Author: VD

Take care of y’all chicken

There isn’t a lot of grammar, or IQ, in Marshawn Lynch’s parting advice for the young sportsman, but there is a surprising amount of wisdom:

“It’s a vulnerable time for a lot of these young dudes, you feel me? They don’t be taking care of their chicken right, you feel me? If they was me or I had the opportunity, the opportunity to let them know something, I say, ‘Take care of y’all money because that s— don’t last forever.’ Now I’ve been on the other side of retirement, and it’s good when you get over there and you can do what the f— you want to, so I tell y’all right now while y’all in it: Take care of y’all bread so when you’re all done, you go ahead and take care of yourself. So while y’all at it right now, take care of y’all bodies. Don’t take care of y’all chicken, don’t take care of y’all mentals, ’cause we ain’t lasting that long.

“I had a couple players that I played with that they no longer here no more, they no longer — so you feel me? Start taking care of y’all mental, y’all bodies and y’all chicken for when you’re all ready to walk away, you walk away and be able to do what you want to do, but I appreciate it. Thank you all and have a good day.”

Never confuse intelligence with wisdom. And never discount observation because it cannot be properly explained.

I thought they were GOOD for the economy

A Swedish township is going bankrupt thanks to immigrants:

The Swedish municipality of Bengtsfors has petitioned the national government for aid due to massive costs incurred taking in more migrants than the municipality could afford. Local Moderate Party politician Stig Bertilsson said the multi-page letter was clear in identifying the cause of the budget deficit as being related to the large number of “new Swedes” taken in and requested aid to cover the costs, SVT reports.

“Costs in municipalities that have received new arrivals have continued to be substantial even when government revenues have stopped. This creates a large negative hole in the municipal cash register,” Bertilsson said.

When asked about tax revenues from new migrants that could bridge the deficit gap, Bertilsson said that in the long run he hoped there would be a rise in revenues but so far there has not been one, adding that the Swedish labour market “has a long way to go”.

Haven’t they taken the increase in their GDP into account? Don’t laugh, though, the US is also bankrupt and for exactly the same reason. The only difference is that the US can still convince people to accept its IOUs.

Divisional Sunday

Whereas a lot of people were amazed that the Titans won. I wasn’t even remotely surprised. They’re a solid, well-coached team across the board whereas the Ravens are overly reliant upon RGIII 2.0, whose long-term utility I continue to seriously doubt despite his incipient MVP status. I was even less surprised by the Vikings’ loss to the 49ers, since it was clear from the first possession that the offensive line could not get Dalvin Cook going.

As for what I expect today, it is Chiefs over Texans, easily, and Green Bay over Seattle.

BREAKING NEWS: The Cleveland Browns have hired their next head coach. Former Vikings offensive coordinator Kevin Stefanski is the Browns’ new head coach, according to multiple reports.

Good for him. Although I have to say, on the basis of yesterday’s game, I would have gone with Robert Saleh.

It’s Houston 21, Kansas City 0. This is why I don’t bet on football.

UPDATE: I did not like O’Brien’s decision to kick the field goal to go up 24. But I did not see it coming back to bite him so fast and so hard. The lesson, as always, is this: if you are the underdog, never take your foot off the gas.

The sooner you lose the momentum, the more likely it is that you lose the game.

Divisional Saturday

I’m entirely relaxed about this one. I would just like to see a good game in which Handsome Jimmy is sacked 37 times, Dalvin Cook rushes for 190 yards and 3 TDs, and Kirk Cousins goes 7 for 10 for 102 yards, 1 TD, and no interceptions. But I have no actual expectations. As always, SKOL!

In the other game, I have a hard time seeing a banged-up Seattle team beating Green Bay. And nothing could be sweeter than going to Lambeau and winning the NFC championship on the frozen tundra.

Mailvox: the utility of the framework

MS appreciates the perspective provided the Social-Sexual Hierarchy’s framework of behavioral patterns.

I’ve been doing a little historical reading and it seems to me that most of the very famous betrayals in history were by Gamma types. I know you’ve repeatedly made the point that Gammas can’t be trusted precisely because they’ll turn on others when they feel slighted, but being able to think of well-known examples of treachery and then comparing what is known of the traitor with the Gamma profile has been quite enlightening.

This is a useful observation. One common theme in betrayals is the way in which the betrayer acts because he feels that he has been insufficiently valued, respected, or rewarded. “I was a big fan of X, but then he went too far” is more than just an old rhetorical device used by the media and political fundraising organizations as long as I can remember, in a personal context it is a very clear sign that the turncoat is a gamma.

Which, of course, is why the same logic that dictates turncoats cannot be trusted tends to suggest that gammas should not be trusted. Envy is the great sin of the Gamma, so as long as there is someone in the organization of whom he may feel envious, the potential for betrayal will be there.

It can be difficult, particularly for those who can sincerely use the assistance, to turn down much-needed offers of support from enthusiastic supporters who only seem to want to help. But the costs of their assistance usually turns out to be several orders of magnitude larger than the benefits. This is why you should never volunteer to help any individual or organization if you suspect you would ever be unable to simply walk away from the situation in silence if things don’t happen to work out to your satisfaction.

We may have to start Unauthorized News

It looks as if the Republican Establishment is making a run at OANN:

Allies of President Trump are pursuing an effort to acquire right-leaning news channel One America News Network, according to people familiar with the matter, in a bid to shake up a conservative media market that has been dominated by Fox News. The investment firm Hicks Equity Partners is looking to acquire the channel and is pitching other wealthy GOP donors to arrange a bid of roughly $250 million for the channel’s parent company, the people said. The firm is owned by the family of Thomas Hicks Jr., co-chairman of the Republican National Committee.

Because that’s just what we need, one more outlet repeating the mainstream narrative. The RNC group – who almost certainly are not genuine “allies of President Trump” – say they want to buy OANN to “compete” with Fox News. Which is precisely the opposite of their intentions. The next step would be a merger with Fox, or a sale to Warner or the Devil Mouse.

This is all about control, not competition.

The Z-man doubles down

The ZmanVerified Account@TheZBlog

His blunder was in making claims that can be independently verified. That and picking a fight with the Zoomers. They dug into his various claims because they have time on their hands and they like mixing it up on-line.

A friend said to me that he has become the old man stomping on the flaming bag of poop while shouting into the darkness.

It was entertaining for a while, but I’m bored with it now.

Except, of course, there was never any blunder. My claims were correct and theirs were not. The few “independently verified” claims that appear to have been verified are both inaccurate and irrelevant. If the Z-man wasn’t technologically illiterate, he would understand how ludicrous their claims have always been. No one, including us, has ever run anything on the scale of Unauthorized using a $75 Premium account on Vimeo.

Do keep in mind the actual claims that were made. Even I am not that brilliant.

And the Z-man is now a proven liar. As everyone involved already knows, and as everyone else will learn soon enough, the Z-Man has conclusively and publicly demonstrated that he is not only a liar, but a particularly lazy and stupid one at that. He does nothing and he has accomplished nothing beyond emanating envy of those who take the time to actually produce things, construct projects, and build communities.

I understand it is going to be very, very amusing for those who are in the know and for those who trust me to rub their retarded little noses in their own bullshit as the facts gradually become apparent to even the most wilfully ignorant. Nevertheless, resist the temptation. The more time that passes, the more they double down and insist upon the correctness of their statements, the more amusing it will be.

Uncle John’s Band put it rather well on SocialGalactic: The success of UA has been the snake revealer. The sort of scum who would rather cry in their permitted corners of the status quo than see the change they pretend to want.

Adios again, Oakland

The Raidess are no longer the Oakland Raiders:

The Raiders are no longer the Oakland Raiders. They’re not the Las Vegas Raiders either.

For now, they’re just the Raiders.

The franchise made a change to all of its social media accounts, dropping Oakland. It will not add Las Vegas to its handle until the new league year starts in March, according to Josh Dubow of the Associated Press.

The NFL already made the switch, listing the Raiders as just the Raiders with no city attached in its releases last week to announce the 2020 draft order and 2020 opponents of each team.

Perhaps they should become an itinerant pirate team, playing all of its games away all season. That might actually work….

But Las Vegas does appear to be a fitting home for them.

Too short and too dishonest for the ride

People often ask me to work with, or publish, or link to, or otherwise support various individuals who are more or less on the ideological Right. And, of course, that has been something that we’ve tried repeatedly to do since we founded Castalia House. The problem, as we have learned over time, is that most people are simply too stupid, too short-sighted, too narcissistic, too independent, or too dishonest to be worth assisting.

The Z-man is not entirely devoid of ideas, and I have occasionally linked to his more insightful posts, but the following comment should suffice to demonstrate why he’s simply not someone that anyone can take seriously as an intellectual or even a commentator. Keep in mind that this is a comment on a post dedicated to declaring that he is the one pure soul worthy of support in a dissident swamp of grifters.

thezman
There was never a lawsuit against Indiegogo. Court filings are public records. For starters, in such a dispute the attorney will look at the contract you signed. He will see there is a dispute resolution process and ask you if you initiated that process. If not, then you will need to do that first. Once that is done and you are not satisfied, he will tell you that the next step is arbitration. Getting a judge to set aside an arbitration clause in a contract is extremely difficult and mostly pointless.

The bottom line is Indiegogo canceled the project, gave the people their money back and that was it. There was no lawsuit. No class action. No arbitration. Nothing.

The combination of ignorance, stupidity, envy, and gamma posturing would be difficult to top without resorting to the visual medium of YouTube. It doesn’t even rise to the level of a clueless mainstream political reporter. Nevertheless, don’t correct him. Don’t set the record straight. Don’t provide him with any proof of what actually happened at all – and I know that literally hundreds of you have it in your possession. Just let his statement stand for the record.

And keep it in mind the next time you ask me why I regard right-wing mediocrities like the Z-man with undisguised contempt and refuse to have anything to do with his kind. Many, if not most, of the so-called “grifters” he decries are not only smarter and harder-working than he is, they are more accomplished and far more worthy of your trust.

Meanwhile, it’s good to see that others on the Right are discovering lawfare can be an effective way to strike back at the weaponized media:

Peter Brimelow, an anti-immigration activist who hosts a website that has published the writings of white supremacists, is suing The New York Times for $5 million for labeling him an “open white nationalist” in an article last year.

The characterization of Brimelow that triggered the libel lawsuit appeared in a Jan. 15, 2019 article by Times political reporter Trip Gabriel that offered a chronology of racist and inflammatory comments by Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa)….

“We stand by the story and will vigorously defend,” Times spokeswoman Eileen Murphy said.

One of these days, we’re going to have to put together a class action against Wikipedia and other media sites used to seed the never-ending slander and libel. This is a good time to go after the media because they no longer have the resources to defend themselves as both their circulations and their revenues are declining.

UPDATE: This response by a Z-maniac is more than a little amusing, considering our complete lack of interest in what any of them happen to think about me or anything else:

This is how a cult leader reassures the faithful: Denigrate the faithless to instill self-righteous superiority within the cult so that they dismiss any counterclaims without thought. Real evidence is no longer necessary. A measured response is to link to evidence or acknowledge that a sealed arbitration leaves room for skepticism.

Notice how the gammas always love to theorize and posture in the complete absence of information. They project their own lack of knowledge as well as their inability to not blurt out everything they know to everyone else. The idea that someone who genuinely possesses the conclusive evidence might not care what they believe is simply beyond their imagination. Sometimes the cult’s superiority is real. And as cults go, it’s quite affordable.

I just thought this was an excellent opportunity to demonstrate to everyone who is in the know that an occasional anklebiter is both a fool and a liar. There is no need to prove it to those who are dumb enough to take him seriously; they will simply move the goalposts anyhow. If they mattered, we’d prove it to them. But they don’t.

Google demonetizes Nick Fuentes

It’s not right, of course, but I can’t say I’m going to shed copious tears over Nick Fuentes being demonetized by Google:

Nicholas Fuentes, who gained headlines earlier this year, has been banned from streaming on YouTube, demonetized, and likely will be banned outright soon.

Now I suppose we’ll find out if he’s genuinely a fighter or if he’s just another ex-YouTuber playing victim. Either way, it’s a great time to go after YouTube, as the parent organization’s top-flight legal chief is currently exiting Alphabet:

The changing of the guard at Alphabet  continues. Roughly one month after Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin announced they’d be stepping down as the CEO and president of the search giant’s parent company, one of their top lieutenants, Alphabet’s chief legal officer, David Drummond, told employees that he is also leaving the company.

I understand he is retiring in order to spend more time making new families.

The former employee with whom he shares a child, Jennifer Blakely, published a post on Medium last summer in which she described Drummond as a serial philanderer who left his wife for her, then left her and the son that he fathered with her for another now-former Google employee.

Blakely also claimed Drummond had had “an affair with his ‘personal assistant’ who he moved into one of his new homes.”

One day later, Drummond issued a statement of his own, acknowledging his relationship with Blakely and their “difficult break-up 10 years ago.” He went on to state that, “Other than Jennifer, I never started a relationship with anyone else who was working at Google or Alphabet. Any suggestion otherwise is simply untrue.”

Days after issuing the statement, Drummond married a Google employee he’d been dating.

Subscribe to Unauthorized, because no one knows how much longer the Darkstream will be on YouTube.