IT’S AN ELECTION YEAR, SO ASSUME THEY’RE JUST GETTING STARTED: Anti-Israel uprisings hit dangerous new extreme in Michigan.
Author Archive: Ed Driscoll
May 19, 2024
21st CENTURY RELATIONSHIPS: The AI ‘concierge’ that will decide who you date.
Dating app users may soon be able to avoid awkward meet-ups with potential partners by using AI “concierges” to do the dating for them.
Users would have an AI avatar programmed with their “interests, likes, dislikes, even conversation habits”, said Glamour, and this bot would chat with other users’ bots to see if “the two real people behind the bots might be a good match”.
HOW IT STARTED:
● Who Said It, Adolf Hitler or Taylor Swift? Can you tell the difference between a quote from one of history’s most infamous revenge-seeking megalomaniacs and Adolf Hitler? Plenty of people couldn’t.
—The Atlantic, August 30th, 2013.
● White Supremacists Call Taylor Swift An Aryan Goddess.
—NPR, May 27th, 2016.
—The Root, September 20th, 2019.
—The College Fix, July 18th, 2021.
How it’s going: Historic German Church Hosts Worship Service Features Taylor Swift Songs.
—MRC TV, Thursday.
CHRISTIAN TOTO: Here’s Why We Needed ‘Judge and the Justice.’ Mark Judge, who Christine Blasey Ford claims saw Kavanaugh’s abuse, reveals all.
PAST PERFORMANCE IS NO GUARANTEE OF FUTURE RESULTS:
Shot: Robert Kennedy Jr.: We need laws to ‘punish global warming skeptics.’
“Those guys are doing the Koch Brothers bidding and are against all the evidence of the rational mind, saying global warming does not exist,” Mr. Kennedy said, Climate Depot reported. “They are contemptible human beings.”
He then turned his attacks directly at the Koch Brothers, accusing them of “polluting our atmosphere,” he said, the blog reported.
“I think it’s treason. Do I think the Koch Brothers are treasonous — yes, I do,” Mr. Kennedy said, Climate Depot reported. “They are enjoying making themselves billionaire by impoverishing the rest of us. Do I think they should be in jail — I think they should be injuring three hots and a cot at the Hague with all the other war criminals. Do I think the Koch brothers should be tried for reckless endangerment? Absolutely, that is is criminal offense and they ought to be serving time for it.”
—Cheryl Chumley, the Washington Times, September 23rd, 2014.
Chaser:
Breaking… @RobertKennedyJr rejects Biden's climate agenda:
1. While he believes climate is an "existential" threat🙄, he says has "no problems with people who don't believe that."
2. Rejects "very, very heavy top-down controls" and subsides to industry.
3. Says if we do… pic.twitter.com/E0pJXLUiNk
— Steve Milloy (@JunkScience) May 19, 2024
Of course Mr. Bond, Spectre does have its methods to deal with those who are uncooperative:
Voters: We would love someone to just act normal like 30% of the time.
Biden: My uncle was eaten by cannibals.
Trump: Buy the only Trump-approved Bible for $59.99!
RFK: pic.twitter.com/lkj2rpi8r0
— Mary Katharine Ham (@mkhammer) May 17, 2024
NEO: The Ghouls of Gaza.
The article also adds this detail about Shani Louk – and perhaps it is true of the other bodies as well:
Louk’s father, Nissim Louk, said his daughter’s body had been discovered in a cool, deep tunnel and was still in excellent condition when it was brought home.
Hamas knew these people were dead but they allowed the families to believe they were still alive, the better to torment the relatives and encourage them to pressure the Israeli government to make concessions. It was also understand that a Rafah operation by the IDF would probably lead to the finding of some hostages, dead or alive. But the whole world, including Biden and company, seems to have wanted to protect Rafah.
Read the whole thing.
JON GABRIEL: As unhappy as Americans are, Biden-Trump debates may actually be a welcome break.
Great news, everyone: Joe Biden and Donald Trump have agreed to hold two debates. If you want a preview, just watch some old episodes of “The Muppet Show” where those two old guys bicker in the balcony.
To be fair, I’m surprised either candidate agreed to these no-win campaign stunts. Scheduled for June 27 and Sept. 10, the debates promise to be a minefield of gaffes that will take years off the lives of any staffers cringing in the wings.
If no one falls off the dais or starts chewing the lectern, both sides will call it a success.
Neither candidate is popular, to put it kindly. According to a recent Pew Research poll, 48% of registered voters support Biden, 49% support Trump, and 49% want both candidates kicked off the ballot.
A couple of old geezers talking smack
That last sentiment grows the younger the sample gets. Two-thirds of voters under 30 say they would replace both candidates if they had the chance.
At least I’m young at heart.
“Donald Trump lost two debates to me in 2020, since then he hasn’t shown up for a debate,” Biden said in a post on X. “Now he’s acting like he wants to debate me again. Well, make my day, pal.”
Trump, for his part, said Biden was the “WORST debater I have ever faced – He can’t put two sentences together!” He ended his Truth Social post with, “Let’s get ready to Rumble!!!”
Oldest democracy on the planet or “Jerry Springer” promo: you be the judge.
It’s 2024, so embrace the healing power of “And.” But will the debates actually happen? Drug Testing Prior to Presidential Debates? From the comments: “You are missing the point. Trump made the ‘demand’ to propogate [sic] the narrative that POTATUS is too old and senile to be President. It doesn’t matter if Biden submits to the test, gives results, whatever. Trump just placed another Free Ad by manipulating the media. Marketing genius.”
May 18, 2024
DISTURBING VIDEO APPEARS TO SHOW SEAN “DIDDY” COMBS ASSAULTING SINGER CASSIE VENTURA:
Security video aired by CNN appears to show Sean “Diddy” Combs attacking singer Cassie in a Los Angeles hotel hallway in 2016, the latest in a months-long series of public allegations and revelations of physical and sexual violence from the hip-hop mogul.
The video aired Friday appears to show Combs, wearing only a white towel, punching and kicking the R&B singer who was his protege and longtime girlfriend at the time. The footage also shows Combs shoving and dragging Cassie, and throwing a vase in her direction.
The security camera video, dated March 5, 2016, closely resembles the description of an incident at an InterContinental Hotel in the Century City area of Los Angeles described in a November lawsuit filed by Cassie, whose legal name is Cassandra Ventura, that alleged years of sexual abuse and other violence from Combs.
Meanwhile from 2020, great moments in projection: Sean “Diddy Combs” endorsed Joe Biden, declared Trump “Dangerous.”
Sean “Diddy” Combs flipped a switch when it came to his friendship with Donald Trump. When Trump became president, things changed drastically, and many of his former friendships faltered — his friendship with Combs being one of them. In a 2020 interview with Charlamagne tha God, the rapper expressed worries about what would happen if Trump were to get reelected as president in the 2020 election. “If this man [Trump] is elected, we’re not standing by no more getting killed, we not scared of anybody standing up and standing by, we’re on the verge of a race war,” Diddy said. This came in the wake of the Black Lives Matter movement surging in response to police violence and the killings of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor.
Combs continued criticizing his former friend and Trump’s controversial opinions in the interview as he said, “White men like Trump need to be banished. That way of thinking is real dangerous.” With the 2020 election nearing, the rapper found it essential to endorse Trump’s opponent, Joe Biden. “When we look at it we don’t have no choice,” he said. “Say what you want about Biden, I can’t say I love to pick either but, hey, we gotta get him [Biden] in office, and then we gotta hold him accountable.” Combs’ interview drew a line in the sand as he made it clear his friendship with Trump was over.
Finally, at America’s Newspaper of Record: Nation Starting To Wonder If Diddy May Have Done A Few Of Those Things He Repeatedly Rapped About Doing.
(H/T: Clay Travis.)
PASS: Who Wants 30,000 Used Teslas?
Hertz’s latest challenge is trying to get out of its entanglement with Tesla. In retrospect, it just looks like a bad idea. Companies like Hertz make money when they rent out cars as often as possible, which means their vehicles will often have more miles than the average vehicle, and, in turn, have more problems that need expensive maintenance. A side deal renting the EVs to Uber drivers — who often have to drive hundreds of miles a day to make a profit — wore down the cars even more, which also weighed down their resale value. Last month, the company announced that it had sold about 10,000 EVs — about a third of the total fleet it intends to offload. At first blush, that looked like Hertz would be ahead of schedule. But the pace of sales is starting to slow. One salesman at a Hertz in Smithtown, New York, told me that sales have dropped from as much as 30 a week in January and February to about five a week in April. Online forums are full of people steering prospective buyers away from Hertz vehicles. One factor may be price. “Hertz does not provide haggling on price,” he said. “It is what it is.”
When Hertz first announced it was selling off most of its EVs, it blamed lower demand among the traveling public than it had expected. “They have an oversupply” of Teslas, said John Plimpton Babcock, an analyst at Bank of America who covers the car-rental company. That lower turnover meant less profit, he added.
It makes sense Hertz would try to sell off its fleet now. Purchases of brand-new EVs are stalling out after a decade or so of stratospheric growth. Auto loans have interest rates starting at about 5 percent and go skyward from there. A shortage of reliable charging stations, and worries about batteries losing power in cold weather, have all hurt public interest in owning — and perhaps even renting — an EV.
If you’re going to rent from Hertz, why not rent something with serious pornographic value? Rent a Shelby Mustang.
GOT WOKE, WENT…: Sports Illustrated fails to deliver May issue after breakup with publisher: sources.
Sports Illustrated’s tumultuous breakup with its publisher caused the magazine to skip production of the May edition – leaving more than 1 million subscribers with empty mailboxes last month, The Post has learned.
Arena Group – which had its license revoked in January after failing to make a $3.75 million quarterly payment to rights-holder Authentic Brands – refuses to turn over the subscriber list to new publisher Minute Media, three sources close to the situation told The Post.
By the letter of its contract, Arena – controlled by 5-Hour Energy founder Manoj Bhargava – does not believe it needs to share the SI subscriber list, sources said.
Authentic sued Arena for $48 million for backing out on the remaining three years of the deal, and Bhargava might use the subscriber list as part of negotiating leverage in potential settlement talks, one of the sources speculated.
Arena Group and Authentic Brands declined to comment.
Minute Media did not return calls.
The disruption – believed to be the first skipped issue in the magazine’ 70-year history – was further fueled by Arena firing about 100 SI employees as part of its negotiating tactics with Authentic.
Bhargava had even threatened to kill the print edition of the iconic magazine after learning Authentic owner Jamie Salter was leaning toward awarding the rights to Minute Media, as The Post previously reported.
The last monthly issue printed was the April 2024 baseball preview edition with Shohei Ohtani on the cover – which was mailed to SI’s roughly 1 million paid and non-paid subscribers before the handover. Arena continued publishing SI after its license was terminated while attempting to regain the rights.
In accordance with the prophecy:
Sports Illustrated Goes Bankrupt Trying To Provide Enough Catering For Cover Model Shoot https://t.co/KacNRUB5Yx pic.twitter.com/CmZqG64P4u
— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) May 16, 2024
JOHN LUCAS: What Incentives Does Israel Have to Agree to a Cease Fire?
The following is a guest post (originally on LinkedIn), by an Army officer with extensive combat experience in the Mideast and the Levant.
* * * * *
What incentives does Israel have to cease counter-Hamas operations?
Nations, like individuals, historically (not always) operate off a series of incentives.
Net positive = do it
Net negative = avoid it
An easy concept to understand but not simple in practice.
There is no shortage in calls for Israel to implement a ceasefire with Hamas, despite the fact that the current conflict is a direct result of the October 7 Hamas attack where over 1100 Israelis were killed, many of them civilians.
To date Israel has resisted these calls, including those from the U.S., for an operational stand down.
But why?
As a student and practitioner of war I find myself asking, what incentives does Israel have to bow to international pressure?
This is NOT a political commentary, merely a thought experiment on incentives vs. disincentives.
Below are three reasons why Israel has no incentive to stop short of total victory:
Read the whole thing.
Related: Only Israel Wants To End the ‘Forever War.’ “Which brings us to the second point: This is already a forever war. And that forever war was declared by Israel’s enemies and is re-declared each time Israel offers to end it. Hamas’s raison d’etre, in fact, is forever war. You can find this out by doing such things as: asking them; reading their statements; reading their essential documents; watching their interviews; opening your eyes; etc.”
PAST PERFORMANCE IS NO GUARANTEE OF FUTURE TRUNALIMUNUMAPRZURE:
No way? https://t.co/3dhkOU5LoS pic.twitter.com/3cs9Iyo0ZZ
— Guy Benson (@guypbenson) May 17, 2024
LES RUSSES ARRIVENT! LES RUSSES ARRIVENT! France Invites Russia to D-Day Anniversary Events and Allies Are Naturally Upset.
France has decided that Western allies shouldn’t let a little old thing like a war in Europe prevent the 80th-anniversary party for the D-Day landings from including the Russians.
Russians were not involved in the D-Day landings. In fact, Russia helped start World War II when its alliance with Nazi Germany gave Hitler a free hand in Western Europe to attack Poland.
All water under the bridge, right? We were “allies” then even when Russian troops raped their way across Germany on the road to Berlin and afterward.
So leaving Russia out of the 80th anniversary commemoration of D-Day would have been bad form. And for French diplomacy, “form” always trumps the real world.
Officials from the U.S., the United Kingdom, and two other NATO allies expressed their chagrin at the invite.
Protocol issues, the symbolism of inviting Russians, and questions about what sort of “diplomatic engagement” would be required were the kinds of queries being asked by the Allies.
“We would defer to the government of France, which organizes the commemoration at Normandy,” a White House official said. “But perhaps this will remind the Russians that they actually fought real Nazis once, not imaginary ones in Ukraine.”
Touché.
Oceania has never been at war with Omaha Beach. Though I’m shocked that France has finally found another nation to surrender to.
OLD AND BUSTED: Dow 36,000.
The New Hotness? Dow closes above 40,000 for first time.
REVEALING THE TRUTH ABOUT THE TOP GEAR POLAR PICK-UP (Video):
QUESTION ASKED: Francis Ford Coppola and Megalopolis: genius or flop?
This Friday sees the Cannes premiere of a film that, by rights, really ought not to exist. As the likes of its stars Adam Driver, Giancarlo Esposito, Dustin Hoffman and Shia LaBeouf all assemble on the Croisette, it will be its now eighty-five-year-old director, screenwriter and producer, Francis Ford Coppola, who will be the most closely watched figure of the night, if not the entire festival.
Megalopolis, the movie that they are all gathering to promote, has been Coppola’s great passion project all through his career. He first came up with the idea in 1977, began to develop it in 1983 and, finally, sold part of his wine empire a few years ago to raise the film’s $120 million budget. At every turn, it seemed somehow unlikely that he would manage to make it; there were rumors of chaos on set (something of a Coppola specialty), with the director firing the visual effects department and, in turn, the production designer and art director resigning, citing the “unstable filming environment.” To which the only riposte must surely be: did you guys not see Apocalypse Now?
Initial reviews are mixed, but many are brutal: Francis Coppola’s $120million self-funded epic Megalopolis panned as an ‘abomination’ by critics following allegations of chaos on set as crew members claim legendary director smoked marijuana in his trailer and ‘pulled young women onto his lap.’
AMERICA’S NEWSPAPER OF RECORD ONCE AGAIN DOING STRAIGHT-UP REPORTAGE: ‘Harrison Butker Does Not Reflect Our Values,’ Says League Of Woman Beaters.
And from Glenn, at his Substack: Harrison Butker, Harbinger?
Related: Time for the Bud Light Treatment: NFL Denounces Player for Advocating Traditional Values.
BURGMENTUM! America’s Next Vice President?
The question, I think, is what kind of balance should Trump seek? I think he needs, more than geographic or demographic balance, personality balance. Someone who is solid, reliable, non-dramatic, not susceptible to tabloid distractions, with a record of success in business and an air of obvious competence that will reassure the business community, Wall Street, and upper-income voters. In my view, more than any of the other VP contenders, Burgum has those qualities in spades.
So I have come around to the idea that, while Trump has other good options, selecting Doug Burgum as his vice presidential nominee could be a smart choice. One more thing: it also offers the prospect of Doug Burgum debating Kamala Harris, which could be a mismatch for the ages.
Or, perhaps: Ex-Rep. Tulsi Gabbard says Democrats, Biden-Harris administration put themselves in God’s place.
WHERE’S HUNTER, FAT? Why You’re Going to Be Hearing More about Hunter Biden Soon.
Democrats believe that they are the party serious about opposing the exploitation of women. Hunter Biden has schtupped prostitutes, impregnated a stripper, and then refused to pay child support. Joe Biden had to be shamed into acknowledging the existence of his seventh grandchild.
Democrats believe that they are the party that is serious about the rule of law. Joe Biden spent decades enacting harsher penalties for drug use, possession, and dealing. Hunter Biden broke those laws many, many times and never suffered any legal consequence.
Finally, for decades, Joe Biden pitched himself as this old-fashioned family man, where “his word as a Biden” meant a solemn promise, a man of traditional values shaped by the working-class virtues of Scranton, Pa. It’s just random bad luck that his younger son turned into Caligula.
A lot of people think the myth of Narcissus is about a man who falls in love with himself — but the real “sin” in the myth is that Narcissus does not recognize himself. No one in government can address the deep skepticism and mistrust in the American public if they cannot see themselves and their past records clearly.
But hey, President Biden can’t even see the past inflation rate clearly.
Read the whole thing.
The strange new official portrait of Charles III is an occasion for conservatives to ask once more, “What’s wrong with modern art?” And is there any alternative to it, if this painting is the best that even a king can get?
Portraiture and monarchy have little place in today’s world—neither is extinct, though each has been largely deprived of function. The king reigns but does not rule. Portraits have prestige but are no longer necessary for memorializing or promoting anyone’s appearance. Democracy and photography have taken over the work of the old forms.
So the king’s portrait evokes dilution. Charles floats as a head on a hardly visible body, an indistinct figure subsumed by red haze. The color is simple and striking, as it must be to catch the desensitized eye. A royal portrait has to compete with every other meme and image today. Only the bizarre has a chance of standing out.
Charles is a neo-traditionalist in certain respects. He dislikes modern architecture and urban planning, for one thing, and has championed the creation of Poundbury, a town being built in Dorset along New Urbanist lines. But his portrait is placeless and modern, recalling a controversial 1997 depiction of his mother by Justin Mortimer.
That painting, commissioned by the Royal Society of the Arts, had Elizabeth II’s head completely detached from her body, against a blank yellow background. The artist may have been channeling his own detachment from his subject: “I don’t have anything in common with her apart from being English,” he told the Wall Street Journal in 2011.
Alienation and crude technique, often coupled with shock or outright obscenity, are familiar characteristics of modern art. What once may have been jarring enough to be liberating has long become formulaic. But royal portraits are a stodgy enough medium that a work like Jonathan Yeo’s crimsoned King Charles can still provoke a few days’ headlines.
The classics of modernism can still stir a reaction as well. A friend recently wrote on Facebook about seeing a Jackson Pollock painting—perhaps better described as just Jackson Pollock paint—at a museum in Philadelphia. He asked the docent why Pollock’s splatters of color weren’t something that any visitor could drip on a canvas himself. He was told Pollock did it first, which might come as a surprise to parents of small children.
In his 2002 review of C.P. Snow’s 1959 book, The Two Cultures and the Scientific Revolution, Orrin Judd of the Brothers Judd blog wrote:
As Snow notes, as late as say the 1850s, any reasonably well-educated, well-read, inquisitive man could speak knowledgeably about both science and the arts. Man knew little enough that it was still possible for one to know nearly everything that was known and to have been exposed to all the religion, art, history–culture in general–that mattered. But then with the pure science revolution of which Snow spoke–in biology and chemistry, but most of all in physics–suddenly a great deal of specialized training and education was necessary before one could be knowledgeable in each field. Like priests of some ancient cult, scientists were separated out from the mass of men, elevated above them by their access to secret knowledge. Even more annoying was the fact that even though they had moved beyond what the rest of us could readily understand, they could still listen to Bach or read Shakespeare and discuss it intelligently. The reaction of their peers in the arts, or those who had been their peers, was to make their own fields of expertise as obscure as possible. If Picasso couldn’t understand particle physics, he sure as hell wasn’t going to paint anything comprehensible, and if Joyce couldn’t pick up a scientific journal and read it, then no one was going to be able to read his books either. And so grew the two cultures, the one real, the other manufactured, but both with elaborate and often counterintuitive theories, requiring years of study.
And thus we we end up with the formulation of Tom Wolfe’s 1975 book, The Painted Word, where modern art exists almost solely to justify the theory behind it, and as Wolfe wrote, “In short: frankly, these days, without a theory to go with it, I can’t see a painting.”
NEO: Mitt Romney: Biden should have pardoned Trump.
Romney added:
… [H]ad I been President Biden, when the Justice Department brought on indictments, I would have immediately pardoned him. I’d have pardoned President Trump. Why? Well, because it makes me, President Biden, the big guy and the person I pardoned a little guy.
So Romney, when you voted to convict Trump after he’d been impeached on bogus charges, did you do it because you thought it made you the big guy or the little guy? My answer is “the little guy.” What’s yours?
Is there a worse case of Stockholm Syndrome in American politics than Romney, who was utterly destroyed by the DNC-MSM in 2012, and yet always comes crawling back to them, futility seeking redemption from a group of self-styled elites who hate him? Or as Steve wrote on Thursday, “This is where I’d like to grab Romney by the lapel of his suitcoat, pull his face so close to mine I could see my reflection in his Brylcreem, and shout, ‘THE BIDEN WHITE HOUSE IS BEHIND ALL THIS, YOU PREENING NINNY.’ And then his security would come and beat me to a pulp, which is exactly why I try not to go to Washington except when I must.”