Year: 2023

Raising Our Game

While Castalia House has repeatedly demonstrated excellence with regards to the content and manufacturing quality of our books, our customer service has been essentially nonexistent. What people may not understand is that this was not simply the result of indifference, but was more to the fact that we had absolutely no control over when a book was shipped out to a buyer.

One of the reasons I have been so reluctant to provide dates, and why I have been so unapologetic about missing those dates that we did provide, is because until now, there was never anything at all that we could do about them. For example, I was told by the bindery that THE JUNGLE BOOKS would be shipped to our newly-established shipping center on March first. However, we did not receive them until April 7th.

Fortunately, we are now in physical possession of our entire stock of leather books, and future books will be shipped from the bindery to the shipping center as soon as they are bound and boxed. We also will not consider any books “ready to ship” until we have received them and are ready to send them out. We have a new email address that anyone who has not received a book of any kind can contact (1), as well as an email address (2) for those who want to check on the status of their Library/Libraria/History subscription.

  • (1) shipping-at-castaliahouse-dot-com
  • (2) library-at-castaliahouse-dot-com

We have also recently discovered a bug in the WooCommerce system that has permitted a few people to order books that were officially out of stock, but still had books listed in the inventory. Apparently, it’s not enough to declare a book out of stock, but the inventory also has to be set to zero or the system overrides the out-of-stock status. So, for example, eleven customers have not yet received their leather Junior Classics set because we did not realize they’d been able to buy them since we’d declared the set to be out-of-stock more than a year ago.

Fortunately, we always keep a reserve to cover shipments that go awry, so we have enough books to send everyone. But in at least some cases, if you haven’t received a leather book yet, it may be because we didn’t know you’d bought it due to this WooCommerce bug. Now that we know about it, we will get the books sent out to the appropriate addresses.

And yes, we will permit new orders of the Junior Classics leather sets once books 7 through 10 are printed and being bound. We printed 500 copies of Vols 1 through 6, but only bound 250, so we can produce another 250 sets whenever we decide to pull the trigger.

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Neither Democratic nor Free

Peter Hitchens asks why the UK is following the fanatically stupid lead of the neocons into war with Russia:

First of all, what interest does the United Kingdom have in continuing and sustaining this war? A powerful faction in Washington DC, with supporters in the West Wing of the White House, the Pentagon, the State Department and the CIA, have long wanted a proxy war with Russia. They believe passionately that Russia must never be allowed to rise again. This faction, whose founding document is known as The Wolfowitz Doctrine, have been hard at work since 1992, when The New York Times leaked their plans. They are almost exactly the same people who created the Iraq War out of nothing, who got the West into the Afghanistan quagmire, and who backed Islamist fanatics in Syria – who were the sort of people they would have arrested in Chicago.

They have an unparalleled record of fanatical stupidity, and everywhere they intervene ends up in corpse-strewn ruins, with everyone who can get out fleeing from the fire and screams… towards Europe and the Channel coast.

If every dollar these zealots have spent on war had been spent instead on building prosperous free countries in places such as Russia, the world would be a startlingly better place. That, fundamentally, is America’s problem. If nobody in the USA will stand up to them, they will get their repeated stupid wars and the rest of us will have to watch, weep and receive the fleeing multitudes.

But we do not have to take part. Why are we in this? How does Britain benefit from war between Russia and Ukraine? How, for that matter, has poor Ukraine benefited from it, its cities wrecked, its economy half-dead, untold numbers of its young men gone to graveyards? Why should any British soldiers be there at all? If Parliament does not debate this, then we are not a democracy. And if any critical voices are drowned out with slander and abuse, then we are not a free country.

Just as the secular commentators can’t make sense of all the evil in the world today due to their refusal to accept the reality of the spiritual world, Christian commentators like Peter Hitchens can’t understand Clown World due to their refusal to accept the fact that they are ruled over by foreigners practicing a foreign religion.

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When Defeat is in Doubt

Conservatism is the art of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. It’s astonishing how every time conservatives start winning even the smallest battles in the cultural war, their intrepid leaders immediately call upon them to lay down their arms and refrain from actually defeating the enemy.

Apparently the Younger Trump is not the warrior that we’d hoped he would become. Regardless, my lifelong boycott of Bud Light will continue.

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Friday Arktoons

FULLSTRIKE! Episode 1: The Early Bird

FIDDLE WITH DARKNESS Episode 6: Chapter 6- The Conspiracist

WARDOGS INC. Episode 26: Operation Five Finger

THE SWORD OF GOD Episode 54: Like Mother Like Son

FRIDAY FISH FUNNIES Episode 15: Why So Serious

BOB Episode 128: Stop Tutting

FLYING SPARKS Episode 67: Making An Example

CHATEAU GRIEF Episode 227: No Smorking

Today marks the first episode of FULLSTRIKE!, Cliff Cosmic’s first original series. Check it out!

Blocking the Bowdlerizers

An English playwright who is already experiencing requests for revisions by SJWs plans to protect his work from his literary heirs in his will:

Martin McDonagh has revealed he may use his will to ensure there are no Roald Dahl-style posthumous edits to his work.

The acclaimed playwright, 53, told how some theatre companies have refused to put on productions of his plays because he refused language changes to make the performances more ‘palatable’. The filmmaker, who wrote and directed The Banshees of Inisherin, described the practice of writers being asked to change what they have written for sensitivity-related reasons ‘problematic’.

Speaking to BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, Martin said: ‘That’s why I’ve got to make sure in my will, the wording of that is very, very specific too. A theatre has got every right not to put a play on. The major problem is that they ask you or another writer to change it to make it more palatable to them or what they think their audience is.’

The playwright’s words come after it emerged that Roald Dahl’s beloved children’s books are being rewritten by sensitivity gurus to remove language they deem offensive. Publisher Puffin hired sensitivity readers to rewrite chunks of the author’s text to make sure the books ‘can continue to be enjoyed by all today’, resulting in extensive changes across Dahl’s work.

It’s a good idea. My initial thought is to include a codicil stating that if the heirs sell any of the rights associated with the work or publish the work with any posthumous edits, the work immediately reverts to the public domain.

Obviously, this requires some careful thinking and precise language, as one does not want to harm an honest literary heir like Christopher Tolkien who did a remarkable job preserving and even extending his father’s literary legacy. But no self-respecting author wants to see what is happening to the work of Road Dahl and other deceased authors happen to his work.

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Undermined by Intelligence

As the Chinese state media sees it, US foreign interests are being systematically undermined by the behavior of the US intelligence agencies toward major US allies:

The leaked documents offer a rare glimpse into the U.S.’ extensive espionage operations targeting both allies and adversaries. Among the most striking revelations is the interception of conversations between high-ranking South Korean national security officials. These conversations focused on concerns over a U.S. request for ammunition, which the U.S. intended to send to Ukraine. The South Korean officials debated the potential violation of their policy of not supplying lethal aid to countries at war and even discussed ways to circumvent this policy by selling the ammunition to Poland.

In the case of Israel, a leaked CIA report sourced to signals intelligence alleges that Mossad, Israel’s primary intelligence agency, has been encouraging protests against the country’s new government. This revelation has sparked outrage in Jerusalem, with the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office vehemently denying the allegations and calling the report “mendacious and without any foundation whatsoever.”

As for the U.S.’ infiltration of its adversaries, the documents reveal detailed information about Russian troop movements, capabilities, and plans. This information was obtained through intercepted communications and human confidential sources, raising concerns about the safety of these assets and the possibility of Russia changing its communication methods to better conceal its planning.

The leaked documents not only showcase the breadth and depth of the U.S. intelligence operations but also highlight the potential consequences of such activities. The exposure of U.S. espionage on its allies may lead to a weakening of trust in these crucial relationships, while the revelation of America’s infiltration into its adversaries’ communication systems may force these adversaries to adapt and find new ways to obscure their intentions.

In the context of the ongoing situation in Ukraine, the documents highlight the proxy nature of the conflict, directed by Washington. The U.S. has been providing intelligence that allowed Ukrainian forces to anticipate and counter Russian operations. The Pentagon’s involvement in organizing Ukraine’s air defenses and estimating the exhaustion of the country’s existing arsenal underscores its active role in the conflict.

Sooner or later, the extent of Clown World’s insidious evil will become known to the entire world. I would not be even remotely surprised to learn that national leaders such as Putin, Xi, and even AMLO have been fully aware of the US-stasi domestic spy program for some time. At this point, most foreigners are better informed about the true nature of the Empire That Never Ended than Americans are, and I have little doubt that more information on the subject will be made available to the US public in the near future.

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Liars Fear the Truth

NPR flees from Twitter in response to being labeled as both “state-affiliated” and “government-funded” media despite observably being both:

After briefly being labeled “state-affiliated media,” NPR has decided to abandon Twitter.

Under the leadership of entrepreneur Elon Musk, Twitter attached a descriptor to the account associated with National Public Radio, characterizing the account as “state-affiliated media.”

After swift backlash, though, the social media site exchanged the label for a different, more accurate one: “Government-funded media.”

Supporters of NPR were angered by Twitter’s original label, seemingly lumping the U.S. news outlet in with sites like Russia Today (RT) and China’s Xinhua News Agency.

Apparently displeased with both designations, NPR announced Wednesday it was suspending its Twitter accounts.

A news article from NPR reported, “NPR will no longer post fresh content to its 52 official Twitter feeds, becoming the first major news organization to go silent on the social media platform. In explaining its decision, NPR cited Twitter’s decision to first label the network ‘state-affiliated media,’ the same term it uses for propaganda outlets in Russia, China, and other autocratic countries.”

NPR will “no longer be active on Twitter because the platform is taking actions that undermine our credibility by falsely implying that we are not editorially independent,” the outlet said in a statement.

John Lansing, CEO of NPR, told the news site he leads abandoning Twitter is about “protecting” NPR’s “ability to produce journalism without ‘a shadow of negativity.’”

The amusing thing about NPR’s little tantrum is that both Russia Today and the Xinhua News Agency are considerably more reliable than National Public Radio, which is both affiliated with the U.S. government and funded by it.

NPR gets another 31 percent of its funding in programming fees from member organizations. Federal funding indirectly contributes to the latter category because the publicly funded CPB provides annual grants to public radio stations that pay NPR for programming.

The media tries to conceal the fact that the Federal government gives the money to NPR’s member organizations, which than gives the money to NPR. There is nothing private or independent about NPR, though at least, unlike the BBC, citizens are not forced to pay a direct fee for it.

It is certainly both telling and amusing to see the extent of their reaction to being correctly identified in this way. The wicked flee even when no man pursueth.

UPDATE: The government-funded Public Broadcasting Service has reportedly followed suit and exited Twitter. It will be informative if the totally-independent and not-at-all marching-in-lockstep mainstream media organizations do the same. In, you know, protest and solidarity and all that.

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Hoaxacaustian Exposed

A Jew named Joseph Hirt who has spent years lecturing American schoolchildren about his experiences at Auschwitz now admits, after being threatened with exposure, that he was never there and those experiences are entirely fictional.

An Adamstown man who has claimed for many years that he escaped from Auschwitz now says he was never in the concentration camp and apologized for saying he was.

“I was wrong. I ask forgiveness,” Joseph Hirt, 91, wrote in a letter delivered to LNP Wednesday evening.

“I am writing today to apologize publicly for harm caused to anyone because of my inserting myself into the descriptions of life in Auschwitz. I was not a prisoner there. I did not intend to lessen or overshadow the events which truly happened there by falsely claiming to have been personally involved,” Hirt wrote.

“It wasn’t about me. I was wrong in using an untruth (my presence) in an attempt to enhance the important truth of the suffering and death of so many – not only Jewish people, but also others held in disdain by the Nazi movement. I was wrong. I ask forgiveness. I used poor judgment and faulty reasoning, risking a sullying of the truth I was trying to share.”

Hirt’s story was brought into question a few weeks ago by history teacher Andrew Reid, a New York man who was born and raised in Lancaster County.

Reid first questioned Hirt on April 15 when he attended a presentation in Lowville, New York, along with several of his students from South Lewis Central School District in Lewis County, New York.

He launched his own investigation, which culminated in a 25-page document he sent to media outlets and organizations that had written about or hosted Hirt, “unknowingly perpetuating his false claims to an even greater audience,” Reid said.

Reid challenged Hirt to apologize publicly and said that if he did not, he would petition the district attorneys in Lancaster and Lewis counties to launch a criminal investigation.

I expect the complete falsity of more of these hoaxes, including but not limited to the Bear & Eagle Cage, the Nazi Masturbation Machine, the Ballpoint Diary of Anne Frank’s Perverted Uncle, and the Flaming Rollercoaster of Death, to finally be admitted due to the fact that the one man who absolutely and unquestionably possesses all the historical facts and figures related to “the Holocaust” is Vladimir Putin.

Remember, my dear readers, which military liberated all of the “death camps” and which current nation is therefore now in possession of all of the meticulous German records of those camps.

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