Thoughts: The calendar says astronomical fall does not start until the autumnal equinox around September 22 or 23. I’ve always felt that autumn begins with Labor Day, so earlier in the month.
Bullet Points:
** Be kinder than necessary, for everyone you meet is fighting some kind of battle.
** Katie Hopkins – update
** A democrat San Francisco federal judge vacated the Pentagon’s designation of Anthropic as a supply-chain risk. In early 2026, the Pentagon designated Anthropic as a national security “supply-chain risk”—a status normally reserved for foreign adversaries—blocking Anthropic and its contractors from working with the government. The government has not yet appealed the ruling.
** Former U.S. Ambassador to Denmark Carla Sands said, “Let’s not forget, Mark Carney has had a lot of China relationships. Whether it’s China economic cooperation, I think he is closer to China than he is to the U.S.” Canada and Red China have so much in common. Neither country has won a Stanley Cup in the 21st century.
** Exploring concubines in Islam – who have slave status.
** United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said, “I want to create an airline that U.S. citizens, all U.S. citizens, think of as the flag carrier of the United States, and they’re proud of the airline. Just like somebody in Dubai is proud of Emirates. I want American U.S. citizens to feel the same way about United Airlines, and that’s my goal.” Dubai didn’t have indoor plumbing when we invented flying. (Fact-checked by Grok!) Of the options available, United, which hubs through Chicago, is my least favorite US airline. I have options and avoid United UNLESS I’m flying to Chicago. I have flown there precisely once in the last two years, and it reminded me why I should avoid both Chicago and O’Hare Intl.
** Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow told CNN she supports cutting off the electricity to the USA. Oh no! How will New York, Michigan and Minnesota survive? Think of all those Somalis and Palestinians living without electricity. They’ll feel like they were back home. (EdB – does your radio station have a back-up generator)
** The New York Post reported, “CNN forced to apologize to Dolly Parton’s family for using photo of Vegas impersonator in covering icon’s death.”
** The U.S. has signaled that it does not want to permanently cripple Iran’s long-term revenue-generating potential. Completely wiping out the Kharg Island oil port infrastructure would severely damage the economic survival of the civilian population and handicap any future, post-regime Iranian government from being self-sustaining. It’s a threat to the Mullahs. At this point, if the Saudis or Kuwaitis wanted to destroy it (since the anti-aircraft defenses were destroyed by the US), they could.
** From logistics to cell therapy, the UAE’s economic footprint in Pennsylvania runs deep — and last week, officials from both sides gathered in Philadelphia to build on it. The Embassy’s Trade and Investment Office, in partnership with the U.S.-UAE Business Council, brought a senior delegation to the city focused on Pennsylvania’s life sciences and health technology sector, building on a trade relationship that supports an estimated 3,200 jobs and a $400 million trade surplus in Pennsylvania’s favor in 2025.
** Musk on Chinese manufacturing.
The Hood
There is a new movie coming called “The Uprising” – which has to be the 50th remake of Robin Hood. The bean counters who run the film studios and the “creative” geeks who call themselves producers keep feeding us the same story, but with a “new” twist. How many more Robin Hood bullshit stories do we need? How about showing just how creative you are, and give us something new? History is RICH with stories. Open a book, maybe, and find a new story to tell.
Let’s look at the original. The core narrative is best captured in the comprehensive text A Gest of Robyn Hode.
The Original Story by plot line: Robin Hood lives as an outlaw in Barnsdale and Sherwood Forest alongside a small band of loyal followers, including Little John, Will Scarlet, and Much the Miller’s Son. Robin and his men capture a poor knight, Sir Richard at the Lee. Finding him honest, Robin lends him money to pay off a heavy debt owed to a greedy, corrupt abbot. The Sheriff of Nottingham constantly tries to capture Robin. In various ballads, the outlaws use disguises, brutal physical violence, and superior archery skills to escape his traps.
King Edward (not Richard the Lionheart) travels north in disguise to capture Robin. Upon meeting, Robin unknowingly showcases absolute loyalty to the crown. The King reveals himself, pardons Robin, and invites him to join the royal court. Robin serves the King for over a year but grows homesick and broke. He returns to the wilderness to resume his life as an outlaw. He prefers being a thief.
Jules lives in Nottingham, the scene of the original drama. She says the castle is now a tourist trap where overpriced Chinese-made trinkets are sold. Sic transit gloria mundi. The locals traded terrorist thieves of antiquity for terrorist Muslims today. Go figure.
If you were to visit Nottingham today, you’d need to know the local lingo: Ay up, mi duck: A friendly greeting meaning “hello, my friend”; Mardy: Being in a bad mood or sulky; Cob: A bread roll; Nesh: Being very sensitive to the cold; Croggy: Giving someone a ride on the crossbar of a bicycle. You’re all set.
Pocahantus Rides Again
In Cuba
In 1898, a 61-year-old former Confederate general put on a U.S. uniform and took the field with Theodore Roosevelt. Joseph Wheeler stood about 5 feet 2 and weighed 120 pounds. West Point class of 1859. He finished 19th out of 22. He earned the nickname “Fighting Joe” in New Mexico in 1860.
When the Civil War came, he resigned his U.S. commission and rode for the Confederacy. By age 26 he was a major general commanding the cavalry of the Army of Tennessee. After the war, he went to Congress from Alabama.
When war with Spain broke out, he volunteered at once. His tender of service was already on file at the War Department. President McKinley made him a major general of volunteers and gave him the Cavalry Division of V Corps. In that division was the 1st U.S. Volunteer Cavalry. Their lieutenant colonel was Theodore Roosevelt.
They landed at Daiquirí, Cuba, on June 22, 1898. Two days later, Wheeler pushed forward and hit the Spanish at Las Guasimas, the first land battle of the war. The Rough Riders were in the fight. In the middle of it, the old Confederate forgot which war he was in. “Let’s go, boys!” he shouted. “We’ve got the damn Yankees on the run again!” The men cheered him anyway.
A week later, Wheeler was down with fever when the guns opened on San Juan Hill. The sound of battle pulled him out of his sickbed. He rode to the front, the senior officer present, and took command of the field. His division included Roosevelt’s Rough Riders. They took the heights.
Pictured: Wheeler (3rd from left), Teddy (far right) in Tampa 1898 before heading to Cuba
Identify the Aircraft
1
Two photos – 75 built – used as a ground-attack aircraft during the Colonial Period.
2
Two graphics – 800 built
Identify the Ship
3
No hull number visible – getting the class is good enough. They’ve been in the news; should be an easy ID.
Parting Shot
End
(1) Only figured it out by cheating, so I won’t say.
(2) Fairey Albacore.
(3) Chesty Puller type Expeditionary Sea Base, or whatever they are calling them now.
– Kle.
Well done, Kle. #3 – They still call them Chesty Puller Expeditionary Sea Bases. Pictured was the USS Lewis B. Puller.
Identify the Aircraft
1 – Fairey Fawn
2 – Fairey Albacore
Identify the Ship
3 – Lewis B. Puller-class Expeditionary Sea Base
Outstanding. I thought the Fawn might give you a moment’s pause….or maybe not.
I respected Scott Bessent. I now admire his command if the English language, as well as Law and Economics.
He’s a genius.
And a street fighter of a different mode. He takes no prisoners with his velvet ball peen hammer approach, especially when shutting down the Dana Bash types of the media trying to get a rise out of him.
He seems to have a gift for deflating windbags, most recently certain “elbows up’ windbags.
Yes, we have a generator.
WAAM: We Are American Made
Also broadcasting as:
Radio Free Canada, broadcasting into Ontario. Soon to be renamed Eastern Michigan.
Broadcasting from the hallowed shores of Lake America.
X2
X3…Trump said, we have a gulf and a lake, now we need an ocean.🤣🤣
X2 :)!!!
I love Scott Bessent, but not that way….
One would never know in years past his private stuff…don’t care, only care what he does for PDJT’s A-Team.
X2
He would love you too, in a different way, if you took him boating…
Nooo, we need TresSec Bessent, can’t afford to lose him to an unfortunate boating accident. 😄
😂
Totally agree about United Airlines . They used to be one of my favorites, but no longer . Domestically, I try to fly Delta, internationally, I prefer the Asian ( not Chinese ! ) airlines . Have yet to fly Emirates or Etihad .
The Atlanta hub is usually not iced in during the winter, and I’ve experienced fewer delays with Delta. Singapore Airlines is good. Air Guruda is to be avoided. Emirates is very comfortable in First Class. I have not flown in the back of their airplanes. I am a frequent flier of Lufthansa.
I was flying Delta exclusively.
Never a problem.
There was that one time.
https://ed-bonderenka.blogspot.com/2014/05/travels-and-travails.html
“Let’s go, boys!” he shouted. “We’ve got the damn Yankees on the run again!”. Did the old General really forget which war he was fighting? IMO, the “the War of Northern Aggression” continues to this day, although it’s being conducted in a less physically combative manner.
Texas and Tennessee (for two) are showing the North how it’s done downtown these days. They have their own stock exchange now.
Posted a comment on Chaos Manor, back in the day, that it looked like the South was preparing to teach the North some lessons that the North had forgotten.
We shall see.
Apology in advance for being long winded. Sunday Skool class a few years ago, one of the members, a junior high skool teacher, said something exceptionally ignorant and disparaging about the Southern states and I responded with a slowly enunciated “Die…..Yankee……scum.” Perhaps not the most civilized of retorts, but really, given my reputation, she shoulda known better. After jaws quit thudding on the floor, I said, we’ll talk about this later, and as soon as class ended, we had a little chat. Who did Lincoln free with the Emancipation Proclamation, I asked innocently enough. Why, the slaves, of course, she answered somewhat haughtily. Which slaves, I asked. Why, all of them, of course. You might want to look into that a little further, I replied, and then mansplained which groups were covered by the Emancipation, and which groups were not, with a few words about the 13th Amendment to the Constitution still not covering all the slaves, specifically those held in the Sovereign Nations of Indian Territory. You could look it up, I said (thanks Yogi). She had no clue, which says a lot about the condition of our public education system, but I’ll give her this much, she looked it up that week, and we had a much more civilized chat the next Sunday.
I’ve tried to avoid all that revisionist crap when writing the Deulist series. In book 5, the war is over but it’s not over. In 1865 the Army moved two corps to the border with Mexico (South Texas) and there was the impending Fenian invasion of Canada.
As an Italian visiting the South, I noticed a major similarity with Italy. We share a deep passion for history. Under the surface, in both places the deep scars left by a Civil War are obvious if you know where to look. Italy got a massive dose of war, Civil and otherwise, on its home territory from July 9th, 1943 to May 8th. Lingering resentment is not aimed at the USA, by the way, but very much aligned on the left/ right political divide in manner and forms that are very difficult to understand if you’re not a local. My family really appreciated the South, by the way.
>My family really appreciated the South, by the way.
But not as much as they appreciated the Center of World Culture, the (second?) Home of the Epstein Class, the Seat of America’s Financial Empire, and a legion of other diverse honorifics too numerous to list, namely Manhattan, right?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CpGtBnVZLSk
Right?
Ms. Hopkins: ‘FADA’…’Fancy Another Day Off’. I am so stealing that! And she is beyond right. Waiting for her to address the ‘school supply list’ that has expanded beyond a few notebooks and pencils to include all manner of things the school used to/should be supplying, which is effectively a hidden tax.
***
Toronto Mayor: Waiting for the subversives to say this is a sneaky backdoor deal with Musk to the proposed ‘affected states’; Canada shuts off power, Tesla Powerwall sales go up….Get yours now before they run out.
Geez, can these people get any more ‘too big for their britches’? Want to shout at them, “Shut up and do your local job!” (Notice how MadMommie has – lately – quit spouting off about foreign affairs, sticking his Marxist nose into other peoples business…unlike Toronto’s mayor…maybe it’s a relay race and now she has the baton.)
***
United: Easy for this guy to say now after the airline went downhill during Biden’s DEI tenure. MrsPaulM has exclusively flown United since the early 80’s, a million-miler who’s ‘status’ has been watered down once she stopped traveling for work. Zero loyalty by the airline. When people feel like sardines or mistreated by the airline the time spent simply becomes tolerated…not a good look for this travel mode.
***
Summer ending: Fall is on its way, can feel the switch-over in the mountain air….47 yesterday morning, warm afternoon. Time to start putting up more wood…and get a dang roof on the new hovel…and power, and a well…and septic. Heh.
Rough Riders. One of my minor quibbles with the mini-series was casting Gary Busey as MG Wheeler. Not sure just how accurate Busey’s portrayal was.
Busey played himself.
In the movie ‘Rough Riders’, “Fighting Joe” Wheeler is played by Gary Busey. Not a very good match stature wise but the movie is great. A couple of close friends of mine were extras in the film. Is it 100% accurate? No. But I think they did a good job and they did get a lot right.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0118453/
Yes, I liked the film. I’ve watched it a few times.
RE the Wheeler/TR photo above. Not a soy face among the lot of them. Admittedly they look to be middle-aged and older men, but what a difference to the typical “male” visage among the under-30 (or maybe even under-40) these days. At least in this here Acela corridor. So many young(er) males look estrogenized, eunuchoid. And the effeminate speech patterns, including the uptalk and even the verbal fry [1]. WTF? I’m not even trying to be nasty here. The effeminate soy-face phenotype is well north of 15%, maybe even 25%, across socioeconomic strata. It’s still shocking to me even though you’d think I should be used to it by now.
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[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHHt-tYS2es
its weird. my neighbor’s boy, good kid, smart, wants to be a welder. good at it too, graduated top tier of his class. hasn’t hardly left his house since he graduated. i had a job three years by then, spent my time off chasing chics before shipping off to boot camp in july. i don’t understand kids these days. he’s going to have a rough time if he does somehow get a welding job. not used to heat, cold, on his feet 12 hours, orders from yahoos etc etc etc. totally not equipped to survive in the real world.
Labor Day — The End Of Summer And The Start Of Fall: Unofficially, Labor Day used to be the end of summer. The large school sales started Labor Day weekend, football teams didn’t practice until after Labor Day, and schools, either K-12 or colleges didn’t start classes until after Labor Day. It was a unrecognized national milestone. But those days are gone.
Fall starts when the temperature is below 100 for a week.
opening picture titled “A Summer Shower Just Passed”?
I like the pseudo-Impressionist AI rendering. But then again it’s probably because I’m a racist.
Not enough “visible minorities” [1] in that, Larry! Straighten your AI out forthwith!
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[1] The University of Waterloo (mor-Ontario, Canuckistan) for example says (per AI summary): The University of Waterloo uses terms like “racialized minority,” “marginalized identities,” and “equity-seeking groups” rather than a blanket use of “minority.” Equity-seeking group? Really?
Anyway, here I was thinking that “colored person”=HateSpeech, “person of color”=GoodThink was the nadir of virtue-signaling foolishness. But apparently POC was a local minimum, and the true depths of stupidity and neurolinguistic wickedness have yet to be plumbed.
Toronto mayor, blowhard Ford, et. al. You might want to re-exam the integrated pipelines and refineries regarding where your diesel, jet fuel, lubricants, and heating oil orignates. Perhaps Danielle Smith will enlighten you. She and Scott Moe seem to be the only rational Premiers in Canada.
There’s only one Robin of Locksley and thats Errol Flynn. Cmon man….
R U flooding?
Me, no floods. I live on top of a ridge so it takes some doing to flood me.
If you start building an ark and collecting animals we’ll know something apocalyptic is afoot.
Have never been to Nottingham (although I did spend a few days R&R in London). Moved to Chico, CA in ’78 to attend CSUC, and lived there for the next 35 years. Back then, you could go to Bidwell Park and walk the same ground where they filmed the 1938 movie “The Adventures of Robin Hood” starring Errol Flynn.
Saw old black and white movie with Errol Flyn ,in late 60s,,,,Captain Blood ,,, made me go looking for the books it was based on. Captain Blood and the Return of Captain Blood. Found them in the JR College library after several years. Great writing ,,hated to learn later Errol was queer as a 3 dollar bill.
Oh Man Sidebar: Bank of America VP stabbed to death in Times Square. Clearly the world has gone from bad to worse @nd the Dementor has taken over many people.
– Lindsey Clancy jury sent home after three days of a confessed murderer of her own children. Too bad her fall wasn’t conclusive, we’d be spared the fawning and idiocy our legal system has become, as well as middle class woman who think she deserves freedom instead of being ended so God can sort her out.
– Charlie Kirk’s killer trial: The judge, apparently a legend in his own mind, just spent (heck, maybe still going like a Congressional filibuster) what seemed like hours reading his 10,000 word case review with state law statutes (poor clerk had to draft that drivel), to the court like those sitting there are 1st year law students needing his brilliance….as if anyone wants to hear this blathering on by a judge who clearly enjoys hearing himself talk nonsense. What a circus that trial has become.
– United Healthcare murderer trial: Nothing. Another circus.
Sorry to hear that poor woman was killed. That time of day (1630) Times Square is filled with tourists. And always a couple dozen squatty Hispanics [1] dressed in Disney character costumes (like Minnie Mouse). The squatty characters pose for photos with tourists, then demand “tips” and go ballistic if the tourist refuses to hand over cash. A stabbing, much less two, is not an expected occurrence. But walking through Times Square gives me a twitch because the crowds are so dense it’s simply not possible to be aware of even most of (much less all) the people around you.
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At least Mamdani said something supporting the cops who fatally shot the murderer. I’ve seen the usual online idiocy of knowitalls saying that “the police didn’t need to hurt her.” They TRIED the nonlethal approach, yeah? Maybe all that blubber served as insulation against the taser? Anyway, I’m curious to learn murderer Pamela Cisneros’ immigration status.
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[1] I’m not saying Hispanics are generally squatty. But I’m saying that the Times Square Disney shakedown artists are uniformly squatty individuals who happen to be Hispanic.
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As far as “VP” goes, a quote from a recent John Ringo novel: “Vice presidents in places like Fieldstone are lucky if they have an office. Not a corner office, just an office. If a person isn’t a managing director, they’re basically carrying the piss bucket.”
Fieldstone is an evil financial company in the novel. But the sentiment applies to any financial entity in Manhattan.
The woman was clearly unhappy in her life and basically told the cops she was going after them. It was a good shoot.
Oh, and it got worse at CK’s murderer trial: “ Judge Tony Graf on Tuesday evening ruled that Charlie Kirk assassin Tyler Robinson will stand trial.”
– Oh goodie, a ruling after all this time that an 8th grader would have been able to do inside of half an hour.
There’s more insanity…
“Judge Graf rejected objections from Robinson’s attorneys during Tuesday’s preliminary hearing,…”, especially this reprehensible irrelevancy by the attorney:
“Mr. Kirk spoke hatefully of certain groups of people. He spoke hatefully of people who don’t have traditional norm-conforming gender identities. He spoke hatefully of people who are not strictly heterosexual,”
Richard Novak is exactly why Shakespeare was correct. What a *****.
Fauxcahontas doesn’t have a clue, as usual, but that is a GREAT putdown!
LL, I fear we’re on an algo. I’ve been reading about the courageous, flintlock General Wheeler for the past week. All hail.
His name is Mandummy