Caption: A flock of birds, a gaggle of geese, a parliament of owls, a covey of quail, a murder of crows. Most flock names originated in Medieval literature and were created to evoke amusing imagery.
“Nevermore”
Bullet Points:
** Life can only be understood backwards, but it must be lived forwards.” – Kierkegaard
** Khamenei’s Brilliant Failure – His strategy against Israel and the United States was working—until Hamas attacked Israel. (h/t Claudio) “All of this came undone when the Israelis proved, even against American resistance, that they still retained the capacity and fury to obliterate Hamas and neuter Hezbollah at stunning speed, leaving the group’s vaunted missilery of near zero strategic use against the Jewish state. We don’t know yet the extent of Iranian-Hamas joint planning for October 7, though captured Hamas documents make it clear coordination was growing. Did Khamenei agree with the Hamas chieftain Yahya Sinwar’s optimistic assessment of October 7’s cataclysmic possibilities for Israel? Khamenei had said repeatedly that he wanted to bleed Israel out slowly. Had he changed his mind? Khamenei is a devout antisemite who alternatively sees Jews as an all-powerful global menace and as an enemy that faithful Muslims can bury. His antisemitism may have altered his calculations, tempting him toward greater audacity. In any case, he egregiously misjudged Israeli resolve after the horrors of October 7.” The whole article is worth the read.
** Lawfare Continues – NEW YORK (AP) — In an extraordinary turn, a judge Friday set President-elect Donald Trump’s sentencing in his hush money criminal case for Jan. 10 — little over a week before he’s due to return to the White House — but indicated he wouldn’t be jailed. The development nevertheless leaves Trump on course to be the first president to take office convicted of felony crimes.
Manhattan Judge Juan M. Merchan, who presided over Trump’s trial, signaled in a written decision that he’d sentence the former and future president to what’s known as an unconditional discharge, in which a conviction stands but the case is closed without jail time, a fine or probation. Trump can appear virtually for sentencing if he chooses.
Rejecting Trump’s push to dismiss the verdict and throw out the case on presidential immunity grounds and because of his impending second term, Merchan wrote that only “bringing finality to this matter” would serve the interests of justice.
** The Hill reported, “Shock poll: 41% of young voters find the killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO acceptable.”
** Keely Brazil Covello reported, “South Dakota ranching couple indicted by Forest Service for fence in place since 1950.” Thank goodness that U.S. Forest Service Special Agent Travis Lunders is there to protect taxpayers from a fence in the middle of nowhere. Now send him to Afghanistan to recover the $8 billion in military equipment the Pentagon left behind.
** Just the News reported, “Surgeon General calls for a cancer-risk warning label on beverages with alcohol.” This is from a quack who believes cloth masks stop viruses.
** Buying a $50K electric vehicle to save $80/mo. in gasoline costs means that it will take 52 years to break even.
** BBC discussion of King Arthur. Drilling down to determine fact from fiction?
** Merry Christmas to blog readers who celebrate the holiday today. In the Holy Land, the Orthodox churches use the old Julian calendar—a difference of 13 days from the Gregorian or “Western” calendar in use today—to determine the date of the religious feasts. Accordingly, the Armenians celebrate Christmas on January 20th, and the Greek Orthodox celebrate on January 7th.
The ‘Up-Side’ to the FW 190
Dark Energy
(h/t Claudio) I’ve always been a dark energy denier – and while some would say that brands me as a racist – could I own a black-owned business if I was a racist? No. The referenced article explains that concerns over dark energy could be explained by gravity (which we don’t fully understand). The concept of dark energy emerged to reconcile observations of distant supernovae. These celestial explosions appeared farther away than expected if the Universe’s expansion were consistent with a purely gravitational model. Physicists theorized that a repulsive force, dark energy, was driving the acceleration. This idea became a cornerstone of the ΛCDM (Lambda Cold Dark Matter) model, the standard framework for cosmology.
…”Their timescape model proposes that the appearance of an accelerating Universe is an illusion caused by the uneven effects of gravity on time. The theory hinges on a key principle of Einstein’s general relativity: gravity can distort the flow of time. In regions of space with strong gravitational fields, such as galaxies, time runs more slowly compared to vast, empty voids in the cosmos. These differences in time dilation mean that clocks in galactic regions would measure billions of years less than clocks in cosmic voids.”
Jimmy Carter is Moldering in the Grave
January 9th will be a day of remembrance for his presidency. Whether he was worse than Barack Hussein Obama and Pedo Joe Biden remains a valid point of discussion. Ronald Reagan won the 1980 race in a landslide. He won 44 states partly due to his charismatic personality and campaigning on a freedom platform. But credit goes where it’s due: Jimmy Carter helped Reagan.
During the four years of Carter’s presidency, stagflation got worse.
Because of the détente policy of Nixon and Ford, tensions with the Soviet Union had gone down, and Carter thought that he could peacefully end the Cold War by being soft on the Soviet Union. In shocking news, that didn’t work! The communists invaded Afghanistan, which forced Carter to admit that he had been wrong about the Soviet Union.
Carter had promised that human rights would be his foreign policy priority. So he pulled the rug from under two important U.S. partners, Anastasio Somoza in Nicaragua and the Shah in Iran. The result was a civil war in Nicaragua that risked Soviet domination in our backyard led by junta leader Daniel Ortega. (Reagan undid the damage, and Nicaragua became a democracy aligned with the U.S. Because of the incompetence of the Obama administration, the same communists, with the same leader, Daniel Ortega, are back in power. Nicaragua is no longer a democracy, and it is aligned with China and Russia against us.)
The other failure was in Iran. Carter traveled to Iran in 1977 and promised the Shah that he would continue to support him no matter what. A year and a half later, Carter was secretly getting assurances from Ayatollah Khomeini that Iran would continue to produce oil if Islamists ascended to power. (One wonders if, during these secret talks, Carter’s emissaries asked Khomeini, “So what do you mean when you say death to America?”) So, he backed out of his promise. He told the Shah’s military to stand down and told Shah to leave Iran. So, a stalwart U.S. partner was replaced by a sworn enemy of America.
Within months, Iran attacked the U.S. embassy in Tehran and took our diplomats hostage for 444 days—until the day Reagan was inaugurated. Oil prices went up. Then Iran also got into a war with Iraq a year later. The result was gas shortages all over America and a drop in U.S. oil imports and production, worsening stagflation. It also caused gas shortages, making long gas lines the symbol of the Carter years.
Carter responded by asking people to use less gas and lowering the thermostat! One wonders if he’d ever met an American in his life. (h/t Chuck Warren)
***
In Germany
(The City Journal) Elon Musk calls it the “last spark of hope” for Germany. European elites call it the heir to National Socialism. The debate over Germany’s reviled populist party, the Alternative for Germany (Alternativ für Deutschland, or AfD), is worth paying attention to since it reveals modern Western society’s most fundamental belief structure.
That debate will heat up further when Musk holds a live conversation on X with the AfD’s leader.
The elites, Musk says, “will lose their minds.” The Alternative for Germany is a leper in German political life due to the party’s opposition to Germany’s lax immigration policies.
Germany’s Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, a domestic intelligence agency, has granted itself authority to surveil the party, which it deems a threat to democracy.
Germany’s other political parties have pledged not to cooperate with the AfD. The resulting “firewall” shuts the party out of governing coalitions, no matter how much popular support it enjoys. The AfD is denied the committee chairmanships in the national parliament in Berlin that its numbers would otherwise entitle it to. German courts have almost uniformly rejected the party’s efforts to remove these legal and extralegal barriers to normal participation in political life. The media keep AfD officials off the airwaves.
While other political leaders, including far leftists, are regularly quoted in the press and interviewed, AfD representatives are spectral presences, rarely heard or seen on broadcasts or given space in publications. The problems motivating the AfD’s rise are not spectral, however. Immigration into Germany increased significantly in 2015, when then-Chancellor Angela Merkel famously announced: “Wir schaffen das! [We can handle this!],” in response to the thousands of Syrians crossing into the country.
Twenty-three percent of the German population in 2021 were first- or second-generation immigrants—before the Ukrainian migration. Over 17 percent of the German population are first-generation immigrants, a higher percentage than in the United States, where less than 14 percent were foreign-born in 2022. The burdens on Germany’s social services, criminal-justice system, and housing stock have been enormous. Fifty-five percent of Syrians with at least eight years of German residency were on welfare in 2023, compared with 5 percent of native Germans.
More than 60 percent of the people in Germany who depend on government benefits for income are foreign-born or second-generation migrants, according to the Wall Street Journal. The disruption to social cohesion from an unassimilated alien culture is greater still.”
Identify the Aircraft
1
Careful…
2
3
Identify the Armor
4
The Das Reich division created the first one as a field modification, but it was so successful that the high command took it and mass-produced it, making 300 of this vehicle.
Identify the Feature Film starring Robert Duvall
Happy 94th Birthday to Robert Duvall
A
B
C
Parting Shot
End
A is Secondhand Lions
B is Deep Impact
C is probably The Great Santini
4 is probably Panzerwerfer 42 auf Maultier
A gaggle of geese, a giggle of girls…
Manhattan judge – he’s making the punishment fit the crime?
Identify the Aircraft:
1. Captured P-47 in German markings
2. Short Sunderland
3. Gloster Javelin
Identify the Armor:
4. Panzerwerfer
Identify the Feature Film starring Robert Duvall:
A. Secondhand Lions
B. Deep Impact
C. The Great Santini
Well done.
Glad I wasn’t the only one that saw that paper on Gravity/Time Theorem vs the Dark Matter Theorem. Despite years and millions+ $$$ of searching, the Dark Matter nonsense just doesn’t fit the observed data and often contradicts the real world. In fact, if every time you hear/read the words “Dark Matter/Energy/Whatever” substitute the word “Magic” and it will fit just as well, if not better in the context.
X2
and all this time i thought i was a dummy b/c i didn’t buy into the concept.
I find it more fun to substitute “aether”, and watch them twitch… because they can’t deny that it’s the same old theoretical physics mistake in new PhD clothing.
Well put, Dorothy!
In HS the physics teacher set out a hypothesis to be answered for extra credit: “Give your reasoning that shadow is made from dark particles vs. absence of light particles.” My answer began with disagreeing with his premise that “dark had particles”, then set out to say why light and dark are not “particle based”. Think I got an A- for my brilliance. (hahaha, probably for a multi-page soliloquy where throwing every concept against the wall made it look like I put a huge amount of thought into the problem.)
Dorothy beat me to it on “Aether” although I’ve used it in this context in the past.
We still have Ethernet!
😀
Aether is particularly useful to SciFi writers. As was stated, you can substitute it with “magic” if you are of a mind.
Aether has a long history as a substitute for scientific knowledge.
In the discussion of animal “groups”, I’ll offer a “rafter” of turkeys.
I’m not sure how that came about – as obscure as the murder of crows seems obvious.
I like “A rasher of bacon”
A Congress of baboons (proving yet again that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery).
Exactly!
That’s good!
I must be channeling my Medieval ancestry, yesterday used ‘Cabal Gaggle’ to describe the Democrats and other Swamp Members (who believe we operate within a Democracy…just ask Harris who invoked it TWICE in her election certification followup “statement”). Wouldn’t hurt to bring back some of that Medieval-level “problem-solving”.
–
As for the [meme] salvo….Liberals enjoy personifying nature and its creatures (anthropogenic climate change for Gaia’s whimsical “weather”) – I’m convinced that’s because they hate themselves for existing yet not enough to off themselves so they make the rest of us suffer by association.
***
Kierkegaard – Always stated…after being married to MrsPaulM for a time…”the Danes are the smartest people in the world”…often said within earshot of her parents to buy some SIL points, athlo I did mean it…and had my Letters of Patents on hand to prove I had ZERO Swedish in my heritage. Was in like flint despite being heavy in German ancestry, but I had nothing to do with that so got a mulligan.
***
Merchan- What a bum who clearly believes his own hubris while downing the seditious Kool-Aid elixir…probably sleeps well at night thinking his brand of evil-doing gets a free pass (hahahah). To add more insult to this embarrassment, he just denied APDJT’s lawyers requests…Friday is happening. Thinking Trump et al should flip them off and not show up while simultaneously filing a lawsuit in Federal court (because Bragg brought a Federal “offense” in State court, which can’t happen in Normal World).
–
Okay, gonna say it…I’ll take the hit: “Too bad those who believe it’s acceptable to street murder heathcare CEO’s for doing their job haven’t turned their hatred towards Soro’s-backed judges, DA’s, and the anarchists among us.”
– Oh, that’s right, it’s because they are part of the Left-Field Warning Track Cabal Gaggle. Thinking it’s time to outlaw Kool-Aid as by all accounts it’s dangerous to a sound mind.
***
SG Quack: “The Irrelevant” followed suit – again by EO fiat, as if there is only one gov’t Branch operating – by effectively outlawing gas gen’d hot water. Too bad we can’t hack into his hot water heating unit and turn it off while showering, see how he likes it (and he’s old and frail – and not Norwegian – so should [might??] have the desired affect).
***
As for January “Christmas celebrations”…ahh, those folks just want their own special party days or are too lazy to take down their decorations by New Years like the rest of us schlub’s. Probably the type who leave their lights up year-round.
>haven’t turned their hatred towards Soro’s-backed judges, DA’s, and the anarchists among us
Some of us (e.g. ME) despise the Soros DAs, the heirs of the Frankfurt School who are running universities, and so forth quite as much as we (I) despise persons such as Brian Thompson. Even more in fact. But, as I said the other day, when people feel (and are daily SHOWN) that they have no recourse through the legal system, they will go extra-legal [1]. I am opposed to extrajudicial killing of even scumbags, because the problem is one of boundaries. Where do you draw the line? I would have ZERO problem with someone killing a proven pedo-rapist (for example [2]) in the street, if that pedo-rapist had somehow got out on a technicality. Zero. But if you go down that road, inevitably at some point some jackass is gonna think he’s justified in killing his neighbor for mowing his lawn at 6AM on Saturday (admittedly a jerk thing to do) or something.
—
If screwing insurees out of covered care was The Job then maybe the system is screwed up and needs to be changed. And no one was holding a gun to Thompson’s head (yet, heh) to force him to take that position and rake in over $10 million per annum. If he’d been say, selling hats, and built Brian’s Hat Shoppe into a juggernaut that crushed Harry’s Hat Shop, Joe’s Cowboy Headgear, and even Estelle’s Chapeaux, well more power to him. But I’d argue that health insurance companies wringing the last penny out of their quasi-captive “customers” (we really don’t have individual choice, but that’s a different rant) is in a different category. Just because you CAN do something (legally) doesn’t mean that you SHOULD. If that sounds “socialistic” well, so be it. But if we don’t get a handle on the widening gulf between regular people and “elites” we are not gonna get socialism, we’re preparing the field for National Socialism. (That’s probably a big driver in the “elite” mania for unlimited immigration, by the way. If you’re a tiny “elite” the last thing you want is a Folk united by culture, by history, and by blood. Keep your servant-serf population atomized and at each other’s throats. Teach the most dangerous ones to hate their own heritage, to be ashamed of the accomplishments of their forefathers, to think they’re guilty from birth.)
—
[1] If the Law doesn’t protect (and punish) impartially, but is rather rigged against you and yours, then why would you respect and uphold the Law? Now I’ll admit the idiots cheering on the murder of Brian Thompson likely haven’t thought it through beyond “Stick it to The Man! Dead white guy, yeah!” That’s because most of them are not only young, but dumb or un/mis-educated assholes. But there is the point that the system really does need to be at least somewhat transparent, impartial, and consistent for there to be widespread public buy-in. And if you don’t have buy in, then the alternatives are anarchy, or dictatorship.
[2] This guy for example. Someone got him in prison. No loss.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLUle7aZrig
in re secton C
we are/have become a society bound by rules made by poorly/mis/uneducated persons that were originally meant to control their tiny section/empire but have been misconstrued and are now employed to essentially control larger/vaster segments of society/this nation.
I am hoping The Donald will set up a panel (like the DOGE) to review and make suggestions to Congress for corrective legislation
Yes! to your spot on comments on me poking the dog with my statement. I agree wholeheartedly on all points. I do not advocate what I “poked”, yet the systemic massive problems with damn near everything under Federal government purvey – most of which they have no business sticking their corrupt self-aggrandizing noses – requires a galactic step backwards in order to move forward with a cleaner slate. Thompson was doing his job, even if I disagree with the nepotistic insurance delivery system that puts the patient at the bottom (you REALLY see its failings everyday…me, I only needed one gulp to know it’s more distasteful than seawater). Thompson’s job is one I could never do because of certain moral underpinnings I have taken a private oath to God to uphold best I am able (ie. they aren’t principles until you have to defend them). That said, look at APDJT…despite naysayers spewing the opposite, stories abound how he has graciously helped others whenever presented with a situation. Doesn’t have to but does …aka spreading the wealth.
– X2 Boron as well.
that they expelled him from his flock for saying “Nevermore” was a sheer unkindness by a conspiracy of probably 41%
dumb question #…:
in this day and age, why does it take over 70 days from the time of the presidential election to the time of the presidential inauguration?
(it shouldn’t take more than 5 days, at best, to count the vote)
(this is in regard to signatures on “Lame Duck” legislation and EOs)
Always wondered that myself, this “peaceful transition” the Dem’s keep harping is weird…but APDJT & Team have used this time to springboard into the office, wasting no time putting some in our nation (they know who they are), and the world, on notice. [New] King Frederik X (DK) is ingratiating himself to Trump — Greenland may be in play. The other end of the stick dictators and potentates have already quieted their rhetoric. And Trump just stated in his impromptu M-A-L presser that if by Inauguration Hamas doesn’t release all prisoners being held there will be hell to pay. I believe him, they should too.
Hamas (etal) is committed to/(worships) death – their own as well as the people they consider the “non-believers”
they do not care, they do not give a hoot
if they give back the prisoners (or their bodies), it will be for some sort of gain (even if it’s only applause from the international elite)
Reminds me of the Thuggee cult from Gunga Din (the movie).
Prager regarding Israel / Hamas: “If Hamas laid down their weapons there’d be peace; If Israel laid down their weapons…they’ll be dead.”
I knew the movies but I was ;ate to the party.
>Elon Musk calls [the AfD] the “last spark of hope” for Germany. European elites call it the heir to National Socialism.
—
Well, good for Musk. I guess he wasn’t kidding about getting actively involved in pushing back against the dominant paradigm of the fallen West. He may have joked about becoming the “Soros of the right” or whatever it was exactly he said, but the difference from my perspective here in the cheap seats is that he’s doing it openly and very personally. And the parts that aren’t personal are more transparent and in-line with ethical standards than what Soros (and his ilk) have been doing. I don’t understand enough about British politics [1] to know if Nigel Farage is a Good Dude or not, or whether Farage is the Best Option to back from a utilitarian standpoint (GD and BO may be the same person, sometimes, other times not). But Idi Amin Dada might not be a worse option than Starmer. I think Musk and Farage have much more in common, goals-wise, than their differences over Tommy Robinson [2]. If Farage has momentum and popular backing, it makes not much sense, to me at least, to try and build up some other MP. “No enemies to the right” and all that, yeah?
—
[1] I have no patience for those on “our side” who spew idiocies such as “they voted for Starmer, screw them!” Just like we voated for Biden? And Newsom? To take but two glaringly excremental examples. We, the normal people of the white (mostly, so far), English-speaking nations, need to stick together against our “elite” globalist overlords. No one left behind. No one abandoned. As wise Ben Franklin said, “We must, indeed, all hang together, or most assuredly our children will be sodomized by foreigner pedo-rapists while our ‘elites’ laugh.”
[2] I don’t know enough about Tommy Robinson to have a strong opinion about him as a human being, but so far as I can tell, his being incarcerated is a travesty. Musk is correct about “Free Tommy Robinson.” IMNSHO Farage is way off base with his remark “[Musk] sees Robinson as one of these people that fought against the grooming gangs. But of course, the truth is Tommy Robinson’s in prison not for that, but for contempt of court.” Yeah? And what of it? Any legal system that fails to protect thousands of its children from gang rape deserves contempt. (Actually they deserve [redacted] with a [redacted], followed by public [redacted], with a rusty [redacted] in the [redacted] (no lube), followed by intracranial injection of [redacted].)
And why do news articles love to add the info-tidbit of “Tommy Robinson (real name Stephen Yaxley-Lennon)”. And? What is the point of this? Why don’t they also write “Leon Trotsky (real name Lev Davidovich Bronstein)” or “Lenin (real name Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov)” or “Jay-Z (real name Shawn Carter)”. In a world where they agree to pretend that the entity calling itself Dr. Rachel Levine is an actual woman, they reject someone birth-named Stephen calling himself Tommy? WTF?
+1
X2
USFS (Forest Service)
The zealot government employees that take these actions don’t realize they are damaging their own employees lives. The ‘rank and file’ live, and raise families, in the communities affect by these actions. Their spouses and their children are often subject to bullying and shunning in the communities where they live in retaliation, unjustified but none the less real, for heavy handed actions by jackboots. Not a morale builder when your loved ones live in fear.
Special Agent Travis Lunders best be a model driver. Local LEOs will be watching for any traffic violation. I’ve seen that happen more than once. Some of those LEOs were relatives.
Lunders and his superiors can’t be too smart. They have pissed off a United States Senator at a time a new sheriff is taking office.
I didn’t realize the AfD was still viable. I hadn’t seen ANYTHING about them for a long time…sigh
Quashed by the left and allowed to simmer.
USFS…had enough dealings with them to not “appreciate” the cut of their jib, whereas, Game Warden’s…knew a few, plus I liked Joe Pickett (too bad Amazon stopped at 2 seasons).
AfD.
Ban them , give them no coverage in the legacy media, make it impossible for them to form a coalition government, do all of that and the problem still remains — Germans mighty angry about hordes of savages destroying their country. No spectral, real. The, at some tipping point, the people go over the edge and change things.
I recall that’s happened before in Germany.
With memorable consequences.
*Not and *Then, obvs
Call it a murder of crows, perhaps.
Just a quick unrelated shout out for a book written by a personal friend of this blogs host, Mr. M.Watson and his book Hunting in the Shadows. I just finished it and wish that four hundred pages kept going. All i can say is what a young mans life to have lived.Read his book.
It’s all true. But it doesn’t tell the story of the rest of his life. I’m lucky to have MikeW as a friend.
(1
Politically incorrect game: Come up with “animal group” equivalents for kinds of people. Nations, or professions, or hobbyists, it’s your choice. Here’s some examples to get started.
A horde of Mongols. Okay, that was obvious.
A gesticulation of Italians.
An awkwardness of introverts.
hope you don’t mind if I use these sometime in the future
I read somewhere that if you factor in the age of the Universe as 20 billion years rather than 15 billion years old, the need for dark energy disappears from the energy and mass equations. Dunno if this is true but I have a real issue over the handwavium aspect of dark energy. “Everything we can’t explain is because of Dark Energy!” Right. No. If it can’t be measured, can’t be observed, can’t be proved then it’s either a shaky hypothesis or just humbug and hookum.
–
Maybe instead of The Big Bang (the Universe suddenly blasting into existence, and from what?) the start was The Slow Fizz. Instead of an exploding soda bottle it was a slow pressure release. That might explain the age discrepancy and then eliminate ‘dark matter.’
Not going to defend Carter – he was not a good President – but I suggest Bush II, Obama, obviously FJB, Woodrow Wilson, and likely FDR as being worse than Carter. Maybe LBJ as well.
It was a race to the bottom.