YUGE: Covington Boy’s Lawyers to Hit CNN With $250+ Million Lawsuit This Week. “CNN was probably more vicious in its direct attacks on Nicholas than the Washington Post.”
Author Archive: Stephen Green
March 11, 2019
APOLOGY ACCEPTED, CAPTAIN NEEDA: I’m so, so, so sorry: A Baby Boomer apologizes on behalf of his generation.
The previous generation, the Greatest Generation, saved the world by sending Orwell’s rough men into the crucible of war in the interest of peace. My generation, the Baby Boomers, was to live the life purchased for us by the boys of Normandy, the Ardennes, Iwo Jima, Okinawa and other killing fields. White marble crosses and Stars of David in these places testify to the enormous price of that purchase. And live we did. What a party we threw ourselves. So, as I reflect on the goodness of the job my generation has done, I apologize. I apologize for it all.
I apologize that we Boomers bankrupted this great nation. We made all manner of promises to ourselves while leaving you the bill.
Plus: “In accounting terms, we have a negative net worth. In everyday terms, we’ve already spent or committed everything we have, everything, to support our generation’s lifestyle, now and in retirement. And it’s no accident. Just because we don’t care doesn’t mean we don’t understand. By the time the bill comes due, we’ll have the distinct advantage of being dead.”
Instead of an apology, I’ll gladly take a cashier’s check.
JON CALDARA: The bullies running Colorado.
The left once fought voter suppression. This legislature is passing a National Public Vote bill, which hasn’t any bipartisan support, without first bringing it to a popular vote of Coloradans.
The left once fought for free speech. This legislature is now passing a bill that requires sex education in public schools include how to have “healthy” transsexual relationships while the bill bans any talk of gender norms. Banning speech is the new virtue?
The left once fought for due process. This legislature is passing a “Red Flag” bill that rips away the right of due process and the right to face one’s accuser. Unlike last year’s attempt, this bill goes so far it also hasn’t gotten any bipartisan votes from lawmakers.
The left once demanded process. Our governor is limiting our vehicle purchases to whatever the governor of California dictates without first getting the required approval from our own legislature, which they would likely give him. But, just like the National Popular Vote, why chance asking for consent.
Read the whole thing.
Melissa and I are already making plans to move to Wyoming once the boys are grown, and I’m thinking we might be forced to pull the trigger even sooner than that.
LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: Trump’s got a budget and much, much more. “Democrat leaders Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi are not pleased with the budget.”
Well, they don’t strike me as very happy people.
PRIVACY: Facebook won’t let you opt out of its phone number ‘look up’ setting.
Last year, Facebook was forced to admit that after months of pestering its users to switch on two-factor by signing up their phone number, it was also using those phone numbers to target users with ads. But some users are finding out just now that Facebook’s default setting allows everyone — with or without an account — to look up a user profile based off the same phone number previously added to their account.
The recent hubbub began today after a tweet by Jeremy Burge blew up, criticizing Facebook’s collection and use of phone numbers, which he likened to “a unique ID that is used to link your identity across every platform on the internet.”
Although users can hide their phone number on their profile so nobody can see it, it’s still possible to “look up” user profiles in other ways, such as “when someone uploads your contact info to Facebook from their mobile phone,” according to a Facebook help article. It’s a more restricted way than allowing users to search for user profiles using a person’s phone number, which Facebook restricted last year after admitting “most” users had their information scraped.
I’ve never given my phone number to any social media site. If that means someday I get permanently locked out of my account, so be it.
#METOO: Former Gillibrand aide resigned in protest over handling of sex harassment claims.
Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), one of the most outspoken advocates of the #MeToo movement who has made fighting sexual misconduct a centerpiece of her presidential campaign, spent last summer pressing legislators to update Congress’ “broken” system of handling sexual harassment.
At the same time, a mid-20s female aide to Gillibrand resigned in protest over the handling of her sexual harassment complaint by Gillibrand‘s office, and criticized the senator for failing to abide by her own public standards.
In July, the female staffer alleged one of Gillibrand’s closest aides — who was a decade her senior and married — repeatedly made unwelcome advances after the senator had told him he would be promoted to a supervisory role over her. She also said the male aide regularly made crude, misogynistic remarks in the office about his female colleagues and potential female hires.
Less than three weeks after reporting the alleged harassment and subsequently claiming that the man retaliated against her for doing so, the woman told chief of staff Jess Fassler that she was resigning because of the office’s handling of the matter. She did not have another job lined up.
What did the Senator know and when did she know it?
THERE SHE GOES AGAIN: Ocasio-Cortez, at SXSW, blasts FDR, Reagan and capitalism, says political moderates are ‘meh.’
Today’s Young Turk “Democratic” Socialists are burning bridges before they cross them. Meanwhile, YouTuber “Mr. Reagan” has an interesting theory: AOC, Tlaib & Co. are actors hired to play a part.
Lots of good info on Venezuela’s neglected energy infrastructure, plus photos.
WELL, GOOD: Pentagon Gives Erdogan An Ultimatum: Don’t Expect Our F-35s If You Buy Russian S-400s.
Pentagon spokesman Charles Summers said Friday morning that there will be “grave consequences” if Turkey moves forward in purchasing Russia’s S-400, according to Bloomberg — this after the top US commander in Europe, Army General Curtis Scaparrotti, recommended to Congress this week that delivery to Turkey of Lockheed Martin’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter should ultimately be cancelled, nothing that the S-400 remains “a problem to all of our aircraft, but specifically the F-35.”
Turkey’s currency fell 1.5 percent this week amid fears relations with Washington could worsen over the standoff. President Erdogan has further missed a “soft deadline” previously set by the US over an offer to buy $3.5 billion Raytheon Co. Patriot missile shield system, as an alternative to the Russian S-400. The Pentagon said the Patriot offer would be impossible should Turkey seek the Russian system.
Failure to receive the F-35s could further impact Turkey’s economy given that a number of Turkish defense technology companies have contracts to build and develop systems and add-ons needed for Turkey to operate the aircraft, such as cockpit displays for the multi-national fighter jet.
Kicking Turkey out of the multinational manufacturing deal would create a few speed bumps, but worth it if Erdogan insists on cooperating so closely with Moscow on air defense.
Also, given the road away from the West Erdogan has put Turkey on, you have to wonder how long before the Dirk Diggler Effect kicks in:
Remember Boogie Nights? Pretty good movie, especially if you like Heather Graham on wheels. But that’s not my point here. Fairly early in the movie, Mark Wahlberg goes out and buys himself a sweet red Corvette Stingray with his dirty-dirty hiney-touching money. By the last quarter of the movie, Wahlberg and John C. Reilly are pushing the battered remains of said Corvette down the street because……..yeah. Dirk Diggler was responsible for maintaining it. You’ve got the look, you’ve got the power….but apparently you don’t have the ability to call Steve down at Jiffy Lube and schedule an oil/lube/tire rotation. I mean, what the hell. If you’re a little short on cash, they usually have a punch card where you can get the 5th oil change free!
This isn’t a condemnation of Saddam’s Iraq per se: It’s a condemnation of ANY country where political connections among contractors and subcontractors, sketchy material suppliers and corrupt or frightened quality control inspectors come together in a big Venn Diagram of “Oh Shit!” Hell, it’s hard enough to keep infrastructure standing tall in America (remember the I35 West bridge collapse in Minneapolis/St. Paul?), but The Third World? Fuhgeddaboudit!
More to come.
March 9, 2019
FREEDOM OF SPEECH FOR ME BUT NOT FOR THEE: Florida school bus aide yanks MAGA hat off student’s head. “Surveillance video catches official yelling at kid then removing the Trump hat.”
March 8, 2019
CENSORED: Twitter Bans Iran Refugee After the Mall of America Locked Him Up for Sharing His Faith.
There’s also #FreeRaminParsa, but I get the feeling Twitter won’t allow that to trend.
SO RATHER THAN CONFRONT THE ACTUAL ANTISEMITES INFESTING THEIR PARTY, THE DEMOCRATS INTRODUCED A WATERED-DOWN, DO-NOTHING RESOLUTION — AND HOW DOES POLITICO SPIN IT? Republican leadership splits, and party splinters over hate resolution.
Well, Politico.
PEGGY NOONAN: Get Ready for the Struggle Session. “In America, and even more so on Twitter, there’s a whiff of China’s Cultural Revolution in the air.”
Mao unleashed university and high school students to weed out enemies and hold them to account. The students became the paramilitary Red Guards. They were instructed by the party to “clear away the evil habits of the old society” and extinguish what came to be known as “the four olds”—old ideas and customs, old habits and culture. “Sweep Away All Monsters and Demons,” the state newspaper instructed them.
With a vengeance they did.
In the struggle sessions the accused, often teachers suspected of lacking proletarian feeling, were paraded through streets and campuses, sometimes stadiums. It was important always to have a jeering crowd; it was important that the electric feeling that comes with the possibility of murder be present. Dunce caps, sometimes wastebaskets, were placed on the victims’ heads, and placards stipulating their crimes hung from their necks. The victims were accused, berated, assaulted. Many falsely confessed in the vain hope of mercy.
Were any “guilty”? It hardly mattered. Fear and terror were the point. A destroyed society is more easily dominated.
It does have a familiar feel, particularly on social media. Looking forward to Glenn’s book on it.
SONNY BUNCH: Lord, grant me the confidence of a mediocre movie about a cosmically powered white woman. “Captain Marvel is a big bowl of mediocrity, a soup comprised of an underwhelming, lightweight lead saddled with poorly edited action scenes that’s set to a disastrously-on-the-nose soundtrack in service of a script that offers little in the way of deviation from the comic book movie mold, with a few winning bit performances that keep the thing from being a total waste of your time.”
Even my young, Marvel-loving sons are pre-soured on this one.
SISTER TOLDJAH: Paul Krugman Says Something Dangerously Stupid About “Brands Of Anti-Semitism”, Gets Flattened In Response.
I’m (just) old enough to remember when Krugman was a not-very-political economist with interesting or unexpected things to say, but those memories are growing dim.
WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, YOU KNOW: A drone builder claims he invented the smallest flying car in the world — the Koncepto Millenya.
Video at the link. It looks really cool, but so small there doesn’t seem to be room for a bag of groceries.
GOVERNMENT IS JUST A WORD FOR THE THINGS WE CHOOSE TO DO TOGETHER, EVEN WHEN WE DIDN’T GET TO CHOOSE THEM AND GOVERNMENT DID IT WITHOUT US: Feds Pay Millions for Lobster Tail, Booze, Toys in End of Year Spending Binge.
A new analysis released by OpenTheBooks.com found 66 agencies spent $97 billion last September, the final month of fiscal year 2018. The end of the year taxpayer-funded spending spree included contracts with Coors, millions on iPhones, furniture, and CrossFit equipment.
“In the final month of the fiscal year, federal agencies scramble to spend what’s left in their annual budget,” OpenTheBooks.com said. “Agencies worry spending less than their budget allows might prompt Congress to appropriate less money in the next fiscal year. To avoid this, federal agencies choose to embark on an annual shopping spree rather than admit they can operate on less.”
Resulting government expenditures included $4.6 million on lobster tail and crab; $673,471 on golf carts; $1.7 million on pianos, tubas, and trombones; $9.8 million on workout and recreation equipment; and $7.7 million iPhones and iPads.
A Wexford Leather club chair cost taxpayers $9,241. The government spent $293,245 on rib eye, top sirloin, and flank steak.
Show up at your nearest federal agency with a bag of charcoal and demand your fair share.
YELLOW RIBBON PROJECT: 12 Years in Captivity for America’s Longest-Held Hostage. “What kind of hell must he be living in, that both our government and the Iranian authorities have allowed him to live in for so long?”
K-12 IMPLOSION UPDATE: High School Student Suspended for Posing With Pro-Trump MAGA Flag and Sweatshirt. “The school let her come back after 3 days, but kept the suspension on her record.”
COLD WAR II: New photos show North Korea rocket site back to ‘normal operating status.’
“These actions amount to a ‘snapback’ from the moderate dismantlement undertaken by the North Koreans at the Sohae launch facility after the Singapore Summit in June 2018,” according to an analysis by Joseph Bermudez and Victor Cha of Beyond Parallel, a research project funded by the think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS).
The images taken on March 6 show activity that “speaks to the ease with which [North Korea] can reverse steps it might take toward denuclearization in the future,” Bermudez and Cha wrote.
A team of researchers from 38 North, which is affiliated with The Stimson Center in Washington D.C., arrived at the same conclusion that the Sohae facility “appears to have returned to normal operational status.”
Sanctions can snapback, too, you know.
FORCE MULTIPLIER: Air Force completes first flight test of Valkyrie unmanned fighter jet.
The flight test is a major step forward for an experimental “loyal wingman” concept that envisions small robotic drones accompanying fighter jets into combat, scout ahead or absorb enemy fire. Military experts have suggested such systems would be useful in a war between two rival nations, something that aligns with the Pentagon’s increasing focus on competing with China and Russia for military dominance.
The Pentagon has yet to commit to the idea. But the Air Force Research Laboratory is among several military agencies dabbling in such technology, partnering with a San Diego-based company called Kratos Defense and Security Solutions to develop the Valkyrie.
Faster, please.
LIZ SHELD’S MORNING BRIEF: The House passes a resolution about lotsa stuff and much, much more. “Yesterday, the House of Representatives passed a resolution that condemned hangnails, broken shoelaces and paper cuts in a brave and bold moral stance against hate. Controversy surrounded some members’ desire to include condemnation of pistachios with shells that won’t open and flyaway hair that sticks to your lip gloss. Or something like that. The resolution changed so many times, I expected the nutters to throw in a tax hike. Are we sure there isn’t a tax hike hidden in there some where?”