Category: Miscellaneous

Tom Brady is going to this tenth Superbowl, David Barclay RIP, and did we just see extortion?

Congratulations to the deplorable Tom Brady. The Trump friend is now cemented as the greatest quarterback of all time. He finished his televised evening by trotting to the sideline to hug his son.

The man needs deprogramming and quick.

We lost a good Catholic earlier this month and I didn’t even know it. Billionaire David Barclay died on January 10^th.

Yes, “billionaire David . . .”. And yet I say he was one of the good guys.

I base that assessment on this memorial that Taki wrote a few days ago.

When Taki once finished a ski run at an exclusive resort, a stranger walked up to him and asked if he was Taki. Taki nodded and the man said, “I like your column [in The Spectator].”

Taki responded, “What is an intelligent person like you doing reading the rubbish I write?”

The stranger responded, ““I own The Spectator, I have to read it—but I still like your column.”

Thus, says Taki, started their friendship.

He said Barclay and his wife kept to themselves, which annoyed a lot of the other guests at the private resort. When someone asked Taki what interested Barclay, he said, “Religious matters.”

He said it was a white lie to deter the man, but it was also true: “David was very interested in religion, quoted scripture, and often talked about the Catholic Church with me.”

Like I said, it looks like we lost a good one this month, but few of us even noticed.

I missed this nugget last week: “Last night Tucker reported something fairly astonishing even by the standards of the last fortnight: He said that Mitch McConnell told President Trump … Read the rest

Tuesday miscellany

I’m merely linking to this: Google Is Not What It Seems. It’s an excerpt from Julian Assange’s new book. I’ve long maintained that something doesn’t “smell right” about Google: its government ties, its shockingly-fast growth, its involvement in foreign affairs.

But, alas, I’m not the guy to talk with about contemporary foreign affairs. I don’t even have a firm opinion on Assange.

Though I am kinda hoping that he and Snowden both get pardons. I have no opinion on whether the pardons are just. I just like it when a stick, any stick, gets pushed in the eye of the Establishment.

My man Taki Theodoracopulos’s current column is just a series of (loosely?) related points. It’s not his best piece by any means, but points are thoroughly-enjoyable.

Lord Belhaven died at 93. His widow said he had the perfect death: “He asked for a gin and tonic, went to bed, and never woke up.” That sounds good but not perfect. If had gone to Confession right before the gin, that would’ve been perfect.

“Trauma is now as American as apple pie, and purported to be caused by many things: betrayal, moral injury, an abuse of authority, the loss of a pet, the closing of a nightclub, or the malfunction of a television set. Actually it’s a spiritual void that afflicts those who use social media and take celebrities seriously. Therapists and quacks are having a field day.”

The Sackler family organized Perdue and developed OxyContin. They “bribed doctors to prescribe it rather vigorously, and managed to kill more Americans than the two atom bombs dropped in Japan did Japanese. Oh yes, after 450,000 deaths, and as early as 2007, the Sacklers began to transfer $10 billion to their private accounts. As it now stands, they’ve got … Read the rest

England after 1688 and bears in the gay community

And why it’s a really big deal

Software’s Incessant Change

Debate at 9:00 (EDT) tonight. The topics of the debate selected by moderator Chris Wallace: the coronavirus pandemic, racial unrest, the Supreme Court, the economy, and the integrity of the election.

Biden has been preparing hard, presumably taking large amounts of memory supplements. Trump said he’s not.

I loathe political debates, but I’ll have to tune-in for this one, at least part of it. My gut tells me that Biden will do just fine, Trump will be hilarious, and there will be no winner.

Where will I watch it? Anywhere. Wired magazine points out that it’ll be harder to avoid the debate than to find it.

That Wired magazine referred to a “Mohu antennae.” Curious, I looked it up. It appears to be a TV antenna made of paper.

A TV antenna? Those are actually still “a thing”?

Well, yes. Apparently, a 16 million thing: 16 million households in the U.S. still use one (2019 figures). I was stunned.

Now, only 6.6 million households use one exclusively. The other 9.4 million households use one as a supplement to a streaming service, which makes sense. If you have Amazon Prime, or Netflix if you’re into foxy pre-pubescent girls, free service from a $30 antenna makes sense if you’re in a big city.

Zogg and Shasta Drink Lots of Wine

Dang: 67,000 acres of wine country have been destroyed by the California fires. “The two fast-moving blazes, the Zogg Fire in Shasta County and the Glass Fire in Napa and Sonoma Counties, are uncontained and had burned more than 67,000 acres by Monday night.”

Zogg and Shasta? When did we start naming fires? From what I can tell, they’re named after where they started or where they’re burning hottest. I have no objections and, of … Read the rest