Lab-Leak Leak Links Lab to Lab-Leak

Peter Zeihan || COVID: What Really Happened in Wuhan?

Peter Zeihan says the US government bureaucracies that stated, with low confidence, that the SARS-COV2 virus leaked from the Wuhan China lab are not known for their medical expertise.

However, the FBI and the Energy Department weren't providing funds to the Wuhan Lab, whereas some of the more prominent government "lab-leak" deniers were funding-involved. In the early 2000's Congress -- playing to the "superstitious rubes" in the hinterland -- banned gain-of-function research in the US. Is it possible that those whose careers were dependent on this work used the Wuhan lab as a way around the ban? Let me suggest, with low confidence, that yeah, they did.

The evidence in support of the "lab-leak theory" has been around since 2020. Citing the evidence back then got you labeled a conspiracy theorist and a likely right-wing racist. Where Big Science and Big Politics meet, one hand washes the other -- or is it a scrub, clear up to the elbow, with careful attention to under the fingernails?

Dangerfield, Will Robinson, Dangerfield!

We don't get no respect. Our politicians tell us they identified lots of fat and colossal waste and would cut spending to trim it. Turns out the fat's on our waist and the spending they're targeting is ours -- on food. The good news: this will leave more room in the family budget for taxes and fees.

We don't get no respect.

Ever heard of The Continental Congress? That's the nation's founders. Now we got the con-man congress -- where the nation flounders. They only act continental when it impresses the league of woman voters. We should have listened closer during the campaign. They were actually saying, "Yes, we con." They're so good at it they could con a surgeon out of his scrubs -- and are, by the thousands. They're giving the entire nation a bath, charging us for the water before fining us for using the wrong soap. They help their lawyer buddies to eat our lunch, give our dinner to the government unions, and feed our breakfast to lobbyists and activists. Then they tell us not to complain 'cause they put it on our kid's tab -- only they're working on the grandkids now.

We don't get no respect. 

Wanna buy some health care deform? If you ask how much, you can't afford it. A decade ago it was all the rage. A House committee wrote a twelve-hundred-page bill to deform health care. The house then improved it by a thousand pages and sent it to the Senate. The Senate tossed all 2,200 pages in the can. They replaced it with 2,400 pages of their very own and sent it to the House. The House was appalled -- which means somebody read it. They came up with a fix. Some say it is one thousand pages of patches, some say two thousand, and some 36,482. Then they figured it out: put it online and you can do it in one really, really, really, really long page. I hear Hammurabi wanted to reform health care but the universe ran out of clay.

We don't get no respect.

You heard of "Hide the Salami," right? The Democrats play "who gets Salamied!" Then they go out on the town to do budget scoring. They want a budget with a big bust while they max out the credit card. They think the national debt means the nation owes them. They say a new program will cost two trillion over ten years but they don't include the cost overruns, so multiply by three. It's budget neutral, they say -- just like Belgium in World War II, it'll get rolled over by tanks four or five times. What about that trillion-dollar deficit? It could be worse and will be. Folks, this is not Smoke N. Mirrors' accounting. I know Smoke N. Mirrors. Smoke N. Mirrors is a friend of the Republicans. This is Smoking Fraud.

We don't get no respect.

Our rulers have low self-esteem. They think any nation that would put them in charge must be populated by stupid idiots and knuckle-dragging neanderthals. They want it to be an intelligent nation, like Denmark (but without the Vikings), one they can be proud of when they go to Bali in January for that global warming conference.

We don't get no respect.

We are blamed for global warming and are told to spend 100 trillion dollars to mitigate it. Politicians, bureaucrats, academics, and various fraudsters act as the mitigators -- meaning they get their mitts on the money.

We don't get no respect.

Our state department does not want to be allied with any nation that would be friends with us. Our Representatives take a tour of Arab Capitals. They expect the Arabs to suggest we bomb Iran. Turns out, they want us to bomb ourselves.

We don't get no respect.

The Chinese blame us for selling them bonds. The Europeans blame us for electing the guy they wanted us to elect. The world that wanted us to disengage from it is now disenchanted with our disengagement. They say we are disengaged when we should be concentrating on our disengagement. And everyone wants us to be poor and miserable while still buying their stuff, all at the same time. Solution: sell us junk.

We don't get no respect. And why should we? We put up with it. Budah-bing.

The Last of Us, Episode Underage Sex

The Last of Us is a zombie apocalypse show without that many zombies. Sure, on occasion the Z's run on screen, commit their slaughters and then run off. They're like the flood tide -- in and out on a regular schedule. It seems the show's creators want a soap opera with zombies, but the Z's don't talk, let alone gossip, hence their absence.

I take it all back. I saw a movie once where a zombie talked, only it was more of an internal monologue. He didn't much like being a zombie -- shuffling around, wondering if his arm would fall off and if his next meal is on the ground around the corner. This walking, talking, and complaining intellectual had real melodramatic potential. I won't say the movie was entertaining, but it made me feel better about my own circumstances. I started watching it because of the attractive girl in the promo (yes, I'm that shallow). However, even the beauty couldn't keep me interested. So: why would I watch a Zombie soap opera with so few zombies and not one stunningly attractive female? I hoped it might be worth a blog post.

The first episode of LOU was pretty good, so I watched the second. After the second, Joel "the morose" and the feisty, uncooperative girl he protects, are on their own. The third diverged into a lesson in morality: that it is possible for two people to work together if they both have facial hair. The fourth is like a road movie that asks the question why would Joel and the kid go to Kansas City? but doesn't answer it. Then the fifth asks: how the hell do they get out of Kansas City after they're dumb enough to go there? Well, it's a struggle, a real f-ing struggle -- worst than St. Louis!

In episode six we flash forward three months, and it's now a road movie without the road. They've been wandering around in the wilderness for weeks and they've passed this one "cabin in the woods" a couple times. Each time the girl insists they stop to ask directions but Joel refuses. He says he knows where they are, they're in North America. But when the cabin has a sign hanging outside that says "Soups On," they stop for some direction -- which the actors badly need. Even though the folks in the cabin have plenty of food, they eat and leave. When Joel is outside he grabs his chest and almost faints. I feared he'd die of heart failure and become just another old, dead white guy.

It's an anxiety attack. Before, when those monsters tried to kill him -- and that's just the regular people -- it didn't cause anxiety. In fact, Joel was so serene he could sleep through an ambush. For him, the root cause of anxiety is fresh air, trees, and a lot of peace and quiet. So: when you live on the knife edge, stay there.

The cabin couple told them to cross the River of Death, which, once Joel catches his breath, they do. Surprise! The far side does not hold the Heart of Darkness, as we're led to expect, but the Soul of Enlightenment! Enlightenment is confined in a stockade built around a picturesque small town whose former inhabitants turned into walking mushrooms. This ideal community runs on the principles of communism. Fortunately, no one has read "The Tragedy of the Commons," which would give away the ending.

I find it's a bad idea to get into political arguments with fictional characters, so I will point the gentle reader to And then there were none by Eric Frank Russell, who provides a fictional libertarian alternative (MYOB).

Joel and the girl stay in a beautiful house where the plush decor is the only sign of the composted previous inhabitants. The Matriarch of the Commie Commune gives the girl a diaphragm for use when she's having sex. Which raises the question: who is she having sex with? She's been on the road with Joel for months. They will leave early the next morning for another arduous journey to meet up with her parents (at least that's the story they gave the matriarch). She's having intercourse, of course -- with Joel. It has to be Joel. Oh, Joel, say it ain't so! Tell us the scriptwriters, who know you better than anyone, got it wrong.

But Joel is in no condition to have sex. If fresh air and trees made him anxious, being around enlightened and helpful people who mean him no harm makes him suicidal. No wonder he wants to run from that communal ideal and the witty girl, who put the "chirp" in chirpy. And sure enough, the girl tries to buck him up.

The gift of the diaphragm says the girl can have sex but she shouldn't have children. You see, Gaia finally got the human population down to a manageable level and the matriarch wants to keep it that way.

In any case, there's a rumor in the common dining area that the girl is a lesbian, so maybe the diaphragm is meant as a barter item for when she's on the road. In their communist system, you don't pay for your food and drink. How do they keep people from consuming too much? They hang fat people. Remember how the pleasantly uber-plump inhabitants of the cabin-in-the-woods spoke of this Shangri-la in the Rockies with a dead-pan dread? That couple wouldn't be hanging around the dining area, they'd be hanging around until they got cut down.

The next morning Joel and the girl are back on the road and Joel is looking for the end of the road. At the end of the episode, he finds it. 

In my review of episode one, I said that once Joel left Boston and its girl bosses he would have "room to grow (or shrink) -- if he can escape the ever-present, domineering forces of the matriarchy." Apparently, he carried the matriarchy around with him like a crushing burden, and rather than shrink he shriveled.

Hitler, the Socialist

From Tik History:

Hitler's Socialism: The Evidence is Overwhelming

Go get overwhelmed.

In my youth, I thought I was a Socialist. I was reading Upton Sinclair, the popular socialist novelist, and the socialists in his books about post-WWI Europe were good people and that was enough for me. Then he introduced the father of Fascism, the thug Mussolini -- only "the Moose" was a Socialist when he made his appearance. The National Socialist street-fighting "brown shirts," were socialist true believers brawling with international socialist "black shirt" true believers (Anti-fa, as it happens). An idealistic young German Piano prodigy becomes an idealistic SS commander.

The Bolshevik creators of the United Socialist Soviet Republics attract a menagerie of Western leftists to Moscow and St. Petersburg (aka Petrograd/Leningrad), including anarchists and syndicalists and every-other ist -- who then bail when things go south but carry the flame of revolution home with them.

True, Sinclair did argue that Hitler/Lenin/Stalin weren't true socialists but I had to ask, how do you tell the difference between the murderous and the benign kind of socialism? In later years I wondered: is fake socialism the only true socialism? Is the grass-roots socialist mantra, "fool me again" and "all power to the Sociopaths!"

As a tenth grader in 1964, I had to admit that Upton Sinclair sure could write. He not only talked me into his beliefs, he talked me right back out of them.

Don't change your mind, change your sex

Andrew Sullivan, who I've read off-and-on since he was at the New Republic magazine, asks: Is this "The Greatest Scandal In Gay Rights History? How journalists - yes, journalists - want to shut down reporting on child transition."

Discussing one program, he notes:

More than a third of the kids pushed onto the trans track had autism, sometimes severe. Others were victims of domestic abuse...No questions about other aspects of a child’s mental health were considered if the kid was identifying as the opposite sex.

It's the fall of 1968. I'm in a ramshackle college bar in a midwestern mill town nursing a Stroh's 3.2 beer -- a legal drink for 18-year-olds. A new girl (I'm unaware how new)  occupies the neighboring stool. I say, "hi." She says, "hi."

We start talking. She's from New York City. I ask if she's visiting relatives, one of two reasons an NYC native would turn up locally -- turnpike pile-up being the other. No, she's having medical procedures performed. "Oh?" says I, with a thoughtful pause, "what procedures are those?" I'm perplexed. My town is not known for medical tourism. She tells me she is having her sex changed from male to female and prepares for a confrontation she doesn't get.

As a Time Magazine reader back then, I knew everything that happened in the world a week after it happened. They'd informed me that sex reassignment surgery was available for those who were born one sex but were "hard-wired" for the other (with only two genders to choose from at the time). This is a rare condition, they explained, which affected maybe one in 100,000 -- whereas we now know it's half of the second grade at the local elementary school. How an otherwise credible publication could get its numbers so far off is beyond me.

Another possible explanation for the numerical disparity between then and now is "water fluoridation." The cumulative effect of all that fluoride could be fewer cavities and more gender-swapping. Naturally, the last part went unmentioned by the public health authorities to prevent undo discomfort in the rubes who simply refuse to cut down on their consumption of sugary sodas and would rather lose their teeth than rearrange their genitals.

There could be another possible, if unlikely, explanation. I once heard of a certain medical procedure where the number of operations performed in a locale was determined by the number of surgeons who perform it. Unfortunately, more people died who got the operation than among the people who remained ignorant of the cause of their suffering and took antacids instead -- death being the sometimes side-effect of the procedure. Apparently, this was not considered a sufficient reason to stop performing it.

Also, I had a friend who was a resident at the local trauma center.  He told me to avoid a certain surgeon whose blade should never be allowed to touch flesh. Everyone at the hospital knew about him but the guy still performed operations so...it's good to have a powerful union on your side. Sure, it's a delicate question, but one that needs to be asked: could the increased availability of medical specialists dedicated to the treatment of the condition account for the swelling caseload? Personally, I doubt it. Fluoridation, that's the cause.

It was the presence of a highly talented plastic surgeon, a man of my slight acquaintance, that made my town the "sex-change capital of the world." He had quasi-nude statues on the lawn in front of his office depicting the human form as GQ and the Swimsuit Edition intended (pre-body positive days). As a scruffy thirteen-year-old, I hitchhiked around town (considered safe means of travel by my peers -- which is not the same as being safe, though we had no problems). I got a ride from the doctor once. His "Truman Capote" like manner made him memorable. I knew him for a total of maybe eight-and-a-half minutes and rather liked him.

A few years later he was on a local television show to talk about prophecy, not puberty blockers. He combined the rhymes of Nostradamus (also a doctor) with the Book of Revelations to place the Second Coming at the close of the second millennium. He mentioned his own modest role in it (he was in one of the crowds, I think). With hindsight, his foresight was a bit off -- unless it was the second coming of crazy he anticipated.

He was the reason the "journeyman-lady" came to town for her transformation. Today, she'd go into the military. She was born a boy, she explained, but always had the mind of a girl. She was required to go through counseling and live as a girl for a time as she underwent hormone treatments. She seemed very much a female when I met her but the below-the-tummy "tuck" was still in her future. I thought, sure, changing your mind can be hard, but is changing everything but your mind easier? I did not try to dissuade her, though, because of what happened a couple weeks before.

I was in a different bar, one with "lounge" in the name, a classier place where the upholstery ain't held together with tape and they charge an extra nickel a drink to keep out the riff-raff. I'd spent several weeks on a summer job in a hot and loud foundry that produced missing fingers among the employees. Having worked overtime and escaped with digits intact, I felt both fortunate and flush with cash. I also found myself in the surprising position of talking to a beautiful, well-accoutered girl. She told me she was going to have a nose job because she didn't like her nose and she was finally doing something about it. This made no sense because, in her case, nature had achieved the pinnacle of nasal perfection, or so I thought.

Admittedly, I come from a family where the proboscis is a prominent facial feature. My father said we had "Noble Roman Noses," even though we weren't Italian. Perhaps it was my distorted view of nasal normality that caused me to counsel her hotness against the action. She had a quite lovely nose, I said, and a simple cost/benefit analysis -- given the possible downside risks -- shows she should not undergo the procedure. She reacted with great hostility, the way wrong-headed people often do when a right-headed person tries to correct their behavior for the overall benefit of the entire society -- a society whose medical resources need to be focused on real medical problems rather than catering to the vanity of stunningly attractive, cash-flush females. In her defense, she did leave town to have the procedure performed, maybe because she wanted to wake up still a girl.

Back at the shabbier bar, a large man came over to the "journeyman lady" and gave me a stern look as he addressed her. "Time to leave." He seemed more like a bodyguard than a friend or relative. As they left I thought, given how open she was about her transition, a bodyguard might be a prudent precaution. 

A few weeks later she was in that bar again and at the center of a celebration. She was now as much of a woman as she was ever going to be. I thought of that old saying, "no matter where you go, there you are!" I wondered if that applied to bodies as well as places.  If so, her problems were by no means at an end.

Disney's Anti-man but pro WASP

Doesn't Disney know that WASP stands for White Anglo-Saxon Protestant?  This is a sub-genre of the White Supremacy conspiracy theory: the White Specificity conspiracy theory.

Disparu has a review of  Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania, the latest Marvel Movie.  I haven't seen it. I'll wait for it to show up on Tubi. Disparu's annoyed that the socialism of the movie "ants" is commented on quite favorably -- then finds much else to be annoyed by. The womanly WASP up-stages Ant-man in the big fight scene and I say "but of course!" Are the poor production values worse than the poor plot? Hard to say.

Apparently, the folks at Disney don't know that socialism comes in various flavors, which displays both an ignorance of history and a lack of imagination. For instance, if Putin took over Disney, top executives and whole creative teams would start "jumping" from the windows of very high buildings. Of course, this is not an example of true socialism -- just socialism as it actually exists. In true socialism, an ant happily works herself to death because she knows the Queen is her true mother and she and the other workers form a true and mighty sisterhood!  In false socialism, the ant sadly works herself to death after the Queen has falsely imprisoned her with the other bitchez and they all fight over scraps. False socialism is what we truly get.

Some will argue that Socialist Justice only requires the summary execution of the fat 'n happy few at the top, while the "creative teams" will churn out poorly produced, but highly expensive, sneakers at a repurposed "amusement park turned reeducation camp."

Forgetting that serious socialists are not easily amused, camp inmates will claim they've already been highly re-educated at Yale and Harvard and demand their student loans be "socialized" while they keep their cars and condos. The jokes on them. Their appeals will go unanswered but not unpunished. In the tragic aftermath, the world will be afflicted with tattered track shoes.

Early Stage Demen -- What's that called again?

Lately, Youtube's been shoving videos under my nose about how to tell if you're in the early stages of Dementia. I recently stopped worrying about early-onset Alzheimers (at my age, it won't be early), and now this. Let me say plainly: if I'm suffering from dementia, I want to be the last to know.

Now that I'm fully retired, I started posting here (after a long break) to keep my mind engaged with -- if not married to -- the thought process. Now I've noticed a feature on the Blogger dashboard called Stats. I wondered, what is this "Stats" thing and do they charge for it? Out of curiosity, I clicked on the "Stats" link and, to my surprise, got a page with -- stats.

There were some page views, which is unsurprising (I do visit my own blog from time to time). Then I noticed a recent interest in posts from the 2008 election. Now, not even I am interested in my thoughts on the 2008 election -- I was barely interested in my "thoughts" in 2008. So I suspect it's either 1) a graduate student analyzing "3Chan" rants (the predecessor to 4Chan) or 2) an FBI informant building a case. How to tell the difference? I'm thinking I'll sell a yearly subscription. The person who makes the purchase is the informant.

I should mention that in the post, "Doom for Democrats?" I speculate on the identity of the Phlegmatic Endtimer, Spengler, subsequently revealed as David Goldman. I sometimes think he is wrong-headed in his pronouncements but always with strong arguments to support his wrong-headedness. Some of his musings can be found here.

I wish I had hit the "stats" button earlier. At the start, I put some fiction on the blog as backup storage and later returned the pages to draft when I reread them and felt embarrassed. Now I see some of those stories got hundreds of page views during the time they were up.

Then there's the interesting case of Ask not for whom dat Canary croaks, it croaks for you!  The first seven years it got the expected couple of views. Then, all of a sudden, it got well over six hundred. Could it have been Russian bots?

Does Credit Expansion lead to Waist Expansion or Waste Expansion?

Jeff Snider at EuroDollar Univesity discusses the Chinese Stimulant that ain't fentanyl -- increased availability of Bank Credit.

Back in the 1980's I read that the Soviet Union had the highest rate of capital investment in the world and on the whole (or rather, "hole"), that investment produced a negative return -- requiring more investment. I read that and thought, "Gee, that can't be good." I had the picture of being on a treadmill and running to stay in place but the treadmill speeds up so, in the end, you're running so you'll fall behind slower. In such a scenario, collapsing from exhaustion seems the logical outcome.

In "The Rise and Decline of Nations: Economic Growth, Stagflation, and Social Rigidities," Mancur Olson didn't discuss the credit markets so much as the "credit to" markets. In his view, the growth of self-dealing special interest groups in an otherwise growing economy produces economic sclerosis that leads to failure. The CCP is a collection of self-dealing special interest groups. Its near collapse during Mao's Cultural Revolution allowed a multi-decade spurt in economic development. Its reemergence as society's "guiding force" will likely herald its decline.

We face a similar danger in the good ol' USA. It's not the dealings of the Fed that will determine our economic future so much as the self-dealing of a web of special interests and influence peddlers I call "The Crony Class." Are they anti-climate change or pro their control of the nation's resources -- and do they see a difference? Crony class interests require a lot of lying-and-believing at the same time. ESG, anyone?

A Telluride Tell-all

If you ask yourself, "where does this lead?" and the answer is "nowhere good," then don't ask the question.

A Black Professor Trapped in Anti-Racist Hell

If the seminar is slow food, the anti-racist workshop put on by college-age students is a sugar rush. All the hashtags are there, condensed, packaged, and delivered from a place of authority. The worst sort of anti-racist workshop simply offers a new language for participants to echo—to retweet out loud.

Way back in the misty-misty, I saw Pulp Fiction with a progressive black friend and afterward said that Quintan Tarantino must have a special license for the prolific use of the N-word. My friend seemed both baffled and distressed by that comment. To me, it was a simple display of movement power. Think of an individual who can say, "You, right here, can use this word but you, over there, can't," and be obeyed -- and obeyed because they can enforce their will. That's a display of power.

I'd noticed that the left often defends the guilty (the murderers Sacco and Vanzetti) and persecutes the innocent (Bret Kavanagh), which puzzled me. I mean, there are plenty of innocent people who need defending. I figured it was a recruitment tool as well as a display of power. Anyone can defend the innocent but it takes a potential activist -- a person willing to commit to the cause and the "new morality" the cause promotes -- to defend the guilty. Once you accept that the murderer is the true victim and the innocent defender of the "loathsome" status quo is the real criminal, you are on your way. How about a donation?

A Mauling by Maher

Nerdrotic discusses some Bill Maher clips where Maher takes the "Cancel Culture" Left to task for acting like the people they are -- and does it to great comic effect.

I first heard of "hate speech" as a political construct in the 1980s when in a bar talking to an admirer of the Communist dictator, Joseph Stalin. We'd been friends since childhood and I hoped that, after the revolution, he might help me get an exit permit. We discussed free speech and I said that the left often equates it with pornography, which the libertine left legally defends while the feminist left puritanically condemns. At the same time, both wings try to suppress political speech. He said, "You can't just let people say anything!" and went on to talk about hate speech. This came from a self-identified Stalinist who thought slave labor camps a necessary, if regrettable, phase -- which made me wonder about the enforcement mechanism he envisioned for his speech codes.

At the time I had a communist roommate who was in graduate school. He borrowed my car, got a flat, and drove it back to the apartment, shredding the tire in the process. He then used a can of fix-a-flat I had in the trunk. A short time later, I stared at the rubbery remains with the specs of foam clinging to the edges and marveled at the magical thinking involved. The fellow thought the contents of that can could knit that tire back together at the atomic level. He seemed confused that it hadn't worked. I joked that, come the revolution, he'd be the Minister of Science and Industry. Seeing the new direction that Science and Industry have taken, I'm thinking the revolution occurred when I wasn't looking.

Blackrock of Ages, Cleave Ukraine?

War, Good Lord! What is it good for? Well, that depends on the meaning of the word "good."

The Stoic over at Stoic Finance discusses the involvement of Blackrock in Ukraine. He provides a compact overview of both the Ukraine war and Blackrock. He claims he doesn't think Blackrock's overall intentions are good or evil but his presentation leans -- evil.

We should be careful not to credit malevolence to actions that can be explained by incompetence. Early on, the Biden administration canceled the "lethal" aid to Ukraine that the Trump administration approved, which was like ringing the dinner bell for Vlad the Invader. However, I don't believe they were sending an engraved invitation to war. They thought they were "lowering the threat level." Likewise, I don't think the administration or Blackrock wants to prolong Ukraine's agony. They're just doing a botched job.

I've no doubt Ukrainians remember the genocidal policies pursued by Moscow in the 1930s, so it's no surprise they decided to fight. By now the war has become a source of gainful employment for the non-refugee population, whose previous pursuits and careers were crushed. Russia's attempts to destroy civilian morale by attacking the infrastructure may increase their commitment to their current means of employment, which is war. Hopefully, that can soon be replaced with rebuilding.

Before the war, Ukraine was known for its corruption, not its scenic beaches or Alpine ski resorts. Under these circumstances, postwar aid would be confined to NGO soup kitchens. By partnering with Blackrock, they can provide some assurance that the thievery will be kept to a more reasonable level and economic aid may provide benefit to Europe and the wider world. Blackrock would not be my choice to run it but I'm not the one choosing.

Looking for a New Thermometer

The leaders of Argentina and Brazil hope to create a common currency to break the trade-denominated link to the US dollar. Joe Blogs compares their efforts to the creation of the Euro around the turn of the century.

Historically, most Euro participants lean towards "easy money" but Germany, having suffered from hyperinflation, is a hard-money, hard-nut to crack. That isn't the case here. Argentina currently suffers from roaring inflation -- not for the first, second, or third time -- which has tanked the value of their currency in dollar terms. Brazil has a similar record. Since their bilateral trade is largely denominated in dollars, this is highly inconvenient for businessmen and, more recently, politicians. The two countries are suffering from inflation fever and the leaders want a new thermometer in lieu of treating their policy problems. Even in the Euro's case, there was a financial crisis in the area because some countries did not follow the program they signed onto (ie limiting budget deficits and so on).

The proposed currency union is a bit like fixing a leaky roof. It's a good idea. What's a bad idea is trusting the job to "roofers" who cause more leaks than they fix. Meanwhile, the bewildered homeowners at the job site find half of their valuables have disappeared before the job is done. When they complain it is explained that the poor result is all the fault of people who live on another continent thousands of miles to the north.

Nevermind the Gap

There's a gap in the chart! Jeff Snider at Eurodollar University has a video where he discusses "real personal income excluding transfer receipts" (think government handouts), which fell "off trend" in 2020 and hasn't recovered. Transfer payments backfilled the gap for a time. Here's his chart:

I fear the "off-trend" has become the new trend. Perhaps people in 2020 were rioting for the wrong reason.

I blame "Cronny Class Consciousness" and the governing philosophy of "Feudalism with the Right People in Charge" for the developing economic malaise.

At its center, the Crony Class consists of politicians, hacks, bureaucrats, and those who acquire power through their ability to influence government action -- the lawyer, lobbyist, and dark-money crowd. This group took to heart the advice of Scarface, "first you get the power, then you get the money, then you get the girl." Confusingly, we now have to add the lawyer/lobbyist girls who want to be "the man" while still blaming "the man" when the man is actually, you know, a man.

The outer ring includes those who benefit from government action, such as corporations that fear bureaucratic overreach or seek government favor or the education establishment which devours government resources while avoiding societal accountability. To this add the legions of minions whose livelihoods depend on promoting Crony Class Interests, such as MSM Journalists (not to be confused with reporters), aspiring academics (not to be confused with actual scientists), and "house experts" (not to be confused with people who know what the hell they are talking about). The tentacles of this class reach far and wide, and gives the appearance of "Nerds working for Sociopaths."

"Crony Class Consciousness" allows them to act as a unit to protect class interest with a minimum of actual coordination. They framed Donal Trump (a minor threat) as a Russian agent for three years, knowing it was bunkum from day one. When it no longer played, the media Emily Litellas said, "never mind," and moved on to the next set of feeble accusations class members are required to promote. Objectively, these are the actions of horrible people. Subjectively, they have their reasons. This beast is hungry and needs to be fed. Those gaps in the charts are just the start.

"Feudalism with the Right People in Charge," says the rulers should come from an accredited, pseudo-intellectual caste (the true nobility of the mind), not a military one. The philosophy provides the justification for the rule of the Crony Class (i.e. Climate Change requires their control of resources) and the rationale for keeping their "expert" descendants in charge (having a lot of kids -- which will expand family contacts in an influence-peddling system -- is frowned upon). Diversity-Equity-Inclusion is sold as the ability to include but is actually the power to exclude. Everyone should get in their place and stay there. Mind the Queue.

Think of a War Where Only One Side Is Allowed to Fight

Media outlets keep promoting 'forest defenders' and ignoring that they shot a police officer

If the left campaigns to free an accused person, that person is likely guilty. When they are not trying to get the guilty off, they are trying to destroy the innocent (see: Sacco and Vanzetti = framed; Justice Kavanaugh = corrupt, and Joe Biden = honest). Even when I was on the left this tendency among those who claim to want a better world puzzled me. I came up with several reasons.

Recruitment: Most people would want an innocent person freed but only a potential true-believing, money-donating, self-deluding activist will campaign to free the guilty.

Delegitimizing the Justice System: The guilty person is on the "right side of history," combating an entrenched evil and therefore not just innocent but heroic. It's the other-way around for the so-called innocent person who is actually a cowardly defender of privilege.

A Display of Power: Freeing the guilty and destroying the innocent will attract supporters to the movement and discourage opponents. Also, it will strike fear in the souls of possible apostates (black conservatives, for instance).

The political left wants power above all else and believes that a highly disciplined and properly led band of activists can gain control during social chaos, hence "the worst the better" for the far left. Many would rather be a camp guard in a socialist state than a factory worker in a capitalist one.

Whither -- or Wither -- San Francisco

Government action and the reaction:

No major American city has failed at the same level as Detroit, whose population dropped from 1.85 million people in 1950 to about 630,000 today. Move over Detroit, here comes San Francisco, which lost 6.3 percent of its population between 2019 and 2021, a rate of decline larger than any two year-period in Detroit’s history and unprecedented among any major US city.

In 1964 the Democrats put the Model City Program in place. It was meant to show what innovative government programs could accomplish. Detroit was a model city. A lot of Federal money and "help" for Community Action went into Detroit. The 1967 riots -- a type of community action -- followed. Those who sponsored the Community Action then wrote a report blaming the results on systematic racism (other people's systematic racism, of course).

It's the model for Democrat Party governance they've followed ever since -- blame everyone else for your screw-ups. Comparing dynamic Detroit in 1960 with its current husk, to sleepy D.C. then with its bustling (and budget-busting) "farms into office-parks" present, explains why this approach -- an apparent failure for ordinary Americans of every color and belief -- persists.

https://www.hoover.org/research/san-francisco-falls-abyss

Under-Whelma, Velma

I said of Prime Video's The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power that it was a bad, expensive flop but not horrible. I suggested ROP was less-than-horrible because I watched every episode and was mindful of the old joke that "the food was awful and the portions were small." However, unlike some Youtube critics, I'm not hoping for a season two.

But as regards HBO's Velma, I suffer no such constraints. The tale is told from Velma's perspective and she revealed herself to be such a horrible person that 15 minutes into ep-one I determined she really was the murderer and, the case being solved, I stopped watching. But I will applaud the show's premise that not all persons of the non-binary persuasion are good.

Velma takes a cartoon character aimed at children and repackages her story for adults between the ages of thirteen-and-a-half and fourteen. With the exception of mainstream media movie critics, everyone else pretty much hated it. We can only hope that HBO cancels the plans for a Pornographic Bugs Bunny Show. Yes, I am aware that Bugs once dressed in drag and kissed Yosemite Sam but dammit, they didn't go steady.

The Last of Us, Episode One

First, I'm not familiar with the video-game, but I knew HBO's The Last of Us had Zombies, though I expected more -- more monsters and more action. However, talking in hallways with guns does work better than just talking in hallways.

The opening scene -- where the coming Fungal Apopocalypse is blamed on Global Warming -- succeeded in lowering my expectations (I'd have gone with an escaped pathogen from Dr. Anthony Fauci's basement lab -- after consulting legal counsel, of course). I'm glad I hung around for Depeche Mode's "Ride with my Best Friend" over the end credits.

Though I enjoyed the extended normal-life setup that followed the opening obligatory lecture, it should have been half as long with twice the ominous overtones. I assumed the delightful and precocious daughter was 14 or 15, so her picking up much of the household burden while Joel, her dad, operated a small business was OK. That doesn't work for a twelve-year-old -- apparently her age in the video game. I did not know she would die in the first episode, so, surprise! I enjoyed the panic, mayhem, and death caused by the sudden onset of the disease. Does that make me a bad person?

Fast forward twenty years and Joel is in a walled-off portion of Boston overrun by "girl bosses" within and zombies without. Given that it's Boston, the superfluidity of girl bosses makes sense. We don't see many zombies but I assume they are the bigger threat. How Joel got to Boston without the help of his daughter isn't explained. Joel isn't exactly "Pale Rider," but nonetheless Tess, his significant other and immediate supervisor, compares him to Clint Eastwood. Still, he has room to grow (or shrink) -- if he can escape the ever-present, domineering forces of the matriarchy. Given that Elle, the young girl he is supposed to accompany on her cross-country journey, is an alpha-diva aspiring girl boss, his chances don't look good. I thought there would be a threat from airborne spores since a fungal infection is the cause of this worldwide distress. However, when they came across a human victim "molded" to the wall in the abandoned Boston subway, I was surprised by how casually they treated the danger. They even seemed to step on some of the protruding growth.

Overall, I thought the first episode was good but could have been better with mo'violence. They showed the bloody aftermath of one violent fight. Why not show the fight? The series is, after all, based on a shooter game -- unless it was a feminist consciousness-raising effort that I thought was a shooter game.

Hollywood has lost the plot...

...and substituted a conspiracy.

In a comment on Disparu's youtube channel, I made the mistake of comparing Amazon's The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power to a low-budget Xena, Warrior Princess that could have used a Lucy Lawless in the lead. Understandably, that really upset the Xena, Warrior Princess fans, and maybe Lucy Lawless as well. I should say I was impressed with the range Lawless displayed as an actor in Eurotrip. She's New Zealand raised but made a convincing Dutch Dominatrix.

I also said that if you ignore what The Rings of Power did to Tolkien (which might constitute felony murder were he still alive), it was not a horrible show.  This, too, was a controversial statement, with others claiming it was clearly horrendous and how could I possibly think otherwise? However, my reasoning here was quite simple: if it's horrible, and I watched every episode, what does that say about me? Rather than stare into that particular abyss, I decided it was a bad, expensive flop -- that if they were trying to make it horrible (a possibility), they hadn't quite succeeded.

Expensive flops are nothing new for Hollywood, but these days a creative mess isn't allowed to sink into the obscurity it deserves. Hollywood now sees itself as the declining Rome of the Entertainment World, offering treasures for protection to a barbarian horde outside its walls, only to anger and whet the appetites of others. It's entered the realm of politics which, these days, is not just "a house divided against itself," but an old mansion where it's every room, closet, and cubbyhole for itself (and don't leave out the servants' quarters). As a result, Hollywood doesn't know whether to fight, flee, or fortify.

Politics has always played a role but it wasn't of paramount importance at Paramount or universally agreed upon at Universal or really dizzy at Disney -- or, for that matter, the lead actor in acting. Left-leaning filmmakers could make a conservative-themed movie and a conservative executive might green-light a left-wing consciousness-raising effort. In the last decade, consciousness-raising has taken over (Hollywood, having found its religion, won't shut up about it).

Recently, I rewatched The Hunger Games and wondered if these days the people making it would have more sympathy for the Capital -- the ignorant folks in the districts just don't understand the problems the experts face just keeping things together! Meanwhile, Indigenous Activists complain about the portrayal of the indigenous inhabitants of an alien planet in the Avatar sequel. Using their criteria, every human should boycott that film. In fact, that's what I'm doing -- until it makes it to Tubi, at least.

My advice to Hollywood is to get on "The Right-Side of Story-Telling" and forget about history (which they find an easy task in the movies they make).

Rob-Boy

With great elan, I announce that my nominee for Robber Baron of the Year (The Rob-Boy award) is that media darling who so quickly turned dirt-bag: Elon! He will play himself in the movie. The tagline will be "Elon Musk is Elon Musk." Not satisfied with taking up space in Silicon Valley, he decided to take up space (at an accelerated pace) in Texas.

Some might claim the honor should go to Sam Banker-Man Freed (freed is what I suspect he will be when the Democrats see how damaging a trial could be -- or he could just be suicided). In any case, Sam Bankman Fried was just a fraud and there are plenty of those around.

Are the Silicon Valley fraudsters today's robber barons?

Let's face it, we're all skewed.

In tenth grade, I was a socialist and told my friends I was a socialist. My reasoning was simple: socialists are good people who want the best life for other people and I was just such a person and therefore a socialist.  Meanwhile, all those folks around me who were not socialists meant that much future missionary work remained.

Then one day, while in study hall staring out the window, I had a thought that was potentially detrimental to my socialist beliefs. The thought itself is less important than my reaction to it. I tried to swat it like it was some buzzing, stinging insect that should be quickly crushed. The reaction seemed almost instinctual. A bit surprised, I then had a couple of thoughts about that thought. First, given my strong belief that the entire world should be organized on the principles of Socialism, it might be a good idea to think the matter through. Second, having attended parochial school, I recognized the impulse toward my own thought suppression. Occasionally, I would question the divinity of Christ or the Virgin Birth and suppress these thoughts because there was that whole damnation thing to worry about. Of course, the divinity of Christ deals with questions beyond the material realm.  Socialism, however, is all about the material realm.

So I hopped on the train of thought that eventually undermined my faith in socialism. At the same time, I thought about my reluctance to get on board. I decided my self-identification as a Socialist had a lot to do with it.  This was sixty years ago and at the time my political identification was of only a few months duration so, who knows, with a few more months of self-inoculation against contrary thoughts I might have become Bernie Sanders.

Still, we can't question everything and, given that reality, accepting received wisdom is useful. At the same time, I've noticed over the years that most individuals who are hyper-critical of the status quo treat their ideas for sweeping, transformational change, as a matter of faith. National interest was often equated with imperialism and opposed. True American patriotism, in their telling, demands loyalty to an improved nation that we can build using a blueprint that no one quite has access to. Also, holding distinctly contradictory opinions -- being for hydropower one minute and against that damn dam the next -- is a side-effect. Interestingly, these same individuals were often quite conservative -- imperialist, even -- where their personal life was concerned.

If I asked an awkward question, the topic would suddenly change. During a conversation, I might point out that a failure to act in the national interest will only cause confusion among foreign nations, and make our own actions less predictable. Then I would say (after the topic was changed) that segregation was a government program aimed at social planning (in a "careful about what you wish for" sort of way). The nuclear power industry they now oppose was created by the federal government, using the expertise of government scientists and the output of government labs. Politicians promised energy so abundant that it would no longer need to be metered. Unmentioned was the highly toxic nuclear "waste" plutonium the reactors would produce -- handy for H-bomb building and powering aircraft carrier battle groups. The utility executives The China Syndrome portrayed as endangering the entire planet were basically doing what they were told. So, designing our green energy future using the same approach may produce a result different from the one envisioned. After all, a million windmills draining energy from the atmosphere could also change the climate.

The reluctance to question socially acquired beliefs may be a good thing on an individual basis since we have to take much on faith as a practical matter.  Lately, it's become a strong -- perhaps even dominant -- social force tangled up with politics and used in the allocation of vast sums of government resources. As a result, we shall choose our next future exercising less care than when we chose our last phone.

The unexamined Utopia is not worth pursuing.

Bjorn Lomborg Declares “False Alarm” on Climate Hysteria

Marvel wonders where the marvel went

Many fans of established franchises such as Star Wars and Lord of the Rings are bewildered by the radical change in direction taken by the new owners of these IPs.  They watch a favorite white male heterosexual character reemerge as a black female gay character and wonder: what is the point? It appears that one person's "retconning" is another person's wrecking.

When an aggressive civilization conquers another they will typically take over important cultural sites of the conquered people and put their own important symbols there. The Christians turned the pagan Pantheon in Rome into a Christian cathedral. The Hagia Sophia started as a Christian church in Constantinople and became a Grand Mosque in Istanbul.

These actions show the conquered who's in charge and help identify the remaining objectors for future cancelation. This is what happened when the imperial Romans placed a statue of the Emperor in the Second Temple in Jerusalem and "encouraged" the inhabitants to make offerings. The resulting fuss is best described by that old Latin saying, "They made a desert and called it peace."

So Super Hero fans might complain that those who have conquered Hollywood should create new characters embodying the cultural traits they wish to emerge triumphant and leave the formerly established icons alone (that would make good business sense!). However, that would miss the point. Conquest is not about making money, it is about taking control and rubbing "their" noses in it. The money and prestige come after. So perhaps our new cultural overlords will create a cultural desert and call it peace while forcing the doubters to agree. Or perhaps they will find their actions were premature and those whose noses are now out-of-joint are too formidable to contend with. Stay tuned.

MARVEL "Re-evaluating" After Disastrous Phase 4

The Bible Becomes Bile

According to the New York Post, "pro-transgender activists ate pages from a Bible as they protested an event featuring Matt Walsh and his controversial documentary 'What is a Woman?' at the University of Wisconsin-Madison."

They should take care. If the Bible thus consumed is truly digested, it will get into their bloodstream. This would make a good horror movie for progressives.

The Good Activist eats the family bible at a highly publicized "last supper." That night spiritual beings (demons sent by Donald Trump to torment him -- or so he thinks) appear -- which he puts down to a nightmare caused by acid reflux until they linker into his waking hours. These demons struggle with his angelic system of ordained Marxist Beliefs. He thinks he is becoming delusional as life lessons from the Bible sneak into his thoughts. He begins to feel unfamiliar sensations like happiness, tolerance (as opposed to "tolerance"), and respect for others. He is no longer hostile to the diversity of thought but instead finds encountering other points of view stimulating.

As the fog of depression lifts from his mind, he realizes the spiritual beings are actually his ancestors whose traditional beliefs appeal to the better angles of his nature. For instance, he no longer believes Clarence Thomas is a White Supremacist. He finds that he can now speak obvious truths and even smile as he is canceled and the red carpet leading to a full professorship is yanked from beneath his feet. His former associates are aghast but that's OK because he can now function in the real world and no longer needs the "reality-based community" to feel a weak, uncertain, and fleeting sense of purpose.

Biden's DOJ gets legal-slapdown

Courting the Children on Climate

In their efforts to gain ever more power, the left seems to favor those who either have yet to reach "the age of reason" (Greta Thunberg, the students at Yale Law) or are well beyond it (Joe Biden). Apparently, they find "a little thinking" among their agents a threat to the movement. So now they have created a court case attacking Montana land management while using children as a shield and wielding the aliments of two-year-olds like Galadriel's sword. You see, the world's going to end before they can vote, on account of their living in a climate-controlled home with hot and cold running water where they don't have to take a trip to the outhouse when it's 40 below and their pee freezes before it hits the ground.

I'm thinking this is a left-wing managed and staged court proceeding so the people being sued won't put up much of a defense and the jury will be overwhelmingly "for-the-children" (if the members have recently moved to Bozeman from Berkeley, that would be a plus). In fact, I would argue for a jury of their peers, which would mean mental ages of no more than six years.

Unfortunately for the Left, a stout defense would throw much doubt on the validity of "man-made climate change." It could even examine the considerable damage caused by the power-grabbing (not power-generating) programs the movement champions. Personally, I think the actions of the adults involved (if I may give their court filings a twist) harm the children's physical and psychological health and safety; interfere with family and cultural foundations and integrity; and cause economic deprivations -- not the state of Montana. Therefore, their suit will likely target fellow-traveling bureaucrats who want to lose, and by losing, win.

Children's Climate Trial

Proto Fascist or Moto Democrat?

"What does Giorgia Meloni's Win Mean for Italy?" asks Peter Zeihan, conjuring up the ghost (or is it the Spirit?) of Italian Fascism, on account of her "God, country, family" mantra.

Benito Mussolini, the Godfather of fascism, was a socialist. Back in 1964, I was in tenth grade reading a novel by Upton Sinclair (himself a Socialist) and he introduced a loud-mouthed Socialist agitator named Mussolini. Imagine my surprise. Turns out Mussolini modeled his fascist party on Lenin's Bolshevik Party, which ruthlessly ran the United Soviet Socialist Republics of the day (aka Russia). True, Benito was all about "the country" as long as he and his gang were running everything in the country, but as for God and family -- not so much. The fascists had party members in every organization to enforce the party line, so the people who ran businesses were run by the party.

According to Upton Sinclair, the National Socialist "brownshirt" street brawlers who slugged it out with the communist/socialist Antifa during the Weimar Republic were also Socialists -- so it was kind of an intramural sport. Later Stalin's USSR and Hitler's Third Reich found common ground -- Poland. Given the history, I never agreed with the progressive propensity to label small government conservatives as fascists, at least here in the U.S. After all, what American Conservatives want to conserve are things like the Bill of Rights and local governments with local control.

As for Italy's political future: who knows?

Whither Italy?

International Money Monkey Business

Jeff Snider has a YouTube video where he explains international money flows.

For a long time, just to keep it simple, I've told people that the U.S.A. imports air conditioners and other stuff and exports debt -- mostly government debt -- as well as land (not the dirt, but the ownership of the dirt) and other assets. Wall Street likes this because they market the debt and manage the assets and Washington DC politicians like this because they can spend an extra trillion in the run-up to an election without having to raise taxes (to think they will curb that habit before it's too late is, perhaps, asking too much). Foreign financiers use the dollar in dealings with other nations. They also consider the U.S. a safe haven (even when they are ideologically committed to destroying the U.S. -- see the Chinese Politburo).

I don't think there is a shortage of Eurodollars so much as an increase in moral hazard. In the 1990s there was a belief that China would bolster the world financial system. Unfortunately, that would require the CCP to give up control of their national economy (and they do see it as theirs). It's become apparent the communists will not let that happen and are quite willing to stiff investors -- especially foreign investors -- to keep control. The killing of the Chinese capitalist chicken has scared the Eurodollar money-monkies and caused a tightening of lending standards while increasing the "safe-haven" appeal of the dollar.

Then there's Putin punishing the world and the world punishing Putin...

Is the dollar sluggish or thuggish?

Why, it's either too loud or not loud enough

Apparently, I'm not the only person annoyed by the sound quality of current movies. I'll turn it up to understand what the actors are saying and then turn it down when the music starts blaring or the explosions start exploding.

Mangini says that in the old days, "you could count on an actor's theatricality to deliver a line to the back seats." But acting styles have changed so dramatically over the years that it has become much more difficult to capture great sound on the set. When actors adopt that more naturalistic style, "it's even harder for the production sound mixer to capture really quality sound. Now we get those compromised microphone positions here in post-production, reaching for a dialogue line that is barely intelligible or maybe even mumbled because it's an acting style, and already, we're behind the 8-ball in trying to figure out a way to make all of those words intelligible."

slashfilm.com: here's why movie dialogue is difficult to understand

More on the Ohio Senate Race

 I live in Tim Ryan's district and I was just out driving around and didn't see any yard signs for him (I saw one for J.D. Vance). Normally the Democrats would have them out by this time so I take that lack of signs as a sign of low enthusiasm. Of course, they may just be worried about their semi-fascist friends and relatives (when I first heard Joe Biden use the term I thought it applied to those 18-wheelers that pass you on the interstate when the snow is deep -- you know, semi-fascist. Come to find out he was talking about me).

Ohio Senate Race

I mentioned here a few months back that Tim Ryan sounded like Trump while J.D. Vance sounded like he might miss out on a dinner invitation if he sounded like Trump. Then the polls came in and J.D. had to kiss Trump's behind (according to Trump) to get the Donald to rally support for him in Youngstown (Ryan's district -- traditionally a heavily Democrat district which Trump carried). It took about two minutes for Trump to eviscerate Ryan (politically, not actually -- in case a never-Trumper should read this).

Wow, "Operation Flee" was an almost Victory!

Last Wednesday, August 25, I checked the MSN newsfeed before bedtime. The headline made it sound like the Afghan evacuation was now an ongoing success. This was based on the number of people flown out of the country. Apparently, they decided that by turning it into a pure numbers game, they can make "operation flee" sound like a triumph: it does not matter who the evacuees are, just crowd them on planes, fly them out, and pump up the numbers. Then on Thursday the terror attack happened. I figured this would be a three day set-back for their propaganda counter offensive. So Biden's speech the other night (where he basically said "never have so many, owed so much, to so few White House Staff") came as no surprise.

Not to say that damaged controlled stopped in the immediate aftermath of the suicide bombing. On Thursday, I was listening to CBS Radio news and their "correspondent" informed me that President Biden had been warning Americans to leave the country "for a long time." So I waited for an example of this warning. The correspondent told me that on Tuesday the President told Americans to leave. Wait. From Tuesday to Thursday is a long time? Well, if you are surrounded by people who want to kill you, it must seem that way. Of course, two days before the Taliban entered Kabul (with the administration's approval, if you believe the Washington Post -- which does feel awkward, I'll admit) the administration made it sound like potential evacuees had plenty of time to pack. Is there ever an appropriate time to panic? Apparently not.

Starships and Stay-ships, Moonbases and Mars-bases, Fun...Profit?

NASA hopes to return to the moon by 2024 (the Artemis Program) and chose SpaceX’s Starship for use as its lunar lander (designated HLS – Human Landing System). The Starship is powered by three ingredients: liquid methane, liquid oxygen, and an electric car magnet and human dynamo named Elon Musk. Musk plans a kind of million man migration to Mars (which will include other genders – I used “man” to keep the alliteration rolling). For Elon, going to the moon is a little like Coca-Cola deciding to produce apple juice because it’s got spare capacity at its bottling plant. In fact, Elon has started so many different projects in the last few years that I have to wonder about his attention span.

Nasa’s HLS choice caused chagrin in the World’s Richest Guy, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, whose moon lander floundered. Bezos’ space launch start-up, Blue Origin,  joined established aerospace contractors to submit a competing bid. Upon losing, he immediately mobilized an army of lawyers and lobbyists to put a stop to the SpaceX contract. They argue that spending 3 billion dollars on Elon Musk’s more capable lander is nuts when you can spend ten billion on their much less capable one (this being established DC tradition and the only one congress holds sacred). Now, I won’t claim to be an astronaut, but this effort to squash the upstart start-up gives me hope that their lunar lander will work. After all, if SpaceX fails, it will fail quickly, given the promised pace of Starship development. Then Blue Origin, with its pocket-sized politicians, could pick up the pieces and profit. 

Starship ranks as the world’s most powerful rocket. Mated with its first stage “super-heavy” booster, it is taller than the Statue of Liberty atop her pedestal. The Lunar-lander portion alone is as tall as a 17 story building (minus the thirteenth floor, of course). Both the booster and the starship will be reusable – and SpaceX intends to build a lot of Starships in a variety of configurations (it’s a “cheaper by the dozen” kinda deal). The lunar-lander could carry 100+ tons of cargo to the surface with ample pressurized living space for the astronauts. They, and the cargo, can descend from the Starship penthouse to the lunar surface by way of an elevator – down, please. The possibilities here are enough to boggle even a stubbornly un-boggled mind, such as my own.

Given the possibilities, the project, as originally envisioned by NASA, seems rather unambitious. The contract covers one “roundtrip moon-trip” for four Astronauts, with hopefully more to follow at a rather sluggish pace. Artemis is somewhat more capable than the Apollo program from fifty years ago. This expensive turkey is unlikely to survive in the congressional slaughterhouse for long. What is needed is something much more inspiring that can mobilize public support. Allow me to offer a few suggestions, a not-so-little dream project for Mr. Musk to pursue while I indulge in my afternoon naps.

Initially, it will start with three dedicated Starship lunar-landers for the moonbase. Ship number one and two will have their retro-rockets mounted around the top of the ship to minimize the kick-up of lunar dust during landing (as is currently conceived). The first lander is maximized for cargo and the second for astronauts. Both will land on the moon upright. After unloading the cargo from the carrier, the astronauts will prepare a long and narrow pad for starship three (the pad might be packed lunar soil covered by a tarp).

Starship number three will be a “stay-ship,” built with its small retro-rockets along its side, rather than around the top, so it can land lengthwise. After it is secured in place, this ship’s engines and fuel tanks will be removed, allowing the entire volume of the ship to be used as a lunar base (the Starship is nine meters in diameter and 50 meters long – I’m using metric measurements since it has left the U.S.). It would be designed and built on Planet Earth with this end in mind. The Stayship can carry much of the required supplies for this transformation in its cargo bay. The powerful raptor engines – configured for operation in a vacuum – will be repurposed to power space “tow motors.” At some point, these will go into lunar orbit with containers full of “exports” and return with containers full of “imports,” after a careful rendezvous with the cargo ship. The removed fuel tanks of the “stay-ship” will be used to store methane and oxygen to fuel the space tugs. Oxygen is rather abundant on the moon, molecularly bound with iron, for instance. Oxygen is also found in the moon-water that clings as ice to the dark side of craters, but moon-water might be a bit too precious to use as a fuel source. Methane, the fuel used by starships, appears rather rarer. 

At some point, the “astronaut” starship will return to Earth orbit with some or all of the astronauts. It will then move cargo and personnel back and forth from Earth orbit to Lunar orbit. The space “tow motors” will pick up supplies in lunar orbit and deliver them to the surface. A space-based warehouse might be called for (perhaps parked at a Lagrange Point, where the interplay of the gravitational fields of the earth and moon will keep it in a stable orbit between the earth and the moon).

Additional “stay-ships” will land at the moonbase and have their guts removed. These ships will be equipped to make solar panels, smelt metals, and produce glass and ceramics for future base expansion. Aluminum and steel production on the moon could provide structural material for a ship bound for Mars but built on the moon. The stored guts of the stay-ships can be used for the Mars ships. These “Mars” ships will only travel in a vacuum or through an extremely thin Martian atmosphere, so they can be designed with this fact in mind. Liquid oxygen can be made on the moon. Perhaps supply ships could fill up with liquid oxygen in lunar orbit and leave liquid methane for the moon. With luck, trapped subsurface gases might be found on the moon (methane, CO, CO2, ammonia). 

At some point, the starship that was maximized for cargo and waited patiently on the lunar surface can be refueled and join the second starship in trips to Earth and back (or head to Mars).

So, two of the first products for lunar export could be rockets and LOX. The moon’s “comparative advantage” in trade might be its one-sixth of earth’s gravity. It could provide a port for large nuclear-powered ships to move about the solar system mining asteroids. If these ships came close to earth we’d hear those “what if it crashes in my neighborhood” scares that accompany such discussions.

This plan would require a larger “up-front” investment but could yield a lunar base that pays for its ongoing operation and might even provide a good return on the initial investment.  That will mean more opportunity for Blue Origin, Boeing, and other interested parties, so they should get their lobbyist to work on something more “inspiring,” rather than more costly.

More Lite than Light!

During the first Obama/Biden administration I decided light opera was the best format for commentary. With music and song, it would float above the mess the way those mountains in Avatar float above planet Pandora. So this Opera will not just be light, it’ll be anti-gravity: No matter how grave the situation, it will be anti-the-gravity of the situation.

The Opera is set on the island estate of the multi-billionaire Artful Shortseller. Art hosts “The International Conference to Solve All the World's Problems with One Foul Swipe.” What is the foul swipe, you ask? Sorry, you are not supposed to ask and I'm not allowed to answer.

It starts with a big production number. The new President's team marches through the gates like parading Olympic athletes planning to disrespect the flag. As they enter they sing:

The DC Press Corps and Officials

With Diplomatic Creep,
We cross History’s Stage.
Both shy and meek
As The World Turns, amazed.

Praise we spread in full,
Without a boastful word,
We give credit to our Bull,
Not just the nagging herd!

President Biden

(Wanders about as he mumbles):

Salute the Marines, Mr. Jill Biden. Salute. What.

(Bumps into the scenery; Consults his mePad; begins to sing.)

Like a mentally stable-man
World leaders, I’ll approach.
One I’ll treat like a door-man,
as I deliver my reproach.
But them that Trump has cowed,
I’ll look squarely in the knees!
As I offer a gracious bow,
And sincere apollo-gee.

Hail, hell! What do I do next? 

(Checks pad) 

"Tell European Nations
Of Power abrogations!"
But Poo-tin calls me a tease.
So I’ll implore “believe me, please!”

I call this number, “History Brought to Boil by a Cracked Pot.”

At the center of Art’s estate is “The Mean-Well.” This is a deep well, as well as a mean well. For some mysterious reason, well-meaning people (mostly voters) get sucked in, fall past the mean, and even plunge below average, which drags down the average, causing the mean to become even meaner. These folks don't mean to be mean, they mean to be equitable. What is the powerful attractive force of the Mean-Well? Could it be the mean-welling of the Mean-Well?

Actually, the attractive force is the fabled Lost Thirteenth Law of an Admired Marxist (choose one). This lost law is forty thousand pages of progressive legislation that, if adopted in its entirety, will yield the forty million pages of regulation that will, in the end, make all this stuff work. The Thirteenth Law was typed before white-out, back when progressives didn’t make mistakes. However, it has been rewritten by AIs (Artificial Intellectuals) using out-white (and there’s a lot of that in it).

Thank dog this is a work of fiction.

The Opera needs a love story but not to worry: with so many malignant narcissists involved, it has lots of love stories.

Invention Prevention

When I was a boy watching WWII submarine dramas, I came up with the idea for a submarine that pushed itself forward by taking in water at the front and pumping it from the rear. In a stroke of genius, I decided to use the water coming in the front of the sub to turn the turbines that would power the pumps that pushed the water out the back. Sure, it would need a bit of a push to get going, but after that you're good.

I got really excited about the idea because I thought it might have applications in the cold war. I told my father so he could maybe call President Eisenhower. My dad said I had just invented a “perpetual motion” machine. Upon hearing this I swelled with pride. I said, "Gosh, golly, gee! I have barely achieved the age of reason and already I've invented a perpetual motion machine! How awesome is that! I'm like the Mozart – whoever that is – of Machine Inventors."

Then my father explained the scientific consensus of the day (thank god that’s changed). There I was, not yet a youth, and I came face to face with my own logical fallacy -- not someone else's, mind you (this happens quite a lot) but my own. Back then we didn't protect our children from such events.

The fact that physics could interfere with a rich fantasy life kinda turned me off on that whole course of study (I should have gone into central banking, where making something from nothing is central to the entire process).

Plan "B" from outer space

 Salvation is a TV series on Amazon Prime. The first season is free.  I'm watching because it's not that good, so when they start charging I'll stop watching. It's kinda like when you are beating your head against the wall, and someone says if you keep doing that you are going to have to pay for the damage, so you stop. 

Here's the plot summary. The earth's in trouble. Again. An asteroid will destroy the planet in six months unless humanity destroys it (Planet Earth) first. Granted, that's a tight time frame for man-caused planetary destruction (it's OK to use "man" in this context) but doable. So the asteroid is actually "plan B from Outerspace."

It's the size of Washington DC and will impact Washington, DC, which sounds good until you see the simulation: the entire surface of the planet turns into molten lava! OMG, not even a dinosaur could survive that! There's always hope, though.

Hope, in this case, is a deep space probe out by Jupiter that can be redirected to crash into the asteroid. This is like a bullet hitting a bullet, with one bullet being the approximate size of an empty tin can and the other being the approximate size of a fully ladened supertanker. But, if you take into consideration their high speeds and something called "inertial mass," which has something to do with something called physics, then the Asteroid breaks apart and the resulting impact no longer destroys the entire planet or kills all 12 billion of us (and our pets). Instead, the pieces miss Washington D.C. and hit Beijing and Moscow, killing 1.1 billion of those people (and their pets). When this possible outcome is described at a Pentagon meeting, everyone goes hmm at the same time. They decide on this collision course. Unfortunately, there are many collision courses! 

President Biden is totally out of the loop and uninvolved, as you might expect.  They could have had Martin Sheen play him (he's old enough) if only there were a believable plot device like his getting briefed. His absence is explained in episode six when he's referred to as a "she." Apparently,  he begins self-identifying as a woman because that description is easier to believe than honest, moderate, and competent. Also, he can now freely sniff women's hair because a woman can do that to another woman, can't she?

During this period of Presidential transition,  government agents and billionaires do what they want with government resources. This is quite realistic but they should call it "infrastructure spending." Also, the deep state is deeply sinister. That's the sort of portrayal that annoyed me ten years ago, but these days, not-so-much (thank you, James Clapper and John Brennan).

Safety Quest

 Oh, hell. I don't feel like explaining this.

 Quest Carefully

Often when on a Quest
You'll create an unholy mess
And cause great distress to others:
Such as horses, goats and your mother.
So it is best,
Outside the nest,
To Quest -- carefully.

When you see a dragon at the break of day,
Run away.
Run away.
Do not believe what the soothsayers say.
Require proof
From the sooth.
If an old man on a bridge offers his advice,
Treat him nice.
Treat him nice.

Quest Carefully.

Use care as you stare
At Buxom, bawdy, barmaids.
Do not imbibe the potions you get
From cute redheads, and brunettes.
Blonds, too,
If it's true,
They've had more fun --
Meaning more flings flung.
And when climbing a ladder
To rescue her from "what's the matter?"
Don't stand on the top rung.

Quest Carefully.

As you pursue your Quest
Never rest, never rest --
Recklessly.
Do not be reckless in your rest!

Sleep with care.

Beware! The woods have bears
And the forest is where
The wolves have their lairs.
And never eat meat
unless it's been cooked to an internal temperature
Of 160 degrees Fahrenheit and you should immediately refrigerate --
Yes, refrigerate!
The unused portions.
This is also the case
When you reheat -- and eat --
the meat you think safe.
Why not be a Vegan?

Quest Carefully. Quest Carefully.
And as you quest, never rest -- recklessly.

I left some hair colors out (space considerations).

Slap them with a Tax

I wrote some lyrics! They are lyrical! They can be sung to the tune of every Radiohead song I’ve ever heard (I haven’t heard them all).

 Big G and the D.C.’s

When I see you eating Big Macs,
With your happy-meal deal kids
I feel your weight upon my shoulders.
I want to…
Slap, slap, slap.

I see you in your big car,
On a commute that is too far;
I feel my temperature rising.
I want to…
Slap, slap, slap.

At the movies when you eat popcorn
So full of salt and fat
I feel forlorn.
and want to…
Slap, slap, slap.

Slap, slap, slap!
Slap them with a tax!
Slap. Slap!
Slap them with a tax!

I don’t want to be your lover,
I just want to control
what’s in your cupboard.

Slap, slap!
Slap them with a tax!

I don’t want to be your doctor
I just want to decide
What's proper.

Slap, slap!
Slap them with a tax!

I don’t want to be your banker,
Just the confiscator of your
Stash, stash, stash!
I don’t want to be your savior,
Just your reg-you-lay-tor, 

Until you meet your Undertaker.

Now, no more lip as I count the bullets in your clips.
Peace.

 15 Steps then a Shear Drop!

It's Powerful Stuff

Some years ago I started doing commentary on current events through the use of musical comedy. Unfortunately, it led to uncontrolled weeping so I stopped. Still, I like putting my thoughts in song (yes, song!), and here is my latest attempt. Think Punk Rock. Starts sweet, ends loud.

Clerk Power

I know you think I'm heaven sent

The greatest hope your world presents.

Your situation's critical

But to me you're typical.

Bad vibrations,

In creation.

Alienation

fills the nation.

Check the box, don't pout!

Just fill -- your forms out.

We must know you. Or we'll no you.
Yes, we know you. And will no you.
Don't break the mold. It fits you.
That moldy mold? Is for you.
Clerk Power. Clerk Power.

I got you feeling desperate

The needs you have are barely met.

But leave no blanks upon the form,

Always behave within the norm.

I'll estrange you.

Rearrange you.

Bad vibrations

Fill creation.

Alienation,

throughout the nation.

I will serve you,

On a platter.

Does it matter? Do you matter?

Clerk Power! Clerk Power!

Clerk Power! Clerk Power!

I know you think I'm heaven sent

The greatest chance your world presents.

But before solutions are devised
All interviews must be reprized.

I'll estrange you!

Rearrange you!

Take your measure?

At my pleasure!

Fill the forms out.

Does it fit now?

Have a cow, now?

Don't act crazy!

Take a nap now.

Don't be lazy!

Or outrageous

It's contagious!

Here to serve you,

On a platter.

Does it matter? Does it matter?
Don't you matter? Do you matter?

Clerk Power! Clerk Power! Clerk Power!

Whew. I was shouting a bit much at the end there. Calm. Down. When did the slogan All Power to the People become All Power to the Clerks?  When the people shouting "All Power to the People" became clerks.

With apologies to Kurt Cobain.