The Other McCain

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

Rule 5 Sunday: Alla Kostromichova

Posted on | March 20, 2022 | Comments Off on Rule 5 Sunday: Alla Kostromichova

— compiled by Wombat-socho

By popular demand, Ukrainian supermodel Alla Kostromichova, who has worked with a buttload of top fashion designers. Originally born in Sevastopol, she now resides in Kyiv, although I suspect that particular datum needs to be updated.
Ceterum autem censeo Silicon Valley esse delendam.

Tangled up in blue?

Ninety Miles From Tyranny: Hot Pick of the Late Night, The 90 Miles Mystery Box Episode #1659, Morning Mistress, and Girls With Guns. 

Animal Magnetism: Rule Five Switchblades Friday, and the Saturday Gingermageddon

EBL: Save Ukrainian Refugee Women!, We Crashed, Shirley Bassey, St. Paddy’s Day Lushes, Lea Seydoux, WAGs of Caesar, Dinah Shore, and Winning Time

A View From The Beach: Angelina Boyko, Fish Pic Friday – Cassandra Dickson, Politics On St. Paddy’s Day?, Tattoo Thursday, A Deposit for a Cup of Coffee?, Some Wednesday Wetness, Giselle’s Husband Headed Back to Work, Headspin, The Monday Morning Stimulus and Palm Sunday

Thanks to everyone for the luscious links!

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Category: Rule 5

Can You Say ‘Hate Hoax,’ Boys and Girls?

Posted on | March 20, 2022 | Comments Off on Can You Say ‘Hate Hoax,’ Boys and Girls?

Nothing suspicious about this at all:

One by one, student leaders representing several historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) across the country described to the House Committee on Oversight and Reform on Thursday their anguish over the recent racially charged threats their educational institutions had faced, while emphasizing their resolve to move forward. . . .
On Jan. 31 and again on Feb. 1, at the beginning of Black History Month, 24 HBCUs received threats that bombs were going to explode on their campuses. Since the beginning of the year, at least 36 HBCUs have received 54 such threats. Morehouse College in Atlanta received a bomb threat on Tuesday, prompting students to shelter in place. These threats have been made, officials told the committee, through phone calls, emails, instant messages and online posts.

Don’t worry, the FBI is investigating:

More than a third of America’s 101 historically Black colleges and universities have been targeted by calls or emails threatening to set off bombs on their campuses since early January, with the vast majority arriving during the celebration of Black History Month in February. The threats are being investigated as hate crimes.
At a congressional hearing Thursday, federal law enforcement agencies said they are working aggressively to make arrests in the 59 cases, calling the case their “highest priority.” All six suspects are juveniles, according to the FBI.
Ryan Young, executive assistant director of the FBI intelligence branch, said investigators have identified “one person and a small group,” although some of the threats may have been copycat crimes.
“Our intention is to bring these individuals to justice,” Young told the House Oversight Committee.

Notice that his testimony said nothing about the identity or motives of the suspects — were they white, black, Chinese? wearing MAGA hats? — and because they are juveniles, it is likely that we will never see the mugshots of these young Jussie Smollett imitators.

But these likely hoaxes have served their purpose, giving Democrats an excuse to hold congressional hearings about “hate crimes.”




 

Category: Crime, Racism

The Jan. 6 Witch Hunt Committee

Posted on | March 20, 2022 | Comments Off on The Jan. 6 Witch Hunt Committee

Tristan Justice at The Federalist calls attention to a Washington Post article which admits that the committee “investigating” the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot is not actually an investigation, but is instead “a key part of the Democrats midterm strategy.” Because some of my acquaintances have been targets of this witch hunt, I can vouch for one main point that Tristan Justice is making, namely that the committee is pursuing “severe retribution against those involved with a constitutionally protected rally” — i.e., the “Stop the Steal” rally at the Ellipse, in front of the White House, which is nearly 2 miles from the Capitol — “as opposed to perpetrators of the Capitol riot.”

In addition to this dishonest conflation of the legal, peaceful “Stop the Steal” rally with the riot at the Capitol, the Jan. 6 witch hunt committee is an effort to smear everybody who thinks the 2020 election wasn’t on the up-and-up as a dangerous menace — a threat to “Our Democracy.”

In a larger sense, what the Jan. 6 witch hunt is about is making Donald Trump an issue in the midterms, to distract from the glaring failures of the Biden administration by ginning up fear and hatred to motivate Democratic voters still afflicted with Trump Derangement Syndrome. The committee has kept up the scare by feeding leaks to the media, giving MSNBC and CNN an excuse to run stories about who has been subpoenaed, and various tidbits of who said what to who on the day of the riot, as if these details add anything useful to our understanding of what happened that day. There is no actual evidence that the organizers of the “Stop the Steal” rally were in cahoots with the separate group of people who breached security at the Capitol; there are no allegations of criminal activity by the rally organizers, yet they have had their phone records seized as part of the committee’s “investigation.”

Intelligent and honest people can see this witch hunt for what it is, but there are enough stupid and dishonest people out there to create an audience for the Democrats’ midterm message, which the media will amplify as loudly as possible in the lead-up to the November elections.




 

Category: Congress, Democrats

FMJRA 2.0: “Don’t Know What I’m Gonna Do”

Posted on | March 19, 2022 | Comments Off on FMJRA 2.0: “Don’t Know What I’m Gonna Do”

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Well, as the season comes to a close, the Senators are going out with a bang. We beat Pete’s division-leading Pilots two games out of three, and then split two games against the Minnesota MoanersTwins. Already starting to think about which players I’ll need to protect from the expansion draft, and who I’ll want to pick up from the available 1970 players, which is going to be a tougher task this time around since we’re adding four expansion teams.
Silicon Valley delenda est.

Sunny skies and cheerful music waft over RFK again this week.

‘Simply Not True’
Bacon Time
The Political Hat
Gregor Mendel Blog
Proof Positive
EBL

Rule 5 Sunday: “Violent” 2D Girls
Animal Magnetism
Ninety Miles From Tyranny
A View From The Beach
EBL
Proof Positive

FMJRA 2.0: Jump
A View From The Beach
EBL

The Internet Is Making Kids Crazy
357 Magnum
EBL

The Arithmetic of ‘Equality’
A View From The Beach
357 Magnum
EBL

In The Mailbox: 03.14.22
A View From The Beach
357 Magnum
EBL
Proof Positive

Climate Change ‘Science’ = Propaganda
357 Magnum
EBL

Probably Not a Trump Supporter
357 Magnum
EBL

In The Mailbox: 03.15.22
A View From The Beach
357 Magnum
EBL
Proof Positive

Crazy People Are Dangerous
First Street Journal
EBL

Ukraine: Yet Another Russian General Killed as Invasion Week Three Concludes
EBL

In The Mailbox: 03.16.22
A View From The Beach
357 Magnum
EBL
Proof Positive

What Is Joe Trying to Tell Us?
EBL

Serial Inseminator Update
Proof Positive
EBL

A Few Words About ‘Russian Intelligence’
A View From The Beach
357 Magnum
EBL

In The Mailbox: 03.18.22 (Afternoon Edition)
357 Magnum
EBL
Proof Positive

Aspiring Rapper Update
357 Magnum
EBL

Policy Goal: Avoid World War III
357 Magnum
EBL

In The Mailbox: 03.18.22 (Evening Edition)
357 Magnum
A View From The Beach
EBL
Proof Positive

Top linkers for the week ending March 18:

  1.  EBL (18)
  2.  357 Magnum (12)
  3. (tied) A View From The Beach and Proof Positive (8)

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Category: FMJRA Award

‘Well, Those Ukraine Girls Really Knock Me Out, They Leave the West Behind’

Posted on | March 19, 2022 | Comments Off on ‘Well, Those Ukraine Girls Really Knock Me Out, They Leave the West Behind’

In 2018, Veronika Didusenko was crowned as Miss Ukraine, but four days later, she was stripped of her title when pageant officials discovered that she was divorced and had a young child. More recently, she was forced to flee Kyiv after the Russians invaded Ukraine.

Permit me to reiterate my longstanding “Don’t Deport the Hotties” exemption to my otherwise xenophobic immigration policy, i.e., that the United States should always welcome beauty pageant winners, international supermodels, and other extraordinarily attractive women. Whatever other goals our immigration policy seeks to achieve, there is no reason why America shouldn’t maximize our share of the world’s pulchritude by granting green cards to good-looking women.

While I can’t say that Donald Trump has officially endorsed my position on this issue, his choice of Slovenian supermodel Melania suggests his general sympathy for the plight of foreign-born beauties desiring to, uh, bring their tempest-tossed selves through the golden door.

Trivia time! Perhaps you didn’t know that Paul McCartney first began writing “Back in the U.S.S.R” as a spoof of Chuck Berry’s “Back in the USA,” but during a chance encounter with Mike Love of the Beach Boys (while they were meeting up with the Maharishi in 1968), Love suggested the idea of a “California Girls”-type theme for the bridge, and thus inspired the famous lyrics:

Well, those Ukraine girls really knock me out,
They leave the West behind.
And Moscow girls make me sing and shout
That Georgia’s always on my my-my-my-my-mind.

During the recording of “Back in the U.S.S.R,” Paul was trying to tell Ringo Starr what drum part he wanted him to play, which annoyed the drummer enough that he walked out of the session, planning to quit the band. Paul then took over on drums, with John Lennon switching to bass guitar while they laid down the basic track, and then they overdubbed everything — Ringo isn’t on the record at all!




 

Category: Immigration, Rule 5, Ukraine

Is Ace of Spades ‘Cruel’?

Posted on | March 19, 2022 | Comments Off on Is Ace of Spades ‘Cruel’?

Who was it that first described Ace of Spades as an ewok? I don’t know, but it stuck, because he was bearded and bespectacled and cuddly. Maybe since he’s started working out — GAINZZ! — Ace is less ewok-like than he used to be, but was it fair for Victor Davis Hanson to call him “cruel”?

That clip is from a Ricochet members-only podcast hosted by former National Review publisher Jack Fowler, and it will probably impress the VDH fanboys (of which Smitty is one) that he endorses Ace, despite his cruelty and “eccentricities,” but I would be more impressed if Ace endorsed VDH. Basically, Ace is the reason I started blogging. Back when I had been trapped at my desk at the Washington Times for a decade (and slowly losing my mind because of it), the spectacle of Ace having fun over there at AOSHQ was very tempting. “I could be doing that,” I said, with zero comprehension of the difficulty involved in (a) consistently cranking out content and (b) trying to monetize such mischief.

The backstory of how Ace became Ace is rather interesting. He has a law degree from a reputable university and had been working as a lawyer before developing anxiety issues that made it impossible for him to keep doing that, and then started blogging as a hobby while recovering, but then had such success as a blogger that his “recovery” became more or less moot. I first met Ace in the smoking area outside CPAC 2006. As I recall, he was smoking Lucky Strikes, and I had no idea who he was at first, but when I learned his identity, I had difficulty reconciling this soft-spoken, mild-mannered guy with the wild man character he inhabits on his blog. Ace was one of the big “gets” for the guest list (along with Andrew Breitbart and Mary Katherine Ham) at the now-legendary CPAC 2008 party that Matt Vadum and I hosted in a suite at the Omni Shoreham Hotel. Pretty sure that was the occasion where Dave Reaboi first met Ace, who doesn’t socialize very often.

Ace, along with Instapundit, is one of the Old School bloggers from back in the day before social media (especially Twitter) and corporate money overtook the amateur individualism of the political blogosphere as it developed in the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks. Back in the Dubya era, the main thing was protecting the Bush administration and its War on Terror against the subversive forces of left-wing “moonbats.” Ace remembers all that, and one of his frequent digs at the #NeverTrump types (besides their notorious enjoyment of kinky “cuckolding” scenes) is that they seem to think it’s still 2003. The voices of the GOP Establishment — the kind of people who have actual jobs in think tanks, or as campaign consultants — are stuck in the past, and fail to understand exactly how the political landscape has changed in the post-Obama era.

As much as anyone might be nostalgic for the Good Ol’ Days — Dubya in the White House, Denny Hastert as House Speaker, Bill Frist as Senate Majority Leader, “shock and awe” in Baghdad, etc. — that era is over, and conservatives must either adapt or become extinct. Say whatever you will about Trump, his presidency at least represented a departure from the stale formulas of Bushism, which is the status quo ante to which the #NeverTrump crowd dreams of returning, like 19th-century French royalists dreaming of a return of the Bourbon dynasty.

If Ace is “cruel” to these people, they certainly deserve the cruelty. Their nostalgia for the post-9/11 heyday of Bushism is misguided, and so intertwined with their careerist ambitions — their desire to be influential in the circles of powers, perhaps as Assistant Deputy Secretaries in a future GOP administration — as to render their bona fides suspect. But their biggest problem is that they are simply wrong, both in policy and politics. Not only did their policy preferences lead to the debacles of 2006-2008, but they have all the wrong instincts as to what is needed for the GOP to recapture its lost dominance. The #NeverTrump crowd wants to be respectable, to eschew the populism that enabled Trump to win in 2016, and if we heed their advice we’ll be back to losing again with a Mitt Romney-style nothingburger of vaguely patriotic Corporate Moderation.

Anyway, getting a shout-out from VDH is the kind of recognition Ace ought to get more of, and would get more of if he weren’t so reclusive. Back when we were all being targeted by Brett Kimberlin’s lawfare, Kimberlin made an effort to “unmask” Ace, which effort thankfully failed. The guy values his privacy because it would be impossible for him to be fully “in character” (like a Method actor) if he had to worry about a left-wing mob of chanting protesters showing up at his palatial seaside home in the Hamptons and trashing his Lamborghini.

Wait — what?

Some of you may doubt that Ace is living the Lamborghini lifestyle, with a crew of servants in his beachfront mansion, but on the other hand, you can’t prove that he has not become a multimillionaire from this lucrative blogging racket. His identity and whereabouts are unknown, after all, so he is shrouded in such mystery that VDH must say “whoever Ace is.”

Just keep an eye out for an ewok-looking guy, Professor Hanson.




 

Category: Ace of Spades, Intellectuals

In The Mailbox: 03.18.22 (Evening Edition)

Posted on | March 19, 2022 | Comments Off on In The Mailbox: 03.18.22 (Evening Edition)

— compiled by Wombat-socho

Ceterum autem censeo Silicon Valley esse delendam.

Clearly.

OVER THE TRANSOM
357 Magnum: How Is That Bail Reform Working Out?
EBL: Are The Seahawks Really Serious About Colin Kaepernick?
Twitchy: Glenn Greenwald Schools Occasional Cortex On Her Deep Thoughts Regarding The First Amendment, also, ESPN Broadcasters Take A Moment Of Silence In Support Of Frustrated Florida Groomers
Louder With Crowder: Kid Rock Releases Official Video For Anti-Biden/Anti-Fauci Song
Vox Popoli: An Alternative Application, The Official Story Is Always False, and The Significance
According To Hoyt: Living In The Evil Fairytales, also, Walk The Line
Monster Hunter Nation: WriterDojo S2E11 – Mandatory Diversity, also, Baen Having A Sale On My EBooks
Granite Grok: Ukraine-Russia – Look, Squirrel!

RIPPED FROM THE HEADLINES
American Conservative: No Allies Who Buy Babies
American Greatness: Bad Orange Woman Suddenly Tightlipped About Hunter Biden’s Emails, also, Will The Next J6 Trial Expose Another DOJ Lie?
American Power: NYT Finally Admits Hunter Biden’s Laptop Is Real, also, Ukraine Could Win
American Thinker: Regarding Mitt Romney
Animal Magnetism: Rule Five Switchblades Friday
Babalu Blog: Freedom House Ranks Cuba Least Free Country In The Americas, also, Dengue Epidemic In Cuba
BattleSwarm: Russo-Ukrainian War Update, also, LinkSwarm For March 18
Behind The Black: Today’s Blacklisted American, Elon Musk Targets 2029 For Beginning Of Mars Invasion, and SLS Arrives At Launch Site
Cafe Hayek: What Are Schools Teaching?
CDR Salamander: Not How You Signal Power, also, Fullbore Friday
Chicago Boyz: Book Review – The Year Of The French
Da Tech Guy: Sick Today, Gone Tomorrow, Quiet Man Fight For Now
Don Surber: Media Lied About Collusion & The Laptop – Why Believe Them On Ukraine? also, Putin’s Side Of The Story
First Street Journal: A Philadelphia Crook Is Lying On A Slab In The Morgue, also, Show Me The Money!
Gates Of Vienna: Welcome Aboard The Asylum Express!, The Vibrant Multiculture Of Heerenveen, and Europe’s African Border
The Geller Report: Ukraine, Money-Laundering Hub Of The New Order, also, Dangerous Deceit By CDC
Hogewash: How You Know You’re No Longer An A-Team Player, Team Kimberlin Post Of The Day, and Women Of The Year
Hollywood In Toto: The Hater Wants To Turn Texas Blue, That Time Michael Mann Turned Heat Into A TV Series, and Woke Chelsea Handler Insists “White Men Owe Us An Apology”
The Lid: Now We Could Lose The Petrodollar
Legal Insurrection: “This Wasn’t A Protest. This Was Physical Intimidation”, In Latest Attempt To Rig The System, The Left Targets GOP Lawyers, and Chapman U. Prof Sues After Midterm & Final Exams Posted Online
Nebraska Energy Observer: Scattershot Friday
Outkick: Baker Mayfield Has Likely Played His Last Game For The Browns, Va. Freshman Emma Weyant Cheated Out of National Championship by “Lia” Thomas, and DeShaun Watson To Cleveland Even As NFL Suspension Possible
Power Line: The Post Computes This, Why Are Liberals So Needy And Fake? and GOP Still On Pace For Midterm Rout Of Donks
Shark Tank: Retiring Democrat Murphy Slams Pelosi, House Leadership
Shot In The Dark: A Picture Conceals 1000 Words, The Real Election Fraud, and From Cornerstone To Stumbling Block Part 2
The Political Hat: Sexy Summer Camp – Drugs, Masturbation, & Witchcraft, also, Firing Line Friday
This Ain’t Hell: Valor Friday, Navy Officer Sentenced, and Putin Vows To Cleanse Russia Of Dissidents
Transterrestrial Musings: SLS Worship
Victory Girls: Is Red China Backing Off From Russia?
Volokh Conspiracy: Judge Neomi Rao On “Textualism’s Political Morality”
Watts Up With That: Northern & Southern Hemisphere Warming, also, Biden Lying About Oil & Gas Prices Again
Weasel Zippers: “Doctor” Fauci Is Back, STD Makes Stacy Abrams The President Of Earth, and Matt Drudge Openly Simping For Russia
The Federalist: Most Cities’ Response To The Homeless Actually Enables More Homelessness, In Its First Year, Biden’s HHS Relentlessly Attacked Christians & Unborn Babies, and Yes, The Senate Should Investigate Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Leniency Toward Sex Predators
Mark Steyn: Week Four Begins, also, Yaroslav’s Wise Guy

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Category: Linkagery

Policy Goal: Avoid World War III

Posted on | March 18, 2022 | Comments Off on Policy Goal: Avoid World War III

Ever since Russia invaded Ukraine, I keep thinking of Barbara Tuchman’s Pulitzer-winning history The Guns of August, which chronicled the miscalculations that led to World War I. Probably few of the people blabbing about the need for NATO to defend Ukraine have read Tuchman’s book, and certainly they seem heedless of its lessons. While I’m all in favor of sending the Ukrainians weapons — and cheer them on in their fight against Putin’s army — the risk of widening the conflict is paramount in my concern, because nobody wants a thermonuclear Armageddon. Right? Hello? “Give Peace a Chance”?

The fact that others — especially the neocon #NeverTrump crew — are less concerned about this worst-case scenario than I am doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re bloodthirsty warmongers, but I do wish they’d stop the broad-brush defamation of their critics as pro-Russian Putin fanboys or “conspiracy theorists.” This is basically what David French is up to in his article in The Atlantic. Any conservative holding an opinion not approved by French is a “right-wing contrarian”:

The overlap between various conspiracy theories is simply extraordinary. Find someone who believes Trump truly won the 2020 election, and the overlap with anti-masking activism (especially pre-vaccine) and vaccine skepticism is almost guaranteed. Find someone who believes in the basics of the QAnon conspiracy theory, and you’ll find an election conspiracist and likely a Ukraine skeptic.
Indeed, contrarianism and antipathy also present a crucial explanation for Trumpism. What’s a key reason the right likes Trump? Because the mainstream media doesn’t. When would they boo Trump? When he conforms to what the establishment wants, including by getting a COVID-vaccine booster.
If you spend any time watching Tucker Carlson or following the rhetoric of popular far-right voices, such as Candace Owens, Marjorie Taylor Greene, and many, many others, you’ll see a consistent theme — they’ll find what they call “the narrative” (another word for the perceived conventional wisdom in the media or in the political establishment) and simply argue the opposite.

What, pray tell, defines someone as “a Ukraine skeptic”? Good luck figuring that out from French’s article, but then again we must ask, what is “Trumpism”? Seventy-four million Americans voted to re-elect President Trump — are we all equally implicated in the sin of “Trumpism”? Yet it is we, not David French, who stand accused of reflexive “far-right” thinking. Our minds are rigid, while French is an infinitely nuanced thinker, and never mind the evidence that French is just another delusional victim of Trump Derangement Syndrome.

As for “the narrative,” this is a phrase popularized by the late Andrew Breitbart, who was so much smarter than David French that it’s not even fair to compare them. Breitbart thought strategically, which is why he was always three steps ahead of everybody else. The man had excellent hunches, which was how he was able to take down Anthony Weiner.

Oh, wait — what was this bit French threw in there about QAnon? That’s the conspiracy theory which claims that sexual perversion is rampant among the economic and political elite. Let’s see — Anthony Weiner, Jeffrey Epstein, Hunter Biden, probably a few other names I could add to that list of influential members of the elite who’ve been exposed as depraved perverts in recent years. Perhaps it is not true that the world is ruled by a secretive cabal of wealthy pedophiles, but on the other hand, there’s enough smoke to make you think there’s a fire somewhere.

The line between paranoia and reasonable suspicion is sometimes difficult to locate, but anyone who trusts our national elite has not been paying close attention. Their track record does not inspire confidence in their judgment, and even if they’re not involved in extreme sexual depravity, I don’t trust those sons of bitches at all.

“The ‘cabal’ that bragged of foisting Joe Biden on us must answer for his failed presidency,” and if these blundering idiots get us into WWIII, don’t say nobody tried to warn you.




 

Category: Intellectuals, Uncategorized
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