There will be no “blue wave”

A rare sane and sober Democrat considers his party’s prospects for the future:

Gianforte’s decisive victory over Democrat Rob Quist on Thursday has provoked a fresh round of soul-searching from the same people who made too damn much of the Montana election in the first place. We have been told that Democrats must field stronger candidates and commit more resources, that Bernie Sanders does not possess some magic elixir that attracts disgruntled white people and that Donald Trump remains popular in places where people really like him. If that’s not quite enough Captain Obvious, Washington Post columnist Greg Hohmann devoted an impressive amount of research and reporting to the Montana aftermath before arriving at the diagnosis that there is “a growing tribalism that contributes to the polarization of our political system.” You don’t say!

Let me be clear that I’m indicting myself here as well: I edit political coverage at Salon, and I followed the Montana news closely. I knew perfectly well how it was likely to turn out, but one can always be wrong about that (as we discovered last November), and I shared some dim sense that it might be cathartic to experience an insignificant proxy victory in a state I have never even visited. But when I ask myself why I felt that way, even a little, the answers are not edifying.

For many people in, let’s say, the left-center quadrant of the American political spectrum — especially those who are not all that eager to confront the fractured and tormented state of the current Democratic Party — Montana and Georgia and 2018 seem(ed) to represent the opening chapters of a comeback narrative, the beginning of a happy ending. If what happened in 2016 was a nonsensical aberration, then maybe there’s a fix right around the corner, and normal, institutional politics can provide it.

First you chip away at Republican triumphalism, and the House majority, with a couple of special-election victories. Then it’s about organizing, recruiting the right candidates for the right seats, registering voters and ringing doorbells, right? Democrats picked up 31 seats in the George W. Bush midterms of 2006 — and will need 24 or so this time — so, hey, it could happen. For that matter, Republicans gained an astounding 63 seats in the Tea Party election of 2010, and many observers have speculated that Trump-revulsion might create that kind of cohesion on the left. So we sweep away Paul Ryan and his sneering goons, give Nancy Pelosi back her speaker’s gavel after eight long years, introduce the articles of impeachment and begin to set America back on the upward-trending path of political normalcy and niceness.

I suspect it’s pointless to list all the things that are wrong with that scenario, because either you agree with me that it’s a delusional fantasy built on seven different varieties of magical thinking or you don’t, and in the latter case I am not likely to convince you.

My position is that Donald Trump is a symptom of the fundamental brokenness of American politics, not the cause. Electing a Democratic House majority (which is 95 percent unlikely to happen) and impeaching Trump (which is 100 percent not going to happen) might feel good in the moment, but wouldn’t actually fix what is broken. Considered as a whole, the “blue wave” fantasy of November 2018 is a more elaborate and somewhat more realistic version of the “Hamilton elector” fantasy of December 2016: Something will happen soon to make this all go away.

The situation is actually worse for Democratic Party than most Democrats realize. The Asian-Hispanic alliance is already beginning to revolt against the Jewish-White-Black dominance of the Democrats, or as they will soon enough be known, the Not-American Party. And the Republican Party cannot easily return to its establishment cuckery, because the Alt-Right’s articulation of the dyscivilizational activities of the Not-Americans is continually pushing the Overton Window towards ethno-nationalism.

This is why I have repeatedly pointed out that the Alt-Right is inevitable. All of the trends, regional, national, and international, continue to point in that direction.

You must not think disapproved thoughts

The Denver Post fires the four-time Colorado sportswriter of the year for a single tweet:

The Denver Post has parted ways with writer Terry Frei after he shared an insensitive tweet following Sunday’s Indy 500 win by Takuma Sato. Sato became the first Japanese-born driver to win the Indianapolis 500 race.

“I am very uncomfortable with a Japanese driver winning the Indianapolis 500 during Memorial Day weekend,” Frei wrote before deleting the tweet.

The Denver Post issued the following statement:

“We apologize for the disrespectful and unacceptable tweet that was sent by one of our reporters. Terry Frei is no longer an employee of The Denver Post. It’s our policy not to comment further on personnel issues. The tweet doesn’t represent what we believe nor what we stand for. We hope you will accept our profound apologies.”

Frei apologized in his own separate statement:

“I fouled up,” Frei wrote. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said what I said when I said it. I should have known better and I regret it. I in no way meant to represent my employer and I apologize to The Denver Post.”

“I made a stupid reference, during an emotional weekend, to one of the nations that we fought in World War II,” he added.

His real mistake wasn’t apologizing – he was doomed anyhow – but in thinking that most Americans even remember who their ancestors fought in WWII, much less care. And remember, there are 85 million or so new post-1965 Paper Americans who don’t give a damn about WWII. If anything, their grandparents and great-grandparents were on the other side. It’s not only ancient history to them, but someone else’s ancient history.

Meanwhile, in Britain, Britain’s Got Talent spares a lad for his “sexist and racist” tweets because he is only 16, but gives him a severe warning:

A source told The Sun: ‘Producers were not happy when they saw he had posted such an inflammatory picture on his Twitter as well as a host of disparaging comments about women.

‘It’s not only a huge embarrassment for Ali, it’s a massive embarrassment for the show too, but producers decided on this occasion to give him the benefit of the doubt and leave him with a warning because he’s only 16. But they will not tolerate contestants using this kind of language as above all BGT celebrates diversity.’

What I would like to see is people start getting fired for publicly expressing views approving of diversity and equality, or other aspects of social justice. I suspect there are already more than a few SJWs not getting hired for that reason, but the Left won’t drop this tactic until right-wing executives respond in kind.

The point is, if you can legitimately be fired for expressing one point of view, you can certainly be fired for expressing the opposite perspective.

Excerpt: CITY BEYOND TIME

CITY BEYOND TIME: Tales of the Fall of Metachronopolis by John C. Wright. Now in paperback.

Smiling down into her eyes, he said, “I have something wonderful to show you, my dear, my love. Come along.”

He put his long, buff-colored coat around her shoulders. “But it’s not cold today.”

“Not today,” he said, and he took her by the hand and led her up the hill.

At first they passed the trees which lined the stream, and when they came among the trees, autumn colors were blooming among the leaves. And with their next few steps, they trod upon a multi-colored carpet of fallen leaves, and bare branches overhead swayed in wintry winds.

When they reached the gardens, he picked her up, so that her slim white shoes would not be wetted by the snow. The fountains were clogged with ice, the marble goddesses and heroes were pale with frost, and the dry grape arbors had icicles depending from the lattice work. She shivered against his chest.

He put her down once they had circled the main house, and little shoots of spring grass were shooting up amidst the profuse beds and congregations of Maytime flowers.

By the time they approached the main door, the grass was green and long, the sun was hot, and the elms and oaks had gone from buds to thick and verdant summer leaves.

A double row of oaks lined the drive leading to the main doors of Ophion House. Lelantos gently pushed Catherine into hiding behind a tree, and pressed close behind her, his arms to either side of her, supporting her. She was nearly fainting, and stood grasping the tree for support, staring at the house.

She saw that his Roadster stood idling in the circle before the doors, festooned with ribbons and flowers, with long strands tied to the rear bumper trailing shoes and cans. On the stairs of the portico, a noisy, cheerful crowd stood facing the doors, men dressed in handsome black tuxedos, women garbed in silks and satins, with flowers woven in their hair.

“It is now a year later,” he breathed in her ear. “I wanted you to see our wedding day.”

A great cheer went up from the house, and the women threw rice into the air as the bride and groom appeared at the door.

Catherine clutched the bark to the oak, and her breath caught in her throat. “That’s me!”

“That’s you. Run forward now, and you might catch the bouquet.”

But Catherine did not move. “Oh,” she sighed, “Oh my… I look so happy. Look at how I’m laughing! Look at my dress! It’s gorgeous! I want a dress just like that for my wedding!”

Her face flushed with joy, standing on tip-toes, the bride smiled and waved toward the oak trees as if she knew they were there, as a lacey white veil, sheer as smoke, floated around her flower-crowned head. The bridegroom winked in their direction. Then the crowd swirled in around the newly-married pair, shouting with good cheer.

The couple fled the pelting rice, laughing, and leapt into the waiting Roadster. With a humming roar, the machine whirled down the lane between the trees, a cloud of dust speeding away behind it.

The noise of the crowd faded away like the sound of an old newsreel. Lelantos walked toward the house, drawing an amazed Catherine drifting, eyes wide, behind him. By the time they reached the lowest step, it was dusk, and the crowd had vanished. When they reached the door, the stars were gleaming cold in the dark above, and the hall clock was whirring and ringing midnight.

“How can this be possible?” Catherine breathed softly.

“All men can reach with their minds into the past and future, with memory and imagination. My family was forced to learn how to bring ourselves along as well.”

“Forced?”

“We come from a future of fire. The smoke of the burning has blotted out the sun, moon, and stars. It is a time of darkness; the streams and seas are turned to blood. Earthquakes swallow islands into the ocean and throw down mountains. Mankind has died in plague and poison, or burnt, or choked, or starved, or drowned or been buried alive. The first father and mother of my family, Lif and Lifrasir, the last of all mankind, escaped death by fleeing down the corridors of Time. We don’t know why. Perhaps the moment when there was no future left at all allowed the past to open up her gates. The pair fled to the farthest future, after time itself had ceased, exhausted, and discovered the empty towers of Metachronopolis, the golden City Beyond Time. New names were given them, Chronos and Rhea, when they mounted the diamond thrones and donned the robes of pallid mist. They opened the mirrored gates of splendor into the creation reborn.”

She looked around at the summer night, at the rustling trees and the silent statues in the moonlight. “I thought things would blur and flicker when we time-traveled.”

“I only stepped on the same hour each day as we came up the hill.”

“And what year is it now?”

“It is midnight of our wedding day; as we came up stairs, I only took strides measuring an hour. The house is empty; all have gone to celebrate.”

“But why didn’t things jump when we went from one hour to the next? I didn’t see the stars spin, or the clouds whip past.”

“Nature admits of no discontinuities, no gaps. The force of Time will always mend itself, to make things appear as likely and as near to right as they may be.”

“And if you go back and shoot your father before you were born?”

“I would never shoot my father. He owes me money.”

“No, seriously.”

“Time would conspire to supply you with a father as near to yours as it might do. Even his name might stay the same. You have encountered odd and inexplicable coincidences? These are the scars of time, the ripples of my brothers as they pass among you. Where time cannot make a clean and even compensation for some paradox, unlikely coincidences attempt to supply the deficit. If they can. If they can.”

“And if no coincidence will stretch that far?”

A strange and haunted look came onto his face. “Without the strong foundation of cause and effect to sustain oneself, one fades. One becomes a paradox, an apparition, and then a ghost, a shadow, a whisper, a memory, a forgotten dream, and eventually… nothing.”

RIP Frank Deford

The last great American sportswriter is gone. We are fortunate that his words live on. My goodness, how the man could write.

THE boxer and the blonde are together, downstairs in the club cellar. At some point, club cellars went out, and they became family rooms instead. This is, however, very definitely a club cellar. Why, the grandchildren of the boxer and the blonde could sleep soundly upstairs, clear through the big Christmas party they gave, when everybody came and stayed late and loud down here. The boxer and the blonde are sitting next to each other, laughing about the old times, about when they fell hopelessly in love almost half a century ago in New Jersey, at the beach. Down the Jersey shore is the way everyone in Pennsylvania says it. This club cellar is in Pittsburgh.

The boxer is going on 67, except in The Ring record book, where he is going on 68. But he has all his marbles; and he has his looks (except for the fighter’s mashed nose); and he has the blonde; and they have the same house, the one with the club cellar, that they bought in the summer of 1941. A great deal of this is about that bright ripe summer, the last one before the forlorn simplicity of a Depression was buried in the thick-braided rubble of blood and Spam. What a fight the boxer had that June! It might have been the best in the history of the ring. Certainly, it was the most dramatic, alltime, any way you look at it. The boxer lost, though. Probably he would have won, except for the blonde—whom he loved so much, and wanted so much to make proud of him. And later, it was the blonde’s old man, the boxer’s father-in-law (if you can believe this), who cost him a rematch for the heavyweight championship of the world. Those were some kind of times.

The boxer and the blonde laugh again, together, remembering how they fell in love. “Actually, you sort of forced me into it,” she says.

“I did you a favor,” he snaps back, smirking at his comeback. After a couple of belts, he has been known to confess that although he fought 21 times against world champions, he has never yet won a decision over the blonde—never yet, as they say in boxing, outpointed her. But you can sure see why he keeps on trying. He still has his looks? Hey, you should see her. The blonde is past 60 now, and she’s still cute as a button. Not merely beautiful, you understand, but schoolgirl cute, just like she was when the boxer first flirted with her down the Jersey shore. There is a picture of them on the wall. Pictures cover the walls of the club cellar. This particular picture was featured in a magazine, the boxer and the blonde running, hand in hand, out of the surf.

Never in your life did you see two better-looking kids. She was Miss Ocean City, and Alfred Lunt called him “a Celtic god,” and Hollywood had a part for him that Errol Flynn himself wound up with after the boxer said no thanks and went back to Pittsburgh.

It is said, and quite rightly, that America does not produce great writers or great literature. We waited in vain for the Great American Novel, and all of the various pretenders wound up falling well short. But I would say that there is a uniquely American literary form that reached its heights in the 20th century, of which Frank Deford was the last of his breed.

The happiest day

This is, without question, the happiest day of Rod Dreher’s life. NO ONE WILL EVER CALL HIM RACIST AGAIN!

This is amazing information. Focusing on the slave ancestor, this means that under the so-called “one drop rule” that was the law in some Southern states in Jim Crow times, I and my children would have been considered black, and subjected to segregation and persecution. Of course it’s highly unlikely that anyone would have known, not even us back then. Our physical appearance is, um, very white. But had genetic testing been around at that time, and had my ancestors been subject to it, the state would have learned that despite the whiteness of their skin, some of them were black, according to the law, and treated them unjustly.

I don’t know if my slave ancestor descends from my maternal or paternal line. My father is dead, but my mother is alive. I hope she will do the 23andme test to see what her ancestry is. That will tell me which line my African grandparent came from. Still, it’s almost certain that some of my ancestors fought a war whose goal in large part was to keep descendants of other ancestors enslaved. Genetically speaking, the story of the African slaves in North America is my story and my children’s story, too. And somewhere in this country, I may have black distant cousins alive today.

Amazing indeed. Speaking as someone who is considerably more American Indian than Rod is African-American, I regret to inform him that it doesn’t actually work that way.

But nevertheless, I’d like to sincerely congratulate Mr. Dreher on his newly discovered blackness. This fraction of a percent of African DNA he possesses absolutely trumps a wife’s black son, a mulatto grandchild, a predilection for black men, or a token black adoptee. Take that, Rick Wilson and Nick Searcy! Try as you might, you can’t outcuck the Cuckmeister.

Our Islamo-Christian heritage

Hey, it worked for the Jews, right? Why shouldn’t it work for the Muslims too? Or, for that matter, the Hindus and ancestor-worshipping pagans?

CNN rewrites history to claim that Islam was part of America’s founding

For CNN, the argument that Islam has “always” been present in the U.S. rests largely on the claim that a significant minority of black slaves were Muslim. On Saturday, CNN correspondent Dean Obeidallah claimed that “Islam has been here since the time of slavery, because ten to fifteen percent of the African slaves brought were Muslim. So Islam was here before the creation of the United States. It was actually part of the creation of the United States of America.” Bell’s interviewee raises the estimate, claiming that “during the slave trade, up to about 25 to 30% of the slaves came from areas where there were predominantly Muslim populations.”

Ironically, the Muslims have got a much stronger claim to America than the Jews do, as there were considerably more of them present at the time of the American Revolution. The Jewish population of America is estimated at about 1,500 in 1790, which is considerably less than the conservative estimate of 95,000 Muslims. Furthermore, given that 9,000 blacks were among the 200,000 soldiers who fought for the Revolution, it is statistically probable that more Muslims (90 to 2,700) fought for American independence than Jews (90 to 100).

From time to time, people have asked me why I consistently criticize the ahistorical mythology of Judeo-Christian America; the primary reason is because it is almost entirely false. That being said, this Islamo-Christian heritage nonsense is exactly the sort of consequence I expected if the previous historical revisionism wasn’t seen by the public for the false historical propaganda that it is.

To paraphrase the linked article, while both Jews and Muslims were present at America’s founding, neither Judaism and Islam — as coherent, self-conscious religious and political civilizations — were. America is a Christian nation. Its heritage is Christian and its values are Christian. Those are the historical facts, and be very wary of the objectives of anyone who attempts to revise them. If they are doing so, rest assured they have a purpose that is at best self-serving, and quite possibly nefarious.

UPDATE: It has been suggested that the black Muslim population was considerably lower than the estimated 10 to 30 percent. In which case, I propose that we revise history once more and henceforth refer to America’s Pagan-Christian heritage and values.

Putting the spine in the Right

Even Townhall is refusing to back down and cuck these days:

The left is shocked that the right has now stopped caring about the old rules, since for so long the left relied on the right to subordinate its human instincts and conform to those rules even when the left ignored them. We refused to stoop to their level, and for a long time, we were “better than that.” But you can only have one side being “better than that” for so long before people get sick of being the butt of the hypocrisy.

Hypocrisy is poison not because it makes people stop knowing right from wrong, but because it makes its victims stop caring about right and wrong. Ben Jacobs got smacked around, and millions of us just don’t give a damn.

Can confirm. We really don’t. The media has made it very clear that they are the enemy of the American people. The American people will do well to treat them accordingly.

The war on frats

The Zman makes an important observation concerning how SJWs arrange to put themselves in authority over others, usually with the help of foolish moderates:

The war on fraternities is also a good study of how the Left operates to undermine traditional institutions. It used to be that frats were self-funded, independent organizations. In many cases, they operated off campus to avoid trouble with college authorities. Those Penn State frats, for example, are off-campus in privately owned houses. This arms-length relationship started to end when colleges “offered” to help the frats collect dues and enforce their rules. Fraternity payments became a part of the tuition bill.

What was pitched as a goodwill gesture to help fraternities, quickly turned into a beachhead for Progressive nutters to impose their rules. The Prog mind always seeks to first gain entry into the organization. From there, they begin to agitate for changes that open the door for their coreligionists. In the case of fraternities, they imposed rules on how the frats select members and maintain discipline. Colleges are now beginning the process of forcing fraternities to admit women, thus eliminating their reason to exist.

There are two lessons to be drawn from the jihad against white men on campus. One is that there can never be any negotiating with the Progs. A negotiation means both sides seek a resolution, but Progs seek only one end and that is your death, even if it means their death. Whatever American Progressivism was in the past, it is now a nihilistic death cult. The Progs sitting down with the campus frats to work out rules, do so with a singular goal and that is the elimination of white males from the college campus.

The other thing is Progs enjoy their own hypocrisy. They relish it, so pointing it out to them has the opposite effect from what is intended. The defenders of Greek life point out that male sportsballers tend to go rapey on campus, yet no one is trying to shut down the football team. Progs find this energizing. It means they are in control and therefore can arbitrarily enforce the rules. Appeals to administrative consistency are blood in the water for the Progs.

Always, always, always be extremely suspicious of those who are eager to help you somehow. We’re very careful with our volunteers, and wary of giving them too much responsibility too soon, for precisely this reason.

Star Citizen: two takes, one conclusion

First, Derek Smart’s observations of the multiplayer system:

This game was never supposed to be an MMO. And it wasn’t pitched as one. And Chris has gone on the record several times, even after all the stretch goals funding were met back in Nov 2014 at $65 million, saying that it wasn’t. And the stretch goals have no such indication or implication that they were building an MMO. Somewhere along the line, because of scope creep and promises made as they pulled every trick in the book to keep raising money from gullible backers, it morphed into an MMO because that’s the only game model that would support some of the things they were promising. And they’re doing all this despite the fact that they neither have the tech, nor the talent, or the time and money to pull it off.

At this point, as I’ve shown above, if they don’t have the framework for their future networking model already in and working in some fashion, there is absolutely no way they’re going to have time to gut what they have now, and implement a proper solution. Something they should have done from the very start. Now it’s too late. And they are still making promises they can’t keep, even as they continue to defer* promised features into a post-release schedule.

My guess is that the current networking layer is going to remain as-is for quite some time, as they continue to build other features and systems on top of it. Then if by some miracle they survive (they won’t) long enough to actually get around to it, all that stuff they are building on top of a network layer they have to replace, will either have to be ripped out, or modified to support whatever it is they need to do in order to support their long term goals.

All of this means that even if they are around long enough for a 4.0 schedule to go live, and it does include the major networking features they need to make what they plan work, until then, backers are still going to be stuck with 8 player clients in Star Citizen. I can’t wait to see what happens when 3.0 goes live with the two moons. It’s going to be hilarious. Maybe they’ll shock everyone and have 6 clients running in Crusader without problems.

Anyone who still has hopes that this project is ever going to be completed, let alone as promised, is delusional.

DevGame has independently reached the same conclusion:

The problem is that literally all the various engines are incredibly restricted with regards to their multiplayer capabilities. They are all match-based at their foundation. What Star Citizen is pretending to try to accomplish, does not exist and never will exist, due to the restrictions everyone has to live by.

The astute reader will, of course, wonder why DevGame has been researching this issue so deeply.