American Pie

Good old boys were drinking whiskey and rye, etc.

 

 

Go Woke, Go Broke

Seattle has lost a significant Microsoft conference due to the city’s escalating issues with homelessness, open drug use, and other criminal activities. In addition to canceling next year’s event, Microsoft has decided to “release holds for all future years.” The company’s Build conference, which attracts thousands of developers and industry professionals, is officially relocating from Seattle to a new venue in 2026.

An email with the subject line “DEFINITE CANCELLATION” indicated that the decision to leave Seattle was influenced mainly by attendees’ experiences navigating the convention area from the Hyatt Regency to the Arch building on 8th Street.

The email noted, “Customers cited the general uncleanliness of the streets, visible drug use, and the presence of unhoused individuals, including a recurring tent in the Arch Tunnel.” It further stated that Microsoft had previously voiced these concerns and that Visit Seattle had been actively collaborating with the Seattle Police Department, Downtown Seattle Association, and Care teams to address them. Unfortunately, these ongoing issues played a significant role in Microsoft’s final decision to relocate the event.”

There was a time when Seattle and San Francisco attracted conventions and conferences, but now that both places are considered open sewers, nobody wants to go there. It’s very democrat and very woke.

 

Before and After

What a difference a day makes.

 

Bullet Points:

**Growing up in Appalachia: Common Experiences (Not just in Appalachia)

** (DHS) 500,000 illegal aliens who were granted the right to work in the US while their immigration parole was adjudicated have had that right revoked and have received notices to leave the United States immediately – they can self-deport, but they can’t remain here and they can’t work here unless they use the door. Swimming the river was never acceptable.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced on June 12 that it sent notices of termination to hundreds of thousands of Cuban, Nicaraguan, Venezuelan, and Haitian nationals who are now currently illegally in the United States, saying they must leave the country and that their work permits have been revoked. “DHS is now notifying parole recipients [that] if they have not obtained lawful status to remain in the U.S., they must leave immediately,” the announcement stated. The move comes after the Supreme Court ruled on May 30 that a Biden administration-era parole program could be ended under the Trump administration. Court documents and the DHS have stated that more than 500,000 people from those four countries were shielded from deportation under this program.

** Another one bites the dust in Oregon due to Democrat politics… Health Influencer Dr. Tyna Moore announced she is moving away from Oregon, and instantly was savaged by (her own) leftists. Her political reasons for leaving- (1) weary of blue state politics; (2) the income taxes (highest in the nation when you account for when the high rate kicks in); (3) Portland has been destroyed intentionally; (4) Oregon is in an economic death spiral. I hope that she moves to Tennessee, Florida, or Texas and leaves Arizona alone.

** Elsa weighs in on illegal immigration.

** Interesting – “Effective today, please hold on all work site enforcement investigations/operations on agriculture (including aquaculture and meat packing plants), restaurants, and operating hotels.” – “The abrupt pivot on an issue at the heart of Mr. Trump’s presidency suggested his broad immigration crackdown was hurting industries and constituencies he does not want to lose.” There is a middle ground that involves enforcing immigration law strategically, securing the border, and ending incentives for future illegal entry, while creating a fair and orderly path for those already here who are genuinely contributing. What the public objects to isn’t legal immigration—it’s the sense that laws are optional, and that those who follow the rules get penalized while those who don’t get rewarded. Conflating border security with cruelty is as disingenuous as conflating all undocumented immigrants with “model workers.”

**During my travels, I took an El Al flight. Not the same flight as Greta in case you wondered. This is an honest question – the people on the flight, and I’m sure that 95+ percent were Jewish, did not use deodorant, and they needed it. Is there something in the Torah that forbids the use of deodorant? When you’re stuck on an airplane for a while, the scrubbers don’t seem to be able to clear it. Historically I’ve been on flights where Vietnamese refugees pissed and shat in the aisles of the airplane (hill people) and other flights where Indians made the whole aircraft smell like curry and body odor, so it’s not like I’m a travel naif. I’ve known American Jews who are immaculate people, so it’s not a religious indictment so much as an honest cultural question. I could also ask why so many Jews are loyal democrats – but they seem to have that affinity. I didn’t poll my fellow passengers. I sat in business class, working on my computer, keeping to myself.

**I don’t think Iran should make a deal. The Ayatollah should keep fighting until the country is one big smoking pit of detritus. Nuke ’em ’till they glow and use their asses for runway lights.

 

Another Big Rat Hole

(Planned Parenthood Under the Microscope) There is no more woke activity than murdering the young in utero.

Planned Parenthood is an abortion giant that harvests organs from babies and uses nearly all of its resources to kill babies, not provide real healthcare. Despite receiving billions in taxpayer dollars, they offer almost no prenatal care, push late-term abortions, and even supply aborted babies for grotesque experiments. As a Christian, I believe every life is a gift from God, and I think it’s time Congress holds them accountable and stops the flow of federal funds to this evil and barbaric organization, said Subcommittee Chairwoman Greene.

Despite receiving 39 percent of its annual revenue from federal funds intended for essential health services, such as cancer screenings and wellness exams, Planned Parenthood is increasingly using its resources to offer abortions to its patients. In FY 2023, Planned Parenthood provided fewer health care services and performed more abortions than in years prior. The latest Planned Parenthood annual report shows that it performed more than 400,000 abortions, an increase of 23 percent over the last 10 years. Compared to a decade ago, Planned Parenthood provided 63 percent fewer prenatal services and 38 percent fewer contraceptive services.

The question of how much of the 39% of funding from FedGov was returned to lawmakers and bureaucrats is one that the subcommittee will investigate. 10% for the Big Guy?

 

Russian Rails

(h/t Claudio) (Strategypage) I’ve known a shot caller in the Russian Railroad Mafia who has influence from the Urals to the Pacific for about thirty years. It doesn’t make me or him anything special. It just means that I’ve had an interest in the situation. He was located in Ishim, and today he’s in Tyumen.  In Russia, everything moves by rail. Hardball roads are impassible in the winter and are poorly maintained in the summer. If you plan to move anything by rail, you need to involve the mafia/bratva if you plan to have it arrive. That’s how it is. I met him when he was selling hardened steel rails, lifted from railway spurs, on the black market. Hardened steel is expensive. It’s used for armored vehicles and in other applications. Selling the tracks when the Soviet Union turned into the Russian Republic was a thriving business.

Overview

Bratva. Red Mafia. Vory v zakone. Going by many names and possessing a criminal resume that includes just about every illegal activity in existence, Russian organized crime (ROC) is composed of several transnational criminal organizations operating worldwide. Contrary to popular belief, the Red Mafia is not one cohesive organization, but rather an umbrella term for a loose network of autonomous criminal groups. What these disparate groups share, besides their Soviet roots, is a passion for any and every remotely profitable criminal activity. ROC is, if nothing else, resourceful, having a hand in everything from human trafficking to fraud. Unlike other international criminal groups, such as La Cosa Nostra (which specializes in protection extortion) or the Mexican cartels (drug trafficking), ROC is involved in almost every criminal activity. Name a crime, and the ROC circuit is bound to have it in its extensive repertoire: money laundering, kidnapping, prostitution, fraud, drug trafficking, human trafficking, weapons smuggling, extortion, auto theft, counterfeiting, and, of course, murder. Russian organized crime is also unique in that it lacks a clearly defined, top-down hierarchy. Unlike the Italian mafias, with their capofamiglii, or the Chinese triads, with their “mountain masters,” the Russian Mafia structural ranking does not include irreplaceable leaders. It would be impossible to take down a few “heads” of the Red Mafia to topple the entire organization because they do not exist. This gives ROC an invaluable strategic advantage over those attempting to dismantle it.

The Referenced Article

Since 2022, the Russian railroads have increasingly had to deal with shortages and sabotage. The shortages begin with the fact that many of the 740,000 railway staff in 2022 soon left to join the military because it paid better and was not yet considered a dangerous job. The initial solution to this was to call on retired workers to return for as long as they could. The railroad managers assured the retired workers that their pensions would still be paid, in addition to the pay they were already receiving as full-time railroad workers. In addition, there would be bonuses as well as pay increases for the longer the retired workers remained on the job. The railroads attempted to utilize convicts for some of these jobs, but found them too unreliable. By late 2024, these many problems forced the railroad to take 100,000 freight cars out of service. A growing number of freight cars were out of service because of a lack of spare parts.

Then there is sabotage. Last year, a Russian freight train derailed near the Ukrainian border. This caused the locomotive and ten empty railcars to derail from the tracks. It took over a week to remove the locomotive and rolling stock. Then the damaged rails had to be replaced. During that time, the rail line was blocked.

Four months earlier, a train containing several fuel tanker cars was derailed east of Ukraine. The derailment caused a large fire, as most of the fuel burned. The government said it was sabotage.

Since 2022, Russia has suffered a growing number of attacks, accidents, or other incidents involving defense activities inside Russia. The government reports that recent railroad accidents have included derailments and damage to signaling and communication equipment. The Russian railroads are state-owned and operated, carrying over 40 percent of Russia’s freight, often through areas where no other form of freight transportation is available. Ukrainian sabotage teams have also caused fires or explosions in factories producing munitions or components for complex weapons, such as guided missiles. The Russian government prefers to avoid discussion of Ukrainian special operations forces being responsible for sabotage inside Russia.

Railroads are particularly sensitive because Russia has a poorly developed highway system, as well as few east-west rivers and canals, so its economy largely depends on 85,000 kilometers of railroad tracks and thousands of railcars moved by thousands of electric and diesel engines, operated by over 700,000 railroad employees. These employees are government workers because railways in Russia are state-owned and operated. In addition to the track and hundreds of passenger and cargo stations, there are also 138 railroad tunnels and 30,727 bridges, each of which is a vulnerable choke point for destruction or damage. There are also over 160,000 remotely operated switches to keep traffic moving and avoid collisions. (The article continues)

The situation in Russia is becoming increasingly complex. The rolling stock and locomotives are old. The rails are old, and production statistics are misleading because A single locomotive can consist of multiple sections. Therefore, the number of locomotives produced may not directly equal the total number of sections produced. Russia counts “sections produced.” That number is approximately 200 diesel engines per year, as reported.

 

Identify the Aircraft

1

 

2

This particular aircraft was flown by an aviator would become famous for his weave…

 

3

 

4 & 5

(4) Above – 706 built

(5) Below – 63 built

 

 

End