Month: December 2023
What Are the Odds?
According to quantum mechanics (or is Stan Lee?) every time a subatomic particle has a choice of moving in one direction or another it spawns two separate realities. And taking all such choices together, it produces an infinity of separate realities (or universes) associated with these different futures that exist side by side. Now the Marvel Cinematic Universe has documented this highly scientific quantum behavior with a panoply of Spidermen in the multiverse. And for all I know they have added a few Spider-transmen to round things out. And because of the Kathleen Kennedy imperative (“PUT A CHICK IN IT AND MAKE HER LAME AND GAY”} there will need to be some Spiderwomen, spiderlesbians and hopefully BIPoC spidertrans-women but most especially Latinx spidertrans-lesbians. Maybe not in that order. After all one cannot constrain the artistic endeavor.
But thinking about all this quantum physics was incredibly stimulating. I started to imagine the multiverse of 2024 election outcomes and the futures it will spawn. For instance, in one universe Joe Biden is struck by lightning and it resets his brain so that he can speak English and walk down stairs without tumbling. But it also forces him to only speak the truth and so he’s assassinated by the FBI for disseminating the document that lists the FBI agents and assets and the scripts and roles they played in the January 6th frame-up.
In another universe Donald Trump declares himself a dictator for one day and has all the data files that the intelligence agencies have collected on Americans erased, reveals who killed Kennedy and forces MSNBC to broadcast Obama’s gay sex tapes during Black History Month.
In yet another universe the most unlikely set of outcomes all occur simultaneously and the American voters come to their senses in numbers so overwhelming that they elect huge majorities of Republicans to the House and Senate. And Trump wins 45 states and re-enters the White House with an ironclad mandate. And with that combination they undo the last fifty years of unconstitutional skullduggery and make the United States a free country for the first time in generations. They fire seventy percent of the federal employees. They cancel the Patriot Act. They eject tens of millions of illegal aliens. They balance the budget. And they impeach all the judges that were appointed by Clinton, Obama and Biden and replace them with the guys who were imprisoned during the January 6th witch hunt. And then they appoint Rudy Giuliani special prosecutor to clean up all the dirt that’s gone on since Obama came into office and have the trials located in Oklahoma. Crazy, right?
Of course, I expect the most likely outcome in this multiverse is the one we expect. That’s the one where crooked judges and prosecutors hand-pick leftist jurors and convict Donald Trump of bogus crimes in their kangaroo courts and then use millions of fraudulent ballots to win the 2024 presidential election and use that outcome to finish off what’s left of this once great nation. Of course.
But even in this most likely of all universes, there is still room for all of this to be the trigger for a cosmic backlash. You could imagine that all of this negative karma building on itself could warp the very fabric of space-time and spawn a reaction. I could imagine that the day after the “winners” of the fake elections are declared, the disgusted Republican voters stage a complete work stoppage across the whole country. Truckers stop delivering food to the cities and oil and gas isn’t delivered. And all the cops go out on strike. In fact, we all go out on strike. And after a couple of weeks when the LGBTQ national guard units admit they can’t drive trucks, Washington might fold and sues for mercy.
And that’s my favorite super hero ending. Sorry Deadpool.
Isn’t physics wonderful?
16DEC2023 – Photo of the Day
16DEC2023 – Quote of the Day
Men gather the clouds, and then they complain of the tempests that follow.
Joseph de Maistre
Guest Contributor – TomD – 15DEC2023 – Hyperinflation Follies
Not just Weimar Republic though they are the most famous if not the most egregious example.
Zimbabwe for example. Attached is a photo of the $100 trillion dollar Zimbabwean bill with the dubious distinction of being the largest denomination bill in human history.
I bought a number of these bills for about dollar and some each in around 2009. I gave them away as gag gifts. Amazingly, a couple of years ago I happened to find that the $100 trillion dollar notes had become rare and expensive. I checked a couple of minutes ago and found them selling in the $100 to $500 dollar (US) range with some higher. I gave about 30 of these things away. The joke is on me.
Adding to the irony, if I sold the notes on the market now, the US Gov would take 25% of my profit away in the form of capital gains tax on collectables. I’m getting a headache trying to think of all the ironies wrapped up in that.
Some outfit in Germany (no irony there) printed these notes for the Zimbabwean government, so they are of substantial quality.
Guest Contributor – War Pig – 15DEC2023 – Who in 2024
Not so sure about voter hate not being a factor. I believe the 2016 election was not as much about love for Trump as it was about a majority of Americans despising Hillary.
Today’s Democrats are trying their best to whip up a seething hatred of Trump and among their core it works. Most liberals would give their firstborn to keep Trump out of office. But then, they have no problem with murdering their babies, anyhow.
The left is using the weaponized bureaucracy to try to get anything they can to keep him off the ballot. It might just work. If they keep Trump off by legal fiat and leave the Biden crime syndicate, I’ll lose all faith in the government and legal system.
The trick may not be to replace Biden at the convention, but to have him resign after the election, which they steal, with another. Harris would be a joke, even to the left who would love to have a malleable Black woman as President. Hillary might be able to blackmail them into appointing her as VP at the convention. Gavin is a strong contender as VP then have him step in when Biden is ushered out due to “health issues”. They would love to have Biden die in office to get sympathy votes, but he may not oblige.
Look for Joe to have health issues. I doubt he would actually resign. The left created a Frankenstein’s Monster with him. Once they get him in hospital for something serious the process of removing him from office will begin. While Hillary would be okay with an assassination and the left will murder people with impunity in prison, I doubt the left will assassinate a US president. Even Trump. If they manage to get Trump in prison, all bets are off. The left uses bananana Republic rules in prison. “Make him disappear”.
Grasping at Straws
At this time of the rolling year, it is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for finding some positive straws to grasp at in order to stave off despair. And probably the likeliest item is just how awful the polls are for Biden. Outside of defense corporation C-suites you’d be hard pressed to find an encouraging word. He has mucked up almost everything he has touched. The man is as popular as smallpox. I guess that’s a negative positive straw.
I asked a couple of friends who would be on the November ballot and one said that Biden would be pulled right before the convention and replaced with Gavin Newsom. And the other told me that Donald Trump would be kept off the ballot by judges. And this fellow seemed relieved because he assumed that another Republican would easily beat Biden. I told him I disagreed. I said I thought that if Trump is forced off the ballot a large enough part of the Republican voters would stay home on election day to give Biden the win. I think this was a new thought for him. I’m not sure I convinced him but I think I gave him something to consider.
So many people are angry and confused by the endless failures that have become the hallmark of our government. And almost as bad is the absurd lies that emerge to paint an unrecognizable version of reality.
Such as:
“We are living through the strongest economy in history. Wealth and prosperity abound. Life here is full of choices and freedom that provide everyone with fulfillment and joy. Big Brother loves you. Joe Biden is vigorous and smart. Ukraine is winning the war. We’ve always been at war with East Asia.”
They’re all such obvious lies that it seems reasonable that most of the country will see through them and punish the ones responsible for the lies and for the underlying problems. So, I grasp at the straw that Biden is so hated that he will be voted out in November. But it’s just a wish. It’s just a hope. It’s not the solution to an equation.
But isn’t life mostly a grasping at straws? We spend our time stumbling around in the dark trying to outguess the stock market or the labor market. We place our bets on a career or an investment strategy or a politician. Sometimes we win. If we win enough times, we begin to think winning is the norm. That was what it was like in the eighties and nineties in America. It felt like winning was how the world worked. But then came the turn of the millennium and things changed.
The people in charge had plans of their own for us and it didn’t involve winning. More like skinning. We were way too happy and prosperous. It was time to let the rest of the world win. And ever since it’s been losing. Losing prosperity, freedoms and self-respect.
Well, now we’re grasping at straws trying to find a way back to what we had. So far it hasn’t worked. Maybe the only thing that’s improved is we know where not to look. It feels futile but we have no choice. The new reality is intolerable and the memory of what we had before is still there. So, we go on.
15DEC2023 – Photo of the Day
15DEC2023 – Quote of the Day
Now the real fruits of human nature – the arts, sciences, great enterprises, lofty conceptions, manly virtues – are due especially to the state of war. […] In a word, we can say that blood is the manure of the plant we call genius.
Joseph de Maistre
U. of Penn. Donors Attempt Reform of Ivy League School
Heather Mac Donald at the City Journal documents a revolt that seems to be going on behind the scenes at at least a couple of the Ivy League schools that have been in the headlines of late.
Apparently the donors have been chafing for some time at the direction the university has taken.
“University of Pennsylvania president Liz Magill would not have been forced to resign last weekend had Penn’s donors and alumni not been organizing against her for two months.
…
The Penn rebels have now upped the ante. They have drafted a new constitution for the school that makes merit the sole criterion for student admissions and faculty hiring. The new charter requires the university to embrace institutional neutrality with regard to politics and faculty research. The rebels want candidates for Penn’s presidency to embrace the new charter as a precondition for employment.”
Could such a thing happen? Would the federal government allow it? I’m sure everyone reading this would be highly skeptical of such an outcome. If nothing else it would require the un-employing of hundreds of DEI commissars that fill the corridors of the ivy-covered halls of Penn and Harvard.
And what of the grievance study departments? How could such organizations fit into a merit based regime. Other than employment for the “professors” what merit exists in what they do? No meaningful purpose is served by what they do. In fact, everyone is harmed by it; society, the students and the parents who have to pay for it. Could this be the beginning of a revolt against the degradation of academia? Hard to believe.
But when the ox being gored is that of the rich and powerful, things can happen. Well, isn’t that how most revolutions occur? Antisemitism has collided with progressive privilege and this has awakened the donors to the monster they themselves have fostered.
We’ll have to see. After all you can’t turn a ship on a dime. And the academic world has been corrupted for not decades but generations. The only thing that favors reform is the sheer crushing weight of the bloated bureaucracies that have been created in these woke places. America can no longer pay for the cost of the parasites sucking at the lifeblood of these dying schools. Especially since they’ve almost stopped teaching anything meaningful.
Will the reforms at Penn happen? Stay tuned and I’ll comment as information becomes available.
Update:
I just read the ZMan’s post for today. He addresses this incident and he says that nothing will come of it. Well, we’ll have to see. Maybe a Festivus miracle is in the offing.