All the Secrets of the Universe and Some Really Important Stuff Too!
Bolsonaro supporters stormed the main buildings of their three branches of government today. It should be interesting to see if Brazil’s election protestors end up as the January 6th protestors did or prevail. Brazil is not within my areas of expertise so I’m not sure what any of this means. But ti does show that America is not the only major country where the Left and the Right are at each others throats.
If you’ve ever seen the concrete in your house’s foundation or on your sidewalks start to crack and crumble after a few years then you might be interested to know that the answer to this sad situation exists in the 2,000 year old Roman Pantheon. Apparently the Romans were better engineers than we are, at least as far as concrete goes.
Researchers at MIT have been studying the phenomenal longevity of Roman concrete edifices and they’ve discovered that using quick lime instead of slaked lime provides for the more reactive inclusions in the material to actually “self-heal” incipient cracks.
“The benefits of hot mixing are twofold,” Masic says. “First, when the overall concrete is heated to high temperatures, it allows chemistries that are not possible if you only used slaked lime, producing high-temperature-associated compounds that would not otherwise form. Second, this increased temperature significantly reduces curing and setting times since all the reactions are accelerated, allowing for much faster construction.”
Near the end of the article it’s stated that the researchers plan to commercialize the ancient technique. Well, as a descendant of the Romans, I declare this cultural (or technical) appropriation. And I demand reparations. I’ve estimated my cut as approximately one billion denarii (silver of course). If enough denarii can’t be found I will settle for gold doubloons.
It’s over now but I think the whole circus has actually been a net positive. The worst thing that could have happened yet another round of Democratic Lite policies from the House. We’ve seen a number of those and just look at where they got us.
Maybe, just maybe this will lead not just to a veto of the egregious Dim policies but also a showcase of policies desperately needed by the country even if not enacted for now.
Also, someone has to look hard at Biden to determine if he is, as I suspect, wholly owned by the Chinese Communist Party. And the Dims simply won’t do it.
The Dims have long concluded that the Constitution, freedom, financial sanity, rational policies, the betterment of the nation all be damned, that the true brass ring is raw power achieved by any means. Anything that hinders their ultimate achievement of that goal is a plus.
My good friend Mike Simonelli has an interesting article in today’s New York Post about the epidemic of murdered cops across the country. He explains how many of them could have been avoided.
One of the biggest problems is the sheer number of the mentally ill on the streets. The other major problem are the Soros funded District Attorneys that refuse to enforce repeat offender statutes that would take career criminals off the streets for long stretches .Here’s one example:
“That includes one who on Dec. 29 ambushed Riverside County, Calif., Deputy Sheriff Isaiah Cordero, fatally shooting him during a traffic stop. The killer had a long history of violence dating back to the 1990s that included kidnapping, robbery and assaults with deadly weapons. Having received his third strike in 2021, Deputy Cordero’s killer should have been locked up and serving 25 years to life.
“We would not be here today if the judge had done her job,” fumed County Sheriff Chad Bianco. Months earlier, Officer Santana’s mother voiced a similar refrain: “I blame the death of my son and his partner on [Los Angeles District Attorney George] Gascón”; they were “murdered by a criminal [who] should have been in jail.”
Mike’s a cop and he understands the specific risks that the present situation has created for police. But at this point anyone living in the large cities with Democrat governments is taking his life into his own hands living there. After all, if these lunatics will shoot it out with the police what chance does an ordinary citizen stand? Getting out is the only way to reduce the risk of violent assault to a reasonable level.
Update:
I was pleased to see former NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton link this article on his twitter feed. I can only imagine what someone like him who knows how things should be done feels about the NYC Criminal Justice travesty we have now..
One of the predictable, tragic consequences of a politically created crisis in our criminal justice system that endangers the men and women who are fighting to keep our communities safe. https://t.co/D8nYtyR8tW
— Bill Bratton (@CommissBratton) January 7, 2023
Dog is man’s best friend. But woman is dog’s best friend. Or should that be mommy. I went with Camera Girl to the vet’s office with Kaylee, our older dog. She’s a 13-year-old German Shorthaired Pointer and she’s starting to wear down. Camera Girl loves her dearly and has been very worried that she won’t make it through the winter. Now this seems like an unnecessary concern. Other than progressive arthritis and a certain amount of mental confusion she seems relatively healthy. She still enjoys her food enthusiastically and can keep up her normal activities, only at a slower pace.
But because of her concerns I went along in case any bad news was forthcoming. When we got there, we entered the office and the receptionist began engaging in the typical female baby talk that is reserved for pets. Then we got to the examination room and the vet tech came in and she too commenced with the mewing and cooing that passes for woman to dog communication. And finally, the vet showed up and she also began the embarrassing babbling. Now I will admit that both the tech and the vet were pretty adept at their medical tasks. They vaccinated Kaylee and cut her nails quite skillfully. And the vet convinced Camera Girl that Kaylee will make it through the year at least. But as a man it was pretty comical listening as three grown women coaxed and comforted a large dog as if it were a three-month-old infant.
Now, full disclosure. I have a very soft spot in my heart for all our dogs past and present. And since I’ve had to be the one holding them when the vet puts them to sleep for the last time, I know exactly how close is the bond between a man and his dog. Of course, they’re not human and certainly not our children. But they think they are. And that obligates us to treat them as family. Since they lack the wherewithal to be responsible for themselves in human society, we become their guardians and keepers. So that’s the logical underpinning for our position. But the emotional relationship is much, much closer to a parent-child relationship than anything else.
So, fine. We treat them in many ways like children. But why do these women pretend they’re talking to newborns? Dogs have the intelligence of a young child in many ways. And they have the ability to respond to verbal commands and prompts of all kinds. Why do these women chirp at them in this embarrassing manner. As a mother and grandmother Camera Girl has always been quite good at teaching and disciplining little children and once they’re beyond a year or so she speaks to children in English with a minimum of singsong and baby words. Why does she insist on using it for dogs. In fact, why can’t she discipline her dogs as well as she did her children?
For the majority of our married life, I’ve been at the office during the week and she was home with the kids and dogs. And without exception she has spoiled every one of our dogs rotten. All of her cooing and babytalk is useless in getting the dogs to obey her. Finally in desperation she asks me to take over and I have to growl at the dog to get obedience. And this is a very bad situation. For larger sporting breeds bad training can be dangerous. But my protests have always been in vain. She just can’t treat a dog as anything but a baby.
But at last, there will be a changing of the guard. When in the fullness of time we need to get a new puppy in the house I will be home much more of the time than formerly and I intend to train this dog. And it will be a revelation to Camera Girl. This dog will obey my commands immediately and unerringly. This dog will be a manly chap who will eschew all baby talk and respond to the curt guttural syllables reserved for a dog in the field. Sit! Heel! Down! He’ll be used to good solid pats to the ribs when he succeeds in his chores and maybe a scratch behind the ear while we’re watching tv together. I’ll allow this dog a modicum of self-respect as a carnivore in good standing. No goo-goo gah-gah. Sure, I won’t stop Camera Girl from chirping at the dog and lavishing affection on him but I will not allow her to undermine the training.
A man and his dog. A woman and her dog. So different.
As the tragicomedy of Kevin McCarthy continues to unfold in the Emerald City of Oz, I was tasked with filling out and presenting my documents to Cthulhu’s minions inside the precincts of the nightmare corpse-city of R’lyeh. Well maybe it was the Dunwich town hall. But there was definitely a lot of eldritch horror somewhere close by I can assure you.
My hand was a virtual claw from having to sign my illegible signature hundreds of times to the various documents. I was made aware of the 11 billion separate types of discrimination that Dunwich recognizes and prosecutes along with the blessings of diversity, equity and inclusion that seem to seep out of every document that I was forced to read. It was inspiring.
It was a particularly dreary day weatherwise, drizzling and forty degrees, but I was kind of happy to foray out into the world just to convince myself it was actually still out there. Apparently not having a Speaker of the House hasn’t managed to disrupt the space-time continuum. And the zombies wandering around town looked neither more nor less mindless and homicidal than usual. So, all’s right with the world.
Maybe I’m becoming acclimated to the present levels of dysfunction and unreality in the world around me. I noticed it didn’t rankle me as much as it used to. Of course, that could mean I’m becoming zombified myself. But whatever the cause it eased the pain while moving around town.
I read a post by Curtis Yarvin on his Substack that referenced Heinlein’s story Waldo. Now Yarvin is a neo-monarchist who is mostly interested in the political situation we find ourselves in. But he’s also a technologist and here he hypothesizes that one of the more promising areas of technological progress could be in providing human/machine interfaces that allow humans to utilize their manual dexterity at different scales and remotely. So, he sees a sort of virtual reality setup where a surgeon could utilize microscopic equipment as if he were the size of the miniaturized characters in “Fantastic Voyage.” Or a gigantic machine hundreds of feet long could be controlled by a human with the point of view of a giant. His premise is that human intelligence and dexterity after proper training is much more responsible and skilled than an AI. After reading about some of the failures of self-driving cars he may be correct. I never thought Robert Heinlein and Curtis Yarvin would intersect in this version of the multiverse. But there it is.
Will Cain did an interview of Tucker Carlson. What I found interesting was Carlson’s answer to what had red-pilled him. He described his mindset as we went through the Iraq War (from 1:36 to 3:19 in the video) and I found myself remembering a very similar evolution. I went from believing that we were there to make America safer to eventual disillusionment and a sense of absolute betrayal by the Republican establishment. And Carlson echoed that. I didn’t watch the whole thing yet because it’s too long but that little snippet stuck in my mind. Millions of people in this country feel totally betrayed by the Republican party and will never forget that. And that is the reality that gives me hope. If people as different from each other as Tucker Carlson is from me can both come to essentially the same point of view about our political system then it must be the truth. And if it is the truth then I’m finally working from correct assumptions. And that is what I’ve been trying to achieve all these years. It’s not that the truth guarantees that things will work out. It’s that basing your actions on false assumptions guarantees failure.
As this was finishing up I se that McCarthy is still furiously negotiating to buy off his enemies with committee seats and promises of accountability. Ah, what a circus. We really should require all of Congress to wear the red nose, baggy pants and size 20 shoes. And the Speaker should always arrive at the podium in a tiny car. As I said in a comment on the last post, we must be terrible people to be sentenced to leaders this atrocious. Robespierre and Caligula were paragons of sanity compared to the bozos we’ve got working for us today.
Well, that’s enough.
It never occurred to me that maybe the anti-McCarthy coup might actually have a chance to succeed but what if they did dig their heels in for a few weeks? Maybe the rest of the House Republicans might start wondering if maybe there were a few more candidates that almost everyone could easily agree on.
It’s so pleasant to dream about what might happen if our elected “leaders” somehow developed backbone and started acting like leaders. Of course, in reality most of them are either completely useless or worse. They vary from hacks and grifters to actual sociopaths. But maybe there are a few that want to do the right thing. And if they show some resolve and take advantage of a rare situation where the actions of a few can impact a whole institution like the present situation in the House, then maybe something unexpected and positive might result.
Just for the sake of argument, suppose after a couple of weeks of yelling at each other behind closed doors, it occurs to some of the more moderate representatives that a more productive way of solving this problem would be asking each member to provide a list of names that they absolutely would refuse to vote for. Taking everybody’s lists, they could then add up the negatives and disqualify anyone who had more than four no-votes against it. Whoever is left would constitute a pool of names that had the potential to be approved. Then after a couple of test ballots using that pool of names as the source, they could pretty quickly come up with the four or five names with the largest support and begin to do some horse trading to see who could become the Speaker.
Obviously, my idea would require that most of the Republican House members were reasonable human beings. And we already know that’s not true. I suspect at least half of them are nitwits. But I’m sure that the more intelligent members of the group could persuade their more cognitively challenged brothers and sisters to follow some simple instructions. Surely there are three or four Republican representatives who are both competent and haven’t sold their souls to Mephistopheles yet. Jim Jordan is one name that has come up often. Maybe there are some others.
The point is the MAGA wing of the party has found a silver lining to the 2022 mid-term meltdown. Their 20-member coalition can wreck the Uniparty’s party. Short of the GOP establishment letting a Democrat become Speaker, their backs are to the wall. And if they did elect a Dem then the whole charade would be exposed and the Uniparty would be truly unmasked for all to see. And from my point of view that would be almost as good as Jordan getting the Speaker’s gavel.
Now, this is all nonsense. None of this will happen. McCarthy will whine and hector the dissidents and they will be threatened by the donors who paid for their campaigns and eventually they’ll vote for good old Kevin. But for just a day or two they did give me something to cheer about. Listening to all of those politicians screeching apoplectically about irresponsibility and the storied history of the “People’s House” gave me a good laugh.
And who knows? Miracles do happen. Very rarely. But not never.
The House Republicans are busy beclowning themselves but I’m happy at least there’s something of a pretense being made of demanding accountability from the leadership. Making McCarthy sweat a little before he’s coronated Speaker of the House is healthy. I don’t believe he’ll enact that rule change to allow the Speaker to be voted out based on a single rep motioning for it. After all, after he’s Speaker he’s untouchable. Why would he honor a promise he made while he was still just a mere mortal? I guess the only reason would be because it would be such a clear proof to the electorate of his dishonesty. But then again, they’ve already embarrassed him. Maybe all bets are already off. We’ll see.
My view is that the Republican House should use their majority to hold the line on everything. They should produce a budget. If the Senate doesn’t want to bargain then say too bad. No continuing resolution, no nothing. Shut down the government and let the Democrats sweat. It’s their Senate and President. Let them vilify the House but it’ll be two years before there will be any way to change the power structure. Even if the American public sweeps them out of office for turning off the endless flow of entitlements the Republican House majority will have done what they were supposed to do, legislate and create a budget for this runaway bureaucracy. What happens in 2024 is just another page in this fake script we’re trapped in. At least they will have shown some honesty, which is in very, very short supply. Let the Democrats have the whole federal government and let them bring this whole charade crashing down around their ears.
Without a brake on the actions of Joe Biden, Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries we’ll be looking at hyperinflation and double-digit unemployment very soon. And that’s what the American people voted for last year. Or at least that’s what the poll results that we saw indicated. It’s important that they get every last drop of the result they chose. It should be clear as day what was selected; sky high energy and transportation costs, unreliable infrastructure and dead-end jobs for most of the population. If that truly is what people want, it’s better for those of us who don’t share that vision to get it through our thick skulls that that is the future. That way we can look for something better.
And as we head down that road, we’ll be able to at least enjoy the comedy that’s on full display from our elected officials. An hilarious cavalcade of grifters, congenital idiots and just plain criminals who are busy selling off chunks of their country to the highest bidder. And it just goes to show that individual honest men are completely defenseless against a government that has transformed itself into an organized crime syndicate. It’s our version of the Baath Party with a revolving door full of Saddam Husseins switching out every four or eight years. And who knows maybe even that charade will be dispensed with soon.
But while it holds out, I intend to savor every bit of the bathos and buffoonery. Let’s hope Dementia Joe gets to finish out his term in January 2029. By then both he and the country should be about the same; a gelatinous puddle of goo. How could I ask for more than that?
When you consider the freak show that makes up the elected leadership of the federal government you may wonder how it’s possible that they have successfully gained permanent control of the United States of America. I’ve wondered about it myself. From what I’ve read people like Joe Biden are just placeholders for the powers behind the scenes. Apparently, the corporate lobbyists are the ones who decide what will be in these omnibus bills that shovel billions of dollars into the coffers of defense contractors, social media companies, big banks and boondoggles like the “green” industries. In concert with the bureaucrats at the Pentagon, the Intel agencies, the Department of Energy and various other groups, policy is decided upon by these shot callers behind the scenes and then when everything is decided they hand a script to actors like Nancy Pelosi, Mitch McConnel and Dementia Joe to tell us poor schlubs that we’ll just have to wait for the bills to be approved before we can find out what’s in them.
The actors make sure they get their cut too but in reality, they are a miniscule part of the puzzle. Nancy Pelosi will have some number of millions of dollars but a Raytheon will pocket many billions of dollars. Now granted they actually produce things like missiles and other weapons systems but the sheer scale of the contracts is stunning. And what exactly does Goldman Sachs produce? For that matter what has Pfizer done to earn the billions that the government shoveled at them? Produced medicines that don’t prevent COVID but give young people heart attacks? Any way you slice it, the government is run by a partnership between the bureaucrats and government contractors who have a gravy train going that they’ll never let stop.
So how does this end? I guess the only way it ends is badly. The people who run things have bought off and faked enough votes to keep themselves permanently in office. The only thing that can stop them is the collapse of the United States. In other words, things have to fall apart so badly that the average man on the street fears what’s happening in his life more than he fears the US military shooting him in the street. That’s a state of anarchy.
That might sound like an exaggeration. But if you think back to the George Floyd riots American citizens stood back and watched as the United States government tacitly allowed riot and arson to go on in the largest cities in this country. There were almost no examples of people fighting back. The one famous example, that kid Kyle Rittenhouse, is notable because he was arrested and charged with murder by the authorities.
I have to assume things are going to have to get much, much worse than that before the citizenry of this country takes matters into its own hands. So don’t be fooled by the pathetic losers who play at being leaders on television as they occupy the supposed seats of power in Washington. The real shot callers are quite a bit smarter and infinitely more invested in the decisions that are made. They’re powerful, well-organized and they have every branch of the United States government supporting them. And I think they’ll be around for a good long time while our country continues its descent into banana republic status.
That statement about there being “a lot of ruin in a nation” is especially true of a place like America. We will stand helplessly by while the feds strip away our rights and then come for our material possessions. It’s the frog in the pot. Bring it slowly to a boil and it’ll just sit there and be cooked.
In fact, the only thing I can think of that would end the whole arrangement would be the crash of the US dollar. After all, this is all about money. If the dollar were no longer worth the paper it was printed on, all those corporations would have to go elsewhere to pay for their luxurious lifestyles. And they’ll gladly go. Money is money. And maybe that’s the best thing that could happen to us. But what a pathetic statement that makes about us as a “free” people.
Last night Camera Girl and I rang in the New Year in our traditional manner by going to sleep at about 11 pm. That’s right. We missed Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest and a host of musical nobodies and cultural degenerates. Interestingly it was 11:58 pm when we were awakened by what I assumed was a thermonuclear detonation but turned out to be what I assume were some sticks of dynamite being tossed around by one of my more excitable neighbors here in Dunwich. After assuring myself that the house was still on its foundations, we wished each other Happy New Year and turned back over to sleep.
I hope everyone enjoyed their night last night, whether by celebrating with friends or singing along as Miley Cyrus tele-visually twerked to Auld Lange Syne. And now we find ourselves in 2023 and like everyone else we look back on 2022 and make some course corrections to help us achieve our goals in the New Year.
And I have. I looked at my poor performance at finishing up my story and realized that I needed a better daily schedule. Or rather weekly schedule. And so, I’ve blocked out my time to write fiction, write for the blog, work, remind Camera Girl that I still live here and take care of all the things that need doing around this place.
So, this morning I woke up, almost on time, and followed my plan, mostly. And by golly it definitely helped. I accomplished more in one morning than I’ve gotten done in the last three weeks. Now granted the holidays are generally the worst time of the year for getting work done but I can see that following a schedule will significantly increase my productivity. And probably getting that writing done in the morning was the best choice. So here I am, a paragon of virtue on day one of the new world order and somewhat smarmy with self-regard.
I’ve also managed to get the web site test bed up and running on my computer and I will shortly be testing out some changes I’m thinking about. And doing it this way I’m less likely to blow up the site by accident. So, once again, paragon of virtue.
So, who’s better than me? I ask you!
Of course, my track record on maintaining resolutions past New Year’s Day has not previously been stellar. So, we will have to see how things pan out. But I am brimming with optimism, good intentions and fat-soluble vitamins so let’s give me the benefit of the doubt.
And in line with my new regimen, I will be careful to prevent any unbridled enthusiasm over current events from erupting into overblown optimism about political saviors putting our political house in order. From now on I’ll applaud attempts at improving things by well-intentioned individuals but I will refrain from declaring anything an outright victory until it’s confirmed by the regime. Let’s say a declaration of defeat by the New York Times or the Washington Post.
And this is fine. There will still be occasion to laugh when a Fredo or someone of that ilk is cast into the abyss by his own handlers or when Dopey Joe rolls down the ramp from Air Force One. I’ll just make sure I don’t read more into these things than they deserve. Moderation in all things.
So here we go. “O brave new world that has such people in it.” Let the games begin.