Category Archives: Freedom

Sobriety check

Posted on by

I figure this is the appropriate time to bring it up (yes; I’ve been waiting for months now), what with some of the exuberance out there in response to DT’s election win.

Shall we start a betting pool regarding the exact date on which he blows up and shows anger and hate for conservatives who’re trying to hold him to it?

McCain and Schwarzenegger both did it, as have others. They run on a patriotic message because they know they need our votes, but they resent having to “lower” themselves to such a level, and that resentment will out itself. If I were a betting man I’d say sometime before the end of January. Maybe even before inauguration, but I figure he can control himself until after.

I would of course love to be proven wrong on this (feel free to jump on my case in four years, please), but it is nonetheless a good idea to have some guarded optimism, or hopeful skepticism, at this stage and save the heady exuberance for after the end of his first term when it turns out he actually didn’t ass-rape us after all.

Go for it

Posted on by

Eric Levitz in New York magazine writes Why the Decimated Democrats May Turn Left:

Without the immense power (and glamour) that comes with the White House, Democrats no longer have any distraction from their fundamental weakness at all other levels of government.

Since President Obama took office, more than 900 Democratic state legislators have been ousted. In January 2009, the party occupied 29 governor’s mansions. Today, it lays claim to 15. The GOP — the party that was supposed to be headed for a great crack-up — holds 33.

In 24 states, Republicans control the Executive branch and both legislative houses. Of course, they now enjoy the same trifecta in Washington, D.C.

But Democrats have lost more than power. They’ve also lost their faith in demographic destiny.

…

The upcoming DNC leadership election is expected to be cast as a struggle for control of the party’s future. For now, the party’s Sanders-Warren wing appears best positioned to win that civil war.

Sure thing Eric. Socialism is the future. Go for it.

Quote of the day—Sebastian

Posted on by

Most of us don’t want power to rule others: we want to be left alone. But in order to be left alone, you have to seek enough power to make them leave you alone. That, I think, is our great Catch 22.

Sebastian
November 7, 2016
Busybodying May Be The Most Powerful Force in the Universe
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

PC creates Trump supporters

Posted on by

Interesting Reason article by Robby Soave “Trump Won Because Leftist Political Correctness Inspired a Terrifying Backlash”

I have tried to call attention to this issue for years. I have warned that political correctness actually is a problem on college campuses, where the far-left has gained institutional power and used it to punish people for saying or thinking the wrong thing. And ever since Donald Trump became a serious threat to win the GOP presidential primaries, I have warned that a lot of people, both on campus and off it, were furious about political-correctness-run-amok—so furious that they would give power to any man who stood in opposition to it.

I have watched this play out on campus after campus. I have watched dissident student groups invite Milo Yiannopoulos to speak—not because they particularly agree with his views, but because he denounces censorship and undermines political correctness. I have watched students cheer his theatrics, his insulting behavior, and his narcissism solely because the enforcers of campus goodthink are outraged by it. It’s not about his ideas, or policies. It’s not even about him. It’s about vengeance for social oppression.

The whole article, and some of the comments, are well worth a read. It’s not long. Speaking as a victim of PC weaponized speech codes, I agree. I wasn’t a trump supporter in May.

I am now.

Intellectual Yet Idiot

Posted on by

From ZeroHedge comes this Nassim Taleb quote.

“The IYI pathologizes others for doing things he doesn’t understand without ever realizing it is his understanding that may be limited. He thinks people should act according to their best interests and he knows their interests, particularly if they are “red necks” or English non-crisp-vowel class who voted for Brexit. When Plebeians do something that makes sense to them, but not to him, the IYI uses the term “uneducated”. What we generally call participation in the political process, he calls by two distinct designations: “democracy” when it fits the IYI, and “populism” when the plebeians dare voting in a way that contradicts his preferences. While rich people believe in one tax dollar one vote, more humanistic ones in one man one vote, Monsanto in one lobbyist one vote, the IYI believes in one Ivy League degree one-vote, with some equivalence for foreign elite schools, and PhDs as these are needed in the club.”

Yep. Pretty much.  Those on the left celebrate diversity, as long as it means different flavors of leftism. They celebrate tolerance, as long as it’s the right tolerating the left. They celebrate inclusion, as long as it means including the left. They can gloat and say “I won!”, but the right is asked to “play nice” when they win. The left calls for free speech, as long as it is left-wing speech. The left calls for “safe spaces” for themselves, but also demand access to anyplace someone on the right wishes to be left alone in peace. The left calls their opponents bigoted, deplorable, hate-filled, narrow-minded, etc., but that’s just projection; they are blinded by their own bigotry, hate, and narrow-minded view of things.

But frankly, I don’t expect there to be a lot of self-reflection by those on the left; I expect tantrums, tears, and terrorism. They think “the public” is wrong; they will miss the warning the deplorable masses are sending them that it’s the elites that are going the wrong way.

Quote of the day—Scott Adams

Posted on by

On election day, should Trump win as I predict, I ask for Trump supporters to stay cool when the predictable riots erupt. And keep in mind that if you vote for Trump, you own it. If you aren’t helping him get it right after he wins, you haven’t done enough. Trump is a group-participation president by design. He is directly asking for voters’ help in “draining the swamp.” In the short run, the best way to help Trump is by avoiding trouble on election day and by reassuring Clinton voters that you have always been on their side as Americans. Then act that way.

The fight ends Tuesday. After that, let’s try to be useful. No matter what happens.

Scott Adams
November 6, 2016
I Don’t Want a Government Job
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

The one up-side to a Trump win

Posted on by

I had not thought of this.

I would have thought that they’d have learned from other actors who’d promised to leave us if so-and-so won in previous elections, and then never made good on it. Credibility is apparently not highly regarded among entertainers.

A mass exodus of entertainers would not break my heart. I estimate that the number who actually leave the U.S. and change citizenship over this will be approximately zero, however. Instead of “Let My People Go!” I’m thinking “Leave me alone already. Go, and quit yer damned yappin'”.

To think of the number of hours of my life (to say nothing of the dollars) that have been wasted watching stupid movies, stupid TV, and listening to stupid music…

I wonder if I could find a court somewhere, to take my case of liability for loss-of-productivity against the entertainment industry. Such would be stupid of course, but less so than some of the blather that comes out of the mouths of entertainers.

Trump is certainly no prize, and may turn out to be a disaster. That’ll be hung on our shoulders as American patriots I suppose, though were not the ones who supported the New York Progressive.

Election day

Posted on by

Weird, weird election cycle. The stories are worthy of a Matthew Bracken or Dan Brown novel. I’ve got pages of links about voting “irregularities,” and a lot of them include electronic voting machines changing the presidential vote on a “straight R party ticket” to Clinton. None of them involve an irregularity going the other way. Not one. Hmmm.

Lots of shenanigans. Honest voting is only possible if both major parties actually want it enough to do what is necessary for it. Neither side apparently does, though for different reasons. Policy preferences make no difference if there are not honest elections to hold the elected accountable. A nation with no border and no common culture or ideas will never have honest elections, because at least one side will always try to take power by corrupting the election process at some point when power is within the margin of fraud. Here’s a few links to peruse (not all of them, just the fraction I decided to grab from time to time): Continue reading →

Quote of the day—Michael Krieger

Posted on by

I want to take a quick moment to discuss his most meaningful insight, which is the idea that “political systems scale poorly.” This is hugely important, because as the current status quo system collapses, many of us in the Western world will be presented with an incredible opportunity to do things completely different.

Michael Krieger
November 6, 2016
Here’s What Happened When a Hillary Supporting MIT Professor Decided to Analyze Her Emails…
[Communism works well enough for a family unit and maybe even a small tribe. Democracy works for somewhat larger groups. Republics work for even larger groups. Republics with strong minority rights work for still larger groups.  But it should be obvious by now that we haven’t recently field tested a particularly good political system for large populations with diverse cultures and large geographical areas. Krieger suggests something that showed considerable promise in earlier tests and should be reevaluated.

If it’s not obvious to you then a civil war may be in our future and you will be enlightened.—Joe]

Jews in the attic example

Posted on by

Via email Bob Reynolds points out:

Here’s one for the “Jews in the attic” category: http://komonews.com/news/local/king-county-using-grocery-store-data-to-target-pet-owners

From the article:

“This is not King County going and grabbing this data, you know, big brother watching what you buy at the grocery store,” said Satterfield.

Instead, the county said they pay the company who pays stores such as Safeway and QFC for access to customer data contained in every one of those reward card swipes.

Satterfield seems to think that paying someone to do it for you means you are “not doing it”.

From my Jews in the Attic Test web page we have an example which predicts the result Bob points out:

Elimination or severe restriction of anonymous financial transactions.  The purchase of food and other supplies for your “Jews in the attic” would show up in the records as being excessive compared to what your needs were.

In the pot, or from the pot

Posted on by

Human psychology is an odd thing. A person can justify and rationalize all sorts of evil for all sorts of reasons. Collective action allows people to absolve themselves of guilt by saying “well, everyone was doing it!” (think social drinking, or conspiring to cheat on a test), or “I was ordered to do it” (think crew-served weapons like machine guns or cannons in war-time). Napleon used a lot of cannon batteries because he knew that people would not want to “let their buddies down”, and that being part of a team effort allowed each man to tell himself “I didn’t kill all those men, I just loaded powder charges,” (or carried cannon balls, or pulled a lanyard, or managed the limber, or whatever). Continue reading →

Quote of the day—Despiser Despised

Posted on by

Democrats lost America’s first Civil War because they enslaved Black people. Democrats are going to lose America’s second Civil War because they attempted to enslave everyone else…

Not every Democrat was a KuKluxKlan member, but every KuKluxKlan member was a democrat.

When peaceful recourse is denied, violent redress becomes justified, it becomes manifold.

Despiser Despised
November 11, 2016
Comment to Democratic Pollster Celinda Lake Tells Union Workers To Lie To Voters
[Talk of a civil war may not be farfetched.

Trust of U.S. political leaders is at an all time low:

GallupTrustInPolicticalLeaders2016
In the last few days a “little elf” told me that in the last few years the number paramilitary organizations in the U.S. have grown from a dozen or so to over a thousand.—Joe]

Update: I found another article that seems to be more authoritative with some apparently firm numbers on the number of armed groups:

Bill Fulton, an expert on the American militia movement and informant for the FBI, has far more than 170 groups on his list of “armed, violent organizations that might take a shot at the Federal Government”. That’s out of an estimated 1,360 “radical militias and anti-government groups” in the United States in 2012 (note that there were just 149 four years before)

Those who need to know already know what the following means. If it’s not crystal clear to you then don’t worry about it. It’s not for you. It’s more fun and games for the NSA:

Continue reading →

Quote of the day—Sean

Posted on by

I can’t help but imagine the drunken sobbing in the writer’s room for House of Cards. Nothing they could imagine would be as dark and twisty as the current state of politics. HoC has gone from a dark mirror of contemporary politics to a sunny, optimistic take on the subject.

Sean
October 31, 2016
Comment to Quote of the day—Jaime
[At first I thought Sean was exaggerating for dramatic effect. But as I I thought about it more I realized he is probably correct.—Joe]

Well… Isn’t that interesting.

Posted on by

More than a handful of people that read this blog are programmers. Anyone know the best way to get this into the hands of people that can actually do something about it?

Considering Washington State is an entirely vote-by-mail bubble-form and counted by machine state, the possibility of rigging by this method is more than a little plausible.

For what it’s worth, I found it from a Drudge link to Infowars, so it’s not like nobody else will hear about it, but…..

Banana Republic, anyone?

Update: Looks like YouTube’s view-count is getting messed with, just like the vote-count 🙁
After more than two hours with a DrudgeReport link, it’s only at 909 views, and 276 likes. Not bloody likely.

A question of tactics

Posted on by

In any battle, you must have weapons and tactics that work against the enemy of the moment. If you use Marquis of Queensbury rules, and he brings three buddies with barbwire-wrapped baseball bats, you will lose. I.e., you don’t take a gun to a law-suit, and you don’t face a mob alone. The English longbow was effective against the mounted French knight because they were fighting by similar rules, against similarly-minded men, on a fair battleground. The longbow did not have any effect against Martin Luther’s 95 theses nailed to the Church door (a mixed metaphor, I realize; just go with it). No matter how distasteful it may be, you must choose the weapons that can hit your opponent’s “center of gravity,” where they have power. Continue reading →

Meme trolling

Posted on by

2016 may be the year parody became impossible.

Draft your daughter

Because “equality.” Or something.

It takes trolling to a whole new level. Most bizarre election ever. The “humor” category tag is invoked, but it’s dark, very dark, humor. It’s like a Mobius strip written in LISP, a recursive self-referential redaction of a caricature of reality.

Quote of the day—Brian Krebs

Posted on by

I have been asked by several reporters over the past few days whether I think government has a role to play in fixing the IoT mess. Personally, I do not believe there has ever been a technology challenge that was best served by additional government regulation.

Brian Krebs
October 25, 2016
Senator Prods Federal Agencies on IoT Mess
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

Rigging the Election – Video IV: $20K Wire Transfer From Belize Returned

Posted on by

From Project Veritas Action:

More extremely damning evidence.

As Jaime told me last night at dinner, this is historic. This is probably the biggest presidential political scandal ever. Nixon deleted 18.5 minutes of audio tape, which wouldn’t have been illegal had they not been under subpoena, and was driven from office. Clinton deleted tens of thousands of emails she was required by law to keep and were also under subpoena. Project Veritas has exposed the directing of people and organizations engaged in voter fraud and incitement of violence by the Hillary Clinton campaign and Hillary Clinton herself.

Hillary Clinton for prison 2016!

Quote of the day—Rolf

Posted on by

I have ZERO confidence that my ballot is being counted correct by the machines tabulating the ballots. I have ZERO confidence that there are not boxes full of pre-marked ballots waiting in someone’s trunk to be produced if the tally starts going the wrong way. I have ZERO confidence that there is any way to audit the vote totals and confirm that they are a reasonable reflection of the intent of the ballots the voters filled out. I have ZERO confidence that only legally permissible voters are casting ballots. I have ZERO confidence that only legal voters ballots are counted.

So why do I vote? Just doing my part in making the margin of victory larger than the margin of fraud. If the nation ever has to resort to the fourth box of democracy, I can sleep comfortably at night knowing I did my level best to use the first three effectively, and the bastards had it coming.

Rolf
October 25, 2016
Comment to Quote of the day—Bob Woodward
[I have nothing to add.—Joe]

Quote of the day—Vox Day

Posted on by

Tibetan religious tradition has it that when the Dalai Lama dies, the Buddha of Compassion leaves his body and incarnates in the body of a young child. The monks immediately go out in search of this blessed child, and when they find him – as they inevitably do – he is tested by a group of high lamas and enthroned as the reincarnation of his successor.

Imagine, however, if the lamas refused to recognize that the Dalai Lama was, in fact, dead. Suppose that instead of going in search of the Buddha’s new carnal home, they hooked the corpse up to a life support machine and waited patiently for the Holy One to awake and rise up. It’s not hard to see that they would be doomed to disappointment, and furthermore, would fail to find the next Dalai Lama as well.

This is precisely our dilemma today, for America, as envisioned by the Founding Fathers, is dead. By every measure, large and small, the original vision of limited government by, for and of the people has been folded, spindled and mutilated beyond recognition. When one reads the Constitution, one simply marvels at the distinct difference between its words and our present reality.

Vox Day
July 12, 2004
You can’t fix a corpse
[The question, of course, is where/how do we find “New America” or reincarnate the spirit of the original? Day advocates voting for Libertarian or Constitutional parties. While I have (mostly) been doing that for many years I’m not convinced it is very productive. I think voting is a measure of the current status of the culture. Hence, I’m inclined to believe the correct answer involves changing the culture rather than voting. The voting will correct itself once the culture has sufficiently changed.—Joe]