Author: VD

On the book front

Peter Grant discusses Brings the Lightning and the challenges of publishing a Western at Sarah’s place:

The third element in my interest in the Western genre was moving to the USA in the 1990’s, and being able to see many of the places mentioned in the books for the first time. Frontier towns such as Dodge City and Abilene were no longer just names, but places I could actually visit. Exotic-sounding locales like Tucumcari (used to good effect by Sergio Leone in his ‘spaghetti Western’ movies) and Taos (infamous for its eponymous bootleg alcohol) were no longer all that exotic, but every bit as dusty and beat-down as the histories described them. I renewed my acquaintance with Westerns from the benefit of that new perspective, and enjoyed them all the more.

The big question for a writer (and, in the case of my new book, the small press that’s published it) is: how does one reach readers in a genre where one hasn’t previously written? I note from initial sales that the book is popular with readers of my blog, and the shared Mad Genius Club writers’ blog, and other books from my publisher. However, despite using categories and keywords typical of the genre, it doesn’t seem to be attracting much attention – yet – from ‘regular’ Western aficionados. That’s not surprising, given that most of them don’t know it exists yet; but what channels should be used to inform them? The genre’s been moribund for so long that it’s hard to think of a commercial outlet that will reach them.

Rawle Nyanze reviews God, Robot, and finds it to be unexpectedly interesting:

I did not expect a book about Bible-believing robots to be this good.

The premise of God, Robot seems very silly at first: a corporation builds robots that worship the Christian God. However, what lies within is a story of how these artificial beings come to understand their place in God’s order as they grapple with their own programming, with human society, and with whether or not they have souls. The result is a wide-ranging tale of great depth that anyone could read and enjoy, whether or not they believe in God.

The book opens with an interstellar criminal named Locke, who is cornered in a monastery by a policeman. Before the policeman arrests him, though, he tells stories about theological robots, or “theobots” to explain why he did what he did. The stories cover the entire range of theobot history, from their creation in 21st-century California to their journey into deep space, along with all the ways they, and human society, changed throughout the centuries. Each story is written by a different author, but they all move the larger history forward and keep the theme unified.

 And finally, Marina reviewed On the Existence of Gods:

It is true that the impasse between those of us who believe in Higher Power of some kind and those commonly identified as non-believers will not be resolved through conversation and argument. Anyone who doubts me is welcome to pick a current hot-topic political issue and try to bring an opponent over to their side. (Don’t do it now. I want you to keep reading, not to start a flame war on social media or  tick off family members. But if you haven’t tried it yet and are up for a challenge, just see how it goes for you.)

However, just because we can’t talk each other into or out of faith, does not mean that one of the central questions of human existence cannot be examined in a proper manner. Dominic Saltarelli, an atheist, and Vox Day, a Christian, took up the challenge (originally presented by PZ Meyers, who declared it impossible to present a rational argument for the existence of gods, refusing Vox Day’s offer of debate back in 2008). Considering the current state of discourse in this country, you will be well advised to read Dominic’s Introduction chapter of OTEOG where he describes his decision process in taking his place opposite Vox in the debate. Suffice it to say that Dominic behaved as a proper intellectual in the matter and even called out those nominally on his side for often refusing to do so. Vox, in his own Introduction, similarly points out that many believers are just as guilty of repeating tired, flawed arguments without applying the proper intellectual rigor to the process.

Affirmative action in action

This sort of affirmative-action-related meltdown happens far more often at the better schools than anyone would credit:

Throughout elementary, middle and high school, Kidd’s talent for science showed. She was accepted into the highly competitive Thacher School, a private boarding high school in California where she promptly earned the nickname “The Science Girl.”

The teachers loved her and lavished her with praise, Kidd wrote, using her homework as an example for other students. When she was a sophomore, her chemistry teachers announced before 240 classmates that Kidd had garnered the highest score in a national chemistry competition.

These accolades only fueled Kidd’s drive to succeed, and it culminated in her acceptance to an Ivy League university.

“The ultimate climax was when I got into Columbia,” Kidd wrote. “Because it’s such a prestigious school, it made me feel like I had proven to myself, and everyone around me, that I made it.”

When she got on campus, she decided, naturally, that she would study science. But things didn’t go smoothly.

The day she moved in was her birthday. “I felt really alienated and alone and didn’t find the Columbia students very welcoming,” Kidd wrote. “During my freshman year, I quickly went from star student to slacker.”

In contrast to the tight-knit community at Thacher, Kidd said, “at Columbia I was lucky if a teacher talked to me.” The lack of close connections with her teachers discouraged her from engaging with her schoolwork.

“Even though I was wired to be a good student,” Kidd said, “I didn’t feel inspired. I got through the year, getting B’s and C’s, but I didn’t care. I was just happy the summer arrived.”

Upon her return to classes in September, Kidd signed up for computer-science classes and “hated every minute of it.”

One morning in April, she woke up and realized she needed to make a change and “started plotting [her] escape.”

She probably would have been a star at a second-tier school. But it’s not only unreasonable, it is cruel to be throwing kids like this into situations where mediocrity is the best possible outcome and failure is the most probable one.

Anyhow, she’s better off doing what she actually wants to do than what everyone else expects of her. It’s neither right nor fair to put the weight of a race on one young kid who happens to be an outlier.

The fires rise

Immigration arson comes to Austria:

Arsonists were most likely behind a huge blaze which burnt down a newly-built but still empty refugee centre in northern Austria, police said on Wednesday. Police are now offering a €5,000 reward for information that leads to the seizure of those responsible.

The huge fire broke out in the early hours of Wednesday in the village of Altenfelden and left only charred remains of the building.

No one was harmed in the blaze, which was battled by up to 200 firemen.

“We found two sources along the building’s outer walls… where unknown suspects are thought to have started the fire,” police said in a statement, adding that investigations were ongoing.

The alleged attack happened two weeks before 48 asylum-seekers were due to move in.

Austrian Interior Minister Wolfgang Sobotka condemned “all forms of violence against refugee centres” while Foreign Minister Sebastian Kurz said in a tweet that he was “deeply affected” by the blaze.

The sad thing instead of taking this as the warning it is meant to be, the government is doubling down and the charity Caritas has announced that it will rebuild the refugee center.

Which means that we’re going to see arsonists burning down refugee centers with refugees in them. The “migrant crisis” is now transforming itself into a war of governments and globalists against the nations.

Hate is a human right

As usual, the cuckservatives and Churchians are blithely falling in line with the globalists and Babelists, as they rush to endorse Big Brother’s war on hate speech. It’s amazing how they fall for the lies every single time.

The fact is that hate is not intrinsically bad. God Himself hates. There are six things He hates – actually, seven that he detests. There are specific individuals He has hated. There is a time to love, and there is a time to hate.The Christian is instructed to hate as well as to love, indeed, we are told that if one does not hate, one does not fear the Lord.

And that, of course, is the root of the pagan campaign against hate. They wish to arrogate to themselves the decision what you will, and what you will be not, permitted to hate. They want you to love Big Brother, and therefore you will not be permitted to hate him.

But hate is our birthright. Hate is part of what makes us human. Hate is an aspect of our free will. And if hate is outlawed, or worse, eliminated, there will be no moral basis for love.

Hate is a human right. The war on hate speech is a war on our humanity. #IStandWithHateSpeech

The call of the cuck

David French preaches a secular version of the standard Churchian “Only Real Man in the Room” sermon:

In Trump, feminists have a true cultural bogeyman, and he is actually dangerous. Trump is commandeering the debate over masculinity and providing the cultural Left with a lifetime’s worth of dissertations, think pieces, and television tropes on the evils of “manhood.” And Trump will have helped define their terms.

He has brought out of the woodwork a bloc of people who apparently believe that the answer to political correctness isn’t truth and virtue but rather becoming what the other side most hates. If the other side polices language, then the answer is vulgarity. If the other side embraces diversity, then the answer is flirtation with white nationalism and white-identity politics. If the other side tries to cast men as dangerous, sex-obsessed bullies, well then hoist the middle finger, glory in Trump’s apparent sexual and financial success, and relish the whining of feminists and “betas” everywhere.

Trump’s masculinity is a cheap counterfeit of the masculinity that’s truly threatening to the cultural Left: man not as predator but as protector, the “sheepdog” of American Sniper fame. This is the brave man, the selfless man who channels his aggression and sense of adventure into building a nation, an economy, and — yes — a family. This is the man who kicks down doors in Fallujah or gathers a makeshift militia to rush hijackers in the skies above Pennsylvania. Or, to choose a more mundane — though no less important — example: This is the man who packs up the household to take a chance on a new job, models strength for his family when life turns hard, teaches his son to stand against bullies on the playground, and lives at all times with dignity and honor.

The masculinity that threatens the Left is the masculinity that embraces the manly virtues while minimizing the traditional manly vices.

It’s more than a little amusing to read this in light of the knowledge that David French is a virtue-signaling cuckservative with the standard African accessory. He has read Heartiste, but he has not understood the first thing about Game; this is little more than an evangelical-flavored BETA whining about an ALPHA and attempting to redefine what winning “really” is.

There is no such thing as “counterfeit” masculinity, there are only the different socio-sexual expressions of it. Trump’s masculinity is Alpha and confrontational. He is a leader. He fights. French, on the other hand is a Delta, and so, unsurprisingly, he values service and selflessness and being a team player. And he is absolutely and utterly wrong about what threatens the Left; the Left will use Deltas, chew them up, and spit them out, as Deltas are naturally inclined to obey anyone with a mantle of authority, even a stolen or false one, who gives them orders.

Just as conservatism has conserved nothing, French’s Delta protectionism has protected nothing; even his own family has been invaded by outsiders. He is a chihuahua that believes it is a sheepdog and thinks the real sheepdog is a wolf.

What genuinely threatens the Left are male leaders who are confrontational, who will never submit to them, and who have the ability to inspire other men to stand up to them as well. In other words, they fear Alphas who publicly stand against them. That is why the Left is having conniptions over Donald Trump and could not care less about anything David French thinks, says, or does.

Deltas always want to redefine leadership, winning, and Alpha as reliability. French’s little sermon reminds me of the Delta who wondered if there was such a thing as a “Stealth Alpha”, the IT guy to whom everyone turns when their computer doesn’t work. But the fact that people need you, rely upon you, and use you does not mean that they follow you, obey you, or even respect you… nor does it cause women to find you attractive.

More SJWs for the SJW list

Jonathan Weisman of the Washington Post went running to the ADL because mean people tweeted memes at him.:

Jonathan Weisman Verified account ‏@jonathanweisman
Anti-Defamation League assembles high-powered team to look at racist, anti-Semitic harassment of journalists

 The high-powered team:

  • Danielle Citron, Lois K. Macht Research Professor & Professor of Law at the University of Maryland Francis King Carey School of Law and expert on online harassment
  • Steve Coll, Dean of Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism
  • Todd Gitlin, Professor and Chair, Ph.D. Program, Columbia Journalism School
  • Brad Hamm, Dean of the Medill School of Journalism, Northwestern University
  • Shawn Henry, retired Executive Assistant Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
  • Julia Ioffe, GQ Contributor and freelance writer
  • Bethany Mandel, New York Post and Jewish Daily Forward contributor
  • Leon Wieseltier, Contributing Editor at The Atlantic and Isaiah Berlin Senior Fellow in Culture and Policy at The Brookings Institution

They’re going to make a list and check it twice. Of course, we make lists too. They should probably be given their own category as the ADL’s Journalist Police.

I almost pity them. Almost. How long do you give it before all of them shut down their social media accounts?

Europe cannot become an Arab country

Thus spake His Holiness the Dalai Lama:

The Dalai Lama says Europe risks losing its identity by taking in too many migrants and warned: ‘Germany cannot become an Arab country.’

Tibet’s spiritual leader says refugees should only stay temporarily and return home to rebuild their countries when the conflicts have ended.

The Dalai Lama, who has himself lived in exile for over half a century, said: ‘When we look into the face of every single refugee, especially the children and women, we can feel their suffering.

‘A human being who is a bit more fortunate has the duty to help them. On the other hand, there are too many now.’

In an interview with German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, he said: ‘Europe, for example Germany, cannot become an Arab country. Germany is Germany.

‘There are so many that in practice it becomes difficult.’

He said ‘from a moral point of view too, I think the refugees should only be admitted temporarily’.

‘The goal should be that they return and help rebuild their countries.’

It’s very sad when the Dalai Lama is a more staunch defender of Christendom than the Pope.

Ladies and gentlemen, your third party candidate!

Bill Kristol’s Israel First party unveils their stealth Trump killer, who we are reliably informed is “an independent candidate–an impressive one, with a strong team and a real chance.”

Yeah, so, about that…. it appears Kristol was talking about David French. National Review’s David French. By whom, we mean this sad sap.

Hi-freaking-larious. In an nationalism-driven election, Israel First is going to try to beat the nationalist candidate with a literal cuckservative. No wonder even the #NeverTrump types are completely underwhelmed.

Laura Ingraham Verified account ‏@IngrahamAngle
Kristol’s pick! That would be the same David French who defended Kevin Williamson?

Byron York Verified account ‏@ByronYork
My sense is much of the commentary isn’t really about David French. More about implausibility of choice after so much hype.

David Burge ‏@iowahawkblog
I think David French would be a better prez than Trump/Hillary/Bernie, but then again so would Fat Bearded Libertarian Guy in Thong

Ben Shapiro Verified account ‏@benshapiro
Trumpsters are going to have a rough time convincing people that it’s somehow David French’s fault if their man doesn’t win.

A.J. Delgado ‏@AJDelgado13
I only know that David French name bc I think i’ve seen it in a few NRO articles I hated…

Ed Morrissey Verified account ‏@EdMorrissey
The “major figure” for an indie bid is … @DavidAFrench? I like and respect David, but this can’t be right.

Ricky Vaughn ‏@Ricky_Vaughn99
DAVID FRENCH FOR PRESIDENT: “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for our wives’ sons.”

 “I gather Donald Trump said I’m a loser. I’ve won some and I’ve lost some, but one thing I’ve always tried not to be is a roaring jackass.”
– Bill Kristol

Can’t say that anymore, Billy. Do you hear that sound? That is the ENTIRE INTERNET laughing at you. Even Susan Estrich, the architect of the Dukakis debacle, is shaking her head and wondering what planet you think you’re orbiting.

Anyhow, I think concerns about the potential effects of a third-party candidate on Trump’s prospects can be safely dismissed now.

The backfire

Republican establishment snobs, and those who lick their loafers, can’t seem to grasp that the more they sneer at Donald Trump, the stronger Trump’s support becomes:

If I hear one more of my conservative/libertarian “high IQ” colleagues (many of them long-time friends) denigrate Trump as stupid, racist, sexist or (I kid you not)  not “really” successful–I may puke.

One certainly may oppose Trump’s policies on a principled basis.  But to hear the right-of-center intelligentsia (who may be well-educated and perhaps even have high IQs, but are not necessarily intelligent) denigrate the presumptive GOP nominee–selected by We the People–using the same leftist tactics used to denigrate George W. Bush and many other conservative standard-bearers, is nauseating.

These “high IQ” members of the GOP intelligentsia simply cannot hide their disdain for ordinary Americans’ selection of a GOP nominee, yet they simultaneously claim that the GOP represents ordinary Americans’ values. The GOP intelligentsia is behaving like a delusional narcissist, reveling in its (false) superiority over the little people.

Actions have consequences. Faithlessness begets the loss of credibility. And the more those who urged dubious conservatives to swallow their doubts and dutifully line up behind George W. Bush, John McCain, and Mitt Romney bluster and posture about how they are going to support Hillary Clinton or Bill Kristol’s Israel First third party, the less anyone is going to listen to them.

I merely jest, of course. Bill Kristol’s third party isn’t going to be called Israel First. I understand Likud USA will the actual name.

Tech volunteers wanted

We are looking for some assistance on the Big Fork team. Here is what we’re looking for:

  1.  Producer/Project Manager. Someone to keep track of what everyone is doing and free up Rifleman to focus on the coding.
  2. Mediawiki — has worked with the Mediawiki codebase and has deployed Mediawiki sites for at least 2 years, has worked on or is at least familiar with Mediawiki templates and extensions.
  3. PHP — understands the internal and external architecture of PHP, is aware of latest developments in PHP 7, HHVM and other optimizers, has experience with problems and solutions in large-scale PHP projects.
  4. Web application optimization — familiar with various methods of caching and parallelizing web applications, including load-balancing, proxy servers, Memcached, ElasticSearch, Varnish, knows Apache, NGinX.
  5. HTML/CSS/JS/AJAX — able to bridge the gap between web design and client-side development. Experience with modern Javascript UI frameworks like jQuery, Angular, Bootstrap, understands reactive design concepts.
  6. Javascript expert — understands the architecture of Javascript, including object-oriented and functional Javascript coding, performance optimization, cross-browser compatibility, future developments in Javascript,
  7. PostgreSQL Administrator — good understanding of configuration settings, performance tweaks, security, user account management, database/filesystem interaction, replication, failover, backup/restore automation.

If one of those roles fits you and you want to help out, email with BIG FORK in the subject. We’re making a lot of progress, but there is still plenty left to do.