Year: 2023

It’s Not That Warm

Just putting this down for the record before the media drumbeat for “warmest winter ever” gets rolling again.

The Winter of 1877-78 is the warmest Meteorological Winter on record in the Twin Cities. The winter of 1877-78 was dubbed the “Year without a Winter.” Indeed, the winter of 1877-78 is the warmest winter on record for the Twin Cities with a December-February average temperature of 29 degrees. The next winter that compares is 1930-31 with an average temperature of 26.9 degrees. In 3rd place is the winter of 2001-02 with 26.8 degrees.

The Year Without a Winter: 1877-78, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources

Obviously it is too soon to reach any conclusions about the current winter, it not even being halfway through January yet, but it should be noted that 2022 wasn’t even a warm year by historical standards.

The average temperature in the Twin Cities metro area in 2022 was 46 degrees Fahrenheit, according to the National Weather Service. That number is below the region’s “normal,” or long-term average temperature of 46.9 degrees. The hottest air temperature in the metro was 101 degrees, and the coldest was 17 degrees below zero.

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I Didn’t Even Have to Ask

There is an old saying, attributed somewhat dubiously to Voltaire: “I prayed the Lord to make my enemies ridiculous, and He answered my prayer.”

I can’t claim any credit here, and I very much doubt any divine intervention was required, as the SFWA has not only managed to make itself ridiculous again, but is now demonstrating that there is no reason for it to even exist anymore.

If you’ve read my body of work here at Upstream over the past year or so, you know I’m not a big fan of the SFWA. From their long and sordid history of hagiographic treatment of serial child molesters to cancelling their own honorees to getting vast amounts of member data leaked, it’s safe to say that SFWA as an organization has entered the “skinsuiting” phase of their existence; a once-valuable entity that had meaning, now merely doing whatever it can to rake in cash on little more than its former notoriety.

If that sounds too harsh, allow me to present what came to mind after I had a chance to pore over their recently released tax returns for 2021. That year’s filings have been of particular interest, given that 2021 saw a highly profiled but spectacularly failed lawsuit.

The “LOLsuit”, as it became known in certain corners of the internet, was the effort of member author Patrick Tomlinson to subpoena Cloudflare into revealing the identities of the users on an Opie and Anthony fan forum that had taken to trolling him. It’s been highly speculated since that Tomlinson received help from SFWA’s Legal Fund for the effort. Many who had taken a look at our previous article on SFWA’s filings from prior years were anxious to see if barely-an-author’s escapades would be reflected in 2021’s long-awaited filings.

Welp, wouldn’t you know it, their legal expenses nearly quintupled compared to 2020 (that year’s filings can be found here):

LEGAL EXPENSES 2020: 17,533

LEGAL EXPENSES 2021: 83,750

Which, naturally, leads me to wonder if 2023 is the year I should consider filing that lawsuit to force the organization to publicly acknowledge that I am still a member. The Legal Legion certainly has a much better record in the California courts than SFWA’s legal team.

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World Evil Forum

I don’t often agree with Greenpeace, but they’re absolutely right to call out the massive Clown World hypocrites who are flying in hundreds of private jets to their mountain temple of evil next week in order to tell everyone else in the world to stop using heat, water, and air.

A few days ahead of the WEF’s annual meeting from January 16-20, Greenpeace has warned of the damage caused by the number of private jets shuttling to and from Davos. According to an analysis by the Dutch consulting firm CE Delft and Greenpeace, the number of private jets to and from airports serving Davos doubled during WEF 2022, which took place in May. This amounted to 1,040 private jet flights during the annual meeting week.

Whatever happened to Zoom meetings? If they can afford private jets, can’t they afford web cams? But I suppose Satan is probably a real stickler for physical attendance at the annual Black Mass.

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We Don’t Know…

But we know.

To be informed about how best to protect ourselves and our loved ones is the smartest thing we can do. I chose the vaccine.
— 12 March 2022, Lisa Marie Presley

Lisa Marie Presley, US singer and only child of Elvis Presley, has died at the age of 54, after suffering a ‘full cardiac arrest’.
— 12 January 2023

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Signs of the Times

  • A large number of U.S. army tanks and military vehicles began arriving at the Dutch port of Vlissingen on Wednesday (January 11), ahead of their transport to Poland and Lithuania later this year as part of moves to strengthen NATO’s eastern flank. The equipment includes large numbers of M-1 Abrams tanks and Bradley Fighting Vehicles from the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division, of Fort Hood, Texas. Dutch armed forces are helping with marine security and guarding the port area where the vehicles will be housed before they continue East.
  • This morning Russian Navy ships and submarines left their base at Novorossiysk, in the Black Sea, en-masse. This is highly unusual and may indicate ongoing operations. Sources seen by Naval News confirm the exodus. The group included the Project 11711 Ivan Gren class landing ship, Pyotr Morgunov, the largest amphibious ship in the Black Sea. It also contained all three Project 636.3 Improved-Kilo class submarines which were present at the base. Analysis suggests that other warships were also sailing, leaving only a few warships and support vessels in the port. It is likely the most empty that Novorossiysk has been in many months.
  • The United States will continue to enhance its joint defense readiness with South Korea and Japan by conducting additional joint military exercises against growing North Korean threats, a White House official said Wednesday. John Kirby, National Security Council coordinator for strategic communications, also highlighted that the US has devoted additional intelligence gathering and military capabilities to the region to that end. “You have seen in just recent weeks some bilateral exercises between the United States and Japan, specifically in response to the increased tensions by the regime in Pyongyang,” the NSC official said in a virtual press briefing.
  • Putin has appointed the current chief of General Staff, General Gerasimov, as the head of all the Russian forces in the SMO, with Surovikin has his deputy. This is one more indicator that the “Big Offensive” will be launched sooner rather than later.
  • China on Thursday delivered the world’s first seaborne drone carrier, the Zhu Hai Yun, capable of operating on its own. The unmanned carrier can be controlled remotely and navigate autonomously in open water. It will undertake marine scientific research and other observations.
  • Sweden’s government is taking steps to reactivate civil conscription in the latest move to shore up its defense capabilities in the wake of Russia’s war against Ukraine. The Nordic country, which in May sought entry into the North Atlantic Treaty Organization together with neighboring Finland, is also ramping up the number of people who are called to serve in the armed forces after a 2017 decision to resurrect military conscription.
  • Every single firing pin in the NZ Defence Force’s 9040 new infantry rifles has been replaced after a number of the rifles broke when the weapon was brought into service. The firing pin is a critical part of any firearm – without one it won’t work. The new weapon is based on the M-16/AR-15 type weapon and was intended to double the range effectiveness of those firing it out to 600 metres. The first shipment of the 9040 rifles bought from United States manufacturer Lewis Machine and Tools arrived in May last year.
  • “The liberation of Soledar was completed on the evening of January 12,” the Russian Defense Ministry said during its daily briefing. The MOD added that the town is “important for the continuation of successful offensive actions.”

Let’s just say it’s a very good time to subscribe to Castalia Library. The January-February subscription book is THE ARTS OF WAR.

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No, Harry, No!

Prince Harry has left readers wincing with his account of applying Elizabeth Arden cream used by his late mother to his frostbitten penis in 2011. The moment appears in his explosive memoir Spare, with a clip from the audiobook narrated by the Duke of Sussex himself making the rounds on social media, where horrified readers have called it a ‘Freudian nightmare.’ In the passage, Harry recalls that his late mother Princess Diana used to apply the cream to her lips, and says the smell of the product made him feel like his mother ‘was right there in the room’ before he applied the cream to his penis.

We’ve officially reached the point where satanic humiliation ritual may be the most optimistic explanation for Harry Markle’s behavior. Who ghostwrote this for him, Jordan Peterson?

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Human Sacrifice on the Horizon

Sacrificing animals at home is now legal in Detroit:

Residents of a Detroit-area community with a large Muslim population can sacrifice animals at home for religious reasons. The Hamtramck City Council explicitly approved the practice, 3-2, Tuesday, another step in recognizing a cultural shift in a city whose 20th century history was shaped by Polish immigrants. Muslims often slaughter animals, typically goats or sheep, or pay someone to do it for them during the holy holiday of Eid al-Adha. Meat is shared with family, friends and the poor. The Hamtramck council in December had voted to continue a ban on animal slaughter but reversed course, at least for religious reasons, after legal advice and objections from people who follow the Islamic faith, the Detroit Free Press reported.

In fact, human sacrifice for religious purposes is arguably more indigenous to North America than animal sacrifice. Don’t forget that the name of the tribe that ruled the Aztec Empire, which not only utilized human sacrifice for religious purposes, but engaged in it on an industrial scale, is the Mexica. And as the nation named after that tribe has increasingly abandoned its Spanish-imposed Catholicism for a syncretic death cult, the historical trend is clear.

It is coming. Don’t think it isn’t. And the only thing that will stop it is a) the collapse of Clown World and b) Christian revival.

There is no such thing as a secular society. Secularism is just a meaningless line on the gradient between Christianity and devil worship.

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The Review Police

Amazon is disappearing reviews of disfavored books.

Like countless others, I’ve been reviewing products that I have bought on Amazon for almost a decade. Around a year ago, I favorably reviewed a book titled SJWs Always Lie: Taking Down the Thought Police (I recommend it). Reviews are in turn reviewed by Amazon apparatchiks prior to being posted. My review of the book was taken down for going against some general standards (which in this case I was criticizing leftists who censor).

Life went on. I kept reviewing books, CDs, clothes, etc. and my reviews were always brief, like others in the site. Sometimes my reviews involving books on or by leftists were characteristically caustic, but no one minded.

Except a month ago, with my review of American Injustice (an extended review was accepted here, in The Iconoclast). It was not accepted for the usual vague reasons (“violates our Community Guidelines”). I could appeal, which I did.

Whereupon all of my reviews were taken down. My reviews on electronics, on t-shirts, on shoes, on books, on games, on films—all taken down. Apparently, the leftist censor thought that my reviews of Jorge Bolet. Rediscovered Liszt Recital, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress, All Creatures Great and Small, Batman Forever, The Confessions of St. Augustine, Duck Tales Vol.1, Gandhi: An Autobiography, Blue Jasmine, World War Z, 20 Million Miles to Earth, Fifty Shades of Grey, The Essential Artie Shaw, Jimmy Neutron- The Best of Season 2, Darwin’s Blind Spot: Evolution Beyond Natural Selection, The Biosphere, Lysenko’s Ghost: Epigenetics and Russia, Littleboutique Fashion Magazine Show Stiletto Sandals Nigh Club Strap Pumps, Basic Questions in Paleontology, The 39 Steps, The mosquito hypothetically considered as an agent in the transmission of yellow fever poison, 1881, 1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed, The Sex Lives of Cannibals, and many, many, many more were worthy of censorship.

Gone. All gone.

I appealed, of course, several times. Ignored each time.

I’m not terribly surprised. I think this began around the middle of 2021, as you can see that there are relatively few reviews of SJWAL or A THRONE OF BONES that have been published in the last two years. I haven’t paid any attention to Amazon for a while, since I’ve been focused on other projects for most of that time, but it appears that in the aftermath of decimating the ebook market and centralizing its control of it through Kindle Unlimited, Amazon has now moved on to actively managing what books its customers are permitted to read or not by filtering its reviewers.

There are 884 reviews of SJWAL, but the most recent is dated October 18, 2021. There are 443 reviews of ATOB, and the most recent is September 19, 2022.

UPDATE: Amazon has deleted 11 ATOB reviews since this post, leaving 432.

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Wednesday Arktoons

MIDNIGHT’S WAR Episode 63: Who Do You Serve?

FAIRY DOOR Episode 1: The Border Town Girl

THE BLOODSTAINED DEFILE Episode 1: Archers to the Front

CHATEAU GRIEF Episode 190: De-feeted. Pro-Rogue.

EVIL MONKEY MEMES Episode 72: In One Basket

CHUCK DIXON PRESENTS: WAR Episode 80: Marine Raid on Munda

BOB Episode 103: A** Wipe

VEGFOLK FABLES Episode 178: Kindling

BEN GARRISON Episode 87: The J6 Swamp

STONETOSS Episode 154: Shock Therapy

DEUS VULT Episode 21: The Lord Guides Me

CHUCK DIXON’S AVALON Episode 89: Never Gonna Stop

If you want content, Arktoons has got it in spades. Two new text series launch today, THE BLOODSTAINED DEFILE and FAIRY DOOR. Check them out!

All US Flights Grounded

  • Early Wednesday morning, the US Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) system that notifies pilots about hazards or any changes to airport facility services suffered an outage that might result in a nationwide grounding. The FAA wrote in an advisory update that its NOTAM (Notice to Air Missions) system had “failed.” The aviation agency provided no immediate estimate for when it would return online.
  • US FAA DOMESTIC DEPARTURES PAUSE EXTENDED TO 9:30 AM ET: CBS

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