Author: VD

No wartime consigliere

Ol’ Pikachu isn’t remotely capable of addressing the challenges that are heading Google’s way. He isn’t even tough enough to stand up to his own SJW employees:

Google’s employees are openly revolting over the company’s handling of sexual harassment and controversial executives hires like Miles Taylor, the former Department of Homeland Security chief of staff who defended the Trump administration’s Muslim travel ban. Last month, 200 employees in San Francisco protested Google’s various contentious decisions. Shortly after, four of the protesters were fired. Google has denied that the employees were fired for organizing. Now those former employees, dubbed the “Thanksgiving Four” plan to file charges against Google with the National Labor Relations Board.

Meanwhile, Google is investigating its own executives over inappropriate relationships they may have had with subordinates, CNBC first reported last month. That includes Chief Legal Officer David Drummond, who recently married an employee in Google’s legal department and faces a string of damaging allegations from another former employee with whom he had an extramarital affair.

Next, there’s YouTube, which has faced controversy after controversy in recent years, ranging from pedophiles lurking in video comments where underage children appear, to the spread of conspiracy theories about victims of the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, last year. (We’d be here all day if I listed every recent YouTube crisis and failure.)

And then there are the dollars and cents. Growth in Google’s core digital advertising business is slowing, and the pressure is mounting for the company to find new areas of expansion. While its cloud and hardware businesses are showing some promise, they still make up a tiny fraction of Google’s overall revenue. At its core, Google is still an advertising company.

But that’s just the internal stuff. Outside the company, nearly every state attorney general in the country is looking into antitrust violations related to Google’s ad business. CNBC reported last month that the probes may expand into Google’s search business as well. The FTC and Department of Justice are also said to be looking at Google’s potential antitrust violations.

With so much scrutiny from regulators and attorneys general, there will almost certainly be some sort of action taken, and Pichai is now the one who has to steer the ship as various government agencies seek to punish his company. Page and Brin picked the perfect time to step down and protect themselves.

It’s informative to see how the founders of the last wave of Silicon Valley giants are all running for the exits as the markets hit a historic peak. The smart money is getting out while it can.

Epstein didn’t kill himself

And no matter what the mainstream media says, neither did his banker:

Jeffrey Epstein’s private wealth banker, who brokered and signed off on untold multiple millions of dollars in controversial Deutsche Bank and Citibank loans spanning two decades for the convicted pedophile, has died from a reported suicide.

The news of yet another mysterious Epstein-linked death comes shortly after the FBI was seeking to interview the bank executive about loans he approved for Epstein and the indicted child trafficker’s labyrinth of US-based and offshore companies.

The Los Angeles County Medical Examiner confirmed Thomas Bowers died by an apparent suicide by hanging at his home before Thanksgiving.

Epstein likewise died from a reported suicide by hanging, according to the New York City Medical Examiner.

No word as to whether it was a red scarf or not.

How “financial efficiency” kills civilization

How a Republican vulture capitalist killed a Nebraska town:

Major Republican donor Paul Singer has very few fans in this town of 6,300 people, where 80 percent of voters backed Donald Trump in 2016.

“I hope Paul Singer is proud of what he did,” Tim O’Connell, a local lumberyard owner, told Tucker Carlson Tonight. “I don’t know how he sleeps at night.”

O’Connell and many other residents are still suffering from the loss of sporting goods retailer Cabela’s, which kept its headquarters in Sidney until it merged with Bass Pro Shops in 2017.

The town’s mayor, Roger Galloway, told Tucker Carlson Tonight that the merger cost Sidney 2,000 jobs.

The sale of Cabela’s to Bass Pro Shops was announced in 2016, a year after Singer’s Elliot Management disclosed an 11 percent stake, and said Cabela’s should explore a possible sale. Singer has earned the title of the “world’s most feared investor” and became a billionaire through tactics described as “vulture capitalism.”

After the sale announcement, the stock price surged and Singer’s hedge fund cashed out within a week. Elliott Management reportedly made at least $90 million.

“They got in there to get the business sold and the business was sold, so they took it and ran,” Damien Park, managing partner at consulting firm Hedge Fund Solutions, told the Omaha World-Herald in October 2016.  “They made a fortune, so they’re happy.”

The residents of Sidney, however, were left without the town’s major employer.

It’s important to remember that the financial benefits of capitalism come with certain costs, and the rewards are not always net beneficial to society. One should always recall that the preamble to the U.S. Constitution does not indicate that its purpose is to maximize gross national product or the sum total of societal wealth.

The next battle

As you may have heard by now, the Big Bear was just deplatformed by YouTube. This should be interesting, as it will be the first time the Dread Ilk and the Bears have had the opportunity to team up and go into battle together.

It’s going to be a blast!

Also, be sure to sign up for the book club so we can email you to get in touch with you if Google goes after the Darkstream or this blog. And if you still haven’t signed up for Unauthorized yet, this is a great time to do so.

I think Semper Fish may be a little TOO fired up, based on his reaction to the news:

As the smoke cleared from the direct assault upon the House of Bear, a hush whisper of malcontent began to rise from the smoldering havoc of the wicked onslaught. The dim twilight began to fade and cause flickers of light to abandon the savagery, but for a moment, a sense of anguish clung heavy in the mist. For the enemy had engaged in open war and they scoffed with pride at the opening salvo of ruin they wrought.

Then suddenly and without hesitation, there arose a trembling roar that gained with intensity. As if a long dead yet undisturbed tree was caressed by thousands of souls on fire which detonated into a racous pyre… AAAHHH! The unison voices bellowed in rage! These were the legions approaching to the aid of House of Bear. At the front of this company stood a mighty Dark Lord adorned with the skulls of previous campaigns and he showed no sign of gloom, but even a smile of satisfaction for the total war he is now sanctioned to unleash. 

Around this devastation grew an incandescence and an appearance of vague figures on the boundary of the stalwart Dark Lord. These minions seemed to move hovering over the ground as if the very air was under their spell, and all were faceless with a vile intent to grind down the enemy until only skulls remain.

Now once the shouting assembly of distant voices began to gather their numbers, their bodies moving gave way to clanging of metal ladles and various kettles filled with hot gravy. Their stomping paws shook the ground almost to the point of not distinguishing the vast array of snarling creatures whose ilk was already in formation and dreadful indeed.

This army is being readied for the battle to come, and may Almighty God bless them and have mercy on the souls of their enemies! 

FORTUNA FAVET FORTIBUS!

Jerry Jones 2.0

That might actually be the rosy scenario. I think a lot of Carolina Panthers fans are beginning to fear that their new owner is going to be more Dan Snyder than Robert Kraft in light of the way he ended the Riverboat Ron era in Carolina:

The Panthers fired Ron Rivera on a Tuesday. Five days before their Week 14 game and four games before the end of the season.

The timing made little sense.

Rivera went 76-63-1 as the team’s head coach with four playoff appearances. The Panthers won the NFC title in 2015 after going 15-1 in the regular season but lost to the Broncos in Super Bowl 50.

Tepper said it was an “emotional conversation” with Rivera as he handed him the pink slip.

“Look, a very hard move,” Tepper said. “Ron Rivera, besides being a good coach, is one of the finest men I have ever met in my life. I have to say that upfront. Look, I came here two years ago. I wanted to show patience on the football side to see how it was going. On the business side, we made vast and sweeping changes and I didn’t want to make those vast and sweeping changes on the football side. I wanted to take time and patience to see what could go and how it could go. I just thought it was time given the way things have gone the last two seasons to put my stamp on this organization on the football side as we’ve done on the business side of the organization. I think as much respect as I have for Ron, I think a change was appropriate to build things the way I want things to be built.”

So, a Wall Street Judeochristian who never played football wants to put his stamp on the football side of the organization. At least Jerry Jones actually played the game at a high level.

One down

The first step towards Trumpslide 2020 has been accomplished:

California Senator Kamala Harris is dropping out of the crowded field of Democrats angling to become their party’s presidential candidate. Harris tweeted a message to supporters on Tuesday saying “it is with deep regret—but also with deep gratitude—that I am suspending my campaign today.”

I’m no fan of Tulsi Gabbard, but she did finish Harris off as slickly as a Venetian with a glass dagger.

One thousand years of SSH

RealTalk notes that it’s impossible to watch entertainment without seeing some form of the SSH in action:

Random SSH esthetics. S2E11 Big Bang Theory.

  1. Gamma Leonard hateful/jealous of rival Alpha Underhill physicist. Throws lots of shade.
  2. Underhill asks Leonard to work with him. Leonard acts like a school girl who just got asked out. Infatuated by Alpha for the next 5 minutes of the episode.
  3. Alpha Underhill meets Penny, hits it off. Gamma Leonard becomes a hater again.
  4. Alpha proves to be a jerk, and Penny runs back to friend-zoned Gamma for comfort.

Was watching the episode while reading this. I can’t stop myself from seeing through this lens anymore. It’s everywhere!

But the scope of the Socio-Sexual Hierarchy is actually much broader, and much older, than Hollywood. Consider this excerpt from Genji monogatari, written in Japan more than one thousand years ago, in which the refined, sensitive Kaoru is expressing his jealousy of the success the bold philanderer Niou repeatedly enjoys with women.

Women apparently have a weakness for his kind of passionate, impetuous behavior. It makes me sad to think that my relationship with him and his sister, the First Princess, has brought me only pain and misfortune. How sweet it would be to seduce one of these extraordinary women, someone Niou, in his usual fashion, has fallen madly in love with, and have him suffer the same torments of longing that I’ve experienced! Shouldn’t a lady who is truly prudent and sensitive be attracted more to me than to Niou? Yet how hard it is to find women of such refined sensibility!

Is it not almost precisely the same Alpha-Gamma dynamic being described?

There Will Be War: History’s End

Created by the bestselling SF novelist Jerry Pournelle, THERE WILL BE WAR is a landmark science fiction anthology series that combines top-notch military science fiction with factual essays by various generals and military experts on everything from High Frontier and the Strategic Defense Initiative to the aftermath of the Vietnam War. It features some of the greatest military science fiction ever published, such Orson Scott Card’s “Ender’s Game” in Volume I and Joel Rosenberg’s “Cincinnatus” in Volume II. Many science fiction greats were featured in the original nine-volume series, which ran from 1982 to 1990, including Robert Heinlein, Arthur C. Clarke, Philip K. Dick, Gordon Dickson, Poul Anderson, John Brunner, Gregory Benford, Robert Silverberg, Harry Turtledove, and Ben Bova.

25 years after the end of the Cold War and the publication of the ninth volume, Dr. Pournelle has revived his classic science fiction series with Castalia House. THERE WILL BE WAR Volume X, History’s End, continues the tradition of combining top-notch military science fiction with first-rate real-world analysis by military experts. The Cold War may have ended, but as recent events everywhere from Paris to Syria have demonstrated, war has not.

THERE WILL BE WAR Volume X is edited by Jerry Pournelle and features 18 stories, articles, and poems. Of particular note are “Battle Station” by Ben Bova, “Flashpoint: Titan” by Cheah Kai Wai, “What Price Humanity?” by David VanDyke, and the eerily prescient “The Man Who Wasn’t There” by Gregory Benford. Volume X also includes timely essays on “War and Migration” by Martin van Creveld, “The 4GW Counterforce” by William S. Lind and LtCol Gregory A. Thiele, USMC, and “The Deadly Future of Littoral Sea Control” by CDR Phillip E. Pournelle, USN, which was awarded the 2015 Literary Award by the Surface Navy Association for “the best professional article in any publication addressing Surface Navy or surface warfare issues.”

The 414-page paperback is now available for $17.99 from Castalia Direct or $19.99 from Amazon.

In other Castalia House news, the new case laminate hardcover edition of John C. Wright’s instant classic AWAKE IN THE NIGHT LAND is now available for $24.99 from Castalia Direct or $27.99 from Amazon. This is an epic collection of four of John C. Wright’s brilliant forays into the dark fantasy world of William Hope Hodgson’s 1912 novel, The Night Land. Part novel, part anthology, the book consists of four related novellas, “Awake in the Night,” “The Cry of the Night-Hound,” “Silence of the Night,” and “The Last of All Suns,” which collectively tell the haunting tale of the Last Redoubt of Man and the end of the human race. Widely considered to be the finest tribute to Hodgson ever written, the first novella, “Awake in the Night,” was previously published in 2004 in The Year’s Best Science Fiction: Twenty-First Annual Collection. John C. Wright has been described by reviewers as one of the most important and audacious authors in science fiction today. In a recent poll of more than 1,000 science fiction readers, he was chosen as the sixth-greatest living science fiction writer.

THE MILO CHRONICLES by Dr. Rachel Fulton Brown are also available for $29.99 from Castalia Direct or $34.99 from Amazon.

Mailvox: patterns of behavior

A reader writes about his experience observing the predictable utility of the Socio-Sexual Hierarchy.

 I recently watched your SSH video and I have been tuning into the Darkstreams more often. The insights about gammas have been surreal as I reflect on interactions I have, a recent one stands out at church.

After service, we took a fellow out to lunch for his birthday. There were six of us, all men, few of us married. I sat across from him, and as conversation built up I asked him (call him Joe) all about his work. He’s a shy guy, slight autism is probably there, but he gets along with and is adored by everyone in our circle. I know nothing about his field, so I asked him lots of questions, genuinely interested, and also ensuring the focus was on him being able to talk about what he loves, after all it’s his birthday. He was having a great time talking about his work, his hobbies, and all of us gave him the spotlight, except…

There’s a guy beside him (call him Gamma) who I didn’t know well but one of the guys apparently had asked him if he wanted to come along. Now, every single time there was a nanosecond lull in the conversation, this guy physically jutted his head forward over the table as if sticking his boot in so you can’t shut the door, and he’d inject something like “So I went to the gaming convention a couple weeks ago, the one that was blah blah.” I mean we would ask Joe about himself, share memories about him and church, but as soon as there was a fraction of an opening, boom! This guy just couldn’t stop talking about himself. It was unreal, I had never witnessed anyone so self-involved, especially when we’re out for lunch treating the guy beside him whose birthday it is!

Several of us were obviously annoyed but no one wanted to ruin Joe’s birthday, we just ignored the Gamma mostly, nodding and smiling as he would go on. When lunch was over, the Gamma asked if one of us could give him a ride home, as he’d come with my friend Alex who was heading back to church to get his wife. We all looked uneasy but one of the guys whose wife wasn’t a part of the event at church said sure. That night, the guy who gave Gamma a ride calls me about some church events coming up, then mentions Gamma. “Dude, he just talked the whole way.” I laughed, but I still hadn’t figured the gamma attribute until my friend said, “I mentioned I gave Gamma a ride to Sue, and she gave me this sour look. She said all of the gals try to avoid him, he’s always trying to approach some of them to chat and they find some way to get out of it.” It really clicked with that, the women thing. They just cannot stand him.

Thanks for being ferocious in exposing the patterns of behavior. It has inspired me to look at myself more often, check what my patterns are. Also, it has been saving me a lot of time from being around men when I notice certain patterns, and can avoid the exhaustion they’ll bring.

Prince Andrew is busted

And busted HARD. There isn’t any more doubt about who is lying about their past relationship:

Prince Andrew sent an email to Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged madam Ghislaine Maxwell at 5.50am to let her know he had ‘specific questions’ about Virginia Roberts in 2015.

Tonight’s BBC Panorama investigation uncovered the email which suggests he asked for Ghislaine Maxwell’s help in responding to Virginia Roberts’ claims he had sex with her when she was 17 and a trafficked ‘sex slave’ of Epstein.

In the email the Prince tells Ghislaine Maxwell: ‘Let me know when we can talk. Got some specific questions to ask you about Virginia Roberts.’

Ghislaine replies: ‘Have some info. Call me when you have a moment.’

At this point, more people believe Epstein killed himself than believe anything Prince Andrew says about Virginia Roberts.