The Latest Larry Correia Rant

 DO I UNFAIRLY PAINT THE LEFT WITH A BROAD BRUSH?

 ...I’m talking about YOU. Regular people. Voters. The guy next door. The masses on the internet. Just average joes. Democrats. Libs. Whatever you call yourself. Anybody who identifies as being on the left.

When your leaders pick a narrative, you drink that Kool-Aid. Even if it’s shit flavored Kool-Aid, most of you smile and tell us it’s the best fucking Kool-Aid you’ve ever tasted. It’s milk from the teat of a magic cherry flavored Unicorn. Nope. It’s shit. You all know it’s shit. But you go along with the narrative anyway.

When the insane progs among you lie their asses off, I’m talking blatant, easily disproven, painfully ham-fisted, fucking LIES… Do you call them out? Do you say, “hang on guys, that’s a little nuts”. Because if you do, the rest of us sure as fuck don’t ever see it. Pick a topic, any topic. It’s always the same.

Read the whole thing. When I got to that part, though, I laughed out loud, woke Mrs. Drang up from her  migraine-induced snooze, and further disturbed her by reading the entire thing out loud. She hasn't objected, so I guess she agrees. Either that. or she has Plans for tonight while I'm sleeping. 

(Actually, i know she agrees because she started talking Seattle politics...)

"The Wokists"

 Tal Bachman: We Have Met the Enemy

The strange figures known as Wokists currently destroying America aren't just reprises of earlier enemies. They represent something rather new. The political cult of Wokism combines the worst aspects of every political cult in history.

Whether they realize it or not, Wokists themselves combine the lunatic loyalty of the Manson family with the hollow pseudo-joy of Jonestown residents, the racism of National Socialists, the inhumanity of Mao Tse-Tung, the bratty tantrums of Veruca Salt, the nihilism of Bakunin-style anarchists, the totalitarianism of Stalin's Soviet Union, the child torture and sacrifice of the Mayans, the derangement of Heaven's Gate followers, the sadistic violence of the Jacobins, and the ruthless control-freakism of the current Chinese Communist Party.

Now add to that noxious syncretic blend the Wokist use of powerful communication technologies to shape narratives and meta-narratives, destroy opponents, and recruit new converts, and you've got yourself a thing.

LOL!

 Seen on Gab:

I'm on Gab as @DW_Drang, some imposter 😛 was already using "Drang".

Thought For The Day

“Once men turned their thinking over to machines in the hope that this would set them free. But that only permitted other men with machines to enslave them.” 

Frank Herbert, Dune

I have been wondering if the Butlerian Jihad is going to begin earlier, and look different, than Herbert thought... 

A Boot, Stomping On A Human Face..

 So Twitter has initiated a purge against President Trump and anyone that doesn't want to see him die in  fire. 

Many of whom have jumped to the Twitter rival, Parler. 

Which is hosted on Amazon Web Services.

Which is shutting it down until Parler starts censoring speech in accordance with the wishes of the technocratic oligarchs. 

Who constitute a kakocracy.

So, fine, here we go to Gab. Which hosts it's own content. 

Might be worth reminding folks...

 ...if they can do it to Trump, they'll do it to you without even a first thought, let alone a second.

Mozilla, developers of Firefox: 'We need more than deplatforming'

"Hygienic Fascism"

Hygienic fascism: Turning the world into a 'safe space' — but at what cost? | TheHill

Author Aldous Huxley once said, “A thoroughly scientific dictatorship will never be overthrown.”

Even as we try to battle the COVID-19 pestilence, we may be contracting a more dangerous virus — hygienic fascism. This involves a process when our political leaders defer to a handful of “experts,” amid what Dr. Joseph Ladopo, an associate professor at the UCLA School of Medicine, describes as an atmosphere of “COVID-19-induced terror.”

Ideologically, hygienic fascism is neither right nor left, nor is it simply a matter of taking necessary precautions. It is about imposing, over a long period of time, highly draconian regulations based on certain assumptions about public health. In large part, it regards science not so much as a search for knowledge but as revealed “truth” with definitive “answers.” Anyone opposed to the conventional stratagem, including recognized professionals, are largely banished as mindless Trumpistas, ignoramuses, or worse.

I must confess, I was surprised, most of the articles I've seen at The Hill.com tend to be more on the Big Government/Social Justice Snowflakery end of the spectrum than in Rugged Individualism's neighborhood, although it is very true that I don't go there enough to be able to say that my impression of their material is conclusive.

But there they are running this article, too: Facial recognition: The other reason we may need a face mask | TheHill

Don’t get out of the hard-learned habit of covering your face, even if you live in a place that will soon no longer require it. Long after the pandemic recedes, we may still need our N-95 respirators, surgical masks and DIY bandana coverings. Marking the triumph over COVID-19, when it finally happens, should not include a bonfire of masks. This symbol of the coronavirus fight may prove just as crucial against a different foe altogether.

Also spreading fast, but largely outside of global health debates and meaningful scrutiny, is facial recognition. We’ve had Apple’s handy Face ID since 2017, of course, with its 30,000 invisible facial dots that coalesce into a phone-unlocking faceprint, but potentially more perturbing applications are already here or around the corner. Face-Six wants to reduce medical errors and fraud by promising to help hospitals “identify patients whenever necessary, conscious or unconscious.” ISM Connect has scanned crowds at Taylor Swift’s concerts to weed out stalkers and generate tour promotion metrics. Clearview AI has been used by over 600 law enforcement agencies to solve cases from shoplifting to murder. So private it listed a fake Manhattan address as its business location, Clearview AI sold a product that allows users to take a picture of someone they are curious about and obtain links to public photos and sites pertaining to this person.

The power that such apps must bestow is suggested in another purveyor’s name, iOmniscient. Its site boasts of clients in 60 countries and over 30 industries, including retail, where it measures customers’ footpaths, visit frequency and dwell time. iOmniscient “excels in uncontrolled environments with non-cooperative individuals,” which would explain its suspected use during Hong Kong’s 2019 pro-democracy protests. In response to the potential surveillance, demonstrators toppled smart lampposts believed to house the technology, destroyed CCTV cameras, hid themselves under umbrellas -- and donned face masks.

These pieces are from the Opinion pages of TheHill.com,  not "news", but still, I'm surprised.

Maybe there's hope after all.

Pandemic Panic Ponders

Haven't posted as much as I might, for a variety of reasons.

For one thing Bobbi and the guys at Powerline are tracking my thoughts pretty closely, and probably more eloquently than I could.

When it comes to science, I have found Spin, Strangeness, Charm and Watts Up With That? to be excellent sources; the former, especially, posts daily (if not more often) on news reports put of Europe, translated into English, with clear explanations of the science and medicine involved, with a minimum of hysteria.


OldNFO published this meme yesterday:

There is a lot we still don't know about SARS-CoV2 and COVID19. A lot of that gets lost in the squabbling surrounding it.

How virulent is it? What simple countermeasures are effective? Are the asymptomatic contagious? are there risk factors beyond the obvious?

If you find yourself hoping people die because they identify it as coming from China, then you're an idiot and I don't care for your opinion. If you screeched because the president shut down air travel from China and then kept screeching that he was overreacting, and pivoted immediately to he wasn't doing enough then you're an idiot and I don't care what your opinion is.

It is my opinion that after a 2 or 3 week lockdown we could have started re-opening with precautions, and we would be a lot better off, because people would still be working, the economy wouldn't be tanking, and, based on the experience in certain places that did not go full "Stay in your homes or else" mode, the disease "profile" would look little different.

I am not an epidemiologist. I admit I could be wrong. But when you look into the backgrounds of the "experts", there's a lot to question there.

The Brit that claimed the USA would have 2,000,000 deaths  was not only grossly mistaken, but he was responsible for several past public health related over-reactions on the part of Her Majesty's Government. (Not to mention having his married lover visit him from across town after publicly scolding Brits to stay indoors...)

Several years ago Dr Fauci responded to legislation banning certain virological research by funneling money to... a Chinese lab in Wuhan China. (I can actually follow the reasoning here. The research involved testing certain mutations to viruses to study responses. and treatments, so the research was important. But...)

As for government reaction...

Releasing felons from prison and arresting law abiding citizens for going outside? No wonder they want 100% mail-in ballots!

A New Definition for "Chutzpah"

It used to be the guy that murdered his parents begging for leniency in sentencing, due to being an orphan.

Now it's the Director General of the World Health Organization saying we should have been listening to him all along...

#BREAKING 'World should have listened to WHO' on #coronavirus: Director General Tedros pic.twitter.com/N7eua2j0JA

— AFP news agency (@AFP) April 27, 2020

 

Do You Want The Boogaloo? Because This is How You Get The Boogaloo (Updated)

(Links added to comments.)

First: If  you don't understand what is meant by The Boogaloo, well... I guess you can look it up on The Urban Dictionary.

Having said that...

In View From The Porch: People are getting edgy... Tamara excerpted a key 'graph from the rather lengthy post The COVID-19 Boogaloo Opus - Handwaving Freakoutery at Medium.

So then I see the following Tweet:

"The drones, donated by DJI, a Chinese company, have gone to 43 agencies in 22 states, all to help enforce social distancing rules."

US using Chinese drones to spy on and lecture Americans about a virus caused by communist China

Oh, and DJI "may be sending data to China" pic.twitter.com/LqH6VzonzH

— Elizabeth Harrington (@LizRNC) April 17, 2020

 Which of course, prompted a revival of the age-old questions

• Drone: Rifle or Shotgun?

and

• What Caliber for Drone?  

As infuriating as the implementation of technology in service of Big Government nannyism is,
Law enforcement is using drones to shout at people for violating social distancing.
the really bizarre thing about this story, as @LizRNC points out in her tweet above, is that these are DJI drones, a product of Communist China.

And an Internet search for the keywords "chinese drones law enforcement" will return dozens ( a conservative estimate) of articles referring to the US Government banning the use of drones from Communist China because of the predilection of the commies to have their tech phone home to the mother ship with details we'd rather the commies not have.

Seriously, what kind of an idiot elected official can be so tone-deaf in the face of Communist China's obvious responsibility for the current global pandemic and think "Hey, I know! We'll use ChiCom spy technology to nag people!" is a good idea.

Allegedly, these drones do not have the ability to transmit or record video.

Sure.

Winnie The Flu says so.

EDIT to add: And then there's this crap:

How do you report places that aren’t enforcing social distancing? It’s simple: just snap a photo and text it to 311-692. #AskMyMayor pic.twitter.com/WQdCcVf1Rl

— Mayor Bill de Blasio (@NYCMayor) April 18, 2020

Note: See comments for some links to news reporting on the subject. Also, statements re: No Video are probably meant to be "no recording of video or taking of photos."

Patriots Day

©1983, 2020 D.W.Drang & The Cluemeter

Battle Road
©1983, 2020 D.W.Drang & The Cluemeter

A Rude Bridge, Arching a Flood
©1983, 2020 D.W.Drang & The Cluemeter

This isn't creepy at all

Apple and Google building coronavirus tracking tech for iOS and Android, coming in May - CNET

What could possibly go wrong?

Two of the tech industry's biggest players are working together to fight the coronavirus, announcing a new set of tools that could come to a majority of smartphones around the world.

The new technology, outlined in white papers published by Apple and Google on Friday and further discussed in a call with reporters Monday, relies on Bluetooth wireless radio technology to help phones communicate with one another, ultimately warning users about people they've come in contact with who are infected with the coronavirus.

 It's like Big Brother and Skynet got together, and...

Contact tracing

Apple and Google's technology is meant to support contact tracing, which historically has been a manual process in which health care workers painstakingly comb through a patient's history to figure out who they were near and may have exposed to infection.

Apps could potentially speed up that process. People who're marked as having coronavirus in an app on their phone could then wirelessly transmit alerts to anyone they come in contact with, potentially leading people to take extra precautions or self-quarantine to slow any further spread.

Apple and Google representatives said they chose to create this joint technology in part because they wanted to ensure interoperability between different phones. The companies also chose to build the system into their iOS and Android software in order to reduce the impact this technology could have on battery life.

To ensure as many people have access to the technology as possible, Google will include the tracking data in an update to its "Google Play services" feature for phones powered by its Android software. As a result, more people will have access to the technology even if their phone isn't being actively updated by manufacturers anymore.

What the companies didn't know is how many people need to sign up to make the system work, in part because the crisis itself is unprecedented. But together, the companies' software runs nearly all the billions of smartphones and tablets in use today.

This project brought to you by the Chinese Communist Party's Ministry of State Security...

The good news, FWIW, is that comments are running against the idea, in this article and in others elsewhere. (Even this jackboot licker here: Apple and Google are working together to fight COVID-19 but it's up to us to make it effective | Android Central)

Rumor Control -- Updated

Coronavirus Rumor Control | FEMA.gov

Naturally, there are those who immediately assume (!) that anything put out by FEMA is a lie.

Seriously, if you happen to find the Twitter thread in which FEMA lists these myths, don't read the comments.

I refrained from reading comments to this one:

I hear unfounded rumors about #NationalGuard troops supporting a nationwide quarantine. Let me be clear: There has been no such discussion. ... For news about the great work the Guard IS doing to support the #Covid_19 response, click the link. #COVID19 https://t.co/JZROM4xfF9

— Gen. Joseph Lengyel (@ChiefNGB) March 20, 2020

 

Meanwhile, in Washington State...

We heard reports that a @target in Seattle was selling n95 masks.

My staff and others stepped in.

Those masks are now on their way to the health care workers who desperately need them. https://t.co/7sCM5kqyfs

— Governor Jay Inslee (@GovInslee) March 21, 2020

 

Apparently, government assets are seizing consumer goods from store shelves...

Great job!! Now, PLEASE SET UP SHELTER IN PLACE!!!! People aren’t staying home or practicing social distancing! This is at Rattlesnake Ledge today!! pic.twitter.com/S84ewSOPDn

— Fledra Hamill (@fledra_hamill) March 21, 2020

#ShutItDownJay this is ridiculous and we look like fools. All the deaths will only be made worse by the republican governor we will be stuck with because you won’t act.

— Kevin Tracey (@KP_Tracey) March 21, 2020

And the response is to beg the governor to lock the entire state down.

Look, social distancing and all that is a good idea; as an introvert, it's what I do anyway. But The Roads Must Roll; as a Son of Martha myself, the idea that we should all just hunker down and let everything stop because the grasshoppers have succumbed to hysteria disgusts me.

(OK, too many literary allusions in there, sorry, not sorry.)

And part of why I tweeted

Would I be regarded as exceedingly paranoid if I suggested the reason Democrat governors are rushing to tank the economy is to get @realDonaldTrump?@stevenfhayward

— Drang (@DWDrang) March 21, 2020

Do I really believe that one or more governors, possibly coordinated, decided "I know! I'll ruin the economy in the pretense of preventing the spread of the pandemic! That'll show that Bad Orange Man!"

No. They may think that what they're doing will really help, they may think they have to Do Something and this is all they can come up with, or maybe they think they have to be seen to Do Something, which is, after all, a common motivation for elected or appointed officials to Do Something Counterproductive and/or Stupid...

Although I do not rule out the possibility that the thought occurred to them that the bright side of a crash would be that Presidents are not usually re-elected when the economy turns bad.

UPDATE:  And just like that, Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer make the question of "Would Democrats trash the economy to get Trump?" look a little more rational...

GOAL Post 2020-8 is up

GOAL Post 2020-8, Legislative Update from Olympia 28 February 2020 - Gun Owners Action League of Washington

I haven't been posting these, since they are now regularly posted to that web site, and let's face it, I haven't been posting much at all.

Legislative season is almost over, although with the clown show Olympia has become it is no longer accurate to suggest that our money or freedom are safe if the legislature is not in session. We're talking about a state where the state tried to sue the voters for an initiative we passed, after all.

Berthold Brecht would have been right at home here.

Anyway. It sounds like most of the bills are dead, although, as Joe points out, these clowns are always willing to pull a Miracle Max on bills that should have died...

Plus there's always the possibility that Steyer and Bloomberg will finance another corrupt initiative to back an even worse law.

One good bill remains, that would remove the restriction on spring-assisted knives. I have a lot of respect for the late Glenn Ford, Capt. USNR (RET), but The Blackboard Jungle resulted in silly restrictions on knives you can open with one hand, which sounds like a minor inconvenience until you need both hands to do a job, and a third to access the tool you need to do it. ("No shit, there I was, 30 feet up a ladder...")

The majority of the rest of the remaining gun-related bills should die in a fire.

GOAL Alert 2019-2 25 April 2019

GOAL Alert 2019-2 is up at the Gun Owners Action League of Washington site.

TEMPORARY HOLD ON BUMP STOCK INFO RELEASE
IMMEDIATE ACTION REQUIRED
According to information that we have not been able to confirm at this time, a temporary injunction blocking release of the names and addresses of those who turned in bump stocks to the Washington State Patrol has been imposed by a Washington judge.

Click the clicky, read the whole thing, act accordingly. It's currently 1745 in Indy, 1445 in WA, so  things may have changed by now. 

WA GOAL ALERT 2019-1

Washington State Legislative ALERT!!! Olympia is consider a bill to release the names of all that turned their bump stocks in. 

Whatever you think about bump stocks, this is an outrageous violation of privacy. 

 Joe's Alert message below has been edited slightly for some typos and punctuation. 

****

FROM: GOAL-WA (Joe Waldron) GOALWA@COX.NET

TO: undisclosed recipients

SENT: Wed 4/24/2019 2:25 AM

SUBJECT: GOAL Alert 2019-124 April 2019

Legislative Alert from Olympia

Last week we reported that a public records request had been submitted to the Washington State Patrol asking for the names and addresses of all of the individuals who turned in “bump stocks” and were compensated by the state. Under the current Public Records Act (RCW 42.56), this information MUST be released.

An emergency bill has been filed in Olympia to block this action for purposes of public safety. The bill is HB 2182, was filed by:

Representatives Shea <http://leg.wa.gov/house/representatives/pages/default.aspx#shea>,

Klippert <http://leg.wa.gov/house/representatives/pages/default.aspx#klippert>,

Boehnke <http://leg.wa.gov/house/representatives/pages/default.aspx#boehnke>,

Kretz <http://leg.wa.gov/house/representatives/pages/default.aspx#kretz>,

Dufault <http://leg.wa.gov/house/representatives/pages/default.aspx#dufault>,

Walsh <http://leg.wa.gov/house/representatives/pages/default.aspx#walsh>,

Orcutt <http://leg.wa.gov/house/representatives/pages/default.aspx#orcutt>,

Young <http://leg.wa.gov/house/representatives/pages/default.aspx#young>.

More than 25 years ago the Washington legislature followed the lead of several other states and restricted access to public records concerning concealed pistol licenses. Why give burglars a heads up of where to go “shopping,” or anti-gun activists the opportunity to publish lists of CPL holders as some have done in other states?

Bill text can be found

here: http://lawfilesext.leg.wa.gov/biennium/2019-20/Pdf/Bills/House%20Bills/2182.pdf

Again, a reasonable assumption can be made if an individual had a bump stock, he or she also possesses a firearm suitable for use with such a device. For those liberals who think this is a reasonable measure, ask them how they would feel about a public records release of the names of all women who received an abortion using public funding as is done in Washington under MEDICAID. Try that and watch the liberal rockets being fired!

YOU MUST TAKE IMMEDIATE ACTION TODAY IF THIS BILL IS TO MOVE. Again, the bill is HB 2182.It is imperative you contact YOUR state legislators today and ask them to support the bill. Your legislator is a liberal? Use the abortion example I cited above as an argument.

Contact information for your legislators may be found at https://app.leg.wa.gov/DistrictFinder. When you insert your address, a box will pop up with links to your state Senator and two state Representatives. Or you can do it the old-fashioned way and look in the “blue” Government pages in your telephone directory.

Timing is critical. One report indicates the WSP intends to release the information as early as tomorrow, Friday, even before the mandatory release deadline.

Will Democrat leadership in both the House and Senate act, and will Governor Inslee sign an emergency bill?

 

GOAL Post 2019-15

Joe sent out the latest GOAL Post last night, and reported that his ISP is acting up again/still, and since the report is still not on the web site, I'll go ahead and post it here. Usual rules, minor editing for formatting for the blog, not textual changes.

FWIW, here is my thought about a Special Session, mentioned by Joe: The Democrats in Olympia, as in Seattle, are unhappy that the state constitution prohibits an income tax being levied by either the state or a municipality. They are trying their hardest to impose at least a "millionaire tax" or pretending that a capital gains tax would not be a fancy name for a tax on income. 

It should be noted that it has been reported that there's a budget surplus right now, and they have no actual plan to use the money they want to try and wring out of the people of Washington State, but they still think our income is rightfully theirs. 

So if there's a special session, I think that the focus will be trying to get more blood from the turnip.

In other news, I received media credentials for the NRA Annual Meeting, so I guess I'd better practice pretending how to be all journalistic and stuff. Better yet, I'll ask questions and report what I see, instead of staying in the bar and making it up...

***

FROM: GOAL-WA <goalwa@cox.net>

TO: undisclosed recipients

SENT: Fri 4/19/2019 5:35 PM

SUBJECT: GOAL Post 2019-15

Legislative Update from Olympia 19 April 2019

• RALLY FOR YOUR RIGHTS
• BILLS PASS, ONE DIES
• CONCURRENCE VOTES
• ONE MORE WEEK
• SPECIAL SESSION LOOMS
• BUMP STOCK WARNING
• LATE DISSEMINATION
• ON THE ROAD

A pro-gun “Rally for your Rights” will be held on the Capitol Campus on Saturday, 27 March at 12 noon.  A little late in the session, but still an opportunity to show your support. It IS on a Saturday. Try to make it and show them the gun lobby is not a paper tiger...

Several bills passed by the end of the second chamber cut-off on Wednesday evening. 

House Bills 1465 (handgun delivery), 1739 (undetectable/untraceable firearms), 1786 (firearms/protective orders) and 1934 (military online/mail CPL renewal) all passed out of the Senate.  HB 1934 was rushed off to Governor Inslee for his signature.  The remainder await a concurrence vote or conference committee action because they were amended in the second chamber.  It’s not over yet!

Senate Bill 5782 (assisted-opening knives) died on the House floor without a vote.  What a surprise!

The Senate has concurred in House amendments to HBs 5027 (Extreme risk protection orders, under 18), 5181 (firearms/mental health) and 5205 (firearms/incompetence for trial).  All three are on their way to the governor.

There is one week left for the House and Senate to review difference between passed versions of the bills and kick them to the governor – or they die for the session.  That doesn’t mean they won’t be back next year… or in a week or two in a special session.  The regular legislative session ends at midnight on Sunday, 28 April.

It appears the Democrats who control the House and the Democrats who control the Senate can’t agree on how much to raise taxes for the biennium.  This means it is likely we will enter one or more 30-day special sessions until they get it sorted out.  Apparently there is no honor among thieves.  As the saying goes, neither you life nor your wallet are safe as long as the legislature is in session.

An individual with what appears to be a fictitious name, “Yati Arguna,” has sent a Public Records Act request to the State Patrol asking for the names and addresses of everyone who turned in a bump stock for cash compensation.  That’s about 1,000 individuals.  Unless a judge blocks the release (reasonable as a public safety measure), state law requires the names be released.  Who is behind this and where or how the information will be used remains to be seen.  Should one assume that anyone who turned in a bump stock has a Modern Sporting Rifle in their home?

I will likely hold off on posting next week’s GOAL Post until Sunday night (when I’ll be flying back from the NRA annual meeting in Indianapolis) or Monday, when we know for sure what passed and what died.  Recognize that in the event of a special session ALL BILLS from the previous regular session come alive again and may be considered, voted on, and passed. 

The week after I’m off for Europe – allegedly.  I’ll be flying on an airline family pass, so it’s “space available” and any movement will depend on empty seats available AND my (very low) seniority number.  I sent my wife to visit family ten days ago, and now I have to go bring her back.  This living alone (not entirely alone, I have a Lab, but she doesn’t talk) isn’t all it’s cracked up to be when you’ve had a wife to spoil you for 50+ years now!

Should a special session be called, it is my intention to continue GOAL Post… all dependent on information being available to me wherever I am.  Historically they don’t use special sessions to drag back gun bills, so unless there’s a major gun incident, we should be safe.  Operative word “should.”

BILL STATUS/GOAL POSITION: