Archive for October 4, 2022

In a post earlier today I talked about how corruption has a lot to do with the failures of Russia in their War vs Ukraine and also how the media protecting them helped preserve this corruption.

Don Surber is a retired newspaperman who writes a very good blog at donsurber.blogspot.com and has for a lot of years. A few days back he wrote a good, but not all that provocative post about the corruption at the FBI. A couple of days ago in his daily update of the news closed with this:

FINALLY, I received this email from Blogger.com:

“Your post titled ‘How to end the FBI’ has been deleted.” No reason. No rhyme. No appeal. Just deleted. The email cited community standards but the community has no say in what those standards are, so they are by definition not community standards.

Readers can still read it here, and decide for themselves if it meets our community standards.

Meanwhile, I started a substack — donsurber.substack.com Guess what the first post is…. 

This tells me that none of this is happening in a vacuum and that it will either end it a collapse of this corruption or a collapse of our freedoms.

If anything confirms the need for this novena, confirms the choice of St. Matthew as the best patron for it.

So let’s go out on a high note of prayer.

St. Matthew Novena - Day 9
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. 

Amen.

Dear Lord, we thank You for giving us St. Matthew as an example of holiness. Help us to imitate the devotion to You he showed in his years of service to Your Church.

St. Matthew, you were called by Jesus to leave behind your old life as a tax collector and follow Him. After this, you devoted the rest of your life to following and serving Him.

Please bring my petitions before Christ Whom you served so faithfully!

You wrote of Jesus’ life and ministry in your Gospel so that others could come to know Him. You devoted the rest of your life to preaching the Good News and helping to establish the Church.

Pray for me, that I may be as faithful a servant of God and His Church as you were. Pray that I may always be eager to put my gifts to use serving God. 

Please also pray for the FBI agents involved in the arrest of Mark Houck.

St. Matthew, pray for us!

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. 

Amen.

Read more at: https://www.praymorenovenas.com/st-matthew-novena

The GOP and Pennsylvania

Posted: October 4, 2022 by chrisharper in Uncategorized
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By Christopher Harper

As the country slouches toward the midterm elections, Pennsylvania provides a microcosm of the battle between Democrats and Republicans.

In 2016, the state put Donald Trump over the top by less than 1 percent of the vote. In 2020, Joe Biden got slightly more than 1 percent of the total.

Down the line, the Keystone State mirrors almost every demographic of the nation from ethnic makeup to average income to the severity of poverty.

On the West Coast sits the Democrat stronghold of Pittsburgh. On the East Coast stands Philadelphia, another Democrat hovel. In between, where I live after 17 years in Philly, the flyover country of Pennsylvania votes almost entirely Republican down the ticket.

In the U.S. Senate race, Mehmet Oz has pulled almost even with John Fetterman. Oz takes conservative stands and has Trump’s backing, while Fetterman ranks to the left of Bernie Sanders and George Soros. Oz isn’t a great campaigner, which is why he isn’t running away with the race.

But one of the main reasons Oz has been gaining ground is that Fetterman had a stroke earlier this year and hasn’t convinced many people, including the media, that he can handle the pressure of the U.S. Senate.

Gubernatorial candidate Doug Mastriano is a stout Trump supporter, but the media have portrayed him as too conservative. Unfortunately, that caricature has left him far behind.

As Common Sense put it recently: “The Democrat is covered in tattoos, favors hoodies, and just had a stroke. Will Pennsylvania send the anti-politician to the Senate?”

Josh Shapiro, an unaccomplished liberal, is likely to follow in the footsteps of our state dictator, Tom Wolf, whose COVID clampdown made him all-powerful for much of the past two-plus years.

Fortunately, the Pennsylvania Senate and House will remain solidly in Republican hands, although the all-Democrat delegations from Pittsburgh and Philly prevent the GOP from overriding vetoes by the governor. The Republicans are pushing for the ability to override executive orders, such as those during COVID, with a majority vote, but legal requirements have prevented such a move until next year.

Also, according to most polls, the U.S. House of Representatives delegation—now nine Republicans and nine Democrats—is likely to add two Republicans into the mix.

Apart from the governor’s race, Pennsylvania looks good for the GOP—perhaps a positive omen for 2024.

One of the reasons why Russia has as feared a reputation as a military power is their victories over Hitler’s Germany & Napoleon’s France in invasions whose failures changed the course of history.

Of of the things overlooked about both of these events is that they had a lot of help in the sense that England was supporting them financially vs Napoleon while fighting a 2nd front in Spain and at Sea while the US was supplying them with millions of dollars of supplies to keep them going.

In Short with help and allies Russia is a terror when something is trying to invade their homeland, against decent militaries Poland 1920’s, Japan 1890’s Finland 1939 and not Ukraine 2022 not so much.


One of the things that has really hurt Russia in this sense has been the unreality of their military. When you have a one man kleptocracy that puts contracts to friends the idea of actually doing what you claim to be doing with the money doesn’t happen, particularly when if anyone complains they might disappear and the media will back up the powers that be.

I suspect that a lot of the Russian logistical support that they thought they had in terms of supplies and other things actually went into the back pockets of Putin and his allies and has gone there for years so now that they actually need these things they only exist on paper.

I suspect even Putin didn’t realize the full extent of it and nobody had the balls to tell him.

Given that more and more the media and tech are shielding Democrats here at home from this kind of thing don’t be surprised if this becomes the end result for us both in terms of Military and in terms of civilian infastructure. We’re becoming a big Chicago where it’s all graft all the time.

This is indeed Obama’s 3rd term.


A lot of people have forgotten this but remember when this war had not started yet the Biden administration was busy trying to get Ukraine to cede the territory that Russia wanted and was ready to fly out their president to a comfortable exile. It was as if the deal with the US was already made to Putin to take over.

The biggest surprise to everyone still remains that the Ukrainian President decided to fight rather than just take the money and run and it likely remains along with the attack of 9/11/01 the biggest single pivot point in world history in the 21st century.

As I recall at the time nobody called it and everyone expected him to die in Ukraine or in exile. His The fight is here; I need ammunition, not a ride,” is going rank in history with Churchill’s “We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender”


Of course the big thing is that while both Churchill and Zelensky stood for defending their country to the last the big difference is Churchill wasn’t a thief in charge of a kleptocracy and Zelensky is. A lot of people are going to get immensely rich off of Zelensky Ukraine being saved and he’s going to do pretty well himself. In that sense he is more comparable to Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand, prince de Bénévent the French Diplomat who managed to be a part of government from the French Monarchy to the revolution to Napoleon and back to Monarchy without losing his head or wealth or influence.

Of course to the Ukrainian people fighting for the survival of their country the whole question of graft if moot. Their primary goal is survival an victory and it it means a bunch of people and companies both foreign and domestic lining their pockets in the process they’re not going to care all that much as long as they win.


Elon Musk is getting a lot of pushback for his suggested settlement of the war:

If this was offered the 2nd week the west would have pushed Ukraine to sign on the dotted line and a lot of folks in Ukraine would have gone along, now with Russia in retreat the Ukrainians aren’t all that keen to give an inch, even with Putin mobilizing and rattling the nuclear cage.

Also the pool of graft money is smaller in peace than in war as rebuilding requires actual structures, you can’t claim to have shot away the concrete for a building.

I don’t blame the Ukrainians for balking but Petraeus not withstanding I’m not in favor of a nuclear war for the sake of Ukraine taking back those last two Russian occupied areas.

The real question mark here is Putin. Right now are the Russians willing or able to dump him and if so what replaces him? Does Putin go nuclear to win the war? Does Russia back up such an order? Does Putin make a deal and “declare victory”.

And what about the Russian people? Ukraine was historically part of Russia for a very long time and a lot of Russians likely backed the war seeing it restoring a part of Russia back to Russia but as soon as it proved to be not a romp but a disaster and a killing ground for their sons likely decided it wasn’t worth it, after all World War 2 was about survival, this is just about pride.

Frankly this would be the best time for Ukraine to make some kind of deal. They are more likely to get the max advantage without the threat of a nuclear war while the Russians are running scared then when the mobilization is complete and a weakened Putin is likely less of threat than an unknown successor.

In once sense the west already has more than it hoped for in terms of neutralizing the Russian military as a threat in the end those its Ukraine’s call as they bear the primary cost in lives and the primary risk of being nuked. My thought is if Ukrainian people want to fight on and bear the costs of it, it’s a just cause and it’s on them, but it’s their war not ours.