The Left: Taking The Progress Out Of Progressive For Over a Century

Anybody else keeping track of the score in the Culture War?

Probably not as there are no actual rules and therefore no way to tally the results. But there are a lot of keen observations out there:

The culture war becomes more infantile by the day. Quite literally. The big talking points of the past few weeks have focused almost exclusively on children’s TV shows, toys and authors.

So let’s see:

First Disney Plus slapped a warning label on The Muppets Show, due to the ‘negative depictions and / or mistreatment of people or cultures’ it apparently features, acknowledging the ‘harmful impacts’ these puppets have inflicted on generations of youngsters.

Then there was the de-gendering of Mr Potato Head. Hasbro announced that the beloved toy brand would drop the honorific, so as to make it more gender inclusive…

Then they came for Dr. Seuss, as it were.

Honestly, I still have no idea why 6 of the Dr. Seuss books have been cancelled and am not inclined to find out. Despite criticism they can’t seem to help themselves.

The pattern keeps repeating itself. Wokists do something mad and when you point this out to them they accuse you of being mad. The people who think that the mascots on Uncle Ben’s rice or Aunt Jemima’s pancake mix are essentially propping up white supremacy are perfectly sensible. Anyone who says ‘hang on a minute’ is crazy.

The claim that critics of cancel culture are obsessing over random examples might hold some water if there weren’t so many examples. Since the Black Lives Matter protests exploded last year, the hitherto esoteric idea that all culture must be cleansed in order to bring about a just society has gone mainstream and led to countless ‘cancellations’.

As if by magic, the left beclowns itself yet again, thus proving their critics correct: this time it’s Pepe LePew.

This new charge was led by a NYT columnist, you know America’s newspaper of record that couldn’t bring itself to break the story of Harvey Weinstein, Mr. #MeToo himself. I guess they don’t want to miss the boat on the next big rapist.

I would note that Monsieur Le Blow looks a bit like a skunk himself,

although I’m sure that pointing that out is reason enough to get me deplatformed. Nevertheless, he seems to have totally missed the point that Pepe’s character (a cartoon, I remind you) was…a skunk. A loser who never won the favor of the fairer sex - because he was a skunk, catch my whiff?

Honestly, I’m surprised the left insists on keeping this up as it doesn’t seem to work out all that well.

The left: taking the progress out of progressive for over a century.

Friday Night Blights

I couldn’t sleep last night, which is no different than most nights except that instead of laying in the dark I perused the offerings of Stars On Demand and selected Good Will Hunting, the 1997 Ben Affleck/Matt Damon written movie that won wild acclaim at the time but I’d never seen. It was awful with a capital A.

Despite all the acclaim it is a schlocky piece of badly written, overacted tripe which nevertheless kept me company for an hour and half of wokeness. I can’t help but feel my time would have been better spent watching the Friday-up-all-night Diners, Drive-ins and Dives marathon.

Very early on in the movie we are exposed to the protagonist's (Will Hunting played by Matt Damon) genius and wisdom in this exchange with his therapist, played by Robin Williams:

Will: "A History of the United States, Volume I." If you want to read a real history book, read Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United States." That book will knock you on your ass.

Sean: How about Noam Chomsky's "Manufacturing Consent?"

“Historians may well view it as a step toward a coherent new version of American History.” That’s the ticket.

And with that one scene this ridiculously overrated 25 year old movie shows us how the fire of today’s woke culture was initially stoked by classroom indoctrination and then insidiously reinforced by cultural outlets like movies.

Interesting side note: Ben Affleck and Matt Damon were neighbors with Howard Zinn before they wrote their Oscar winning script. So in a way the scene was simply product placement for Zinn’s A People’s History of the United States. It represented a construct the naïve 20-something boys already firmly ascribed to: the alternate history of the U.S. relying on anti-American narratives, bereft of mitigating historical context and committed to presenting the story of America as an evil history of western-white-male-racism-paternalism-and-imperialism. The fact that it was written by a guy in the neighborhood who supported Mao, Castro and other mass-murdering commie thugs was just a bonus. And with their Oscar success that one throw-away line in the movie helped transform Zinn’s alternate history of America into a cultural icon. That’s the power and the glory of Hollywood.

Several years later David Chase worked Zinn’s American Manifesto into his hugely popular HBO show, The Sopranos, albeit from a rather different mindset. Keep in mind that Chase cast the rather dim Anthony Jr as “the clueless asshole of the family, an obvious unworthy future mob boss that was Tony's burden as a father to endure.” So you can interpret any of his dialogue as the expression of something Chase considers stupid.

This New York Post Obit of Zinn is rather fair and balanced:

Zinn ransacked the past to find alternative models for future struggles. That, of course, is not the job of the historian but of the propagandist.

  Like Zinn’s book Good Will Hunting is mind-numbingly superficial, naïve and sophomoric. Don’t waste your time.

The next time I can’t sleep I’ll just look around to see if I can find a Piglet to snuggle.

Truth Is Like A Lion

“Makes no sense!”

“National Guard Troop Guarding Capitol: More Media Here Than Anyone Else, It's A Beautiful Day”

In fact the longer you consider it the less sense it makes.

Either our “intelligence” services are criminally inept or they’re simply criminal. Either way it gives you cause to worry about whoever has their hand up the so-called President’s butt and continues to wag his hand and tongue around to the ruin of this country. There is only one thing left to do, but that will be no simple task while half the citizenry remains insensate to this batch of usurpers committed to undermining our lives, our fortunes and our sacred honor.

Pray that some day soon truth will once again come to be valued, recognized and accepted.

Space X: The Stolen Ending

Best headline of the week, so far:

“SpaceX Starship Rocket Lands Successfully But Then Explodes”

It contains everything one has come to expect from media coverage: a lead with a disingenuous “fact” intended to muddle the case then stick the “landing” with all the sensationalism one can muster. Damn! They are good.

Granted, the rest of the operation was most impressive:

But unfortunately the patient died.

Space X explodes after landing

It’s enough to make you think that Space X’s victory was stolen at the very end. I doubt, however, that will deter Elon Musk from trying again.

It sort of reminds me of when Trump won the 2020 election only to have it stolen at the very end.

 

I doubt that will deter President Trump either.

Hoping All The Chickens Go Home To Roost

  I don’t remember how Wednesday – formerly Hump Day – came to be Chicken Day around here, but why not? Chickens are so underrated.

It’s as good a meme as any and sometimes the world is so distressing that camels just can’t do it justice any longer.

So here’s hoping that all who’ve fallen ill will heal soon so we can transmogrify back to normal.

Or at least what’s come to be known as the new normal.

I’m off to the hospital, hoping that Raj will be ready to be released some time today. Here’s hoping pbird and escaped commieny’s DH will be able to go home to roost today; prayers for them and all others in need today.

Is There Anything They Can’t Do?

Between global warming and the coronavirus, is there anything they can’t do? They literally cover every trouble in the world.

It's the US' deadliest avalanche season in years. Experts say Covid is partially to blame

Of course they do. And the “experts” would certainly know wouldn’t they?

Little Johnny discovered this giant coronavirus in his front yard after a recent record global warming snow event. What is he thinking standing right next to it without a face mask!

Don’t tell that to the “experts”

 

 

Raj update: nothing new since last night to report. I left the hospital at 8, got home at 8:30 and was asleep by 8:45. Woke at 6 feeling humanoid again. Heading back to the hospital and if the new meds and electrolyte infusions get his labs and tachycardia incidents under control they’ll release him. Otherwise they will hold him for more tests to see what’s messing up the electrolytes. Will keep you updated.

Good Morning From Somewhere

Sunrise Somewhere in Northville

I’m  pre-posting this open thread for Monday whereas I’m not sure where I’ll be in the morning.  It’s currently 1:00 am and Raj and I are at the University of Michigan hospital awaiting an available room most likely at their satellite hospital down the road a piece. His cardio monitor started showing multiple incidents of tachycardia Sunday afternoon and the oncall doc called 3 times to tell him to get to an emergency room. Being stubborn he ignored the first 2 but I took the last call around 8:00 pm and here we are, where we should have been this afternoon.

Long story short, they administered some drug to get his heart back in rhythm – I know many of you have been there and done that. He’s doing fine but obviously they want to keep him overnight for additional monitoring and from the looks of it that might be accomplished right here in the ER.

So that’s all from MOTUS central for now, will check in sometime in the morning, assuming I’ve managed to get a couple hours shuteye and my phone isn’t dead.

Your prayers are most welcomed.

More Leadership Lessons From Governor Cuomo

I confess, I haven’t been following this story closely:

Second former aide accuses Gov. Andrew Cuomo of sexual harassment

Charlotte Bennett, a young looking 25

But shouldn’t the headline read “Second former aide accuses Emmy-award winner and best selling author Gov. Andrew Cuomo of sexual harassment” you know, in deference to all his iconic accomplishments?

Now you can’t blame me for enjoying the few times the left decides to get rid of some of their baggage by applying their rules to one of their own. I would imagine that the over-under pools for how long the Guv still has in office have been hyper-active this weekend. And I’ve certainly enjoyed the comment section at the NYT article about this: what the devil is this cancel culture thing?! Take Alex G’s lament for example -

“Are we living in such a dystopian society where a man can’t flirt with a colleague without being cancelled?…It’s a scary world we are going to live in when people have to live in fear how their comments will be interpreted.”

Yes, Alex, we are, and it is; thank you for pointing that out. And probably for helping create it.

Can we all recognize now that the halls of political power have become the new Hollywood for young people seeking fame and fortune? Accordingly, politics has and always has had its own casting couch culture. Given that fact it is not at all surprising that the left believed they could take Trump out with allegations of sexual misconduct in our oh-so-sensitive #MeToo world. After all, haven’t we seen time and again that when you control the press you control the narrative, be it true or false.

What this latest saga clearly demonstrates above all else is just how right Rush Limbaugh was all along: the media couldn’t destroy Trump because they didn’t make him. The story’s corollary though is just as interesting: when you are a completely media-made man it is quite simple to take you down. Buh-bye Andrew.

Oopsie! No Do-overs this time.

You probably should have stuck with Sandra Lee, Andrew, even though she was only semi-homemade.