As some of you might know my wife because of a back/hip issue has to sleep on a recliner in the den as we don’t have a hospital bed which is why I sleep on the couch in the den because I didn’t get married to sleep apart from my wife.
Today I woke up to the overwhelming smell of pot in the house. This is a very strange thing because nobody who lives here or has lived here uses and all the doors and windows are closed with it being 30 degrees outside.
It is the nature of things to change and also the nature of people who are 60+ to note how much better the “old days” were.
I’m sure if it was 150 years ago Fitchburg would have smelt of horses and if it was 100 years ago Fitchburg would have smelt of factory smoke and burning coal and 40 years ago depending on which way the wind blew Fitchburg smelt of the waste water treatment plant.
But right now there are parts of Fitchburg that smell like pot and this morning anyways the smell was so bad it got into my house.
I plan to die here in the city I was born in and that my parents were born and died in. This is my home. I understand that in hundreds of ways my life is much easier than it was for my folks and even than the me of 30 years ago.
But at the risk of sounding like a sixty year old man, let me say this: I miss normal, normal was good, I miss sanity, sanity was good and I miss the post world war 2 years of my youth when America was great and was not shy about it’s greatness.
And the only reason why some of you reading this do not is because you didn’t have the joy of living through those years made possible by folks like my dad.
And it’s not because my parents generation who fought world war two were the greatest generation, they would point to their own folks as better than them. It’s just that the generations that have followed have sucked royally.
Decline is a choice and we’ve chosen it, and the more fool us.
The speed of cultural change in this country amazes me. A recently as 5-10 years ago and definitely 20 years ago a military operation that successfully recused civilians taken hostage unharmed that took only one casualty slightly wounded and killed multiple terrorists in the process would be universally hailed by both sides of the political aisle and lionized by the press.
Instead it has at best been ignored and at worst attacked by sitting members of congress as a “massacre”.
There have been quite a few national disgraces over the last few years. This is one of them.
Rand Paul did something yesterday that we don’t see much of. An old fashioned filibuster of the Ukraine Bill where people actually hold the floor and talk.
While I concede that the current cloister rules are what allowed the chances at SCOTUS which finally doomed Roe I approve of both the Filibuster and Paul’s use of it here and would bring it back if I could, HOWEVER I’d only approve of the real thing.
You see for the last few decades rather than actually holding the floor and making the face a filibuster was considered as read if enough senators indicated they were behind it. I’ve always felt that was lazy. If a bill is worth filibustering it’s worth doing it for real.
Because of a previous vote Paul’s filibuster is limited but he’s playing out the string like Jackie Robinson remaining on the field watching Bobby Thompson circling the based ready to protest if he missed any of them on his way around them in the excitement of the moment.
Agree or disagree on various issues he’s a man of principle. We need more of them in congress.
The difference between a good player and a great player is how they perform when the chips are down.
While Tom Brady will always have the edge on Patrick Mahomes because of their head to head record in the playoffs (favoring Brady 2-0) Mahomes with his 3rd Superbowl win proves he belongs in the GOAT conversation not just by the victory. But by the fact that TWICE in the same game he lead his team down the field to score the tying or winning points where failure would have meant defeat and did so with less than 30 seconds on the clock.
A lot of stat guys are not believers in “Clutch” performers. Mahomes as well as Brady proves such an assertion is nonsense. Having Mahomes follow Brady It’s like watching DiMaggio come after Ruth or Mantle after DiMaggio.
Oh and full marks to Brock Purdy the idea that a Mr. Irrelevant forced Mahomes in a situation where he had to do that is astounding
Law Professor Glenn Reynolds, the Blogfather has been worth reading for 23 years and if I actually had a bucket list lunch with him would be on it.
At substack yesterday he posted one of the best assessment of Joe Biden’s current situation that I’ve read. That something Reynolds has written is good is a given, but this is SO far above even his standard that you must read it. There are two bits that jump out at me:
As Time magazine reported shortly after the 2020 election, a “cabal” — Time’s word — of “left-wing activists and business titans” worked to get rid of Trump. It pushed mail-in voting. It moved to block election fraud suits brought by Trump and supporters. It employed social media censorship to mute pro-Trump arguments and amplify anti-Trump arguments. It sponsored protests.
Time called this a “conspiracy to save the election,” but in truth it was a conspiracy to save the election for the Democrats. The consequences in terms of lost faith in democracy have been severe, but the worst effect is that the winning ticket was never seriously vetted by the media or the campaign process.
As one of those who was muted by twitter and is still muted by Youtube for this reason that really strikes home. The second:
After noting the Democrats desperate to replace him he makes what I think is THE critical point:
But whatever the Democrats do about 2024, I would like to see some accountability for the election of 2020. A cabal of insiders colluded to control the outcome, through all sorts of underhanded tactics. (Tech companies censored the Hunter Biden laptop story broken by The Post, and retired intelligence officials falsely claimed it was fake, Russian disinformation). The press allowed Biden to campaign from his basement, covering up the truth that he was already unfit for office.
Now we’re in a pickle. Whatever happens in this election, I would like to see some consequences for the games played with our democracy in 2020. Elections belong to the voters, not the insiders. Or at least they should.
To get that point across, we’re going to have to impose some costs on the folks who rigged the last one.
This states a basic truth that blue cities that were once the envy of the world and are now lawless places where police can be assaulted with impunity, where open air drug markets reign and business have fled. There have been people trying to steal elections for as long as there have been elections just has there have been thugs, drug deals and thieves in all of human history. They only get away with it when those whose job it is to stop them turn a blind eye for their own purposes and let them do it.
Unless there are consequences for these actions both for those who did it and those who allowed it, it will happen again until the people finally say ENOUGH!
I suspect if it reaches that point, ENOUGH will not be conveyed via an excellent essay on substack.
Finally as you might recall the WQPH 1st Annual Shrove Tuesday Brunch is scheduled to begin at 10:30 AM at Slattery’s Restaurant in Fitchburg. There have been a lot of small coincidences that have taken place to retard this event that seemed to be overcome. About 48 hours ago it appeared there was one that would not be, the projected storm that closed my place of work today with the potential of 13″ of snow falling fast right at the travel time. The restaurant mindful of the storm and scheduled to be closed on monday gave us till 4 PM on Sunday to cancel or reschedule. After discussion with the head of WQPH we decided to go ahead even if it meant half or less would show but dreaded that is was the wrong one. Yesterday I came home from Eucharist Adoration (cancelled today because of the potential storm) to a phone message from the owner who was there because of a funeral luncheon asking for one more confirmation one way or the other.
I called the head of the station again, our speaker coming down from NH and bringing a relic of the Crown of thorns was determined to come and give his talk on the feast of the Holy Face of Jesus. It was at this time I remembered General Patton’s famous weather prayer written by Fr James H. O’Neill a Catholic priest. I tweaked it and tweeted it out while sending a copy to the head of the station who email blasted it out to her prayer group. It reads:
“Almighty and most merciful Father, we humbly beseech Thee, of Thy great goodness, to restrain the immoderate weather due tomorrow with which we have to contend. Grant us fair weather for Spiritual Battle. Graciously hearken to us as soldiers who call upon Thee that, armed with Thy power, we may advance from victory to victory, and crush the oppression and wickedness of our enemies and establish Thy justice among men and nations.
We ask this through Christ our Lord Amen”
As of this moment (4:47 AM woke up coughing) the snow that two days ago was predicted to start at 1 AM and end at 3 PM has not yet started (although it’s predicted to do so shortly and is now scheduled to end at 1 PM with an 80% chance of 1-3″ in my area, a walk in the park for any New Englander.
The Biden admin not withstanding this is still a free country and if you wish to believe this is a coincidence you are welcome to do so. If you don’t and are one of the folks who prayed that prayer at our request, thanks much for making the prayer and thanks to he who answered it.
German Woman talk show host:Mr. Williams, why do you think there is not much comedy in Germany?
Robin Williams:Did you ever think you killed all the funny people?
Today at Don Surber’s site he celebrates the contributions of various ethnic groups, starting with Blacks as it’s black history month and ending with the WASPS who founded this country making all those other contributions to America possible. He notes many people who might have been forgotten a few I had never heard of and in going through the list he has this section about Jewish Americans:
As for Jews, I can go on all day about them. They gave the country physicists, Irving Berlin and a host of comedians. Jews invented Hollywood by founding Columbia, Fox, Paramount, Universal and MGM. Even the Warner Brothers were Jewish. Could we kindly stop the anti-Semitism already?
Emphasis mine
That reminded me of this Dave Chappelle bit on Kanye & Jews:
Now the hesitancy to talk about Jews in Hollywood/Entertainment or bring it up is something I’ve never understood. When various ethnic groups come to a country and start a business you will see family coming over and joining in. There is a reason why so many pizza places were run by Italians.
If people start a business, especially people outside the dominant culture they tend to hire family and people from their same ethnic group, additionally people who come to a country looking for work tend to check first within their ethnic group, same culture, same language and once they assimilate they and/or their children & grandchildren branch out.
So see a lot of XXX and sons, but you very rarely see XXX and grandsons because by the time you reach that generation the kids are Americanized and go their own way.
So Thomas Edison not withstanding if Jews went all in on entertainment, if Jews founded Columbia, Fox, Paramount, Universal MGM and Warner Brothers why should anyone be surprised if.
They tended to hire a lot of Jews when they started.
A lot of Jews tended to gravitate to the entertainment business
And a ton of Jews are still in the business today.
This makes sense particularly if you consider that Jews historically have not been particularly loved or treated well through history. Why wouldn’t you get involved in an industry that is:
Profitable
Secure (meaning that it won’t disappear)
Has influence
And gives you the change to put the Jewish point of view out there
Alas because some were far leftists you had a leftist point of view pushed too but I digress.
Bottom line I’m not about to get my knickers in a twist because ethnic Jews took the risk to get into the ground floor of the entertainment business which provides comfort and joy to people all over the world and still reaping the rewards of that risk. If you have a problem with that then that’s your problem.
But neither am I going to deny that’s the case because people might feel upset about it being said openly. Frankly I think the reaction of of a Jewish person to the “Jews run Hollywood” business should be: ”Yeah Jews are big in Hollywood and I’m damn proud of it!”
It’s not a conspiracy, it’s just the way things went naturally.
I’ll leave you with the Robin Williams joke I started with, he delivers it better than I write it.
With massive layoffs not only at the Post, which is owned by Jeff Bezos, but also the Los Angeles Times–and with Sports Illustrated being probably as dead as the Detroit Lions’ Super Bowl dreams–the answer may be a loud “Yes.”
Meanwhile, in Democrat-controlled Illinois, the Illinois Local Journalism Task Force, created by legislation in 2021, is betting on the dinosaurs, that is, traditional media. Last week, the task force issued its recommendations for journalism in the Prairie State.
“Its proposals are mostly about getting taxpayers to pony up and putting government in control,” Mark Glennon says in Wirepoints, “[with] no mention of journalism’s own failures.”
Indeed, there are many failures. The glaringly obvious one–unless you work in mainstream media–is that journalists are pushing a narrative to score love from the 20 percent of the population who are far-leftists. Even in Illinois, a blue state, there are not many ultra lefties–they might make up 25 percent of the populace here.
Among the recommendations from the tax force include a whole slew of tax credits for local news sources, including for subscriptions, businesses who advertise with them, as well as for local news providers hiring reporters.
Every one of the recommendations from the task force are wretched ideas that I could eviscerate easily one by one, but to save time, I’ll move on. But not yet. Besides these tax credits, the task force recommends exempting local news sources from Illinois’ corporate income tax.
Some states have no corporate income tax.
News should be a mass market product, not a niche offering, but the liberals in charge have turned it into that. Again, I’ll be brief. Most Americans–and yes, most Illinoisans–believe there are only two genders, and most had doubts about the COVID propaganda of 2020-21. And most of them are fed up with the lamestream media minimizing the ongoing crisis with rampant crime.
Yeah, I get it, the internet has hurt local news providers. But they didn’t adapt. The same with Big News.
Let’s talk about extinction events. Real ones. Extinction is usually portrayed as mass death, yet it’s also a mass life event.
Following the Permian-Triassic mass extinction, the lystrosaurus, a runt buck-toothed freak reptile, thrived, along with many other emergent species. Soon, geologically speaking that is, came the dinosaurs. After the Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event, different small animals, mammals and birds among them–as well as fungus–prospered.
There’s never been more media–or more information–than there is now. Print newspapers are sometimes called dinosaur media. I believe they should always be named as such. Among the new media are of course blogs such as this one, YouTube and Rumble video channels, streaming services, podcasts, and so much more. A consumer of information is now faced with a daunting challenge. Because finding enough time to sift through all of the choices–let alone absorb all of them–is impossible.
Last Thursday, Chicago Tribune reporters held a one-day strike against its owner, Alden Capital, a hedge fund firm. “We often say, ‘Newspapers are not dying, they’re being killed,'” Gregory Pratt, a committed left-wing Trib journalist, told WGN-TV.
Wrong, Pratt. Newspapers are being killed because journalists are emitting an unpopular product and looking down on their customers.
Let’s return to the Illinois Local Journalism Task Force.
In its rancid report there is a map of Illinois. Counties with few media choices are marked in that map in different shades of red. One of those is McHenry, which is northwest of Chicago. I know of two great news sites reporting about McHenry County: Cal Skinner’s McHenry County Blog and the Lake and McHenry County Scanner–a suburban answer to the phenomenally successful CWB Chicago. I’m certain that the task force didn’t include these sites in their elitist media tally.
Another fabulous Illinois news source is the aforementioned Wirepoints.
Big creatures usually don’t survive natural mass extinction events. Small ones, nimble animals, find opportunities in an altered world.
Remember, lystrosaurus made way for larger and grander beasts, such as the Tyrannosaurus rex. Today’s blog may become tomorrow’s News Corp–the parent company of Fox News, Dow Jones, HarperCollins, and so many more.
Humans will always crave information–it’s in our DNA–it is just a matter of how it’s delivered to us. We’ve come a very long away from when the evening news was a caveman squatting in front of a bonfire telling whoever was sitting in front of him how that day’s hunt went. If that prehistoric anchorman delivered fake news–“I killed six mammoths today with my bare hands!”–his audience simply walked away. Kind of like what consumers of Big News are doing now.
The dinosaur media–and the Illinois Journalism Task Force–doesn’t get it.
John Ruberry blogs regularly from the Chicago area atMarathon Pundit.
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