at-risk kids, as well as stressed-out single moms, and lower social productivity. 

It’s impossible for me to understate the role my own father and my grandfathers had in my young life – and in the case of the Old Man, well into my middle-aged life.  The Old Man was a rock, a good man, a great man, a man of iron integrity and enormous personal strength, to whom I will strive to live up to for the rest of my life.  When he passed away a few years back, my brother and I were talking about him, sharing some memories, and I commented, “you know, we two, you and I, are the men we are today because of him.”  My brother agreed.  It’s been over four years now and I’m still struggling with the empty place in my life where a giant once strode.

Children – especially boys – need fathers.  A nearby, engaged grandfather can fill the role; the Old Man in fact did this for my sister’s twins, whose father had abandoned the family before their birth.  But many grandparents aren’t able to be full-time role models, and in most cases there can be no substitute for a full-time, fully engaged, responsible and yes, manly father.

Rachel Lu continues:

Finally, both Sax and Farrell have many interesting things to say about the masculine loss of purpose. They understand that many men today are suffering from a kind of existential crisis. Men aren’t sure what role they are meant to play within society at large. Once, able-bodied men were genuinely necessary to keep their families and communities alive. Today, robots do much of our heavy lifting, and our meat mostly comes from factories, not forests.

Well, in the Casa de Animal, much of our meat comes from the surrounding countryside, and always has.  I’m looking forward to taking my grandsons afield after fish and game when they’re old enough.  But the general point is a good one; modern society has made life pretty soft, and a soft life makes for weak people, and has been endlessly pointed out in these virtual pages and elsewhere, weak people make hard times.

The author concludes:

Perhaps this is the real point, threading its way through all these authors. A man is truly a remarkable creature, with tremendous potential to do good. This is what I see, watching my sons from the back deck, and the implicit realization of that potential may explain why boys from their earliest years are thirsting for a quest, and spoiling for a noble fight. This desire is not toxic, or at least it need not be. But realizing that potential is much harder than the lightsaber-wielding preschooler can possibly understand. It takes the discipline of Sax and Peterson, the social savvy of Farrell, and the high-flown ideals of Esolen and Miner. When that potential is not achieved, bitterness and despair often follow.

Boys can break your heart. I have five. I’m not sorry, but I never let myself forget that the path to manhood is a hard one.

Just to add some egregious toxic masculinity, here’s some prose from an old dead white guy.  “What a piece of work is a man.  How noble in reason, how infinite in faculty.  In form and moving how express and admirable.  In action how like an Angel, In apprehension how like a god.”  (Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 2.)

I think it all boils down to purpose.  There is nothing as detestable as a man with no purpose.  And yet Western society today seems to be churning out young men with no sense of purpose, in great carload lots.

But consider this: As I’ve said repeatedly, I think we are entering the last phase of this cycle:

  1. Hard times make tough people.
  2. Tough people make good times.
  3. Good times make weak people.
  4. Weak people make hard times.

The manly man, the man with a purpose, may not be gone – just on hold.  Because when we circle around to the first phase, we’ll need tough people.  Indeed, the tough people may be the only ones that survive the final phase.

Read the whole article.  It’s worth your time.

Animal’s Hump Day News

Happy Hump Day!

OK. Yeah. Why not. We’re out here in rural Alaska. Nearest law enforcement is over thirty miles away. By your own stated opinion, we’re defenseless. Come on out. Find out how defenseless we are. We live out here amongst 1500-pound moose and 700-pound bears. Come on out. Fuck around and find out. We’ll be waiting.

Honestly, how stupid are these people?  Excerpt:

The radical Christians are found in rural areas, right? “Their towns are defenseless,” he claims. He’s dead serious, too. Punish them. Punish their towns. You say that Black Lives Matter burned cities to the ground? “I say ‘let them see firsthand what it’s like what (sic) a community is truly burned to the ground.’”

So he’s calling for (likely unarmed) liberals from the cities to “show up 100 deep in every rural town in a 50-mile radius intent on revolution.”

You betcha.  Come on out, you pencil-necked soy-eating fuck.  Come on.  Pick a place.  Any small town, any little rural community, anywhere in the USA.  We all have guns, we have ammo and plenty of it.  I’m not even a Christian, but I’ll stand arm in arm with my neighbors who are.  Fuck around and find out.

With that out of the way…

On to The Links!

When I watch the video clip in this story, I’m picturing big 1966 Batman flashes of BOOM!  POW!  BIFF!

Not a fan of Twitter, but this is a pretty good string.

No shit, Sherlock.

All signs point to “no.”

Smith & Wesson hits back.

Turns out the Dobbs decision has little to no effect in Alaska.

America’s coming debt crisis.

Why Biden(‘s handlers) keep lying about energy.

Democrats – a serious threat to the Republic?  Read and decide.

No shit, Sherlock Part Deux.

Further proof that Her Imperial Majesty Hillary I, First Of That Name, Dowager-Empress of Chappaqua, is a bitter, angry old harpy.

“I think you’re clear.”

This Week’s Idiots:

Vox’s Ian Millhiser is an idiot.

Maxine Waters (Dimwit-CA) (Repeat Offender Alert) is an unhinged, loony old bat, and an idiot.

Pramila Jayapal (Nitwit-WA) is full of more shit than a Christmas goose, and an idiot.

Slate’s Dahlia Lithwick (Repeat Offender Alert) is an idiot.

AntiProfa continues to demonstrate that they are all idiots.

The Guardian’s Jill Filipovic is an idiot.

USAToday’s Carli Pierson is an idiot.

The Guardian’s David Daley is an idiot.

What bright spots?

The LA Times Harry Litman is an idiot.

Root’s Candace McDuffie is an idiot.

This Week’s Cultural Edification:

Boy, are things a lot different than they were two weeks ago today.  As we discussed Monday, two Supreme Court decisions have put a lot of folks off their feed, while delighting plenty of others.

So, a recent effort from America’s Songwriter seems appropriate here.  In 2000, Bob Dylan released a single, Things Have Changed, from the soundtrack of the film from that year, Wonder Boys, which starred a pre-Ant Man Michael Douglas, a pre-Spiderman Toby McGuire and a pre-Iron Man Robert Downey Jr.  – as a film it was only fair, but it did give us this song, which seems oddly appropriate now, twenty-two years later.  Enjoy.

Rule Five Criminal Order Friday

I’ve talked about the deterioration of California in general and San Francisco in particular for some time now, but recently RealClearInvestigation’s Leighton Woodhouse did some really great work on exposing the details of that deterioration.  Excerpts, with my comments, follow:

The epicenter of the political earthquakes rattling San Francisco’s progressive establishment is a 30-square-block neighborhood in the center of downtown known as the Tenderloin. Adjacent to some of the city’s most famous attractions, including the high-end shopping district Union Square, the old money redoubt of Nob Hill, historic Chinatown, and the city’s gold-capped City Hall, it is home to a giant, open-air drug bazaar. Tents fill the sidewalks. Addicts sit on curbs and lean against walls, nodding off to their fentanyl and heroin fixes, or wander around in meth-induced psychotic states. Drug dealers stake out their turf and sell in broad daylight, while the immigrant families in the five-story, pre-war apartment buildings shepherd their kids to school, trying to maintain as normal an existence as they can.

“If you happen to be walking through the Tenderloin and you feel unsafe, imagine what it feels like to live there,” said Joel Engardio, head of Stop Crime SF, a civilian public safety group. “The Tenderloin has one of the largest percentages of children in the city. It’s untenable, inexcusable to ask them to confront this hellscape.” 

To all of the more-or-less normal people of this formerly great city, I’d like to ask this:  Who did you vote for in the last few elections?  I seem to remember that San Francisco has been a one-party town a lot longer than California has been a one-party state.  How’s that workin’ out for ya?

Think it might be time to try something else?

Nancy Tung, a prosecutor who once handled drug enforcement in San Francisco, called it “ground zero for human misery.” Kathy Looper, who has run a low-income, single resident occupancy hotel in the Tenderloin for more than 45 years, said, “It feels like we’re in Gotham,” adding that she once considered putting a spotlight on her hotel roof and projecting a Batman signal into the sky.

Actually, projecting a Batman signal probably would be no more futile than a lot of the actions the city has taken to rectify this mess.

But here’s where it gets interesting:

Crowded onto its street corners and inside the tents congesting the sidewalk, countless petty criminals play their roles in a structured and symbiotic criminal enterprise. Its denizens fall into four main groups: the boosters, typically homeless and addicted, who steal from local stores; the street fences who buy the stolen merchandise; the dealers who sell them drugs for the money they make from the fences; and, at the top of the stack, the drug cartel that supplies the dealers and the wholesale fences that resell the goods acquired by street fences. Each has a role to play in keeping the machine moving, and the police know exactly how to disrupt it.

Experts say the city could, in fact, arrest and prosecute its way out of most of the problems in the Tenderloin if it chose to. It thrives, instead, as a zone of lawless sovereignty in the heart of a major American city – the criminal version of the area commanded by Seattle anarchists in the so-called Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone, or CHAZ, in 2020. Where those extra-legal districts were eventually dismantled, the Tenderloin’s structure is entrenched.

The following portrait of the Tenderloin crime syndicate is based on dozens of conversations with law enforcement officers, prosecutors, recovering street addicts, parents of addicts, and community activists over many months, as well as direct observation of the area.

“Everyone knows what’s going on. The cops, mayor, and D.A.,” said Tom Wolf, a recovering addict. “Everyone knows it’s organized and cartel-backed. They just don’t think it’s worth it to stop it, because nothing’s going to change anyway. They’ve surrendered.”

Read it all.  It’s well-researched and, actually, sad.  San Francisco was, as I’ve often said, once one of the world’s great cities.  Now it’s literally a shithole.

I’ve known San Francisco was bad since before I spent a year working in the Bay area in 2017.  It’s gotten worse since then.  I avoided the Tenderloin, even then, but I did spend some time down at the waterfront, in Chinatown and Japantown, and those were pretty bad already.  Mrs. Animal and I were treated to one junkie in Japantown standing on a street corner and screeching obscenties at passerby, and even then it wasn’t unusual to see used needles and human feces on the streets and sidewalks.  All the parks and open areas were filled with sleeping bums; the one time I took the BART it was filthy, run-down, full of sleeping winos and smelled like stale piss.

And the fact is, the city could ‘arrest and prosecute’ their way out of it.  It’s going to be a lot tougher now than it would have been say, ten years ago, but it’s either going to have to be done or the entire Bay area will descend into this madness.  Start with the dealers and the wholesale fences.  That shouldn’t be too hard.  Clean up the addicts and vagrants after that.

In the end, though, this all comes down to voting patterns, and I don’t see the voting habits of San Franciscans changing any time soon.  So, as far as I’m concerned, they should quit bitching about the drugs, the crime, the feces and the tent cities.  They knew what kind of government they wanted, and now they’re getting it, good and hard.

Rule Five Tone Policing Friday

I found this interesting; here’s a bit from author Sarah Hoyt on tone policing.  Excerpts, with my comments:

So– the tone policing….

You see, the thing is that the left also believes those stories they used to upend religious faith and living. They now believe that any opposition to their nonsense must be because we’re all super-religious. What religion varies, but what these people think constitutes an argument would be hilarious if it weren’t so sad.

For instance, on a thread about the ridiculous parents who take their children to drag shows, people kept posting an article about the Baptist Church covering up sexual abuse of children. And they thought this invalided the point that children at drag shows is wrong. … somehow.

The argument that Sarah Hoyt describes here is “whataboutism,” and it’s bullshit.  The Latin term is tu quoque, meaning “A retort consisting of a charge or accusation similar to that which has been made by one’s antagonist, as in the case of a person charged with bribery who replies that his accuser’s hands are not clean of corruption: also used attributively: as, the tu quoque argument is not conclusive.”  It’s one of the last resorts of the feeble-minded.

To be fair, you see the tu quoque used by arguers from both sides, all too often.

The argument in that is difficult to fathom, unless you come from the POV that all adults abuse children, and those who claim not to are a) Baptists. b) hypocrites. (I wish I didn’t think that the person posting it really believes it is impossible to refrain from abusing children, and so might as well do it often and publicly. Seriously, every institution that works with children will have that problem because, duh, pedophiles go where children are. And every one of them will try to cover it up, because they don’t want to be killed. But that doesn’t mean there are a lot of pedophiles. Just that a few operate with inpunity (sic) in every institution. And I’d bet you a large sum of money the biggest cesspool is public schooling.)

But the point is, they are now in the position of being adherents to a cult. Unlike Christianity, their cult is not functional. It not only doesn’t lead to better living, no one really can live by it. It’s a collection of incoherence and stupidity that melts at the touch of reason…. or ridicule.

And what’s more, they know it.  If you want to wade into the snake pits that are Twitter or Facebook, you can see plenty of evidence for that; the Left is far, far more likely to block or delete messages disagreeing with them than to address them, whereas the Right trends in the opposite direction.  These are broad tendencies but I think it’s correct.

Look, they no longer hold a monopoly on story telling, or communication. Yes, they keep trying to get it back, but their very frantic flailing is evidence of impotence. No winning side in a culture war ever tried to get the government to silence the opponents.

And they are far more susceptible to ridicule than we ever were. Besides not having any clue who we are and what we do.

Live your life outloud, according to your values.

And when they try to attack and ridicule, treat them as the spoiled children they are. Dismiss them with a word. Laugh at their tantrum. Pat them on the head and tell them the adults are talking.

And stop tone policing. Yes, we’re allowed to be rude to those who are impoverishing the future of our children and grandchildren.

We’ve been polite too long. It’s time to let our inner brats come out to play.

It’s time to show just how utterly ridiculous they are. Mock them mercilessly and derisively. Show them for the incoherent hypocrites they are. You don’t need to do much for that, they are all that, and most don’t even have good intentions.

I couldn’t agree more.  And I think I’ve been doing that here, in these virtual pages, for some time.

Look, the time for civility is done past.  It’s time to take off the kid gloves and replace them with those big squishy boxing mitts.  It’s time to point and laugh at the absurdities of woke culture and the loony Left.  And, on more than a few occasions, it’s time to simply tell the wokesters and loony lefties to shut up, that grownups are talking.  It’s time for them to know they aren’t and shouldn’t be taken seriously.

Maybe ridicule can get us where civility couldn’t.  But I think, at this point, we have little left to lose by trying it.

Animal’s Daily National Geographic News

The October, 1961 National Geographic.

When I was a little kid, I always enjoyed going through the monthly National Geographic, once the Old Man had read it and passed it down through my siblings to me.  It was a quality publication in those days, full of fascinating insights into exotic locales.  Somewhere around here I still have an October 1961 edition, and it’s neat to look through that and see the state of the world the month I was born.

The current National Geographic – currently going by the childishly stupid NatGeo – is none of these things.  Law & Liberty’s Mark Judge describes the fall of this magazine.  Excerpt:

Today, National Geographic, like so much of the rest of the culture, seems gripped in a mania focused on guilt over race and gender. As part of the magazine’s April 2018 “The Race Issue,” editor Susan Goldberg offered this headline: “For Decades, Our Coverage Was Racist. To Rise Above Our Past, We Must Acknowledge It.” Goldberg hired a scholar, John Edwin Mason of the University of Virginia, to dig through the archives and find white supremacy. Interviewed by Vox, Mason announced that “the magazine was born at the height of so-called ‘scientific’ racism and imperialism — including American imperialism. This culture of white supremacy shaped the outlook of the magazine’s editors, writers, and photographers, who were always white and almost always men.” Responding to a 2018 cover featuring a cowboy on horseback, Mason argues that “the image of the white cowboy reproduces and romanticizes the mythic iconography of settler colonialism and white supremacy.”

And then there was the ridiculous hagiographic Fauci, a documentary that gives the impression that the proper response to public authority is unquestioning obedience and unceasing praise.

It’s sad – read the whole thing, because Mr. Judge describes his father’s work and how he met many of the leading lights of the original National Geographic.  But I think this, like so many things, is a sign of the descent of American society into kakistocracy.  There are so many signs that it’s difficult to name them all, but I’ll give an example:  Written English.  In my business I have occasion to read written work, such as work instructions, investigation plans and reports, and so on, written in many cases by recent college graduates but also at times by experienced people with ten or fifteen years of industry experience.  And the average writing skill?  It ranges from middling to absolutely awful, with a few stellar exceptions that I can only assume are self-taught.

National Geographic is just another example.  When I reached adulthood, I had bought my own subscription to this old periodical and maintained it until sometime in the late Nineties.  The last straw was their cable TV channel, the mostly terrible programming thereon, and the descent of the magazine as Mr. Judge describes.  Not to mention the stupid “NatGeo” appellation.

It was once a fine American periodical, professional, fact-based, scrupulously edited and fascinating.  No longer.  And that’s too bad.

Animal’s Daily Twitter News

Before we start, check out the first chapter of a new fiction series over at Glibertarians!  And a belated thanks to The Other McCain for the Rule Five link.

Now then:  Elon Musk has bought a 9% share in Twitter, making him the single largest shareholder.  This might yield some lulz.  Excerpt:

April 4 (Reuters) – Tesla Inc (TSLA.O) top boss Elon Musk revealed a 9.2% stake in Twitter Inc (TWTR.N), worth nearly $3 billion, likely making him the biggest shareholder in the micro-blogging site and triggering a more than 20% rise in its shares.

Musk’s move comes close on the heels of his tweet that he was giving a “serious thought” to building a new social media platform, while questioning Twitter’s commitment to free speech.

A prolific Twitter user, Musk has over 80 million followers since joining the site in 2009 and has used the platform to make several announcements, including teasing a go-private deal for Tesla that landed him in regulatory scrutiny.

Of late, however, he has been critical of the social media platform and its policies, saying the company is undermining democracy by failing to adhere to free-speech principles.

“It does send a message to Twitter … having a meaningful stake in the company will keep them on their toes, because that passive stake could very quickly become an active stake,” said Thomas Hayes, managing member at Great Hill Capital LLC.

Granted Twitter will probably remain, well, Twitter.  Twitter is living proof of the old maxim, ‘Never argue with idiots.  They will drag you down to their level and beat you with experience.’  Twitter has the worst noise-to-signal ratio on the internet, and as I’m sure you know, they’re up against some pretty stiff competition.

But Twitter’s current management, as I’m sure you also know, has been engaged in some pretty heavy-handed censorship of any commentary anywhere on the spectrum that is to the right of Leon Trotsky.  With Elon Musk in the shareholder’s meetings, that might well change.  He owns a substantial stake in that company now, one large enough to give him a good deal of leverage, and he has repeatedly made plain his belief in unfettered free speech.

It will be very interesting to see what happens now.