“When I arrived in Japan in the early 60s at age 18, it was quite a culture shock…”

• OK, your memories made me laugh – WTH.

• Have to admit I am a little envious – both witnessing the rebirth of a nation, and doing so while it still had a dominant non-western identity.

• Have yet to have the chance to explore Japan – but always enjoyed my parent’ stories.

• They lived there in the early 50s – no kids – traditional house with rice paper walls, soaking tub, etc. – and they had many interesting & funny stories.

• As a boy I was fascinated by a picture of their lawn being cut by ~12 gardeners – with scissors – and I was also fascinated by some of the art that they brought home.

• Happy to read any other memories that you wish to share.

Ray Van Dune:

Exactly.

I think some, but not all, of the increasingly overt authoritarianism we see from Democrats is because they’ve doubled down on the “By Any Means Necessary” card so often, they have veered into blatantly illegal, unconstitutional, immoral means which could indeed destroy the Dem Party, if subjected to the barest fair legal scrutiny.

Listen beyond the talk about podcasting and spoken books, as interesting as it is. Then go on to the next 20 minutes.

If you you keep going to 46-7m, Peterson there usefully outlines differences between Trump, DiSantis, and Ramaswamy as Presidential candidates.

https://althouse.blogspot.com/2023/08/jordan-peterson-and-vivek-ramaswami.html

This week one of China’s biggest real estate companies, Evergrande, filed for bankruptcy, and, as well, a major financial services company, reportedly with trillions of yuan under it’s management, was reported to have missed payments on some thirty of it’s products.

Now comes this story, reporting that the number of inbound overseas tourists visiting China in this first quarter declined a staggering 99%, down from the pre-COVID quarterly figure of 3.7 million foreign tourists, to the current figure of only 52,000.*

One wonders if some of this precipitous decline isn’t due to more aware people who understand that China is to blame for the pandemic, and are refusing to visit that country, and enrich it, to prop it up with their tourist dollars.

* See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3FVBM-2Tao

What Ukraine war slang really means | Russia Ukraine update – Daily Mail

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RWQtW9Y4ryw

“Orc”
“Cargo 200/300”
“Macronite”
“Goodwill gesture”
“Banderite”
“Mobic”

And many others.

Russo-Ukraine War

NATO Rearmament & Spending in 2023 – Is NATO answering the Russian Challenge? – Perun

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mU_b_mqCZI

Timestamps:
00:00 — The Race To Rearm: NATO Spending In 2023
02:31 — What Am I Talking About?
03:01 — Data Interpretation
06:43 — The Pre-invasion Picture
10:39 — NATO Responds – 2022
19:59 — NATO Figures – 2023
27:32 — National Examples
27:41 — The US
29:26 — Poland
32:33 — Germany
34:36 — Canada
36:35 — Additional Budget Drivers
44:17 — In Perspective
48:24 — Conclusion
49:23 — Channel Update

One stop shopping! (Actually I’m not spamming the thread.)

https://wattsupwiththat.com/2023/08/19/climate-lawfare/

What was once considered essential for the understanding of the universe, say ” the ether” or “dark matter” proved to be, poof!, not so fundamental after all.

Look, squirrel! (UFO, NHI, …)