The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

In The Mailbox: 03.16.26

Posted on | March 17, 2026 | No Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho

On this day in 1984, Gary Plauche cured a pedophile (who had been abusing Gary’s son) with a single dose of leadicillin.
Silicon Valley et Hamas delenda sunt.

OVER THE TRANSOM
Director Blue: Micro-Targeting Iran’s Secret Police, The Day The Sky Exploded Over Tunguska (1908), Iran Defense Analysis – “The Math Says It’s Almost Over”, 
357 Magnum: 16 March 1984: The Moment Gary Plauche shot Jeff Doucet, and Don’t Bring a BB Gun to a Gunfight
EBL: Peace Proposal with Gayatollah Mojtaba Khamenei, Barramundi Fish, Tucker TACO Time, The Madison, and MAGA Ides of March
Twitchy: While Hollywood Congratulates Itself, Here’s A Song That Should Have Won An Oscar, Democrat Senator’s Term Limits Pledge Aged As Well As You’d Expect, and You Gonna Cry, Kinzinger?
Louder With Crowder: Gavin Newsom’s LA blew $20 million on shelter for 32 homeless people, and it’s not finished after FIVE years, Joy Reid Claims Women in America only have it slightly better than they do in Iran, Actress Patricia Arquette claims without evidence there’s totally an attack on the “trans” community, Grandmother spends 6-months in jail after AI wrongly identifies her for bank fraud in a state she’s never been to, and Criminal illegal immigrant shoves two Americans into subway tracks, now we’re finding out how many times he’s been deported
Vox Popoli: Wizards and Their Games, How Bad is the War Going? The Return of Appendix N, A True Soulsigma Fan, and Is Netanyahu Dead?
Cedar Sanderson: An Interview With FanFiction Readers, also, Coral Honeysuckle
The Bugscuffle Gazette: Self-Care
Upstream Reviews: Pearl of Fire
Draw & Talk Comics: Guess Who’s Back? Again?
Stoic Observations: The Irrationality of the Infinite, also, The Incubator Story

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Greatness: Las Vegas Cops Refuse to Release Violent Repeat Offender, Defying Judge’s Order, Obama’s Presidential Center Seeking 100 Unpaid Volunteers to Staff Lavish Facility, Bessent Says Treasury Department Shutting Down Sham Charities That Funnel Money to Hamas, N.C. Medicaid Scammers Sentenced to More than 14 Years in Prison For ‘Somali-Style fraud’ Scheme, and The Party That Forgot Its Base: How the GOP Has Failed White America (Part 1)
Animal Magnetism: Animal Magnetism LIVE Ep. 79 – Spreading Worries
BattleSwarm: Antifa Commies Convicted, Adobe Fined, CEO Steps Down, Stock Tanks. AI? and Motjaba: Dead, Or Just Gay?
Behind The Black: Continuing our tour of Uranus’ five biggest moons: Ariel, A new startup proposes a giant 88,000 satellite data center constellation, Astronomers discover a super-Earth-sized exoplanet covered by a molten ocean of lava, New telescope array in Chile is financed entirely by private funds, and Terran Orbital wins contract to build cubesat to go to Apophis with ESA’s Ramses probe
CDR Salamander: Russia’s Fifth Spring At War – On Midrats, also, A Mine Threat? Where Are The Minesweepers?
Don Surber: Democrats help Iran, 
Elizabeth Nickson: Without The SAVE Act, We’re Living In A Slave State
First Street Journal: You in a heap o’ trouble, boy, also, I check Bluesky so you don’t have to
Gates Of Vienna: Religions of Hate and Murder, Sharia in Germany: “It’s Not a Fringe Phenomenon”, Update on Synagogue Attacks in the Low Countries, and We Don’t Want the Führer! We Want the Ayatollah!
The Geller Report: Massive “MAKE IRAN GREAT AGAIN” Rally in NYC Backing Trump Administration’s Strikes on Iran, ENEMEDIA WANTS US TO LOSE, Israel Confirms That Michigan Jihad Attacker’s Brother Was Hezb’Allah Commander, Trump Vows to Secure Strait of Hormuz as Warships Deploy, Coalition Grows, and After Wave of Islamic Terror Attacks, Mayor Mamdani Decries Crisis of ‘Islamophobia’
Hollywood In Toto: Can Conan O’Brien Protect Hollywood from Itself? Original Highlander Is Still a Glorious Mess, SNL Mocks Tucker Carlson, Gets Pundit 100 Percent Wrong, Oscars 2026 Review: Resist, They Must, and Why Won’t Hollywood Rally Behind Ben Bankas?
Legal Insurrection: Fremont Jewelry Raid Shows How California’s ‘Reforms’ Empower Criminal Mobs, Replacing History With Wildlife – The Suicidal Insanity of Anti-Western Ideology, Women’s Basketball Team at Howard U. to Remain in Locker Room Rather Than Stand for National Anthem, Censored, Dismissed, Confirmed – History of Blood Clots & COVID Vaccine Debate, and ‘It’s Up to You’: Airlines Demand Congress Fully Fund DHS as Chaos Continues
Nebraska Energy Observer: Colonel Schlicter, Sunday Stiff, and From the Land of Muddy Waters
Outkick: Venezuela Rallies Past Undefeated Italy, Trump Congratulates ‘51st State’ On WBC Victory, NHL Commissioner Says Russia May Stay In Penalty Box For 2028 World Cup Of Hockey, Golden State Warriors Coach Steve Kerr Is Now An Oscar Winner, Yes, MLB is More Popular Than the NBA, and Olivia Dunne’s Patriotic Uniform Has America-Hating Libs Sobbing
Power Line: Judge overruled on 3rd-country deportations, Lessons of the Iran Conflict, How to Destroy a City, The Ehrlich bomb, and Congratulations Are In Order!
Racket News: The Swamp Log, Will Evicting Blackstone Help Young People Buy Homes?
Shark Tank: Osceola County Sheriff Blackmon Endorses Jay Collins For Governor
Shot In The Dark: Liberators
The Political Hat: Happy Pi Day, The Ides of March, and Leviathan’s App Store
This Ain’t Hell: Artillery Get Some, Send in the Marines, Money, Honey, Rescue Pilot Logs Record Helo Time, and Korean War vet Matt Clark dead. Oh, and Paul Ehrlich
Transterrestrial Musings: Brian Doherty, Understanding Space Policy, and 100 Years Of Liquid Rockets
Victory Girls: Hillary Won’t Leave Any Dime Unmolested, AZ Democrat Goes Creepy in Trying to Defend Males in Women’s Sports, and Donald Trump Is The Epicenter Of All U. S. Issues
Watts Up With That: New energy policies in California threaten America’s national security, Dramatic New Ice Core Evidence Shows Current Century Warming Common Throughout the Last 400,000 Years, Ed Miliband’s Wind Farms Could Cripple UK ‘Iron Dome’ Anti-Missile Systems, Storing Green Energy to Last Germany 10 Days Would Require A 60-Million Tonne Battery, and Where Do We Go From Here? Climate Science at a Crossroads – or perhaps Going Down the Drain?
The Federalist: Trump Admin Can’t ‘Make America Healthy Again’ Without Abortion Pill Restrictions, SCOTUS To Hear Arguments On Trump’s Bid To End Temporary Status For Foreign Nationals, Carolyn Bessette’s Love Story Wasn’t A Fairy Tale, But Pre-Internet Dating Looks Like One, No, Republicans Don’t Need To ‘Change’ The Senate Rules To Pass The SAVE America Act, and Democrats Spent Your Money ‘Queering The Maps,’ And They Want To Do It Again
Mark Steyn: Best Years of Her Life – Katharine Hepburn in The Philadelphia Story, “Lullaby of Broadway”, Up the Escalator, and May I Have the Envelope…?

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Category: Linkagery

Rule Five Sunday: Ersatz Gingermageddon

Posted on | March 16, 2026 | No Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Actually the best way to do this would be to have everyone supply links to toothsome redheads, but we have to work with what we’ve got. Thanks to @Rule5Texan for this one.
Ceterum autem censeo Silicon Valley et Hamas delendam sunt.

EBL: Saturday Night Girls With Guns, Sweet Potato Piper, Project Hail Mary, Juicy Chicken, Why Were Americans Slim In The 1970s? The Count of Monte Cristo, “Jezebel”, MAGA Womens Iranian Soccer Team, Hamnet, Mary Tyler Moore, and “Sunday Girl”

A VIEW FROM THE BEACH: Ari-Maj, MD Set to Set New Striper Regs, Fish Pic Friday – Ixia Miranda, Greed, I’ll Have the Meat Lovers with Added Pepperoni Thanks, The Wednesday Wetness, Cold Kills Menhaden Near Virginia Beach, MD Waterman Feels Betrayed by Gov. Moore, Tattoo Tuesday, Gone Fishin’, The Monday Morning Stimulus, Palm Sunday and MDE Investigator Pins Calvert Cliffs Fish Kill on Recreational Fishermen.

BACON TIME: Rule Five – Yes, I Will Have A Beer

Thanks to everyone for all the luscious links!

 

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Category: Rule 5

FMJRA 2.0: Holding Our Own

Posted on | March 16, 2026 | No Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Another 3-2 week for the Senators as we cling to second place in the Beta Division. We took two out of three at Fenway, losing only to Don Gullett as the Sox pounded poor Steve Renko for seven runs on their way to a 10-1 blowout win. Then it was off to Anaheim where the Angels scraped out a 2-1 win against Pat Dobson, only to fall 6-3 as we scored four runs off Tommy John and got two more off the Angels’ bullpen. So here we are at 60-64, nine games behind the Twins and five ahead of Pete’s Brewers, who we’ll face Tuesday before going to KC to take on the Royals. This could be the week we hit .500.

Ceterum autem censeo Silicon Valley et Hamas delendam sunt.
FMJRA 2.0: Better Than Expected
A View From The Beach
357 Magnum
EBL

Rule 5 Sunday: Because I Can
A View From The Beach
EBL

In The Mailbox: 03.09.26
A View From The Beach
357 Magnum
EBL

In The Mailbox: 03.10.26
A View From The Beach
357 Magnum
EBL

When the Jokes Just Write Themselves
A View From The Beach
357 Magnum
EBL

‘Thou Shalt Not Bear False Witness Against Thy Neighbour’ (Exodus 12:16)
357 Magnum
EBL

In The Mailbox: 03.12.26
A View From The Beach
357 Magnum
EBL

The Terrorist and the 12th District
357 Magnum
EBL
A View From The Beach

In The Mailbox: 03.13.26
357 Magnum
EBL
A View From The Beach

Thanks to everyone for all the links!

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Category: FMJRA Award

In The Mailbox: 03.13.26

Posted on | March 14, 2026 | No Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Usual weekend deadlines for the usual weekend posts.
EBL has been posting about seafood for a while so here’s an appropriate SOTD
Ceterum autem censeo Silicon Valley et Hamas delendam sunt.

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: All This “Clean Energy” Is Causing Environmental Harm, The Bride! – “All the subtly of a sledgehammer”, and Avoid Road Rage
Director Blue: Open Borders, Islam, & The End Game, A Day at The Battle of Hastings (1066), 
EBL: Japanese Oysters, Project Hail Mary, Islamic Terror Attacks, Atomic Rooster “Friday the 13th”, and Juicy Chicken
Twitchy: “This is a Case About Swinging D***s”,  Treason In Times Square? and Chuck Todd Finds Out The Hard Way That There Is Such A Thing As A Stupid Question
Louder With Crowder: Planned Parenthood’s desperate for cash after Trump cut their funding, “Serial upskirter” who filmed over 100 videos up girls’ skirts avoids prison time in Australia because he isn’t sure of his gender, Hidden Origins of Feminism – Socialists, Polygamists & Con Artists, Shrill Sen. Gillibrand breathlessly tries to bait General into blaming Pete Hegseth for Iranian schoolgirl deaths, and Joy Reid goes on bizarre rant blaming White people for why the Congo isn’t just like Wakanda
Vox Popoli: The USA Found Out, The Boots on the Ground Scenario, The German Meltdown, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb, and HOW TO SLAY A WIZARD
According To Hoyt: Yes, They Think We’re Stupid, Hold On, Hello, and In Theory
Cedar Sanderson: Read Aloud Early, Often, & Never Stop, also, The Case for Herbs
Stoic Observations: Circle Update, also, Make America GTA Again 
Upstream Reviews: Twelve Months

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Greatness: Bessent Says Treasury Department Shutting Down Sham Charities That Funnel Money to Hamas, American Crime Blotter – 3/13/26, Old Dominion Gunman Said ‘Allah Akbar’ as He Commenced Attack, Boomer Wisdom, and Volatile Loyalties
BattleSwarm: Iran Strikes (Day 12), Iran Strikes (Day 13), and LinkSwarm For March 13
Behind The Black: Miranda, the smallest of Uranus’ spherical moons, The new town of Starbase is canceling its May elections, A day-by-day description of the entire Artemis-2 manned mission, China to begin construction of its Mars sample return spacecraft, and German rocket startup Isar Aerospace wins launch contract from Astroscale
CDR Salamander: No, I’m Not Over What NAVSEA Did To The Constellation, Fullbore Friday
Da Tech Guy: Five Iran War Thoughts Under the Fedora
Don Surber: Military is winning in Iran so media spins a lobster tale, also, How do I define victory?
First Street Journal: Transgender-Affirming Specialist Ignores Reality
Gates Of Vienna: A Culture-Enriching Recidivist in Paris, The Moral Low Ground, Explosive Jew-Hatred in Liège, ISIS Attack at ODU, and Our Muslim Troubles – A Video Series, Part Seven
The Geller Report: Police Open Terror Investigation Into Overnight Fire Attack on Netherlands synagogue, As Domestic Terror Attacks Pile Up, Democrats Continue to Leave Homeland Security Un-Funded, Michigan Synagogue Terrorist Identified as Muslim Migrant from Lebanon, Jihadist at Old Dominion University Targeted Pamela Geller in 2016, and Iran’s Supreme Insult – Mojtaba Khameni, The Fraud of Succession
Hollywood In Toto: Late Night Hacks Buy Fake News Hook Line and Sinker, Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives Makes Murder Fun, Nick Offerman Calls Dennis Quaid ‘Crazy’ for Trump Support, Reminders of Him Has Perfect Secret Weapon, and Project Hail Mary Takes Aim at A.I. Slop & Sequelitis
Legal Insurrection: “We are calling on Gov. Hochul to change the program to forbid these schools from discriminating”, Trump says US “totally obliterated every MILITARY target in Iran’s crown jewel, Kharg Island”, Opposition to Epic Fury on Twitter/X Being Led by Non-American Accounts, 24 State AGs Target National Academies Over Alleged Climate Lawsuit Bias, and Cuba Confirms Regime has ‘Held Talks’ With Trump Admin
Nebraska Energy Observer: English Liberty, Lead, Follow, or Get out of the Way, and Amelia – Eagle
Outkick: America Remains Undefeated – USA Beats Canada In World Baseball Classic, Twisting The Knife: Florida Beat Kentucky Again, But Todd Golden Wanted To Run The Cats’ Out Of Nashville, Leafs Coach Calls Out Team For Lack Of Response From Dirty Hit On Auston Matthews, Back To Wood: Big 12 Pulls Plug On LED Court For Semifinals After Slipping And Injury Scares During Tournament, and Nancy Mace Is Boots On The Ground As War Rages, Cavinder Twins Double Team Lane Kiffin & Angel HATES Caitlin!
Power Line: Judge Boasberg Strikes Again, No More Churchill, No More Austen, One for you, nineteen for me, Americans Support the SAVE Act, and Not all in the family
Racket News: What Happens After You Decapitate The Kingpin?, 
Shark Tank: Volusia County Sheriff Chitwood Endorses Jay Collins For Governor
Shot In The Dark: Yep, I Did It, also, Technology
STUMP: Chicago Downgrade Watch – Reactions & Bond Pull, 
The Political Hat: Having To Choose Between The 2nd & 4th Amendments In Minnesota, also, Firing Line Friday: Prayer in the Public Schools
This Ain’t Hell: ODU ROTC Cadets Halt Attacker, Valor Friday, New Grenades, Aerial shooting, and ICE Needs Cars – Not really
Transterrestrial Musings: And Now For Something Completely Different
Victory Girls: Trump Voters Are Not Isolationists, Amanda Marcotte Thinks Parents Shouldn’t Have Rights, and Lindy West Thinks Polyamory Is A Feminist Construct
Watts Up With That: Inconvenient wind turbine facts, No, TIME, the Planet Isn’t ‘Heating Faster Than Ever’, Report Suggests Chinese Communist Party Using Nonprofit Networks to Attack American Energy, They’ve nearly given up on climate — plastics will be next, and Barclays Sounds the Alarm on Renewable Energy
The Federalist: SCOTUS Finally Cracks Down On The Schools Secretly Transing Kids, This Week’s Terror Attacks Prove Immigration Isn’t ‘Good’ Just Because It’s Legal, Passing SAVE Act Would Signal Congress Actually Answers To Voters, Which Is Why Congress Hates It, Hegseth Orders Task Force To Probe DEI Indoctrination At America’s War Colleges, and ‘Round River’ FBI Op Was A Deep State Conspiracy To Thwart Investigation Into Biden Family Corruption
Mark Steyn: Live Around the Planet – Day 12, Grand Prince of War, One Step At A Time, and The Ground We Surrendered

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Category: Linkagery

The Terrorist and the 12th District

Posted on | March 13, 2026 | No Comments

Two decades ago, the phrase “Dearbornistan” became common among conservative bloggers during the Global War on Terror, because of the notorious cluster of Islamic radicals in the Detroit surburb of Dearborn.

As soon as I heard about Thursday’s attack on a synagogue in West Bloomfield — before anything had been reported about the suspect’s identity — I checked to see how far the synagogue was from Dearborn. It’s about 20 miles, but the distance is a bit shorter to Dearborn Heights, which is six miles west of Dearborn itself. Both communities are part of Michigan’s 12th Congressional District, which sends Democratic “Squad” member Rep. Rashida Tlaib to Congress. She is despicable:

Rashida Tlaib is the least mediagenic of the three founding members of the Squad who entered Congress in 2019 (the others are Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar), but she is arguably the most venomous, and indeed, the most dangerous. On August 29 [2025], she spoke at the People’s Conference for Palestine in Detroit, and significantly enhanced the reputation she had already amassed for harsh, ugly rhetoric, strident hatred of Israel, and unashamed anti-Americanism. And so the inevitable question arises: what has happened to us as a nation that there are people of this perspective in Congress, and what kind of long-term damage might they do to the strength and unity of our nation?

The idea that this rabid fanatic was “praying” for members of the West Bloomfield synagogue is rather ludicrous, considering that it was one of her pro-Hezbollah constituents who committed the attack:

Armed FBI agents executed a search warrant at a home in Michigan overnight Thursday, believed to be in connection with the synagogue attacker who rammed a vehicle into a Jewish house of worship earlier in the day.
Video shows agents outside a brick home in Dearborn Heights, a city in Wayne County, using a long battering tool to break a front window before making entry. Law enforcement told WJBK/FOX 2 Detroit they were conducting a search warrant.
The raid came hours after a suspect rammed a vehicle into Temple Israel, a large Reform synagogue in West Bloomfield, around 12:20 p.m. local time.
The suspect, identified as Ayman Mohamad Ghazali, 41, allegedly rammed the synagogue and opened fire at security guards with a rifle, authorities said. Armed security returned fire and shot him dead.
During the incident, the vehicle caught fire, filling the building with smoke. All staff and 140 students were evacuated, FOX 2 Detroit reported. . . .
Multiple law enforcement sources and federal authorities said the suspect entered the United States as the spouse of a U.S. citizen roughly 15 years ago during the Obama administration and was granted citizenship in 2016.
Ghazali, born in Lebanon on Jan. 4, 1985, entered the U.S. through Detroit Metropolitan International Airport on May 10, 2011, on an IR1 immigrant visa, according to DHS.
He later applied for naturalization in October 2015 and was granted U.S. citizenship on Feb. 5, 2016.

Dead men tell no tales, but the motive is obvious:

A Lebanese official told The Associated Press that Ghazali recently lost four family members, his two brothers, a niece and a nephew, in an Israeli airstrike in Mashgharah, Lebanon, during the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. . . .
Sky News and NBC reported that Ghazali’s two brothers were members of Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed militant group.

Mashgharah is known as a Hezbollah stronghold in the Bekaa Valley region, and the question that must be asked is, why are we importing people from Lebanese terrorist strongholds? My guess: Democrats need foreign voters to elect scum like Rashida Tlaib to Congress.



 

Category: Islam, Michigan, Terrorism

In The Mailbox: 03.12.26

Posted on | March 13, 2026 | No Comments

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Call for Authors – Short Stories!
Silicon Valley et Hamas delenda sunt.

OVER THE TRANSOM
Director Blue: An Illustrated Guide to Drone Warfare
EBL: Abalone, Saint Matthew’s Passion, The Count of Monte Cristo, and Why were Americans slim in the 1970s?
Twitchy: Reporter Makes A Funny Out of Mamdani’s Wife Liking 10/7 Posts & Gets Dragged, The Spud Is Silent About CNN’s Media Malpractice, and Sen. Gillibrand Demands Sen. Tuberville Apologize for “Islamophobic” Post
Louder With Crowder: Foster children accidentally placed with trans serial killer, Woman Discusses Relationship With AI Octopus Boyfriend, With so many stabbings on London buses, government is calling for them to have “bleed kits” available, Now the Brits are warning parents that their kids’ artwork might be “Islamophobic”, and Chuck Schumer’s latest excuse against voter ID? It would allow ICE to block certain people from voting
Vox Popoli: Can’t Stop the Signal
Upstream Reviews: Tenure 4- Extracurricular Activities
Cedar Sanderson: Song for a Cracked Voice
The Abbey of Misrule: In the Desert of the Heart
Jim McCoy: Humanity Through Art – Why Civilization Depends On Stories
Ammo.com: Average Age of U.S. Mass Shooters

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
CDR Salamander: Orders, Duty, & the Ridgway Benchmark
Dana Loesch: The War For The Soul of the Right – Understanding Multipolarity
Don Surber: Ayatollah Press says Iran’s winning
Racket News: Jeffrey Sachs Is Trying to Fix The NYT Iran War Coverage One Email At A Time

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Category: Linkagery

‘Thou Shalt Not Bear False Witness Against Thy Neighbour’ (Exodus 12:16)

Posted on | March 12, 2026 | No Comments

Not every day I quote the King James Bible in a headline, but it seems that some people don’t understand why the Ninth Commandment is so important that God felt the need to include it in the Top Ten.

Making false accusations is both a sin and a crime, and it can also be a tort — libel or slander — although as a society we have allowed this sin to go unpunished so often that some people think they can get away with it. If you’re wondering about the mug shot at the top of this post, she once broke the Ninth Commandment without suffering any consequences, but then she later broke another commandment, and was sent to prison.

She walked out of the North Carolina Correctional Institution for Women last month, having served her time. When I saw the news of her release, I checked the calendar and discovered that tomorrow, March 13, is the 20th anniversary of a notorious event in North Carolina:

March 13, 2006, was a Monday night, and one might suppose that the Allure Escort Service in Durham, North Carolina, would have had many adult entertainers available for the occasion. For some reason that was never adequately explained, however, while the lacrosse team captains had reportedly requested white strippers, the two performers sent to 610 North Buchanan Boulevard were a 31-year-old mixed-race woman, Kim Roberts (half-black, half-Korean), and Ms. Mangum, a black woman who was then 27. This contributed a racial aspect to the subsequent controversy that had a magnetic effect in attracting national media attention. . . .

You can read the rest of my latest column at The American Spectator.



 

Category: American Spectator, Crime, Media Bias, North Carolina, Racism

When the Jokes Just Write Themselves

Posted on | March 11, 2026 | No Comments

Talk about an easy layup. That headline is such an invitation to sarcastic responses that I would be ashamed to make wisecracks. As is my habit when I encounter something like this, the first question that crossed my mind was, “Who is this person?” Immediately I turn to Google to try to get the writer’s biographical background to explain why someone would publish something so obnoxious. There isn’t much biographical material about Anniki Sommerville — she’s a middle-aged British woman mainly known as a podcaster. She first gained notice for a 2022 book, F*ck Nailing It: How to Ditch the Job You Hate and Find Work You Love, the cover blurb of which tells us, “From running a multi-million-pound company to becoming a freelancer and everything in between, Anniki Sommerville has learnt some valuable life lessons about what work means to her. She’s figured out that ‘nailing it’ is a one-way ticket to burnout and disillusionment, and instead found a more joyful path to contentment.” So there’s that, which doesn’t tell us much.

She evidently found a receptive audience for her message, and has kept cranking out content aimed at 40-ish women in need of this kind of girl-boss self-help stuff. It’s a crowded market, admittedly, as there are thousands of women trying to get rich selling their own varieties of the same basic product. Anyway, let’s dive into this mess:

Why so many women like me are giving up on men, and what we can do about it
“I just keep asking myself, ‘What’s the value of men?’” a friend says to me. She’s explaining how burnt out she feels by the sheer deluge of terrible news stories — men being the chief protagonists of the violence and chaos — while simultaneously dealing with her own imbalanced gender set-up at home; she is doing 95 per cent of the domestic load on top of working full-time, five days a week, with three children. I nod sympathetically. . . .

(Notice the connection, from “terrible news stories” about men engaged in “violence and chaos,” to the perennial complaint about hubby not doing his share of domestic chores. What does one have to do with the other, really? Never mind. She nods sympathetically.)

“I’m going to live in an all-female commune,” another friend announces as we walk her dog. “I just want to hang out with women, we can help one another and there will be none of this toxic masculinity sh*t to deal with”. I mull over the reality of commune-living (no privacy, group meals, arguing over who forgot to buy milk, and how long would all these women might spend in the bathroom…) But I do see her point.
Every woman I speak to is angry, much of this anger directed towards men. . . .

(Ever since Trump beat Hillary, really, and the fact that “this anger directed toward men” has leaped across the Atlantic is simply a function of the fact that the United States, with 330 million people, dominates the culture of the English-speaking world, so that the 70 million residents of the U.K. echo in their own quirky accents many of the same beliefs and attitudes that prevail in American media. “But I do see her point.”)

On social media, the algorithm sends me shocking facts about men (chiefly Epstein but for some reason also male serial killers?), and women then pulling these men apart. I follow one woman who remixes toxic masculinity content, and tears each comment down (it’s funny but I also feel my rage increasing).
“Don’t you think it’s strange that more men aren’t commenting on the Epstein thing?” one woman says in her reel. I think about it and agree. I mentioned it to a mum on the school run: “Well, they don’t care. It doesn’t impact them. I think a lot of men would do the same if they could get away with it.” I’m shocked and don’t agree, but it feels maddening that so many women are traumatised and men seem… so calm? . . .

(Lady, if you ever form a coherent thought, let me know, but in the meantime what part of “non sequitur” do I need to explain here? Jeffrey Epstein is dead. The doings of a degenerate finance mogul had zero direct impact on my life, and almost certainly had no impact on your life, so what is this “trauma” you claim to be experiencing? I’ve got enough hassle in my own life without worrying about who was or was not implicated in the Epstein scandal, and cannot for the life of me comprehend why anyone would expect me to care.)

Of course, these conversations aren’t new — I grew up with a feminist mum in the 70s and 80s telling my dad to pick up his socks and take out the rubbish. It’s also true that sometimes women are going to let off steam to their friends, but these conversations feel different. When we’re continually fed negative news stories about men, or another toxic wally on a podcast is talking about women “going back to traditional roles”, while we’re picking their pants up off the floor, we can start feeling like men are to blame for everything. . . .

(Again we’re back to the trivial domestic complaints. One minute she’s ranting about Epstein, the next paragraph it’s about picking up socks.)

It becomes easy to romanticise what life would be like if the domestic humdrum was equally shared, but we don’t want that to mean shutting men out entirely. Is it fair to amplify hate for our partners because of what is happening on the world stage – rather than them just forgetting to book parent’s evening? Perhaps the parents’ evening blunder isn’t related to all men being bad? (And this isn’t just mid-life women – a Vogue article titled “Is Having A Boyfriend Embarrassing Now?” has been going viral for months). . . .

(STOP LETTING MEDIA TELL YOU WHAT TO THINK! In my journalism career, one of the things I’ve learned is that you’re not contributing anything useful merely by following the herd and dogpiling on whatever Big Story that the major media insist everybody is supposed to care about. Does anyone need my opinion about Iran or Israel? Or should I weigh in on whatever controversy is going on in Congress? Tune out the noise and think for yourself. But here’s this lady who just had to throw in a reference to a women’s magazine article that’s “been going viral for months” to justify her jumbled-up emotional rant about How Awful Men Are, without realizing that her media consumption habits are a huge part of the problem.)

I spoke to Jennifer Cox, author and psychiatrist, about how many women are going off men. Is it just me and my friends? She explained how she’s seeing this disengagement amongst many of her therapy clients. “I’m increasingly struck by just how many of my patients are moving their emotional focus away from men. From the time of Trump resuming office [in 2024], there seems to have arrived a generalised loss of male-focused libido in women, which plays out across their decisions and choices, and spans age and background. The precise shape this radical decentering of men takes appears to differ according to life stage, but I can’t ignore the pattern”. . . .

(Again, it’s really about Trump, living rent-free inside the heads of all these women, not only in America, but worldwide.)

I asked [the psychiatrist Cox] why it was happening now. “It appears to have picked up pace in light of [numerous] abuses of power, from the Pelicot case to the Epstein files,” she says. “And it’s clear that social media is contributing to this sense of mistrust and suspicion.” While this is happening, men are also being targeted with ways to harness their masculinity in unhelpful and abusive methods that contribute to the cycle of hate and distrust. “Lost young men themselves are finding solace online among figures who in turn abuse their vulnerability,” she says. . . .

(So we’ve gone from Trump to social media and “the cycle of hate and distrust,” and the important thing — the message Cox and Sommerville are both selling to their audience — is that women are utterly blameless. Everything is men’s fault, and women never do anything wrong, and so the narrative is all about women as traumatized victims.)

Cox believes that one of the key reasons that we’re seeing the divide open up is because we’re not encouraged to spend time together beyond cultivating romantic and sexual partnerships: “Our society has never encouraged us to build intimacy between genders based on something deeper than sex. It’s as if the algorithm has learnt this, and is now feeding the fire for gender war. Women are suffering a group trauma, about which men are (ironically) feeling victimised. It’s a dangerous cycle. In order to unite against a rage-bait fracture, which benefits only toxic influencers and billionaires, we all need to work on our real-world inter-gender relationships.”
So that means less scrolling and more connection. I spoke to my partner about it recently, too, and asked how he feels about all this negative news about men. “I feel powerless, too. It’s terrible,” he said. “I have two daughters, and I want them to grow up in a world where they’re not terrified of men and learn that men they see online aren’t representative of all.” . . .

(Ooh! Sommerville “spoke to my partner about it recently” — the first disclosure that she actually is in some kind of relationship with a man. We’d like to know more about this guy. What kind of desperate masochist must he be? But I’ll leave aside the morbid curiosity, and get on with the fisking.)

Cox believes we need to go back to the drawing board if we want to avoid a continual cycle of anger. Her advice is simple. “If we’re going to beat this, men and women need to finally learn to — first and foremost — ‘just be friends.’” . . .

(No more fun of any kind!)

This takes work and isn’t an overnight solution. It doesn’t mean giving your partner an easy ride either (women definitely do more of the domestic load and this needs to stop or they will run off to communes in droves). However, for me this also means dialing down my social doomscrolling, finding positive male role models I can talk to my daughters about, and navigating certain news events so they don’t become the only stories we’re exposed to.
Also reminding men that they have to work to engender trust and connection (rather than immersing themselves in anti-women content). It’s true that I dislike Russell Brand just as much as the next woman… but there are also plenty of examples of positive masculinity out there. We just need to talk about them more, perhaps.
And going back to Cox’s advice, this is a time when we need to connect more – not less. The scrolling doesn’t help – we’re often only seeing evidence that confirms our worst fears around certain types of men. Oh, and maybe watching more Will Ferrell content? He recently did a speech where he recommended women take over the world for a bit.
“I don’t know what else to do,” he said at the Women In Entertainment Gala, “We’ve been running the show since, what, 10,000 BC, something like that, and we’re not doing so good.” It was met with laughter. But also hit a nerve.

THE END! That’s her walk-off — a Will Ferrell joke, told at the “Women In Entertainment Gala,” an event I never heard of until now, but which was sponsored by The Hollywood Reporter (THR). The magazine is owned by the Penske Media conglomerate, which also owns Variety, Rolling Stone, Billboard and other publications. Penske Media was founded by Jay Penske, heir to a fortune founded by his famous auto-racing father, Roger Penske. No word on whether Jay Penske has been reminded of his need “to work to engender trust and connection,” or what he thought about Will Ferrell’s joke. But I’d bet a million dollars that Anniki Sommerville never once thought about what it is Jay Penske or his father do that has made them so rich, and why there would be no “Women In Entertainment Gala” if Jay Penske wasn’t footing the bill.

Success is not distributed randomly, and men of value — as Roger Penske certainly is, and as his son also appears to be — deserve more recognition than they get. The thought occurs to me, also, that Jeffrey Epstein must have had some basic merit to have acquired so much wealth and influence, even though his remarkable ascent in the world of finance appears rather mysterious. Is it possible to find something of Greek tragedy in Epstein’s disgrace and death? I don’t know, because I’m not one of those people who’ve been obsessed with the Epstein saga (as Anniki Sommerville and her friends seem to be), but my point is that a lot of feminist complaints are rooted in an ignorance of, and an indifference toward, the value of work that men actually do.

The work I’ve actually done this morning is fisking Anniki Sommerville’s absurd column about women “giving up on men,” and I don’t expect any particular reward for this work, but undertook the task because it seemed necessary. These feminist bitches ought to be grateful for my work, but they’re not, and that’s really the whole point, isn’t it?



 

Category: Sex Trouble
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