Roundup
Here we go again:
(1) Colonel MacGregor is Tucker Carlson’s longtime go-to “expert.” He sings the same song as Carlson. I’ve written about him before, mostly in connection with his pro-Russian “predictions” about the Ukraine War (see this). Apparently he’s now opining on the awfulness of Israel and our war on Iran – of course.
That’s why bonchie of RedState has posted this Twitter thread listing the things about which MacGregor has been wrong (hat tip: commenter “IrishOtter49”). The list is long. It would be a lot easier and shorter to list the times MacGregor has been correct.
(2) And speaking of disinformation (which we were), “X” has suspended 800 million fake accounts over the last year. Yes, you read that right: 800,000,000.
Elon Musk’s X said it had suspended 800m accounts over a 12-month period as it fights the “massive” scale of attempts to manipulate the platform.
The social media company told MPs it was continually fighting state-backed attempts to hijack the agenda on its network, with Russia the most prolific state actor, followed by Iran and China.
As part of the battle against such content, X suspended 800m accounts in 2024 for breaching its rules on platform manipulation and spam, although it did not reveal which of those suspensions related to foreign interference. X has approximately 300 million monthly users worldwide.
(3) Is this true? And if so, to what does it refer, and we will ever learn?:
Former Mossad official and JCFA researcher, @Sagivasulin2025, says: “I can say that big things have happened in Iran, on the scale of the beepers and perhaps even more. They may not photograph as dramatically, but over time we will hear about them, and they are no less amazing. There are also other significant things that remain up the sleeve.”
Prior to the beepers, it would be harder to believe. Now it’s much more easy to believe.
(4) About traffic through the Strait of Hormuz, Trump has been working on the insurance problem [my emphasis]:
Iran’s mullahs thought they could weaponize the Strait of Hormuz; instead, Trump turned their maritime choke point into a pressure point on their crumbling regime and its enablers.
As Washington underwrites safe passage and “privateer” tankers steam through silently with transponders off, the ayatollahs are reduced to offering bribery coupons for “safe passage” to any government willing to dump U.S. and Israeli diplomats, advertising weakness to friend and foe alike.
(5) This is at least part of the reason the arts have gotten so crummy:
The problem for opera and ballet, and indeed for straight theater and musicals as well, is that they stopped looking for audiences and started looking for grants. A bunch of woke, rich White people can give you money to produce the first Inuit opera but it doesn’t mean anybody wants to see it.
And have you looked at the contenders for Best Picture at the Oscars this year? I had the misfortune to see a half-hour of the film that writer ranks as #2: One Battle After Another. It’s a half-hour I’ll never get back, but at least I didn’t pay money for the privilege. I plan to write a review soon. Suffice to say I think it’s the worst movie I’ve ever seen.
I plan to write a review soon.
I may or may not have already posted this review – can’t remember.
Just imagine if Plan 9 from Outer Space had better actors. It’s that bad.
And it will likely win “Best Picture”.
“… the times MacGregor has been correct” comprises a null set. Or, if you prefer Venn Diagrams, MacGregor’s predictions and reality would be two completely non-overlapping circles. Maybe not even on the same piece of paper. But I’ll say this for him: he’s consistent.
One Battle After Another was the first movie that’s made ever me walk out of the theater in the middle of it. And I was there with a free ticket in a very comfy chair with popcorn and treats – so my laziness and inertia were extremely strong.
It’s basically an Antifa masturbatory fantasy with high production values and A-list actors. About an hour into it I realized that I hated all of the main characters, despised what they claimed to stand for, and couldn’t stand another hour of watching them do dumbass things. Life is too damn short for that.
Maetenloch:
You liked it a lot more than I did 🙂 . And you lasted longer, too.
(2) Wow! That’s a big number.
(3) The idea that virtually everyone today carries a mobile phone, switched on, in their pocket throughout the day, is a stupendous surveillance possibility, for many reasons.
It used to be true in the early days of cell network technology that the cell provider could triangulate location very approximately solely through the pings that the phone emits to towers. Now apparently, that can be very precise, without the use of GPS.
And how hard is it for a nefarious actor to highjack the OS on your phone? Or other software trickery?
Also, many or most of modern automobiles are always connected to the internet, all of the time.
I would imagine that smart leaders within Hamas or Iran would rely of couriers exclusively and forego modern tech. But it would seem that this is not the case.
“As part of the battle against such content, X suspended 800m accounts in 2024 for breaching its rules on platform manipulation and spam, although it did not reveal which of those suspensions related to foreign interference. X has approximately 300 million monthly users worldwide.”
There is a mechanical engineer who posts at Althouse and he would insist that the correct way to express 800,000 is 800m.
In my electronics background that quantity would be 800k, and 800,000,000 would be written as 800M.
So you might be off by a factor of 1000. Since the article states X has approx 300 million accounts it would be hard to suspend 800 million of them.