The MAGA Martyr has been identified

 AARRRGH, Crazy, Forward!, Gah., I'm from the government, news, politics, youtube, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Jan 062021
 

Ashli Babbitt: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know

She was a veteran, a QAnon conspiracy weirdo, and shot in the throat or chest by – reportedly – a plain clothes Capitol police officer not because she was waving a gun around or carrying a karambit, but because she was going through a window.

You can see her get shot at about 0:41 in this video (at least until it gets memory holed):

After a year of being told that arson and murder are just the way change is made, and perfectly acceptable ways for people to express their political views, I remain unconvinced that the government executing someone for trespassing is entirely a good thing. Were the  police working under Castle Doctrine? Is there a duty to retreat in D.C.?

 

Also: Get ready for a whole lot of this sort of thing:

And let’s see if this stays up:

 Posted by at 10:32 pm

Name That Bigot

 blather, history, weapons, youtube  No Responses »
Jan 062021
 

Oddly enough, this one is nothing about politics.

Sometime in the 1980s, a very young version of me came across a then-current magazine article on the OSS “Bigot,” a modification of the 1911 pistol to fire darts rather than bullets. The point was that this WWII-era weapon would be very quiet compared to the standard 1911 and could be used for taking out sentries and the like. Problem was it apparently didn’t work all that well and a suppressor was a lot more sensible. Still, the vague memory of that magazine article has irritatingly stuck with me for decades. As memory serves it had a number of large, possibly full-scale photos of the hardware. Repeated efforts to find it again have failed. It might have been in something like “Soldier of Fortune” or some similar terribly 80’s sort of magazine. Does this sound at all familiar to anyone?

NOTE: “Forgotten Weapons” video about the Bigot with extra audio awesomeness. Go on, guess what it is…

 Posted by at 9:30 pm

Well, this year is off to a rollicking good start

 AARRRGH, Crazy, Forward!, Gah., Hmm..., I'm from the government, news, politics, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Jan 062021
 

Remember *all* through 2020, when “mostly peaceful protestors” were allowed to trash business districts and government offices with AT MOST a harsh talking to by the police? Yeah… that’s leftist privilege. If you are a right winger and you want to do something vaguely similar, but with a whole lot less of looting and arson, the police will shot you in the neck.

Woman brought out on stretcher, covered in blood… Shot by DC Police…

 

“We want to petition our government.” Government response:

Those sure do look like “high capacity magazines” those fellers have. As well:

Not only “high-cap” magazines but a “hell yes we’ll take your AR-15.” The government gets to have those. Not you or me, though. The likes of us will be restricted to clubs and Molotov cocktails, so long as we pass certain ideological tests. “Want to burn down a book store to protest western civilization and Enlightenment values? Go right ahead. Annoyed about voting irregularities? Here, have a flash-bang.”

Yeah, 2021 is gonna be one hell of a year.

 Posted by at 2:35 pm

Slight difference in tone

 art, awesomeness, blather, youtube  No Responses »
Jan 062021
 

David Bowie’s “Heroes” is a song about the triumph of the human spirit. Written in 1977, it is about two lovers separated by the Berlin Wall. Lots of people love this song and are cheered by it:

 

A lot of singers have covered it. And then… Peter Gabriel released his own version. Same melody, same lyrics, and at least to me it seems utterly flipped into a lament. To me it comes across not “we can be heroes” in the sense that “we have this great potential,” but “we could, but we’re not.” It almost sounds like someone who had the chance to be a hero and failed and is now living with the failure.

I gotta say I find the Gabriel version far, FAR more evocative.

 Posted by at 7:03 am

This is not the tripod you were looking for

 AARRRGH, art, books, Crazy, dumbassery, Gah., history, science fiction, ಠ_ಠ  No Responses »
Jan 052021
 

The UK’s Royal Mint commissioned an American artist to design a coin to celebrate author H.G. Wells. His design references “The Invisible Man,” “The Time Machine” and “War of the Worlds.” All fine and dandy. Except… ummmmmmmm…………..

Sigh. Really?

Celebrating the Life and Work of H. G. Wells

Bad enough the artist did this. Worse is that it got this far without being corrected.

 Posted by at 5:50 pm

MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA…

 awesomeness, news, politics  No Responses »
Jan 052021
 

Officer who shot Jacob Blake will not face charges, district attorney says

Remember the protests in Kenosha? Well, get ready for Round Two…

 

Now, in a sane world it would have never gone this far. The police shooting of Jacob Blake was good not just because he was going for a knife… but because, according to all available evidence, HE ALREADY HAD ONE. Someone in the process of kidnapping children while holding a karambit would seem like a bad person and a valid bullet sponge.

Now for all charges to be dropped against Kyle Rittenhouse.

 Posted by at 4:39 pm

“Key to the Future” driverless turbine powered cars with singing passengers

 history, Hmm..., science, youtube  No Responses »
Jan 052021
 

Well, *this* didn’t come to pass either. And in many ways… *good.* The monkeymotions the operator(s) has to go through to get the car into driverless mode would be too much for most people, then or now… and the idea of each car requiring a minute or more of a dedicated ground traffic controllers time is just nuts. A few million cars on the road would require a few hundred thousand controllers, most likely… possibly pushing close to one-to-one around rush hour. And everyone breaking out in song… yeesh. Families that sing together? Yeah, them days is gone, folks.

Something else: “dad” here looks like he’s well past 60, but he has a distinctly teenage daughter. How many families back then actually had Dad having kids so late… past 45, well into his fifties? This trope seems to pop up a *lot.*

Bonus: pre-digested food cooked by infra-red. Ummm… yum?

 Posted by at 4:03 pm
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