Home » Open thread 11/19/21

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Open thread 11/19/21 — 64 Comments

  1. We have traveled extensively over the years in the England. Still a fair number of Roman buildings in various levels of decay around, all brick. They would put a line or two of red brick in the middle of the walls. We have also walked on a Roman Road in the middle of the Yorkshire Dales. Truly amazing.

  2. Nancy Pelosi managed to cram through Biden’s BBB enormity. It’s weird that so much of our economic stability now hinges on the whims of Joe Manchin. Also it’s interesting that a Rasmussen poll indicates that a clear majority of people are absolutely not on board with it.

    There must be a significant number of congress critters who don’t really care about being reelected. Perhaps many of them have secured lucrative sinecures with various organizations around the swamp, like lobbying firms, PACs, and 501c3s? Perhaps some of them are sufficiently deluded to believe their constituents won’t hold them accountable, or that somehow increasing taxes and spending during a period of inflation is somehow a good move?

  3. Yes, I would love to know what is being offered to those democrat representatives who know for certain that they will be voted out of office if they support this abomination of a bill: well paid teaching position at their local university? lobbying position? a lucrative ‘make-job’ in the swamp?

  4. As John Cleese would say, “And now for something completely different”.

    For those of musical inclination, absolutely fascinating interview of Sting by Rick Beato. Long…over 50 minutes, but for me, riveting. I wonder how many modern millennial musicians start out their day trying to play and practice Bach as their warm up as Sting and his guitar partner do?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efRQh2vspVc

  5. SHIREHOME, under normal circumstances, yes. But these days pretty much everybody (including even the most liberal outlets who go out of their way to put the rosiest picture for Dems) are forcasting a fairly significant drubbing of the Dems in the House in the 2022 midterms.

  6. The Seattle Times reports that Gauleiter Inslee has decided that the Washington vaccine mandate will not be stricter than Biden’s (currently enjoined) federal mandate. I see this as a (very minor) sign of progress: an otherwise virtue-signaling governor passed up an opportunity to signal that he was going to be EVEN MORE virtuous than the President.

    Of course, there is so far no chance that the state mandate will be overturned in court; as far as I know it’s still considered inside the scope of state power. And our legislature apparently has no problem with allowing the dictator governor to use “emergency” powers forever.

  7. I see that in Austria there is a significant push back on the Govt on isolating the non vaccinated. Police, Military refusing to enforce the mandate and joining in large protests.

  8. Well, Kamala made history today as “the first woman to hold presidential prerogative in American history.” The reason? JoJo had his colon checked out earlier today and “temporarily transferred power to Vice President Kamala Harris on Friday morning so he could undergo a colonoscopy. . . . It was not immediately clear whether the exam included a cognitive test, which some Republican lawmakers have insisted the president undergo.”

    I have considerable compassion for the docs at Walter Reed, having to examine a patient in the advanced stages of recto-cranial inversion.

    https://nypost.com/2021/11/19/biden-to-undergo-long-awaited-physical-exam-day-before-79th-birthday/

  9. Not Guilty on all charges.

    There is still some sanity in the American justice system. Not much. But some

  10. Julie Kelly wonders is Rosanne Boyland died from police inflicted violence on Jan6th, not a drug overdose as coroner authenticated.

    Heroes in the tunnel tussle are prosecuted and confined for many months while DC/Cap Hill cops aren’t even ID’d.

    Meanwhile, 14,000 hours of video remains secret. This post at Ace sets the outrageous context of Kelly’s report at Am Greatness.
    http://ace.mu.nu/archives/396572.php

  11. As Ackler says, Kyle Rittenhouse has been fully acquitted. I surprised myself by starting to cry as I listened; I was so ready to give up all hope for our system, or already had. Now I guess we wait to see if there are riots.

  12. Hallelujah! I wonder if “Karen” was finally convinced by the (lack of) evidence or if prosecution malfeasance became too obvious to ignore.

    Next steps: 1) make the prosecutors pay for their sleazy tactics 2) go after the jury intimidators. I hope they’ve got some security for the jury members whose lives are all in danger now.

  13. In my pursuit of all things Weather … Underground that is, I’m watching “Katherine” (1975) on Amazon Prime. It’s based on the life of Diane Oughton, the society girl gone radical and her star-crossed, revolutionary lover, Bill Ayers.

    Oughton is played by the young Sissy Spacek, all blazing blue eyes and bright red hair.

    And Bill Ayers? By Henry “The Fonz” Winkler! From” Happy Days” to “Days of Rage.”

    They make a cute couple.

    A shame she blows herself up at the end, assembling a bomb in the Greenwich Village Townhouse Explosion.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenwich_Village_townhouse_explosion

  14. Great news about Rittenhouse verdicts. I imagine there is much gnashing of teeth. Also I wouldn’t be surprised if a few media organizations were sued.

  15. I actually teared up a little myself. In some very significant ways, this trial was far more important to our culture and society (or what’s left of it) than any election.

    Though I haven’t lived there in 11 years, I was born and raised in Wisconsin. It especially makes me happy to something so consequential and so positive come out of my home state.

  16. I await reports that the jurors were intimidated by threats that the White Supremacists would riot after a guilty verdict.

  17. Mrs. Whatsit: “I surprised myself by starting to cry as I listened.”

    Same here! My eyes started to water up! Last time that happened was when Trump won.

    I, also, was about to give up faith in our country/our system. Watching the news just a just short time ago I could see the literal shaking that Rittenhouse was doing as he heard the “not guilty.” He clearly has been so traumatized by the events that night and again by the trial.

    My goodness, that poor kid (along with his family and close friends) was certainly put through hell, wasn’t he? While it is rude of my to think this, and more so to say it; but, I do believe that there is a special place “down there” for those who did this to him. They had no shame!

    And thanks to those jurors, despite being stalked at least twice, saw fit to vote the way that they did. I hope nothing happens to them or Rittenhouse.

    A big “Hallelujah” is in order! Hallelujah! Justice seems to have won today.

  18. I’m sure the prosectution is deeply regretting not agreeing to that mistrial profferred by the defense the other day.

  19. Delighted for Kyle by this verdict. Maybe the right to protect and defend private property will be rediscovered in the future.

  20. PA+Cat, it appears that the judge did in fact grant the motion for mistrial with prejudice after the verdict. Interesting choice, since an acquittal has the same effect — the charges are dismissed and can never be brought again, and a full acquittal can’t be overturned on appeal, so granting the motion was surplusage. I wonder whether the judge 1) simply didn’t want to leave the motion hanging or 2) wanted to send a message to the prosecution that — even if there had been a conviction — it would have been overturned as a direct result of their improper conduct or 3) is preparing the ground to refer the prosecution to the Wisconsin bar disciplinary folks. Any other ideas out there?

  21. Oh Happy Day, not guilty on all counts. Please Kyle go somewhere else tonight and let the local government handle the chaos, now it’s their turn to keep the peace which I hope they can do.

    Thank goodness for a jury that did the right thing. I am breathing now since I have been holding my breath for days.

  22. huxley @ 1:41 p.m.: I’ve had such a sense of dread over the outcome of this trial.

    So have we all. And I’m glad for Neo’s sake that she can breathe easily at last and sleep well tonight. She has worked so hard over the past week to provide us with her own sharp insights as well as links to other writers.

    Mrs. Whatsit– I’ll defer to Neo about the judge’s intentions. I’m just relieved he did what he did.

  23. I’m so happy to have been wrong about this jury. I would have bet big money on a hung jury. So much for my predictive abilities.

    Even so, in a rational world, charges would have never been brought. In a little less rational world, jury deliberations would have lasted about as long as a coffee break. I’ll be interested to hear jury members explain why they took so long to make a decision.

    But for now, I’ll focus on the joy and relief that Rittenhouse must feel. A good day.

  24. I’d like to say that I don’t endorse Kyle’s decision to go out that night. It was too dangerous even if noble and courageous. Unfortunately, the government failed to act to protect its citizens and left little recourse for those citizens to defend themselves or property. That’s the provocation that lead to the unnecessary deaths. Everything was the inevitable result of the government allowing the situation to happen at all, and much worse to allow to continue for days.

    I’m glad the jury recognized Kyle’s rights, which are their own. The notion by prosecution that everybody takes a beating is outrageous and fortunately wasn’t not accepted by the jury. Alas, the prosecution’s claim is in line with the government which allowed Kenosha to take a beating for daring to stop Blake from beating a woman.

    Thank you, neo, for giving this forum to share thoughts.

  25. The Antifa riots are what the Weather Underground’s “Days of Rage” in 1969 would have looked like, if supported by the police, FBI and Democrat authorities.

  26. A lot of liberals in the peanut gallery had cruel unkind remarks about Kyle Rittenhouse’s “crocodile” tears last week. The NARRATIVE must be upheld in the face of callous demeaning arbitrary idiotic snark. God bless this young man and his decency and throughout his future journey. Human decency will never be out of fashion; even if it doesn’t fit ones insular dogmatic skewed narrative. Witnessing this kid’s grievous ordeal and the resulting not guilty verdict is a huge relief. In real time… Court TV’s Michael Ayala yammering about white supremacy yada yada….it never ends.

  27. An Ominous:

    Did an Electrical Engineering summer internship in a coal-fired power station many moons ago. Trucks collecting fly ash from the electrostatic precipitation plant to be used in pozzolan were constantly coming and going.

  28. Zaphod:

    Started 3BP but boy, the Red Guard scenes are horrifying. I worry there is a “He loved Big Brother” scene coming up.

  29. Leland,
    While I would agree that ‘Discretion is the better part of valor’, there comes a time when a person has to take a stand that entails risk. At least, an ‘American’ person does. That is why Kyle went out that night.
    This trial was deeply symbolic for just that reason. The left is on a mission not only to obtain absolute power – but to wipe out our unique (dare I say; ‘Exceptional’ ?) national character.
    I teared up too. Thankful for Kyle, thankful for what is left of America. And hoping this attack on our national spirit has opened a few more eyes.

  30. @Huxley:

    The book gets better.

    You know, it’s probably more visceral to hear it in Audible than to read about it on the page. Mind you, could just be that I’m a Cold-blooded Machiavellian. 🙂

    At the risk of being a crashing bore, Country C is ruled today by people whose parents and grandparents were on the receiving end of that kind of fratricidal mob insanity and survived and said Never Again. Country U is ruled by people who have never had anything not go their own way in their personal lives and are seemingly intent on doing what Country C did to itself 55 years ago.

    Not too many Ayers and Dohrns hold any positions of influence in Country C in the Current Year. They were black marked for life and put out to pasture.

    Another thing you might notice as you read the book is that whilst it’s full of Scientists, and while scientific and technological developments drive the main plot events, Scientists do not set policy. They (unsurprisingly) don’t get to go write random op-eds in the press. The Chinese State does not ‘Leak Power’ as Yarvin describes happening Western Liberal Democracy.

  31. @Molly+Brown:

    I’m glad he did it. I’m glad he survived. Tens of Thousands (at least) need to do it for there to be any meaningful change.

  32. Zaphod:

    Is the West the Trisolarians in 3BP?

    I still don’t assume the Chinese have said Never Again to insanity. People are still disappearing. They’ve got the fiercest social control on the planet outside of North Korea. I’d bet it’s Never Again, Unless…

    Your earlier remark that 3BP was lovecraftian set me off on a Lovecraft kick. I discovered that the film “Annihilation” was basically a version of HPL’s “The Colour Out of Space.” Unspeakable horrors, incomprehensible mysteries.

    However, the film had such a heavy science element that I concluded it was just terribly written sci-fi.

  33. @Huxley:

    “Is the West the Trisolarians in 3BP?”

    Don’t think so. But haven’t finished. So in the words of Zhou Enlai re implications of the French Revolution, “Too Early to Say”.

    Last I knew there were quite a lot of disappeared people in the US. Men who couldn’t pay swingeing insane child support and got thrown into prison for years, the Capitol protesters, Chauvin. Stick your head up and offend the wrong people in the USA and you will disappear one way or another. Do likewise in China and you will also disappear. But you won’t be anally raped by Blacks in the Chinky Pen. There’s that.

    Uighurs. Sure they likely killed a bunch. More of a body count than Iraqis and Afghans during period 1990-2021? Your guess as good as mine. Seem to remember just yesterday that militant Islam was America’s implacable enemy and that justified all sorts of unpleasantnesses abroad. Or you might say that the Uighurs of Xinjiang are the Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza. In fact, I would say that. Given that I fully support all manner of Israeli bastardry to hold what they have taken, I don’t really have much of a leg to stand on whilst criticising the Chinese for not being the Chosen People.

    If you can source the Lonely Planet Guide to Hong Kong and Macau ca. 1990, read the supplementary stuff on Shenzhen and Guangzhou — copious warnings about not being robbed or cheated by Uighur gangs when changing money on the black market. This before Uighurs became flavour of the decade because China was still West’s strategic ally against the Soviets The Chinese see the Uighurs as troublesome riff-raff who need civilizing. My Machiavellian view is that the Chinese need to go and kill precisely 7 million. Not 5, not 6.. most definitely not 6… and not 8.. Just 7 will do. Knock off 7 Million Uighurs and you’ll never read about them again 😛

    I will say, though, that I have it on very good authority that in Australia, the medical establishment will not offer replacement organ transplants to anyone who got one done in China.

  34. Zaphod:

    According to an informant, Bill Ayers said that killing off 25 million Americans would do the trick for the New Left’s Revolution. The informant was Larry Grathwohl. His book, “Bringing Down America,” is riveting.

    I don’t support that sort of thing, even for Muslims.

    I also don’t equate the American government with the ChiCom government on those terms.

    The Chinese just disappeared a top female tennis player. Find me a comparable example.

  35. Not too many Ayers and Dohrns hold any positions of influence in Country C in the Current Year. They were black marked for life and put out to pasture.

    Zaphod:

    I missed this part while you revised. No, Ayers and Dohrn weren’t blackmarked for life and put out to pasture.

    After the Weather Underground, Ayers set his sights on transforming American education:

    Ayers is a retired professor in the College of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago, formerly holding the titles of Distinguished Professor of Education and Senior University Scholar. –wiki

    Dohrn didn’t do quite as well, but not badly. She was an adjunct professor at Northwestern U. Law from 1991-2013.

    Let it not be forgotten that Ayers mentored Obama in the Annenberg Grant. Ayers and Dohrn launched Obama’s political career from their livingroom, and Obama suffered no damage for the association with the two most prominent, radical sixties bombers.

    No, Ayers and Dohrn did not disappear to menial jobs with no influence.

  36. @Huxley:

    She’ll be back. Like Jack Ma. Sort of. Maybe a bit more Stepford Wife-ish next time around.

    I can’t quite find you a comparable example. I think you can imagine my views on that fine specimen of humanity, Harvey Weinstein.

    Despite him being objectionable in the sight of Zaphod on multiple grounds, do you seriously think he has gotten due process and that Women Never Lie and absolutely never prostitute themselves to get ahead and then attempt to have a second bite at the apple when they think the wind is blowing their way?

    On a purely utilitarian view, one might argue that messing with the odd female life here and there is less likely to trouble Jeremy Bentham’s Mummy than the deluge of false and meretricious allegations have blighted male public figures in the West these past few years.

    Of course there is vast corruption and misuse of power in China. Same everywhere there is Power. The point is that power has to be controlled. When it’s not controlled, you get Salem. Black Lives Matter. The CCP viewpoint is self-serving but right: nip these things in the bud good and hard before they become out-of-control mass hysterias.

    Are you familiar with the term Baizuo? Literally White Left. Very popular in China this last few years. Describes Western Woke-ism. To be called Left in China is no compliment at all nowadays. Anything smacks of being Baizuo, gets smacked down. On the whole massive public support for doing so. All the regime has to do is show them pictures of Portland… or Elon Musk’s idea of what constitutes a suitable wife for that matter 😀

  37. @Huxley:

    Let’s say that this female tennis star told the unvarnished truth and that nasty ugly commie politburo member made her an offer she couldn’t refuse.

    It might amuse you as an American to see said member’s member get an airing and see some ‘justice’ being done and you might see it as opening up a chink in some monolithic Chinky Tyranny.

    Obviously from the rest of the Politburo’s view, this would be a Bad Thing and therefore it ain’t going to happen. Although my reading of the I Ching and the finest Longjing Tea Leaves suggests that the member with the dishonourable member is likely to draw the short straw in a forthcoming corruption investigation after a suitable face-saving interval.

    From the viewpoint of the stability of the entire Chinese polity and the Common Weal… having a mass movement of female hysteria taking things real and imagined out on their menfolk sweep the land would be a Net Doubleplus Ungood.

    And I mean that last sentence with zero irony. Only a certain kind of brainwashed Westerner(*) could believe that airing it all is always good.

    In the West, you ‘win’ in politics by Defecting to the More Left every single time. This breeds chaos. Chinese have seen enough chaos and will utterly crush anyone who looks to be upping the entropy.

    * Make no mistake, we too have been brainwashed our entire lives to believe certain things are so true that they don’t need any further thought or investigation and should just be axiomatic. The question is whether or not in 2021 our brainwashing is more or less adaptive than their brainwashing.

  38. Zaphod:

    I believe I misunderstood your Ayers/Dohrn point. However, I’m not sure of your point in @9:48.

    If a MeToo accusation threatens or is perceived to threaten the government, then it’s OK she be disappeared?

    What are the limits, if any, to this pragmatism?

  39. @Zaphod:

    Better one prominent woman disappears for a bit than 1.4 billion person society is rocked for 2 or 3 years with a #MeToo movement which destroys many innocent careers and lives along with some guilty ones.

    There are zero limits to the pragmatism of whoever holds real power in your society or in China. Were there any limits when your rulers decided to export all your factories to China so that they could grow richer than Croesus whilst impoverishing and destroying their own working people? Were there any limits when they decided to steal an election or to unleash AntiFa on you?

    The only real limit is the threat that the armed American populace throws away the rule book and resorts to unlimited warfare on the ruling elite. Still waiting for that to happen. Limit? Unlimited? My head hurts now.

    Limits and Constitutions are fairy stories we tell ourselves around campfires in the cave while the sabre tooth tiger roars in the dark. Someone should make a Lovecraftian Parody of the Federalist Papers 🙂

    The only question is whether or not the pragmatism of those wielding power is more or less aligned with the interests of those they rule over. I posit that there is presently more alignment in China in 2021 than there is in USA and Rest of the West in 2021. In fact in the West interests of ruler and ruled are mostly now at best orthogonal if not sometimes diametrically opposed.

    Relative alignments were certainly different in 1800 and 1900 and maybe even 1980. But I am interested in the world we have to live in now and for the immediate future.

  40. Zaphod:

    Well, that’s pretty clear. I still disagree. I’ll still take the fairy tales about the Constitution and Human Rights. But clear.

    We will fence again another time.

    Re: Lovecraft

    I discovered that Lovecraft has become big in the last ten years. There was a Lovecraft renaissance in the 1970s, but this is bigger. All sorts of movies, a doco, websites and multiple premium leather bound editions of his work.

    I’d say Hollywood has run out of Philip K. Dick to steal from. Lovecraft really is the motherlode of modern horror.

  41. @Huxley:

    One could argue: ‘But what if that women was you?’

    Fair point.

    But what if you were Derek Chauvin just doing your job on any given day?

    If I had to choose, I’d pick the less random wager with the Devil and choose to be born Chinese in 2021. Doing your mundane quotidian job is one thing. Flying close to the light (being a celebrity or a politician or a billionaire) is another thing.

    Do you get my point? The average Han Chinese today is safer than the average American White Male. Reach for the Brass Ring and the odds start to fluctuate.

  42. @Huxley:

    Always a pleasure to exercise my inner reptile in debates with you.

    Lizard People are real, you know!

    I figure there’s something afoot in the collective unconscious: Lovecraft and Zombie Movies.

  43. What has risen may sink, and what has sunk may rise. Loathsomeness waits, and dreams in the deep, and decay spreads over the tottering cities of men.

    –H.P. Lovecraft, “The Call of the Cthulhu”
    _________________________

    Zaphod:

    HP had it knocked. A true poet.

  44. physicsguy, thanks for that Sting interview pointer. I’m digesting it now. I’m not a proper ‘fan’ of his, having only really ever heard one album all the way through, but the fact that Ten Summoner’s Tales crops up a couple of times in the interview so far is encouraging. That’s the Sting opus in my collection, and I’ve always thought it an incredible achievement, so the interview is most welcome – ever since hearing that record, I’ve wondered how Sting’s mind worked, that he could generate such a thing.

    Shirehome, have you got any pointers to that news about Austrian police/military not going along with enforcement? I’m checking around my usual sources for news from Germanophone space and not seeing this yet, but it would interest me very much to be convinced that this is happening at a scale that would matter.

  45. Reports coming in of some pretty wild anti-covid restrictions protest events in the Netherlands.

    However I’m too lazy and stupid to do due diligence and anyway the only things I know about the Dutchies are canals and giant cheeses. I’ll leave it to the experts.

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