Bertelsmann, the German giant, which formerly used to put out “The Christmas Book of the Hitler Youth”, has become the leading publisher and distributor of some of the most famous and influential racist woke books.
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Bertelsmann has conquered and gutted American publishing’s crown jewels. The book spines beloved to generations of readers are now just assets to a corporate office in Westphalia which uses them to distribute racist hate across America.
Posted in Dystopia Watch | Comments Off on The Ex-Nazi Corp Behind Anti-Racism is Buying Up Book Publishing
Two Iranian-born brothers were charged in Sweden with aggravated espionage for allegedly spying for Russia and its military intelligence service GRU for around a decade, prosecutors said Friday. One of the men worked for Sweden’s domestic intelligence agency.
Authorities identified them as Peyman Kia, 42, and Payam Kia, 35. One of the brothers was also indicted for the alleged gross unauthorized handling of secret information. It wasn’t immediately clear which of them it was.
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Back in the year 2000, David Brooks made his name with the publication of his first book, Bobos in Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There. Until that time, Brooks had been a journalistic journeyman, having put in stints at the City News Bureau of Chicago, the Wall Street Journal, National Review, the Washington Times, and the Weekly Standard. But Bobos in Paradise made him a star. In 2003, when the New York Times went looking for someone to replace retiring conservative columnist William Safire, Brooks got the job. Ever since, he has been one of America’s most visible and widely published pundits, with regular appearances on PBS’s The News Hour, NPR’s All Things Considered, a contributing-writer slot at the Atlantic, visiting professorships at prestigious universities, and even a TED talk, which he delivered back in 2019. And all of this came about because of a book filled with observations about America’s future that have turned out to be spectacularly wrong.
Yesterday’s Midterms were not a victory for conservative or progressive ideology, but an assertion of the growing power of geography in American politics. It was less a national election than a clash of civilizations.
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So, what is happening in this increasingly inexplicable country? Essentially, there are now two prevailing realities in the US. One is primarily urban, single and, despite some GOP gains in this demographic, still largely non-white. It functions on the backs of finance, tech and the service industries. The other is largely suburban or exurban, family centric and more likely involved in basic industries like manufacturing, logistics, agriculture and energy.
Usually, the media assume these two Americas represent equally viable political economies. But this is increasingly not the case. In population terms at least, red America is now growing far more rapidly than blue America. And this makes it more important politically. Since 1990, Texas has gained eight congressional seats, Florida five and Arizona three. In contrast, New York has lost five, Pennsylvania four and Illinois three. California, which now suffers higher net outbound-migration rates than most Rustbelt states, lost a congressional seat in 2020 for the first time in its history.
Posted in Dystopia Watch | Comments Off on A Tale of Two Americas
The word GUY so pervades American speech that a detailed account of it would hardly seem necessary, yet the multiple meanings of the word guy are quite complex and are connected to the structure of English. Contemporary English is in a schismatic state between those who make use of or prescribe generic nouns and pronouns, such as man and he ‘human being’, and those who view these constructions as signs of a deeply sexist structure of English. Generic uses of man and he have now long been the targets of “politically correct” language reforms, the chief objection being that a word that primarily signifies the masculine gender cannot also signify the feminine gender or serve as a nongendered or gender-inclusive lexical item. Both man and he primarily signify the masculine gender, but they are also polysemous. English man ‘male human being’ developed from the Old English grammatically masculine noun man(n), whose meaning was originally ‘human being’, and hetook on generic functions after the loss of grammatical gender in the Middle English period. Semantic change is not an uncommon phenomenon, but such changes should not be taken as clean, crisp breaks with the past. The prototypical meaning of a lexical item may change its focus, but the old meanings can still remain connected peripherally. The cognitive model behind the multiple meanings of man and he, despite the current trend to eliminate their generic and inclusive uses, must still be powerfully active in the minds of English speakers, for the development of the word guy closely parallels their meanings and functions.
Posted in Think about it. | Comments Off on The Ascent of Guy
Companies, emboldened by an economic rebound after the nadir of the pandemic, rushed to acquire talent and fill their ranks with skilled middle managers. The Harvard Business Review even wrote that middle managers are more important now than ever (Fortunewrote that story six ways to Sunday as well). But a lurking recession is now threatening the livelihoods of white-collar workers: Those higher-salaried management roles—the jobs once heralded in American society as the key to obtaining the middle-class American Dream—may be axed in waves.
As these jobs vanish in favor of blue-collar workers at more manageable costs, that pipeline to the middle class could be chopped at the knees, reports The Financial Times.
Middle-management jobs typically deal with information flows–gathering and consolidating data for upper management, supervising production processes, performing interim analytics, identifying (and hopefully resolving) production problems, and monitoring employee performance. That sort of thing is more and more being automated, significantly flattening management hierarchies.
Posted in Dystopia Watch | Comments Off on The Jobs That Built America’s Middle Class Are Disappearing, Intensifying Its Downfall
talk about social issues ever, ever again. Instead, they would run solely on their economic message. Asked about abortion? Pivot to jobs as quickly as possible. Your opponent attacks you as a bigot on race or LGBT issues? Talk about taxes. The economy was bad, and voters, they were sure, were eager to hear their message of fiscal restraint and benefits for “job creators.”
The Democrats would be able to say whatever they want on the icky stuff—abortion, gender and sexuality, racism, whatever—but voters would ultimately take a good look at the bad economic indicators and reward Republicans with a landslide victory.
The plan failed miserably. Mitt Romney, the “safe” GOP nominee for president, lost decisively. The economic message had been vague and unmotivating, and the silence on social issues had been suicidal, permitting the Democrats to define the debate however they wanted.
Ten years later, the pony is trying that same one trick, and it’s still not working. RINO Romney declines to support his Republican Senate colleague up for re-election … will he be punished? It is to laugh.
Politics is about morality, not economics. Democrats understand this. Few Republicans do, and they’re not running for election.
Posted in Dystopia Watch | Comments Off on Smothering Advantage
Once your iPhone is connected to the satellite, you can call an emergency service when there’s no cellular signal coverage from your carrier. Satellite connectivity can also be used to share your location with friends and family via Find My.
Since it takes some time to establish the connection with the satellites, iPhone will ask users a few questions while the device is searching for signal. This includes questions such as “What’s the emergency?,” “Who needs help?,” and “Is anyone injured?” Then, iPhone automatically sends a text message with all these details to a local relay station.
A useful thing, if you are accustomed to wandering out in the middle of nowhere.
Not me, but other (crazy) people….
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Once again, a friend and I are in what we jokingly call THE CONE OF CERTAIN DEATH. Unbelievably, the devil has managed to scrape together a tropical storm after the end of hurricane season, and he has tried really hard to get it to go right over my house. The National Hurricane Center’s prediction cone is looming ominously, like the strong possibility of Kamala Harris becoming president when Biden finally forgets who he is.
The Democrats have constructed a machine that has almost eliminated the non-voting Democrat. “Enthusiasm” no longer matters if three weeks before an election somebody comes for that mailed ballot or keeps calling about it. Late-breaking trends don’t matter anymore if there is a large buffer of early votes in place.
Cheating? Sure, probably in lots of places (PA certainly) but the reality is that the left has made full use of the new rules to guarantee themselves a pretty sizable baseline in most places even without the “additional” voters and large-scale organizing also provides cover for “additional” registrations. Those dark-money billions actually mattered again in this election.
US Livid As Brittney Griner Transferred To Russian Forced Labor Camp
The White House is livid after WNBA star Brittney Griner has been transferred to a forced labor colony to serve out a nine-and-a-half year sentence after her conviction for possession of a small quantity of cannibas oil.
Note the equation of ‘White House livid’ with ‘U.S. livid’. Sorry, but the White House is not the U.S. I doubt that anyone outside of the clerisy gives a shit about what happens to Brittney Griner, who made the foolish mistake of believing that celebrity earned her a pass for violating an easily avoidable illicit-substance law.
Will she learn anything from this? Doubtful. Will her ‘fans’ learn anything from this? Extremely doubtful.
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Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke accomplished something remarkable on Tuesday. Though he didn’t win his campaign against Gov. Greg Abbott (R., Texas), the widely anticipated loss was Beto’s third failed bid for public office in as many election cycles since 2018—a trifecta of political failure.
But actually winning an election would be a bad move for Beto: He’d actually have to work. As it is, the only thing he needs to run is his mouth, hardly an exhausting enterprise, and people will keep giving him money.
He raised almost $200 million from Democratic donors over the course of these failed campaigns.
There are a lot of stupid Democrats in this country. Monetizing that stupidity is one of the most reliable roads to a comfortable lifestyle I know.
Posted in Democrats: Party of Fake and Gay | Comments Off on Born to Fail: Beto O’Rourke Achieves Rare Trifecta of Political Defeat
In a statement earlier this week, the DOJ said it was sending officials to 64 jurisdictions throughout the country – most of which would be in red or purple states.
For years, liberal activists—with the assistance of their corporate media allies—have been pushing the myth that there is a wave of “voter suppression” going on across the country. As the record registration and turnout numbers in recent elections prove, as well as their numerous losses in litigation show, this is a false claim created by opponents of commonsense election reforms like voter ID.
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But is this claim really true, or is it an overblown assessment similar to the fraudulent claims made in 2016 that the Russian government had conspired with the Trump campaign to fix the election?
Putin Insiders Pray for ‘Frightening’ GOP Election Sweep (Daily Beast) Does anybody seriously believe that some arrested adolescent writing for the Daily Beast has any accurate knowledge of what ‘Putin insiders’ are praying for? I suppose it doesn’t really matter if you get paid for just making shit up….
“Not all of the white working class struggles,” writes J.D. Vance, Ohio Republican candidate for U.S. Senate, in his memoir Hillbilly Elegy. Across his state’s eastern border in Pennsylvania, John Fetterman epitomizes this assertion, to the extent he can be called “working-class” at all. Fetterman, with a net worth of $800,000, would have to be elegized as a kind of “Main Line,” if not exactly “Beverly” Hillbilly.
LARPing as a steelworker cum coal miner, Fetterman has been elevated by the key Democratic establishment institutions—the media, corporate world, academia, and Hollywood—to the status of demigod; one might call it the Zelensky treatment. Having ignored the white working class for so long, these institutions are dedicated to the illusion Fetterman can restore these benighted voters to the Democratic fold. Fetterman allows Democrat elites the deluded self-assurance that they still speak for the working class and align with its interests. Now, after a debate performance that will enter the annals of American political blunders, they are doubling down in support of their man.
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Despite his “working-class” posture, Fetterman did not struggle, at least financially. His tattoos and Carhartt apparel don’t conceal his graduate degree from Harvard’s Kennedy School. His family’s wealth has allowed him to maintain his hobby of the mayoralty of a minuscule municipality, which didn’t fare well under his watch. Contrast him with North Carolina Lieutenant Governor Mark Robinson, who worked in a factory before his political career. Fetterman is a giant of a man who wears the right clothing and sports the right facial hair and tattoos, but he isn’t “blue-collar Pennsylvania” any more than Mehmet Oz.
Posted in Dystopia Watch | Comments Off on The Comical Fetterman Mystique
Sometimes it’s wrong to begin a phrase with the word “just”. I offer as evidence two such situations. I think there’s a common thread to be drawn.
My wife works at a company that is often buttfucked by consultants and outside vendors, leaving her and her overworked colleagues to clean up the mess. Each such mess is usually introduced with the patent phrase “Oh just do X”, where X is some process that inevitably fails to work as advertised. Handwavium then generally ensues.
The Idaho stop is the common name for laws that allow cyclists to treat a stop sign as a yield sign, and a red light as a stop sign. It first became law in Idaho in 1982, but was not adopted elsewhere until Delaware adopted a limited stop-as-yield law, the “Delaware Yield”, in 2017. Arkansas was the second state to legalize both stop-as-yield and red light-as-stop in April 2019. Studies in Delaware and Idaho have shown significant decreases in crashes at stop-controlled intersections.
This appears merely to legalize existing behavior on the part of bicyclists. I have yet to see anybody on a bicycle pay attention to either a stop sign or a red light.
The 2022 midterm election is once again characterized by extreme polarization between the parties. As Statista’s Katharina Buchholz details below, despite moderate positions gaining slightly this year, an annual survey by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs shows that moderates are in the minority in both parties the United States.
In July, 42 percent of self-described Democrats said they were moderates or conservatives, opposite 58 percent who considered themselves liberals. The gap is even bigger in the Republican Party, where 77 percent identified as conservatives and only 23 percent said of themselves that they were moderates or liberals. According to this survey, this makes Republicans in fact a whole lot more conservative than Democrats are liberal.
Posted in Think about it. | Comments Off on Are Republicans More Conservative Than Democrats Are Liberal?
Proving once again that she was only hired so the Biden administration could fill their diversity quota, President Biden’s press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre struggled through another painful and cringeworthy press conference where she had difficulty stringing coherent sentences together in order to answer simple questions from reporters in the briefing room.
The following video report from Germany is the clearest evidence to date that migrant invasion is more than just a rag-tag bunch of impoverished third-worlders seeking to escape oppression, and more than just economic migrants hoping for a better life. It’s a deliberately-organized invasion of armed young men.
The orders given to the border police to hold off from interdicting the arms suppliers come from somewhere further up the chain of command. Why are such orders being issued? In order to answer that question we would have to figure out the answer to an additional question: Cui bono?
What we are seeing now is the execution of a carefully-crafted plan. I’m not privy to enough intelligence information to specify who the planners are, nor exactly what final outcome they intend. But the dénouement which will soon be arriving in Europe — and in the United States, in a slightly different form — is clearly a deliberate action.
Posted in Dystopia Watch | Comments Off on The Shock Troops of the Great Replacement
My mate and I have noted our supply of various spirits is running out just in time for the holidays. What this means is undertaking a two-hour road trip to an adjacent state where we can shop in a pleasant, supermarket-style store stocked with spirits and wine from across the country and around the world. The knowledgeable staff will help us choose new brands based on our tastes. We will drop several hundred dollars and return across the river with enough to get through the long, dreary winter. I will try and find a good brand of cinnamon whisky which, in my experience, is a highly effective cold medicine.
We cannot get this in our home state. Why? Because our state has a “Liquor Control Commission,” a relic of Progressive and Prohibition-Era socialism that “appoints private businesses to act as its agents and sell its products in exchange for a commission.” In effect, it protects a crony market of crappy, hole-in-the-wall liquor stores staffed by surly, resentful employees, and limits beverage selections to those it deems worthy of being sold in our state. It also regulates what brands of liquor can be distributed within the state, which is why (I suspect) the only cinnamon whisky on sale around here is ‘Fireball.’ Which is… not that good.
The store we go to is part of a national chain. The reason they do not operate in this state is because of this part of the Liquor Commission’s power: “Normal proof spirits (>21% ABV) are sold only in a limited number of agent stores.” I imagine securing a permit to be one of those “limited number of agent stores” is a hotbed of paybacks and backroom deals with some organized crime thrown in.
Country Squire readers will recall Australia’s terrifying Black Summer, 2019/20, when massive bush fires burned some 35 million acres, destroyed an estimated 3 billion vertebrates (perhaps driving a number to extinction), wrecked scores of irreplaceable rock paintings, wiped out 3000 buildings and, sadly, 47 people died. The tragedy may have cost Australia as much as A$80 billion.
Now research has revealed the cause of this catastrophe. In a work entitled “How 1970s conservation laws turned Australia into a tinderbox” a number of researchers from major academic institutions across Australia and elsewhere have published their findings in MDPI, the largest open-access, peer reviewed publication in the world. This, then, is grown-up, serious, local scientific analysis of a truly dreadful event.
The reason for the ferocity and extent of the fires is now clear. Detailed findings for one of the worst affected areas found that before the 1970s there were fewer bushfires, while after the 1970s, they became more prevalent, eventually resulting in the horror of the Black Summer. So, what changed in 1970? This new research demonstrates that the pivot point was legislation, introduced in the 1970s, based on the trendy idea that –
“Nature should be left to grow freely without human intervention”
Posted in Dystopia Watch | Comments Off on A Burning Issue
Few regions have been more consistently Democratic than the West Coast. Even compared with the Northeast, where Republicans occasionally win governors’ offices, the appropriately named “left coast” has been adamantine in its progressivism. Republicans haven’t won statewide office in California in years; in Oregon, it’s decades. Washington has elected a Republican secretary of state, but she now serves in the Biden administration. And the region’s major cities are overwhelmingly blue.
That could be changing, at least a bit. As cities from Seattle and Portland to San Francisco and Los Angeles fight crime and disorder, something of a political rebellion has broken out. One progressive fashion entrepreneur has called San Francisco “a city of chaos,” where his employees are not safe. The city, by some estimates, has deteriorated further and faster than virtually any urban area in the country. Within the last year, though, San Francisco recalled its progressive district attorney, Chesa Boudin, as well as left-wing members of the city school board. Meantime, remarkably, Seattle elected a Republican as city attorney, and Los Angeles district attorney George Gascón has faced backlash, and a possible recall. Voters have a chance to continue this rebellion this week.
Posted in Think about it. | Comments Off on West Coast Blues
