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20 U.N. Peacekeepers Wounded in Mali Attack
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2 07:26 Besoeker [1] 
4 13:00 magpie [2] 
2 13:37 swksvolFF [1] 
2 12:36 Bubba Lover of the Faeries8843 [1] 
1 01:41 Deadeye Jaiting7534 [1] 
2 13:08 magpie [1] 
11 17:53 Black Bart White1700 [1] 
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Page 6: Politix
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-Obits-
Larry Flynt, pr0n publisher and free speech activist, dead at 78
[JPost] How the hell did he live this long?
Posted by: Frank G || 02/11/2021 00:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Perhaps the only industry with more scumbags than the towing industry.
Posted by: Raj || 02/11/2021 0:56 Comments || Top||

#2  You forgot the Politics Industry Raj. That has the most scumbags.
Posted by: CrazyFool || 02/11/2021 1:08 Comments || Top||

#3  Originator of scratch-n-sniff centerfolds.
Posted by: Clons Schwarzeneggar1650 || 02/11/2021 1:31 Comments || Top||

#4  I forgot all about this guy. Indeed, what a character. He sure hated Trump.
Posted by: Clem || 02/11/2021 5:19 Comments || Top||

#5  Larry taught me that not all pictures of naked women were something I wanted to see.
Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/11/2021 7:06 Comments || Top||

#6  He sure hated Trump.

Of course,he did. He was one of the elites, do'ncha know?
Posted by: AlmostAnonymous5839 || 02/11/2021 7:12 Comments || Top||

#7  ...in the Hunter Biden sort of way.
Posted by: Procopius2k || 02/11/2021 7:49 Comments || Top||

#8  It's an honest business. Doesn't hide anything from you.
Posted by: European Conservative || 02/11/2021 12:51 Comments || Top||

#9  'Austere 1st Amendment Scholar'
Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/11/2021 17:03 Comments || Top||


-Short Attention Span Theater-
At least 5 killed in massive crash on icy Texas interstate
[ABC] DALLAS -- At least five people were killed and dozens injured Thursday in a massive crash involving 75 to 100 vehicles on an icy Texas interstate, police said, as a winter storm dropped freezing rain, sleet and snow on parts of the U.S.

At the scene of the crash on Interstate 35 near Fort Worth, a tangle of semitrailers, cars and trucks had crashed into each other and had turned every which way, with some vehicles on top of others.

"The vehicles are just mangled," said Matt Zavadsky, spokesman for MedStar, which provides the ambulance service for the area. "Multiple tow trucks are on scene. It’s going to take a lot to disentangle this wreck."

Thirty-six people were taken to hospitals from the crash, several with critical injuries, Zavadsky said.

Police set up a reunification center for family members at a community center.
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 13:46 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under:

#1  I just watched the first-responders briefing with drone footage of the scene. There were at least three separate incidents, separated by 50-100 feet. Some people were maintaining an adequate separation on the freezing-rain slickened highway, and stopped short of the wreck, but the bozos behind them were following too close.
Posted by: Bobby || 02/11/2021 18:31 Comments || Top||

#2  Bobby, I saw some raw footage by a rubbernecker - am I right in guess that roads were wet until this overpass and it froze? One direction seemed fine, the other side had trucks going at normal D/FW speeds and just slamming into the pile-up, one truck trying to scrape the medium wall in an attempt to dodge/slow down.

Any of you first responders who have attended extrication and whispered bull-shit to the triple car stack: watch the video.

I counted at least two fk fk fk't all collisions. Nothing could be done; the cars were banged up so bad if the occupants were functional, they were trapped.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/11/2021 18:52 Comments || Top||

#3  *the 3rd wreck, likely being the first wreck, which wasn't on the video I saw
Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/11/2021 20:10 Comments || Top||

#4  Bridges don't dissipate the cold to the ground, like pavement on grade
Posted by: Frank G || 02/11/2021 20:15 Comments || Top||

#5  Just like Atlanta when we get a dusting not equipped nor should we pay the $$ for one or two days a year. And all the northerners who have moved here think they can drive in inclement weather ice ain’t snow
Posted by: Beavis || 02/11/2021 21:17 Comments || Top||

#6  Guessing the Windward, not Leeward,side.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/11/2021 21:56 Comments || Top||

#7  I learned to drive in northern Illinois. 20 years ago, in Dallas, I left work 10 minutes after it started drizzling. On the first bridge I came to, I started sliding and nothing could stop me until I was the fifth vehicle in a six-car collision. I could hardly stand up on the bridge, and I routinely walked on frozen lakes in Illinois.

A trucker interviewed on the teevee said, "30 miles of dry roadway, then suddenly - crash!'

The most informative signs I've seen read, "Bridges freeze before roadways". Believe it!
Posted by: Bobby || 02/11/2021 22:56 Comments || Top||


For Real ? Gab TV Hardware Device To Transform Your TV Into A Free Speech Device
Posted by: Angumble Phish5980 || 02/11/2021 01:30 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Roku, or a DIY Kodi box will do that.
Posted by: Deadeye Jaiting7534 || 02/11/2021 1:39 Comments || Top||

#2  Better yet, disable the TV so it stops working.
Posted by: Bubba Lover of the Faeries8843 || 02/11/2021 12:36 Comments || Top||


Fond Memories of The 1950's
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 00:34 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  EASILY the greatest thing I've seen all day. Thanks for posting.
Posted by: Tom || 02/11/2021 13:34 Comments || Top||


-Signs, Portents, and the Weather-
White House looks at domestic travel restrictions as COVID mutation surges in Florida
[Kansas City Star] The Biden administration is considering whether to impose domestic travel restrictions, including on Florida, fearful that coronavirus mutations are threatening to reverse hard-fought progress on the pandemic.

Outbreaks of the new variants — including a highly contagious one first identified in the United Kingdom, as well as others from South Africa and Brazil that scientists worry can evade existing vaccines — have lent urgency to a review of potential travel restrictions within the United States, one federal official said.

Discussions in the administration over potential travel restrictions do not target a specific state but focus on how to prevent the spread of variants that appear to be surging in a number of states, including Florida and California.

"There are active conversations about what could help mitigate spread here, but we have to follow the data and what’s going to work. We did this with South Africa, we did this with Brazil, because we got clear guidance," one White House official said.

"But we’re having conversations about anything that would help mitigate spread," the official said, referring to discussions about new travel restrictions that could target the spread of the U.K. mutation in Florida.
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 10:45 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Hmmm....that's the ticket. Shut down all interstate travel. We'll see who screams the loudest first (teach those big blue cities that put you in the seat that its not magic that puts stuff on the shelves).
Posted by: Procopius2k || 02/11/2021 10:50 Comments || Top||

#2  It is interesting that China virus mutations are named after countries while the China virus itself mustn't be called the China virus.
Posted by: Elmerert Hupens2660 || 02/11/2021 11:13 Comments || Top||

#3  I expect that I might never leave my home state of North Carolina in my lifetime, the way things are going.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia || 02/11/2021 11:14 Comments || Top||

#4  Government travel permits, sounds familiar from somewhere in the Cold War. The Sovietization of America rushes forward at a breakneck pace.
Posted by: NoMoreBS || 02/11/2021 12:16 Comments || Top||

#5  First shut down all interstate travel in & out of the DC area, particularly of trucks delivering food & vital supplies.
Posted by: Bubba Lover of the Faeries8843 || 02/11/2021 12:23 Comments || Top||

#6  Gotta punish people who don't toe the line. Need to make some examples!
Posted by: ed in texas || 02/11/2021 12:31 Comments || Top||

#7  Welcome Back to MAD MAX
-- Enter MAD MAX <-> AMERICAN STYLE 2021 - Where Every County Mountie has an AX to GRIND and uses it !
B-H Style(Biden Harris) with a Pelosi Attitude Pull Over an See
Don't Like what you see,
Well, Chop Chop,
Dystopian America at its Best!
Coming to a Highway, Byway or Interstate near YOU!
Posted by: Dino Bumble1005 || 02/11/2021 16:51 Comments || Top||

#8  Re #2, recall ancient Jingle Dynasty poem:

A friendly environment [China!]
For little distemperors [China!]
Give your bundle of joy
A head start with this ploy...
For Pandemic Birth Tourism: China!
Posted by: Maggie Hupomp2614 || 02/11/2021 18:00 Comments || Top||

#9  "I would have liked to have seen Montana."
Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/11/2021 18:57 Comments || Top||

#10  scientists worry can evade existing vaccines

"Science" now includes "worrying"?

Does St. Anthony know this?
Posted by: Bobby || 02/11/2021 19:14 Comments || Top||

#11  You will never see Montana or any other state in the Disunited States of America, Mad Max will see to that, just like Cuomo did in Nuevo York some months back, with NJ, PA, CT and VT in tow. The borders they were shut. U R trapped like a batdsh*t crazy rat...enjoy your home while you have it !
Posted by: Spats Brown8899 || 02/11/2021 20:44 Comments || Top||


In UK, roving teams bring COVID-19 vaccine shots to homeless
LONDON (AP) — In a pandemic, homeless people face being more forgotten than they already are. But not by doctors like Dr. Anil Mehta, who is on a mission to bring the coronavirus vaccine to those hardest to reach and often most at risk of getting sick in east London.

Mehta, a general practitioner, and his small team of doctors and nurses have been showing up at homeless centers in his local area, a COVID-19 hot spot, offering a free jab to dozens who might otherwise get left behind in Britain’s mass vaccination drive.

"They will get missed if we don’t find them proactively," Mehta said. "They really don’t have anything going for them, in terms of medical care. Finding them is absolutely essential to what we need to achieve in our boroughs."

The homeless aren’t listed among the British government’s highest priority groups for the vaccine rollout — which currently include people over 70, nursing home residents, front-line medical staff and social care workers, as well as the clinically vulnerable.

Because those sleeping outside and people in shelters have no address that doctors can contact them at, some local authorities across Britain have begun sending out roving vaccination teams to identify the clinically vulnerable among them so they can have access to the jab.
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 07:30 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:


Cuomo sets up 19 COVID-only nursing homes
[NYP] The Cuomo administration has quietly set up 19 "COVID-only" nursing homes throughout the state to treat patients recovering from the killer bug who are discharged from hospitals.

State Health Commissioner Howard Zucker revealed the establishment of the coronavirus-only nursing homes in a 16-page letter sent to the state Legislature Wednesday, which was his response to a series of questions submitted by lawmakers who chair committees overseeing nursing homes.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo and his health department came under fierce criticism last spring — during the worst of the COVID-19 outbreak — when thousands of recovering coronavirus patients were released from hospitals and sent to nursing homes.

Some nursing home operators claimed a March 25 state Health Department directive pressured them to admit or readmit COVID-19 patients at a time when they were already overwhelmed by the outbreak. At the time, nursing homes were not allowed to test new admissions for COVID-19, had inadequate personal protective equipment and suffered from staffing shortages.

Nursing home operators complained they were told they could not transfer sick COVID-19 patients to the temporary state Javits Center hospital or the United States Navy’s Comfort hospital ship which then-President Trump dispatched to New York harbor to help treat sick patients during the pandemic.
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 02:12 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "inadequate personal protective equipment" continues to be a problem. My sister's nursing home recently got scammed with a shipment of N95 masks (from China of course) that turned out to be counterfeit. They got a refund of their outlay for this. Basically NOTHING has been done at the federal level to ensure a safe domestic source of N95 masks at the VAST quantity needed to deal with the current epidemic, much less build up a stockpile for the next epidemic. Does anyone really believe there won't be another epidemic similar to COVID-19?
Posted by: Bubba Lover of the Faeries8843 || 02/11/2021 12:29 Comments || Top||

#2  Had to move my sister to a better quality nursing home after she was hospitalized with COVID-19 on Thanksgiving Day. She is doing much better now, thank you.
I'm getting to know the admins, nursing staff & nurse practitioners at the new facility. They knew that there was such a thing as outpatient monoclonal antibody infusions for high risk newly diagnosed COVID-19 patients, but they were all under the impression that such therapies were not available locally. I conveyed the news that there were at least 2 infusion centers within 8 miles of their facility. One of them was run by the same hospital system that the nurse practitioner worked for! She was flabbergasted that her own hospital had not bothered to inform her of this possibility. So I've been sending them a series of emails with the details.
Posted by: Bubba Lover of the Faeries8843 || 02/11/2021 12:33 Comments || Top||

#3  Not to be confused with euthanasia clinics in 1930's Germany, of course...
Posted by: magpie || 02/11/2021 12:57 Comments || Top||

#4  Coming soon, Cuomo order crematoriums to be build next to those nursing homes. Cremation is mandatory!

Posted by: Seeking Cure For Ignorance || 02/11/2021 13:37 Comments || Top||

#5  Wonder how self-euthanization will sway the rates.
Posted by: Woozle Trotsky8701 || 02/11/2021 17:37 Comments || Top||


-Land of the Free
Midway Ammo
Israeli Military Industries (IMI) 9mm and 5.56 available.

Note: This post is not intended as an enforcement of the vendor mentioned.
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 11:14 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  From what I'm seeing, buck twenty per 9 (plus shipping) is a good price right now especially for a name brand, if you need it.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/11/2021 11:32 Comments || Top||


Utah Axes Gun-Permit Requirement
[Free Beacon] Residents of Utah will soon be able to carry concealed guns without a permit.

Governor Spencer Cox (R.) will sign legislation into law this week to eliminate the permit requirement, his spokeswoman told the Washington Free Beacon on Tuesday. The act will allow any law-abiding person over the age of 21 to carry a gun under his or her clothes while in the state. Convicted felons, those adjudicated mentally ill, and other people prohibited from owning a gun are excluded from the policy.

Clark Aposhian, chairman of the Utah Shooting Sports Council, said his group has been pushing for the change since 2013, when a previous attempt was vetoed by then-governor Gary Herbert (R.). He said the bill becoming law is a win for law-abiding gun owners and will cut down on potential wait times for those in danger, noting that getting a permit can "take up to 90 days."

The repeal of permit requirements for concealed gun carry has accelerated over the past decade in a show of the increasing influence of gun owners and Second Amendment groups, especially at the state level. Utah is the 17th state to adopt a permitless carry system. While Vermont has used a permitless system since its founding, most states effectively banned any form of concealed gun carry until the mid-1990s. As recently as 1986, 16 states banned concealed gun carry while another 25 had laws allowing state officials to reject permit applications for any.

Now, no states outright ban concealed carry, and only eight states still allow officials to reject permit applicants who otherwise comply with training and background-check requirements.

Experts said the relaxation of concealed gun carry restrictions in recent years after concerted efforts from groups such as the National Rifle Association is proof of how influential politically active gun owners can be.
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 00:52 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Texas next?
Posted by: Deadeye Jaiting7534 || 02/11/2021 1:41 Comments || Top||

#2 

Please GA. Next?

Since violent criminals by their very definition DO NOT follow, nor obey such ill thought thru KNEE JERK Laws. Thus do take advantage against honest citizens placed at a disadvantage by having to obtain a permit to defend themselves

I would adjust the Law as follows tho. Because not all Convicted Felons are violent. About 1/3 are white collar non-violent crimes.

So maybe just those felons that have used a firearm in the commission of a crime, or were convicted of Physically Violent Acts with any type weapon, or Mentally Ill, or have been addicted to or sold addictive Illegal drugs.

What harm does a NON-Violent/Stable person pose owning a firearm? Other than not being able to defend themselves and their families against Home invaders, CarJackers and muggers?




Posted by: NN2N1 || 02/11/2021 6:22 Comments || Top||

#3  Have had that for a couple of years here in Idaho. Got my concealed carry permit long before that. Agree with the law but would like to see some basic training to go with it. Here in the western US where ranches abound, folks grow up with guns and are pretty responsible. Would think the same applies to Utah generally although they DID elect Willard to the Senate. Buyers remorse set in yet?
Posted by: Warthog || 02/11/2021 9:42 Comments || Top||


Britain
London Mayor Appoints Woke Activist Brigade To ‘Review' Statues For ‘Diversity'
[Summit] The mayor of London Sadiq Khan has appointed a rogues gallery of woke partisans as a ’task force’ to review whether statues and other landmarks in the city are ’diverse enough’.

The selection is chocked full of people who have previously declared their disdain for Britain’s history, prompting warnings that unelected activists with an axe to grind are being placed in charge of erasing history.

Khan has said that it isn’t the intention of the commission to pull down statues, but merely to ‘raise public understanding’.

And that ‘understanding’ is seemingly that practically every statue, street name, and memorial in London is racist.

One of the members is a man called Toyin Agbetu, who previously vandalised a statue of Robert Geffrye, a former London mayor with links to the slave trade, with red paint in an effort to symbolise the ‘blood on his hands’.

The Commission also includes an art critic by the name of Aindrea Emelife, who previously expressed supported for BLM activists who pulled down a statue of Edward Colston last year.
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 02:05 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under: Antifa/BLM

#1  Another Camel's Nose move to establish New Meccastan
Posted by: Fleresh Uleart1138 || 02/11/2021 4:16 Comments || Top||

#2  statues are meant to honor exceptional people. when everyone is the same, no one is exceptional

welcome to Harrison Bergeron world.
Posted by: Bob Grorong1136 || 02/11/2021 7:36 Comments || Top||

#3  Woke Statue Shows Flo at the Keyhole!
Stole wonderful secrets from Seacole,
Like how to treat trannies
With colourful fannies,
And how one can locate one's pee-hole.
Posted by: Maggie Hupomp2614 || 02/11/2021 8:17 Comments || Top||

#4  "The public... it must be moved on!"
And lo, the Embankment was gone,
So they strolled by a Thames
Lined with brutalist gems
On their glorious new... Path of Khan.
Posted by: Maggie Hupomp2614 || 02/11/2021 8:22 Comments || Top||

#5  Or femmes. Whichever.
Posted by: Maggie Hupomp2614 || 02/11/2021 8:24 Comments || Top||

#6  There goes Isambard Kingdom Brunel.

If they touch William Marshal or Churchill, I'll personally declare war.
Posted by: Rob Crawford || 02/11/2021 9:21 Comments || Top||

#7  ^ I don't think they'd have the cojones to cancel Churchill -- not with all those American tourists paying to visit the War Rooms -- but as I appreciate it anyone who walked around London quoting Churchill unreservedly would immediately be arrested for Hate Speech.
Posted by: Matt || 02/11/2021 12:33 Comments || Top||

#8  Churchill on Islam:

Indeed it is evident that Christianity, however degraded and distorted by cruelty and intolerance, must always exert a modifying influence on men’s passions, and protect them from the more violent forms of fanatical fever, as we are protected from smallpox by vaccination.

But the Mahommedan religion increases, instead of lessening, the fury of intolerance. It was originally propagated by the sword, and ever since its votaries have been subject, above the people of all other creeds, to this form of madness. In a moment the fruits of patient toil, the prospects of material prosperity, the fear of death itself, are flung aside. The more emotional Pathans are powerless to resist. All rational considerations are forgotten. Seizing their weapons, they become Ghazis—as danger­ous and as sensible as mad dogs: fit only to be treated as such.

While the more generous spirits among the tribesmen become convulsed in an ecstasy of religious blood­thirstiness, poorer and more material souls derive additional impulses from the influence of others, the hopes of plunder and the joy of fighting.

Thus whole nations are roused to arms. Thus the Turks repel their enemies, the Arabs of the Soudan break the British squares, and the rising on the Indian frontier spreads far and wide. In each case civilisation is confronted with militant Mahommedanism. The forces of progress clash with those of reaction. The religion of blood and war is face to face with that of peace. Luckily the religion of peace is usually the better armed.
—The Story of the Malakand Field Force (1898)
Posted by: Threreger Schwarzeneggar1013 || 02/11/2021 17:57 Comments || Top||


Economy
Twitter Reports $1.14 billion net loss for 2020 (RT News - Brief)
Posted by: Angumble Phish5980 || 02/11/2021 01:36 || Comments || Link || [2 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Good. F**k 'em.
Posted by: Clem || 02/11/2021 5:20 Comments || Top||

#2 

Well it seems Twit Screwed the Pooch of this stunt.

But I suspect the Digital Robber Barons have Deep Pockets with Deep State connections and won't feel a thing.

Likely the pain will only be at the stock holder level and they will be there to jump in an buy up the deflated valued stock at pennies on the dollar. Making more $$$$ and resulting in greater control of the company's agenda.

QUESTION:
Where is the FCC, ACLU, Judicial Watch , US DOJ and State Criminal Codes and etc...?

These Social Media Billionaires need to be reeled in quickly.
Posted by: NN2N1 || 02/11/2021 5:26 Comments || Top||

#3  Reeled in? Uh...no. Examples must be made.
Posted by: Pakvi Roti || 02/11/2021 8:54 Comments || Top||

#4  Soon to be subsidized, like the BBC, in a Covid Bill by the Democrat controlled House?
Posted by: magpie || 02/11/2021 13:00 Comments || Top||


General Motors records $6.4 billion profit in 2020 amid pandemic
[TheHill] General Motors recorded a $6.4 billion profit in 2020, a slight drop from the previous year, even with the coronavirus pandemic affecting businesses around the world.

The automaker issued its full-year and fourth-quarter reports for 2020 on Wednesday, showing the company made a strong comeback last year after its North American plants had to shut down in the spring for about two months.

"GM’s 2020 performance was remarkable by any measure, and even more so in a year when a global pandemic caused companies around the world — including GM — to temporarily suspend manufacturing operations to keep employees safe," CEO Mary Barra wrote in a letter to shareholders released Wednesday.

"Once-in-a-century challenges like these are tough, but they also provide much-needed clarity and perspective," she added.

The company still documented an 11 percent drop in revenue to $122 billion compared to 2019’s $137 billion revenue and $6.7 billion profit, according to The New York Times.
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 01:19 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Good..then they can start to repay the American people the $10B Obama gave them years ago. Tell you what..we'll even forgo interest ... just pay the original $10B back
Posted by: Warthog || 02/11/2021 9:35 Comments || Top||

#2  Maybe we should ask Raj if it is likely that they decided to move future TY 2021 "Profits" to TY 2020 to avoid a Biden/Pelosi scalping?
Posted by: magpie || 02/11/2021 13:08 Comments || Top||


Home Front: Politix
Former CIA Officer Says He Left Democratic Party Because of Impeachment
[E-Times] A former CIA officer wrote that he left the Democratic Party due to the impeachment of former President Donald Trump, saying that it only serves to exacerbate the political divide.

"For years, Democrats like me have watched with increasing alarm as our own political leaders and activists ... have used an endless stream of hateful, violent and ultimately un-American rhetoric that has resulted in billions of dollars in economic damage and given birth to a violent national movement," wrote Bryan Dean Wright, the former intelligence officer, for the Daily Caller.

Write added that the "modern Left" is infused with "systemic hatred" that has "inflamed profound political divisions and the predictable outcomes that come with them, most especially violence and destruction."

"The most egregious example came in the summer of 2020, with Leftist race riots that cost upwards of $2 billion in damages," he added, saying that Democratic leaders didn’t offer condemnations when "fires raged," property was vandalized, and lives were destroyed.

Asserting that Democratically elected officials incited violence last year, Wright added that during riots, "a woman in New York City threw a Molotov cocktail at four police officers sitting in their vehicle during a riot" and "were unharmed only because the gas bomb failed to ignite."
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 10:59 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  #Walkaway. — it’s why Donald Trump won in 2016.

Project Veritas is hiring a new CEO and other staff to handle the information coming in. A lot of people like this gentleman are deeply unhappy.
Posted by: trailing wife || 02/11/2021 15:52 Comments || Top||

#2  When you see Brian Dean Wright on the street, just say "Hi'!

Posted by: Hupolulet Chearong9337 || 02/11/2021 15:57 Comments || Top||

#3  Biography of Bryan Dean Wright: Is an American freelance political strategist & opinion writer. He is also a former CIA operations officer
Posted by: Hupolulet Chearong9337 || 02/11/2021 16:10 Comments || Top||

#4  just say "Hi'!

I always liked the way everyone in The Village said "Be seeing you..." in The Prisoner.
Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/11/2021 17:08 Comments || Top||


Why I Love Frank Zappa, And You Should too
Thus guy's in my all-time top five musicians. For those of you care and give a rat's ass, they are in order - Rush, TOOL, Frank Zappa, AC/DC and Disturbed. I'm into the easy listening stuff...

Consider when this clip was filmed - almost forty years ago. I have a client who met him around 1992 - 'the strangest person I've ever met' was his precise quote. Strange does not preclude prescient.
Posted by: Raj || 02/11/2021 00:52 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  ...The dude was full-goose bozo, batsh*t insane. He was also one of the smartest guys to ever pick up a guitar.

Good night, Frank, wherever you are.

Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski || 02/11/2021 4:17 Comments || Top||

#2  Frank Vincent Zappa (December 21, 1940 - December 4, 1993) been dead for nearly 28 years; I would suggest the author try living in the 21st Century, while he still is able to breath. 1/5th of the 21st Century has already expired into history, and before long the author will expire too.
Posted by: Fleresh Uleart1138 || 02/11/2021 4:25 Comments || Top||

#3  Dum vivimus, Flereth, vivamus;
Yes, get thee behind us, O Thomas,
For dum spiro, spero!
Time flies like an arrow...
And an apple is yesterday's promise.

Okay, so it ain't Zappa. Jeez... I can't look. Did I hit... er... miss? ;-)
Posted by: Maggie Hupomp2614 || 02/11/2021 6:29 Comments || Top||

#4  Yellow Snow
Posted by: Warthog || 02/11/2021 9:37 Comments || Top||

#5  Well I'm about to get UPSET
From watchin' my TV
Been checkin' out the news
Until my eyeballs fail to see
I mean they say that every day
Is just another rotten mess
And when it's gonna change, my friends
Is anybody's guess
So I'm watchin' and I'm waitin'
Hopin' for the best
Even think I'll go to prayin'
Every time I hear 'em sayin'
That there's no way to delay
That trouble comin' every day
No way to delay
That trouble comin' every day
Posted by: Glenmore || 02/11/2021 10:45 Comments || Top||

#6  Maggie & G - Congratulations!

You are better than a

Rhyming Song Lyrics Generator !

You have been entered into the running for The Position of Poet Laureate of Rantburg !

Position to be awarded on February 29, 2021.
Posted by: Deadeye Wittlesbach3430 || 02/11/2021 11:07 Comments || Top||

#7  Little-Green-Footballs used to have a Zappa quote of the day after Sept 11. I never liked Zappa's music but the quotes were impressive, funny and wise.

Of course LGF went crazy at some point and I stopped being able to tolerate the blog so I have no idea if the quote of the day remains or not.
Posted by: rjschwarz || 02/11/2021 12:52 Comments || Top||

#8  ^ I think it was the bike pics of sprockets and gears that sent him over the edge
Posted by: Frank G || 02/11/2021 13:22 Comments || Top||

#9  Deadeye, that wasn't my rhymin', it's from 'Trouble Every Day' on the Mothers of Invention's 'Freak Out' album (their first album, AFAIK.)
Posted by: Glenmore || 02/11/2021 14:39 Comments || Top||

#10  No Warren Zevon?
Posted by: Beavis || 02/11/2021 14:53 Comments || Top||

#11  Movin' to Montana soon
Gonna be a dental floss tycoon
(With mah zircon-encrusted tweezers,
Gleamin' in the moonlight!)
Posted by: Black Bart White1700 || 02/11/2021 17:53 Comments || Top||


Science & Technology
How Fake News Goes Viral
Hat tip - AMAC's magazine
[Scientific American] NASA runs a child-slave colony on Mars!

Photos taken by a Chinese orbiter reveal an alien settlement on the moon!

Shape-shifting reptilian extraterrestrials that can control human minds are running the U.S. government!

What drives the astonishing popularity of such stories? Are we a particularly gullible species? Perhaps not—maybe we’re just overwhelmed. A bare-bones model of how news spreads on social media, published in June in Nature Human Behavior, indicates that just about anything can go viral. Even in a perfect world, where everyone wants to share real news and is capable of evaluating the veracity of every claim, some fake news would still reach thousands (or even millions) of people, simply because of information overload. It is often impossible to see everything that comes into one’s news feed, let alone confirm it.

In disease models, highly connected people are called "superspreaders" because they help drive epidemics. By examining the behavior of actual Twitter users, however, she demonstrated in 2016 that superconnected agents pass on very few of the memes they receive. This is because they cannot possibly see, let alone read, everything in their staggeringly lengthy feeds. "People who are highly connected are unlikely to see anything that is even five minutes old because it is so far down their feed," she notes. Thus information overload ensures they are less likely to get infected in the first place. In her view, hubs suppress the vast majority of memes but may help to spread the few they let through.

Also playing a role in virality: friends tend to form clusters. So, for instance, because Alice knows Bob and Clive, the latter likely know each other as well, and likely share similar views on many issues. These clusters help establish what social media aficionados think of as an "echo chamber." Most of us tend to see some memes several times, increasing the likelihood that we too will share them. Making matters worse, the contagiousness of a meme—unlike that of a flu virus—depends on how often it has been shared. In a Web-based experiment involving more than 14,000 volunteers, sociologist Matthew Salganik, then at Columbia University, and others showed in 2006 that recruits were much more likely to download a particular song if they were aware that their peers liked it.

Such "social reinforcement" can ensure that contagiousness increases sharply once a certain threshold of exposure is crossed. "You see one person post, ’NASA’s got slave colonies on Mars,’ and you think, ’That’s ridiculous,’" Porter explains. "You see a second person post, ’NASA’s got slave colonies on Mars.’ You see this many times, and it somehow becomes more plausible the more times you see it." And so you share it, too. Several research groups are exploring the intricate cognitive processes that lead to one meme being chosen over another.
Posted by: Flater Gloluse1367 || 02/11/2021 08:39 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  usually with the collusion of Washington Post, NY Times, ABC, NBC, CBS, PBS, ... Why do you ask?
Posted by: Zorba Lumplump1243 || 02/11/2021 11:09 Comments || Top||

#2  It gets published in Scientific [Sic] American?
Posted by: magpie || 02/11/2021 12:56 Comments || Top||

#3  Nothing new. Just another one of humanity's original sins.

A Lie Can Travel Halfway Around the World While the Truth Is Putting On Its Boots

Besides, as the vilest Writer has his Readers, so the greatest Liar has his Believers; and it often happens, that if a Lie be believ’d only for an Hour, it has done its Work, and there is no farther occasion for it. Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it; so that when Men come to be undeceiv’d, it is too late; the Jest is over, and the Tale has had its Effect…

Falsehood will fly, as it were, on the wings of the wind, and carry its tales to every corner of the earth; whilst truth lags behind; her steps, though sure, are slow and solemn, and she has neither vigour nor activity enough to pursue and overtake her enemy…
Posted by: JHH || 02/11/2021 16:34 Comments || Top||


How To Get Started in Making Maple Syrup
[Popular Mechanics] We had a place in Vermont with maple trees out back. During a particular time of year in Vermont, late winter, there is no good reason to do anything outside. We were all about trying to get our kids outside, so we thought: Let’s drill a hole and get some sap.

I bought pails and the proper drill bit, and some cold-resistant tubing. Then I tapped the trees I remembered being maples from their beautiful colors in the fall. Maple trees turn first and give off the most beautiful colors for the autumn. I can remember, as a kid, picking up the seed pods from maples—we called them helicopters—peeling them apart and sticking them on my nose. My kids do that now, too.

We boiled the sap in my garage over an old propane turkey fryer. Once we did that, a bulb went off in my head. We did all that work, I thought, so we might as well tap more trees and get more syrup. So we did. Eventually it turned into a business. We make syrup, but we also accomplished our original goal: My kids get outside in the part of winter when no one really wants to go outside in Vermont. And they do it with us. On top of the syrup, that’s another gift the maple tree gives us.
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 01:35 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1 
HUMOR FOLLOWS

Will the figureheads of the New Socialist Democratic Party (NSDP) Admin., given its Earth 1st Tree Hugger's / Humper's Manifesto agenda item #69A-Tree ☺ of the NSDP. Continue to allow this travesty of Sexual Bark Assault ☺ being inflicted on the Maple Tree population all for our "Human Privilege" and enjoyment?

Therefore, calls for Maple Tree Reparations are demanded for the centuries of "Human Privilege" abuse these trees have suffered.

With such Reparations to be managed by the NSDP.

Posted by: NN2N1 || 02/11/2021 6:00 Comments || Top||

#2  I am reminded of Rodney Dangerfield's business lecture in Back to School.
Posted by: swksvolFF || 02/11/2021 13:37 Comments || Top||


Southeast Asia
US to impose sanctions on military leaders in Myanmar, Biden says
[Aljazeera] United States President Joe Biden on Wednesday said the US will impose sanctions on Myanmar’s military leaders following their coup d’etat and called for a return of power to civilian leaders.

In televised remarks at the White House, Biden condemned the military’s takeover from the civilian-led government and its detention of the country’s elected leader, Nobel laureate Aung San Suu Kyi.
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 02:00 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  "Well, that ought to do it. Thanks, Ray."

- Dr. Peter Venkman

Mike
Posted by: Mike Kozlowski || 02/11/2021 4:19 Comments || Top||

#2  Quota based promotion boards ?
Posted by: Besoeker || 02/11/2021 7:26 Comments || Top||


Government
Court Docs Show FBI Can Intercept Encrypted Messages From Deep State-Backed ‘Signal' App [Big League Politics]
[Big League Politics] Recent court documents have indicated that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) possesses a tool allowing them to access encrypted messages on the Signal app.
Vintage Vint Hill Farms Station (VHFS) signals intercept class at the graphic.
Signal has rapidly gained in popularity as Silicon Valley monopolists have grown more openly hostile to free speech, but the platform may be vulnerable to backdoors that undermine the privacy protections provided through the encrypted messaging service.

According to documents filed by the Department of Justice and first obtained by Forbes, Signal’s encrypted messages can be intercepted from iPhone devices when those Apple devices are in a mode called “partial AFU,” which means “after first unlock.”

Latest: Democrat Who Said Conservatives are Terrorists at Sham Impeachment Hearing Took Pedo Bucks From Jeffrey Epstein

When phones are in partial AFU mode, Signal messages can be seized by federal authorities and other potentially hostile interests. GrayKey and Cellebrite are the tools typically used by the FBI to gain this sensitive information, an expert has explained.
Posted by: Angumble Phish5980 || 02/11/2021 02:13 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Assuming Signal's encryption works the way they say it does, that means it's not practical to intercept a message in transit and read it. But that's it. There is no other protection available. Anyone in possession of either device would have complete access.
Posted by: Angstrom || 02/11/2021 10:45 Comments || Top||


-PC Follies
Another Way Youtube Threatens & Deplatforms People
I've been checking out musician Rick Beato for some years now. He will go over and break down songs mostly from the perspective of a guitar player, and I like almost all of them (Simon & Garfunkel can blow me, toothless). Irrespective of the fact that the musicians he references in these songs still get royalties from Rick's replaying of these songs, some of them are bitching about it and he's received various levels of warnings and notices about this from Youtube, sending him threatening e-mails that if he commits this three times, he will be banned from Youtube permanently and thus effectively deplatformed.

I mention this because Rick Beato is in no way overtly political; this cancel culture bullshit is getting worse and is expanding far and wide because Youtube feels (correctly at this point) they can do this and suffer no repercussions.

Legally speaking I'm of the opinion this is more a copyright fight over $ than anything else but the Stalinist trend towards banning and threats is unmistakeable.
Posted by: Raj || 02/11/2021 01:07 || Comments || Link || [1 views] Top|| File under:

#1  Professor Beato is a great teacher of music theory and composition. And his guitar lessons are a great place for an intermediate player to start.
Posted by: Deadeye Jaiting7534 || 02/11/2021 1:41 Comments || Top||


Science
SpaceX beat out SLS to launch the moon orbiting station.
NASA Awards Contract to Launch Initial Elements for Lunar Outpost

NASA has selected Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) of Hawthorne, California, to provide launch services for the agency’s Power and Propulsion Element (PPE) and Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO), the foundational elements of the Gateway. As the first long-term orbiting outpost around the Moon, the Gateway is critical to supporting sustainable astronauts missions under the agency’s Artemis program.

After integration on Earth, the PPE and HALO are targeted to launch together no earlier than May 2024 on a Falcon Heavy rocket from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The total cost to NASA is approximately $331.8 million, including the launch service and other mission-related costs.

The PPE is a 60-kilowatt class solar electric propulsion spacecraft that also will provide power, high-speed communications, attitude control, and the capability to move the Gateway to different lunar orbits, providing more access to the Moon’s surface than ever before.

The HALO is the pressurized living quarters where astronauts who visit the Gateway, often on their way to the Moon, will work. It will provide command and control and serve as the docking hub for the outpost. HALO will support science investigations, distribute power, provide communications for visiting vehicles and lunar surface expeditions, and supplement the life support systems aboard Orion, NASA’s spacecraft that will deliver Artemis astronauts to the Gateway.

About one-sixth the size of the International Space Station, the Gateway will function as a way station, located tens of thousands of miles at its farthest distance from the lunar surface, in a near-rectilinear halo orbit. It will serve as a rendezvous point for Artemis astronauts traveling to lunar orbit aboard Orion prior to transit to low-lunar orbit and the surface of the Moon. From this vantage, NASA and its international and commercial partners will conduct unprecedented deep space science and technology investigations.

NASA’s Launch Services Program at Kennedy will manage the SpaceX launch service. The HALO is being designed and built by Northrop Grumman Space Systems of Dulles, Virginia, and the PPE is being built by Maxar Technologies of Westminster, Colorado. NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston manages the Gateway program for the agency. NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland is responsible for management of the PPE.

Posted by: 3dc || 02/11/2021 00:00 || Comments || Link || [3 views] Top|| File under:

#1  At the Outer Planets Assessment Group meeting, Bob Pappalardo said the Europa Clipper project received formal direction Jan. 25 to cease efforts to support compatibility with SLS; plan is to proceed with a commercial launch vehicle [like Falcon Heavy].
— Jeff Foust (@jeff_foust) February 10, 2021

https://twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/1359591780010889219
Posted by: 3dc || 02/11/2021 1:06 Comments || Top||

#2  Rumors float that Bidet* wants to kill SLS and manned NASA projects. Maybe Shelby's retiring because he doesn't want it said he didn't have the clout to stop that from happening...
Posted by: M. Murcek || 02/11/2021 7:09 Comments || Top||

#3  SLS should have been killed WAY before this. What a boondoggle.
Posted by: Pakvi Roti || 02/11/2021 8:57 Comments || Top||



Who's in the News
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A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.

Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.

Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has dominated Mexico for six years.
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Two weeks of WOT
Thu 2021-02-11
  20 U.N. Peacekeepers Wounded in Mali Attack
Wed 2021-02-10
  5 Detained For Death Threats To French Teen Who Criticized Islam As ‘Religion Of Hate'
Tue 2021-02-09
  Houthis launch attacks on Soddys in Al Jawf and Marib
Mon 2021-02-08
  Syrian teen arrested in Norway for plotting attack
Sun 2021-02-07
  LeM chief arrested in Jammu; major terror strike foiled
Sat 2021-02-06
  U.N. Report Says Qaida's Leader in Yemen under Arrest
Fri 2021-02-05
  Border Patrol Agents Arrest 11 Iranians in Arizona Who Illegally Entered US
Thu 2021-02-04
  IS Attack Kills 19 in Hama
Wed 2021-02-03
  Israeli Delhi embassy bomb: National Investigation Agency registers case, police busily following leads
Tue 2021-02-02
  Somali forces end Al-Shabaab siege of Mogadishu hotel; 9 dead
Mon 2021-02-01
  Kidnappers Demand 15,000 Libyan Dinars for Each Egyptian Kidnapped in Tripoli
Sun 2021-01-31
  A busy day in Kabul: Talib assassin toes up, Talib Kabul Number 2 tied up, 2 kabooms kill 1
Sat 2021-01-30
  Lashkar-e-Islam leader killed in an IED explosion
Fri 2021-01-29
  At least 150 Soddies defect to Houthis in Yemen
Thu 2021-01-28
  Turkey announces arrest of 12 foreign ISIS members attempting to enter Syria

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