Month: February 2020

Star Trek – The Original Series – Complete Series Review – Season 1 Episode 19 – Tomorrow is Yesterday

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In this episode the Enterprise is inexplicably sent back in time by getting too close to a “black star.”  I guess that’s supposed to be a black hole.  They find themselves in Earth’s upper atmosphere above Cape Kennedy right before the first moon shot.  A jet fighter is sent up to investigate the “UFO.”  The Enterprise locates the fighter jet, and fearing that it might have a nuclear weapon, grabs it with a tractor beam.  But this destroys the plane and the pilot is beamed aboard the Enterprise to save his life.

Spock informs Kirk that the pilot cannot be released back to Earth because his knowledge of the Enterprise would alter history.  But then Spock discovers that the pilot’s yet-to-be-born son will be an important man in the future of space exploration.  Therefore, the pilot must be returned or that would change history.

After that Kirk and Sulu beam down to an Air Force base to retrieve evidence from the wreckage of the jet that would prove the Enterprise was a real UFO.  This leads to another man being beamed aboard the Enterprise.  At this point the writers put the plot mercifully to bed.  The Enterprise would fly very fast toward the sun ending up even farther back in the past and then “slingshot” back out and start going forward in time.  Somehow, when they reached the time where each of the men captured from the past had been affected by the Enterprise they would be beamed into the spot where their bodies were.  So, we see the pilot in his plane and suddenly we see the appearance of someone being beamed into his location.  But somehow after the beaming occurs the pilot no longer remembers anything about the Enterprise and goes about his mission and returns to Earth.

And the Enterprise hurtles into the future at faster than Warp Factor 8 and in order to prevent overshooting their “present,” Scotty puts on the brakes and the crew pitches back and forth in their chairs.  They’ve made it home and everyone is happy.

So, this is the first-time travel episode.  So that’s something.  But it’s kind of meh.  The pretense of a rationale for how they went back in time and the even flimsier logic for how they retuned wouldn’t convince the lowliest of geeks.  Spock and Bones bickering about the fate of Kirk during his burglary is kind of contrived and silly.

As for Shatner mockery points, he does get a scene where he has a fist fight with three or four Air Force servicemen.  He gets to roll around a bit and throw some pretty phony looking punches.  But it’s also nothing to write home about.

If you’re interested in the nostalgia of seeing the Enterprise interact with 1960s Americans, I could throw an extra point in and call this a six.  Put that together with the Shatner score and I’ll call this a 6 // 5.

What Do the Deplorables Want?  How About, What Do I Want?

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So, this is a loaded question.  There isn’t a monolithic consciousness that pervades all of the Right and aligns everyone’s opinions.  I have friends who really only care about the Supreme Court and are praying for a Roberts-proof lock on the voting.  Then I know guys who more than anything else in the world want to see Comey and all his superiors all the way up to Barry O get frog-marched into prison for their treasonous crimes over the last several years.  And I know plenty of people who believe as an article of faith that unless the illegal immigrants are ejected by the tens of millions in the next couple of years that America will be finished.

Look at this list and the other priorities you know about; First Amendment violations, Second Amendment outrages, social media discrimination, job offshoring, etc.  These priorities are all over the place.  What pattern or organizing principle can clarify how all of these goals are related?

A couple of years ago I wrote a post in which I compared the present illegal immigration situation to a sinking ship.  The steps I outlined to solve the problem were:

  • Step One – Plug the hole.
  • Step Two – Pump out the water.
  • Step Three – Repair the damage.
  • Step Four – Review cause of crash and take measures to prevent recurrence.

I laid out what each of these steps translated into with respect to the immigrant problem but it’s easy enough to guess what they were.

Thinking back to that analogy and looking at all the other problems listed above I have to modify the model.  It’s not as if we struck a reef and a hole has to be repaired.  It’s like a group of maniacal saboteurs armed with explosives has systematically blasted a dozen separate holes in the hull and is in fact still setting up additional charges.  In a situation like that plugging holes is not the first order of business.  The first job is to liquidate the saboteurs.

For that reason, I agree with the folks who want to prosecute the Coup and throw the book at them.  These people are an existential threat to us and as long as they are still in place, we will never make any progress on wresting control of our lives back into our own hands.  Comey, Brennan, Clapper and the rest of the conspirators have attempted to overthrow the lawfully elected President of the United States and although they failed, they are still walking the streets unpunished and waiting to get back to work as soon as they have another chance.  These people are a de facto oligarchy that decide what is allowed to occur in the federal government and even who is allowed to run it.

Since J. Edgar Hoover started blackmailing Jack Kennedy back in the 1960s the security apparatus has been dictating policy from behind the scenes and controlling many of the elected officials that we thought were the decision makers.  Does it go above these coup leaders?  Maybe we’ll find out.  If the lower level guys squeal on the mid-level rats I would imagine that anything is possible.  But this will require that William Barr is both genuinely patriotic and absolutely fearless.  It’s hard to believe that we could be that lucky.  Once again, we’re about to find out.  It’s way past the time for Barr to start getting results from Durham’s investigations.  After the acquittal some people have stated that the first indictments are about to be handed down in the next few weeks.  Well, I’ve heard that many times before.  But I’m interested in seeing what is the result.  As stated above I thing that prosecuting these people is the only way to head off further damage to our country.  Otherwise we’re just chasing yesterday’s disaster and never catching up.

09FEB2020 – American Greatness – Post of the Day – Multiple States Introduce Bills to Ban Transgender Transition for Children by Eric Lendrum

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Here’s a little good news.  Finally some meaningful push back from sane people.  But it doesn’t go far enough.  They should include revocation of medical licenses for doctors involved in this.  Something like this needs to be dealt with very harshly.

https://amgreatness.com/2020/02/07/multiple-states-introduce-bills-to-ban-transgender-transition-for-children/

We’ve Got the Bastards on the Run

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It’s possible, in my opinion, to belabor certain points.  For instance, some folks are so interested in the inside baseball of the Justice Department corruption that countless words will be expended weekly going over the minutia of the various documents available and how these might impact future moves by President Trump’s allies and enemies.  Granted, that many people are fascinated by the prospect of the swamp getting nuked by Attorney General Barr.  I myself am among those who would build a statue to Mr. Barr if he won that war.  But I think continuously covering the same ground is too maddening to contemplate and a form of abuse of the readers.  That being said, I want to regurgitate some of the events of this past week.  And the reason is I want to talk about what the cumulative effect of all these wins has been on the morale of the Right Wing.

I have some friends on the Right who for a long time have been borderline clinically depressed over the state of the country and the prospects of things ever improving.  Well, this week I caught them smiling and laughing about the events of the past few days.  When I accused them of optimism, they tried to deny it but the smiles on their faces put the lie to it.  And in the news a poll found that Americans by an 80% to 11% margin thought that their lives would improve in 2020.

What we are seeing is the result of winning.  What we are seeing is the result of trying.  People have been conditioned by decades of seeing the hapless Republicans having their heads handed to them by progressives in the Media and the Democrats that they automatically assume that no matter what break comes our way it will be stifled by a combination of the power of the Left and the incompetence of the GOP establishment.

Well, what we saw this week is something that we haven’t seen since Reagan.  Sustained good news.  A whole week where every real piece of news went our way.  Every event showed President Trump winning and the various Leftists taking it on the chin.  You might ask, so what?  Shouldn’t we just take this in stride and move onto the next fight?

No.  We should celebrate.  We should relish the moment.  We should go out to dinner and order something special and if you’re of the persuasion, pop open a bottle of good wine.  Call up your friends on our side of the aisle and share a laugh and a pleasant conversation.  This doesn’t happen every day.  Their side took some pretty heavy shots and their leaders and their followers were noticeably stunned at just how bad things turned out.  Guys like James Carville were sounding the alarm.  They know just how bad it will be for their side if a Bernie Sanders or even a Pete Buttigieg ends up as their candidate.  They’re terrified.  And us?  We’re elated and confident and expecting it to get even better.  And the best part?  They know the truth of both sides of it and there’s not a damn thing they can do about it.  As I said in an earlier post, impeachment is the last bullet in the gun.  If you can’t get a conviction or even a bipartisan effort you’re out of luck.  President Trump has actually come out of the trial stronger than he went in.  Every effort the Democrats have tried, from the ridiculously partisan show trial in the House to Pelosi’s petulant tearing up of her copy of the SOTU have backfired and made them look dishonest or ridiculous or both.

Next week we’ll have to get back to battling in the trenches with these dishonest swine but for now it’s not only desirable to celebrate it’s necessary.  Raise a glass of cheer to President Trump for having the fighting spirit to risk everything to expose these evil clowns for what they are.  And toast yourself for not giving up.  We’ve got the bastards on the run.