Category: Uncategorized

The con man’s escape

If you don’t understand how Rush Limbaugh was a gatekeeper and a deceiver rather than the fearless pursuer of truth that he publicly affected to be, consider this Clinton-era exchange from his radio program. Pay particular attention to the way he generates a way to extricate himself from the discussion in a manner designed to discredit the caller:

Larry: The point- well, I don’t know if he committed suicide or not, but I know we haven’t been told the truth, and you always say you’re in relentless pursuit of the truth, but not on the this issue you’re not. You ducked this issue. You do not pursue the truth here. That’s a fact. We’ve not been told the truth, and that’s the fact, too. You can read the Fiske report and see that it’s full of errors. Have you read the Fiske report?

Limbaugh: I- yeah- well, no, but I.

Larry: Well then, you’re not in pursuit of the truth.

Limbaugh: ..but, I-, I- so, what we have here, you are—

Larry: You’re not informed.

Limbaugh; …you are not, as- as Mr. Snerdley thought, a Clinton supporter.

Larry: Well, I think Clinton’s going to be re-elected.

Limbaugh: No, no, no. Did you tell him you were a Clinton supporter..

Larry Yes. I, yeah, I… (Limbaugh dumped his telephonic tormentor.)

Limbaugh: Well, so you lied, Larry. So, when you tell one lie, all of what you say is worthless. That’s the mantra, today. So sir, you’re not going to be rewarded by saying- you don’t have to lie to get on this program. If you are in the pursuit of Vince Foster being murdered, get your own show, and you go out and pursue it as best you- as best you can, but don’t lie to get on this program, to accuse me of malfeasance, or some- some sort of incompetence, as host.

If we are to judge Limbaugh by his own standard, everything he ever said was worthless. First, that’s a ridiculous standard. Second, how would Larry’s preference for Clinton or Dole make any difference whatsoever with regards to the subject being discussed? Limbaugh was merely casting about for an excuse to extricate himself from a position that was discrediting him, which is exactly what con men do. Notice how he suddenly becomes much more smooth and eloquent once he has established his rhetorical escape route.

Beware the man who always uses the word “because” to rationalize his words and deeds. An honest man is content to state his position. The dishonest man always has to sell you on whatever it happens to be at the moment.

Now, I don’t care about Rush Limbaugh and a perusal of the blog archives will demonstrate that I never have. But as Sam Harris and Jordan Peterson fans can confirm, one of the most effective ways to focus my baleful gaze on an individual or a concept about which I am otherwise indifferent is to dispute my casual comments on the subject. So, if you’re a big fan of Rush, I would recommend that you don’t try too hard to defend him here.

UPDATE: I am far too busy to even begin doing the research that would be necessary to write such a book. And Rush is no longer even potentially relevant, for obvious reasons. Therefore, I will happily leave the task to some other writer.

Mimicry is not protest

I don’t know who was taking the idea that CPAC was “protesting censorship and cancel culture” seriously in the first place, but it is amusing to see how they’re still following their own tradition of cancel culture:

The Conservative Political Action Conference has barred activist Young Pharaoh from speaking at its ‘America Uncanceled’ event, citing his “reprehensible” remarks on Judaism. The rapper denounced the move as “censorship.”

CPAC organizers took to Twitter on Monday to declare that the rapper and lecturer would no longer be welcome at this year’s conference, noting they had “just learned” of controversial comments he’d made in the past. While they did not offer any specifics on what he might have said, Young Pharaoh himself soon weighed in to fill in the blanks. 

“This is censorship at its best! All because I said ‘I do not believe in the validity of Judaism and am willing to place $50,000 on myself to debate the top Jewish rabbi.’ Now I’m no longer invited to CPAC,” he said in all-caps, appending the post with the hashtags “#racist” and “#dictatorship.”

Pharaoh was slated for a late Sunday time slot, typically a lull in the yearly CPAC event, though his appearance would have come just an hour before that of former President Donald Trump. 

While it is unclear exactly what prompted the decision, CPAC’s announcement followed a story in Media Matters chronicling some of Young Pharaoh’s more hot-button statements, including his description of Judaism a “complete lie,” arguing that “Israeli Jews” are responsible for “censorship and pedophilia on social media” as well as a number of conspiracy-minded claims about Covid-19 and vaccines. 

The activist continued to double down even after news of his canceled talk made the rounds, challenging the American Jewish Committee to “send me your best rabbi to debate” after the org accused him of spreading “horrific antisemitic lies.” 

Some of us haven’t forgotten how CPAC cancelled Milo. And imagine how CPAC would react if they heard what Jesus Christ had to say about Judaism and the Jews. I mean, it’s not as if Young Pharoah described them as “liars” and “the children of the Devil”.

Christians, don’t be fooled any longer. Conservatives are not on your side. They never have been.

If you want your fake elections

You can keep your fake elections:

The United States Supreme Court refused to review the Pennsylvania 2020 Election cases.

The court made the announcement on Monday morning.

Justices Alito, Gorsuch, and Thomas dissented from the denial.

Trump- nominated Justices Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett sided with the liberal justices.

So much for the importance of electing Republicans to appoint Supreme Court justices…. 

Going the way of the Whigs

Republicans are rapidly realizing that voting for Republicans isn’t going to provide them with the sort of government, or the sort of society, they prefer:

According to a new poll, nearly half of Republicans say they will leave the Republican Party to join a third-party created and led by former President Donald Trump. That doesn’t bode well for the Republican establishment. 

The new poll by Suffolk University-USA Today found a whopping 46 percent of Republicans are willing to leave the GOP in order to a join new party created by Donald Trump. Just 27 percent of Republicans said they would stick with the GOP, and the rest are undecided. 

“We feel like Republicans don’t fight enough for us, and we all see Donald Trump fighting for us as hard as he can, every single day,” said Brandon Keidl, a 27-year-old Republican and small-business owner from Milwaukee. “But then you have establishment Republicans who just agree with establishment Democrats and everything, and they don’t ever push back.”

The question, of course, is if the new America First party will actually put America and Americans first or not. Because there is no doubt that the Establishment will already be moving to subvert it before it even begins to take form.

Rush took the ticket

In light of this reported estate plan, there really aren’t too many questions about Rush Limbaugh having served as a gatekeeper for the Right once he reached the top:

A decade ago, the late Rush Limbaugh scoffed at the notion of leaving any of his money behind. We know this because he was reacting to us. Our coverage of Steve Jobs’ no-tax estate plan made a lot of waves. Rush felt the need to insert himself into the narrative by sharing his thoughts about legacy.

They were terse and tough. He didn’t want to leave anything behind. If he spent everything and died broke, he’d be happy, he said.

Now, a year after announcing he had terminal cancer, he’s gone. And as far as anyone can tell, he left a whole lot of money behind.

Some estimates put his net worth above $600 million. That’s probably just career earnings and not a real net figure, but it provides a sense of the amount of cash flowing into his operation over the years.

He was the biggest name in radio. It takes a vast amount of work to burn as much as $85 million a year and have absolutely nothing to show for it. We know that his “Southern Command” in Palm Beach alone can be worth up $50 million to his estate under the right conditions.

It’s unlikely that his widow will keep it around forever. She was decades younger than he was and has a lot of living left to do.

Either way, unless Rush made a whole lot more effort to look out for his posterity than anyone but the tabloids suggests, she’s the boss now.

There were no kids. She inherits it all.

Unlike most ticket-takers, however, I don’t think his initial success was the result of his ticket-taking. His success was unexpected, original, and almost certainly organic. It looks more as if his wife was the prize, and while his talent was returned to God, his massive accumulation of assets went to the Devil.

I always wondered how Rush could go so far and absolutely no farther no matter what information came to light, given his obvious intelligence and analytical skills. And I assumed that it had something to do with his desire to maintain his position in the media; his humiliation during the NFL debacle clearly clarified his thinking with regards to the difference between influence and power. But it appears he may have been even more compromised than I had assumed.

It is intriguing to observe that the more successful you are, the more fearful you appear to become if you do not fear God only. If your soul has a price, whatever it might be, sooner or later the Devil will find a way to make you an offer.

Corporate cancer kills

You may recall that I addressed the convergence of British department store John Lewis in Corporate Cancer.

John Lewis is the king of the Christmas commercial. Its famous 2010 Red Dress advert featured the life of one woman from birth to old age as she goes through all of the stages of life while wearing a red dress. It’s a touching little piece, a brilliant advertisement that is well worth seeing, and it boosted Christmas sales at John Lewis by 39.7 percent that year.

The 2017 ad, which featured an oversized Muppet called Moz and a little mixed-race boy was equally well-received, but only by the marketing experts. They were particularly excited by the diversity and the interracial aspects of the ad.

Hurray for seeing some diversity on such an epic advertising moment—my surprise at the mixed-race parents shows how rarely we see it in the advertising world.

—Zoe Harris, group marketing director and head of invention, Trinity Mirror

How rarely indeed! However, the 2017 Christmas season was marked by an unusual series of identical rarities. It wasn’t merely John Lewis, but also Marks & Spencer, Debenhams and Sainsbury’s, who each independently decided to feature mixed-race couples celebrating Christmas together in their big holiday advertisement. Even more remarkably, every single one of them just happened to feature a black man with a white woman, which, given the present UK demographics, can only be described as extraordinarily improbable.

After all, there are more Indians, Pakistanis, Chinese, and other Asians in the UK than there are blacks. Where were they?

Unlike the USA, the United Kingdom tracks ethnicity rather closely, so we can accurately determine exactly how statistically improbable these expensive Christmas advertisements were. As it turns out, there is only a one-in-327 chance that such a couple would be randomly selected. And the chance of all five commercials just happening to feature that particular pairing is one in 3,738,856,210,407.

That is one in 3.7 trillion, more or less. So, it wasn’t just a series of coincidences. It was evidence of convergence in the British advertising industry.

You will probably not be surprised to learn that these converged commercials did not prove to be very popular with the British public over the 2017 Christmas season. As a result, John Lewis was forced to cut its prices to prevent its year-on-year sales from falling and stated that its holiday sales “will negatively affect full-year financial results”.

Corporate Cancer was published in 2019. Two years later, the business news about the outlook for John Lewis will not surprise anyone who read the book.

John Lewis could close eight more of its remaining branches, with larger older shops most likely to close for good, it is claimed. The department store could shut a fifth of its 42 remaining stores, as negotiations with landlords continue and hundreds of jobs are put at risk, The Sunday Times reports. 

Any announcement of closures is expected to take place alongside the company’s annual results on March 11. John Lewis Partnership’s chairwoman Dame Sharon White has reportedly put forward eight shops for closure in an effort to further cut costs after the company suffered a £635m loss last September, The Sunday Times reports. 

The news follows the closure of eight John Lewis stores, including John Lewis’ flagship Birmingham store, and the loss of 1,300 jobs in July last year – which was followed by a further 1,500 jobs axed from head office in November. 

The Voice of Saruman

The Forge of Tolkien Episode 20, THE VOICE OF SARUMAN, is now on UATV.

Standing at the base of the Tower of the Cunning Mind, Gandalf warned Pippin and the others to beware of Saruman’s voice—but what power did Saruman of Many Colours have over the company, if his most dangerous weapon was his speech?

In this episode, recorded on the feast of the Epiphany, Professor Rachel Fulton considers what Tolkien reveals about the dangers of trusting politicians by way of his characterization of Saruman and Gandalf as “messengers” of a particular kind. What kind of creatures were the Istari, and why did they have the powers—and limitations—that they did to influence events in Middle-earth? What does Saruman’s temptation and fall reveal about the meaning of Power, and how did Gandalf defeat such a powerful foe?

In other Unauthorized news, Razorfist has brought his Metal Mythos music documentary series to UATV, which videos are now being featured in their own eponymous channel.

To guarantee deletion

Post your comment twice. Or three or four times, as some moronic would-be commenters do. In case you  still haven’t figured it out, the comments here are moderated. So, when – not if, when – your comment does not appear right away, that is not an indication that something went wrong somehow and therefore you should repeat your comment.

And frankly, if this concept was ever difficult for you to understand, you probably should not be commenting here anyhow.

Every comment that is posted more than once will be deleted. Repeat offenders will have their comments spammed, which will eventually lead to none of your comments appearing at all. And no, the moderators are not even a little bit interested in the usual excuse of how “the preview didn’t work and my comment didn’t appear, and so I thought that if there is even a slight possibility that readers here might be deprived of my Very Important Opinion, it was imperative that I submit it again.”

Allow me to spell this out for the gammas: never, ever, enter a comment twice more than once. Yes, this means you. Even you. And especially you.

This rule is ontologically applicable. This rule applies regardless of whether you think your comment went through or not. This rule applies under every possible, imaginable, and hypothetical scenario. There is NEVER any excuse for submitting a comment twice. And if a comment is submitted twice, both iterations will be deleted by the moderators.

The amusing thing about this reiteration is the whining protests of the gammas. They know perfectly well that they’ll be the most affected by this.

UPDATE: Apparently this is yet another problem we can blame on Boomers. Two double comments, both Boomers, including one on this very post.

The education offensive

If you don’t understand the concept of 5GW, or what the Chinese call Unrestricted Warfare, this expose of the systematic purchase of England’s private schools should help you grasp the basic concept:

Hundreds of independent schools left in dire financial straits by the coronavirus pandemic are being targeted by Chinese investors, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.

Experts anticipate a ‘feeding frenzy’ as firms, including some run by high-ranking members of the ruling Chinese Communist party, seek to expand their influence over Britain’s education system. Seventeen schools are already owned by Chinese companies, but that number is set to rocket.

Amid rising concern about Beijing’s tentacles reaching into British classrooms, an investigation by this newspaper can reveal:

Nine of the 17 schools under Chinese control are owned by firms whose founders or bosses are among China’s most senior Communist Party members; Princess Diana’s preparatory school is owned by a Chinese group that openly trades on her name; Schools are using educational tools for teaching children a ‘whitewashed’ view of China; 

One firm admitted its acquisition of British schools is aimed at supporting China’s controversial Belt And Road strategy, which aims to expand Beijing’s global influence.

This is only one front in the education offensive. Another one is aimed at higher education in the USA:

Since 2004, the Chinese government has sponsored Confucius Institutes on college and university campuses around the world, providing teachers, textbooks, and operating funds. Until recently, an agency of the Chinese Ministry of Education, the Hanban, oversaw Confucius Institutes. In the wake of widespread criticism, the Chinese government has reorganized Confucius Institutes under a new organization, the Chinese International Education Foundation.

In April 2017, the National Association of Scholars released Outsourced to China: Confucius Institutes and Soft Power in American Higher Education, a comprehensive report on the way the Chinese government infiltrates American colleges and universities to enhance its own image. At that time, we counted 103 Confucius Institutes in the United States.

As of February 17, 2021, NAS counts a total of 55 Confucius Institutes in the United States.  

That number will almost certainly begin rising as long as Biden appears to be the President. If it does not, this will definitely count as another post-election anomaly. 

And how is that a bad thing, exactly?

U.S. States are beginning to follow the lead of foreign governments like Australia in breaking the power of Big Tech:

Last month, a lobbyist approached Kyle Davison, a North Dakota state senator, with an unusual proposal: a law to stop Apple and Google from forcing companies in the state to hand over a share of their app sales.

Mr. Davison, a Republican, was focused on bills related to a $200,000 literacy program and birth records for the homeless. But he was intrigued by the lobbyist’s arguments that the tech giants were hurting small businesses, and he thought such a law could attract tech companies to North Dakota. So he introduced it.

“She said to me that this could be big. But to me, that means the local newspaper is going to come with a camera,” Mr. Davison, 60, said. “I would not be truthful if I said I expected the reaction.”

At the Capitol in Bismarck, a 21-story Art Deco tower that’s the state’s tallest building, a hearing on the bill last week drew Washington lawyers, North Dakota newspapers and Silicon Valley executives. Siding with Apple and Google was Americans for Prosperity, the conservative group funded by the Koch family. On the other side was the Fargo Chamber of Commerce. One person called in from Alaska.

Supporters of the bill said it would help smaller companies and only hurt Apple and Google’s revenues. Apple’s chief privacy engineer, Erik Neuenschwander, testified that the bill “threatens to destroy iPhone as you know it.”

Siding with Apple and Google was the conservative group funded by the Koch family. And you wonder why conservatives always lose? They literally side with their enemies. 

And destroying iPhone as we know it is a feature, not a bug.