Category Archives: Entertainment

Thank You, Mr. President, by Bill Bonner

Posted on January 4, 2018 | Leave a comment

Bill Bonner explains why he’s grateful to President Trump. From Bonner at bonnerandpartners.com:

BALTIMORE – We owe Donald Trump a hearty and sincere “thank you.”

Not only did he save us a lot of money (see below)… but he also helped us better understand how government actually works.

What “The Donald” understood better than the professional politicians was that democratic politics is basically a form of entertainment.

It’s a sordid part of show biz – all hocus pocus… suspension of disbelief… and performance art – closer to nude mud wrestling than The Crown.

Big Dog

The press still doesn’t get it.

In an article that appeared in The Washington Post on Tuesday, reporters had tallied 1,950 “false or misleading claims” the president made last year.

We were surprised; we thought he had made more than that. And why not?

No one expects a standup comic to tell the truth. No one checks Beyoncé’s lyrics for factual errors. And who worries about accuracy while watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer?

Another article tells us that Trump is “mocked on social media for bragging” about his nuclear button.

Of course, that’s not what President Eisenhower would have done. But these are not Ike voters. And this is not Ike’s Old Republic.

Today’s voters have lost faith in the system, with its solemn deceit and its counterfeit dignity. And they’re happy to hear someone speaking in a language they understand – the lowbrow media patois of Howard Stern, the Kardashians, and “The Big Dog” himself, WWE champ Roman Reigns.

Trump, a lifelong celebrity, sensed that the role of president has little to do with geopolitical facts, mastery of the federal budget, or knowledge of history.

It’s more like a reality TV show or a WWE wrestling match – with put downs… posturing… and fake fights.

In other words, it was right up his alley.

To continue reading; Thank You, Mr. President

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Who Stole Our Culture? by William S. Lind

Posted on January 2, 2018 | Leave a comment

This is a good historical examination and analysis of cultural Marxism. From William S. Lind at lewrockwell.com:

Sometime during the last half-century, someone stole our culture. Just 50 years ago, in the 1950s, America was a great place. It was safe. It was decent. Children got good educations in the public schools. Even blue-collar fathers brought home middle-class incomes, so moms could stay home with the kids. Television shows reflected sound, traditional values.

Where did it all go? How did that America become the sleazy, decadent place we live in today – so different that those who grew up prior to the ’60s feel like it’s a foreign country? Did it just “happen”?

It didn’t just “happen.” In fact, a deliberate agenda was followed to steal our culture and leave a new and very different one in its place. The story of how and why is one of the most important parts of our nation’s history – and it is a story almost no one knows. The people behind it wanted it that way.

What happened, in short, is that America’s traditional culture, which had grown up over generations from our Western, Judeo-Christian roots, was swept aside by an ideology. We know that ideology best as “political correctness” or “multi-culturalism.” It really is cultural Marxism, Marxism translated from economic into cultural terms in an effort that goes back not to the 1960s, but to World War I. Incredible as it may seem, just as the old economic Marxism of the Soviet Union has faded away, a new cultural Marxism has become the ruling ideology of America’s elites. The No. 1 goal of that cultural Marxism, since its creation, has been the destruction of Western culture and the Christian religion.

To understand anything, we have to know its history. To understand who stole our culture, we need to take a look at the history of “political correctness.”

To continue reading: Who Stole Our Culture?

 

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Happy New Year: Don’t Be Fooled By the Orthodoxies of the Messengers, by Doug “Uncola” Lynn

Posted on December 31, 2017 | Leave a comment

Here is Hollywood’s latest in political correctness. From Doug “Uncola” Lynn at theburningplatform.com:

The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. …We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society. …In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons…who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.

– Edward Bernays, “Propaganda”

Edward Bernays (1891 – 1995) was a famous pioneer in the field of public relations and is, today, often referred to as the Father of Propaganda. Perhaps Bernays became thus known because he authored the above quoted 1928 book titled with that very term. He was actually the nephew of the famed psychopathologist Sigmund Freud and was very proud of his uncle’s work. More than that, however, Bernays accepted the basic premises of Freud towards the use of emotional manipulation of the masses through advertising. It was, in fact, Bernays, who changed the term propaganda into “public relations”.

If the excerpt above from Bernays’ book “Propaganda” is true, then it would imply there are men of great power who utilize psychology in order to message and manipulate the minds of the masses. Are these the men that Thomas Jefferson, supposedly, once warned about? Indeed. They are the ones who control the issue of currency; the ones who first by inflation, then by deflation, caused the banks and corporations to grow up around the people thus depriving them of all property until the people’s children woke up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.

These are the men who financially and politically manage sovereign governments as well as the handful of corporations that control 90% of the media today.  It is not hard to imagine, therefore, why it would be in the best interests of these men to mentally maneuver the masses into complacency. But how is this psychological manipulation implemented?

Through lies, of course.

To continue reading: Happy New Year: Don’t Be Fooled By the Orthodoxies of the Messengers

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Christmas Story, by James Howard Kunstler

Posted on December 25, 2017 | 1 comment

James Howard Kunstler ponders It’s a Wonderful Life. From Kunstler at kunstler.com:

These are the long, dark hours when cis-hetero white patriarchs sit by the hearth chewing over their regrets for the fading year and expectations for the year waiting to be born. I confess, I like Christmas a lot, Hebrew that I am, perhaps the musical and sensual trappings more than the virgin birth business. Something in my mixed Teutonic blood stirs to the paganism of blazing Yule logs, fragrant fir trees, rousing carols, and snow on snow on snow. I hope we can keep these hearty ceremonies… that they are not banished to the same puritanical limbo where the Prairie Home Companion archives were sent to rot.

One surviving old chestnut of the season is the 1946 movie, It’s a Wonderful Life, a movie so thick with gooey holiday sentiment, it’s like bathing in egg nog. It’s larded with messages of good-will-to-all-mankind, of course, but some of the less obvious themes — almost certainly unintended — tell the more interesting story about where America has come from in recent history and where it went. One thing for sure: every year that goes by, the America of It’s a Wonderful Life seems utterly unlike the sordid circus we live in now.

The movie takes place in a town, called Bedford Falls, like many in my corner of the country, upstate New York, or at least the way they used to be: alive, bustling with activity, with several layers of working, middle, and commercial classes employed at real productive work making things, and a thin candy shell of “the rich,” portrayed as unambiguously greedy and wicked — but overwhelmed in numbers by all the other good-hearted townspeople.

The movie depicts an American social structure that no longer exists. It’s both democratic and firmly hierarchical — owing probably to the lingering influence of army life in the recently concluded Second World War. Jimmy Stewart plays George Bailey, the head of an old-style family-owned Savings and Loan bank, a very modest institution dedicate to lending money for new homes. His competitor in town is the wicked old rich banker Henry Potter (Lionel Barrymore), a swindler and thief, who wants to put George out of business.

To continue reading: Christmas Story

 

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The Year of the Headless Liberal Chicken, by CJ Hopkins

Posted on December 18, 2017 | Leave a comment

Since the first tall tales of Russian intrigue, Trump’s enemies have been making idiots of themselves. From CJ Hopkins at counterpunch.org:

Photo by frank drewett | CC BY 2.0

According to the Chinese zodiac, 2017 has been the Year of the Rooster. Myself, I’ve decided to designate it the Year of the Headless Liberal Chicken. I don’t mean that to be insulting … or, all right, I guess I do, a little. But my heart goes out to liberals, seriously. At this point, the amount of utterly baseless, contradictory propaganda, mass hysteria, and just flat out insanity the ruling classes have demanded they swallow is more than any human mind, no matter how medicated, could possibly handle. Is it any wonder so many of them of lost it and started seeing Nazis and Russians coming out of the woodwork? Just consider what the average liberal has been forced to try to cognitively reconcile since the tragic events of last November …

First came the overwhelming shock of Hillary Clinton’s loss to Trump, a repulsive, word salad-babbling buffoon with absolutely no political experience who the media had been portraying to liberals as the Second Coming of Adolf Hitler. This was a candidate, let’s recall, who jabbered about building a “beautiful wall” to protect us from the hordes of “Mexican rapists” and other “bad hombres” who were invading America, and who had boasted about grabbing women “by the pussy” like a prepubescent 6th grade boy. While he had served as a perfect foil for Clinton, and had provided hours of entertainment in a comic book villain kind of way, the prospect of a Donald Trump presidency was inconceivable in the minds of liberals. So, when it happened, it was like the Martians had invaded.

Mass hysteria gripped the nation. There was beaucoup wailing and gnashing of teeth. Liberals began exhibiting irrational and, in some cases, rather disturbing behaviors. Many degenerated into dissociative states and just sat there with their phones for hours obsessively reloading the popular vote count, which Clinton had won, on FiveThirtyEight. Others festooned themselves with safety pins and went out looking for defenseless minorities who they could “demonstrate solidarity” with. Owen Jones flew in from London to join his colleague Steven Thrasher, who was organizing a guerilla force to resist “the normalization of Trump” and the global race war he was about to launch, which “not all of us were going to get out of alive.”

To continue reading: The Year of the Headless Liberal Chicken

 

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Posted in Cronyism, Entertainment, Governments, Horseshit, Humor, Investigations

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Have We Reached Peak NFL? by Charles Hugh Smith

Posted on December 15, 2017 | Leave a comment

SLL’s response to the title question is: let’s hope so. From Charles Hugh Smith at oftwominds.com:

How will the owners and managers of the multi-billion-dollar NFL empire handle the league’s decline phase?
OK, I get it: pro football is so popular because it’s one of the last refuges of modern life that hasn’t been ruined by politics. Oops, scratch that. But we shouldn’t pin the decline of pro football’s popularity (as measured by viewership) solely on player protests, as the decline predates the recent politicization.
As this chart shows, viewership has been sliding for years across the entire demographic spectrum:
Even more troubling for the multi-billion-dollar NFL empire, the youth demographic is evaporating like mist in a scorching summer day in Death Valley. The problem for the NFL is two-fold: the number of young people who are dedicated NFL viewers is modest, and even worse, it’s declining at a fast clip.
I am sure there are plenty of 25-year old fans, but anecdotally, I don’t know a single Millennial who has any interest in sitting through a 2-hour pro football game at home, or ponying up the big bucks and huge chunk of time required to attend a game.
Again, anecdotally, young people seem more likely to watch a short clip of the game’s highlights on Youtube than devote 2+ hours to sitting through endless annoying TV adverts for a few moments of action.
Or they’re investing their sports-related time and money in college or local sports; if they’re parents, their time may be devoted to their kids’ sports activities.
In other words, pro football is an interest of the older generations that isn’t shared by the younger generations. We can chart this progression with an S-curve, which in the case of the NFL, is marked by the “boost phase” of viewership in the 1970s and 1980s as Monday Night Football expanded the TV audience and the league added franchises.
To continue reading: Have We Reached Peak NFL?

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The Curtain Rises On Trump Theater, by Justin Raimondo

Posted on December 7, 2017 | Leave a comment

President Trump is a master of distraction, and the distraction usually has a purpose. From Justin Raimondo at antiwar.com:

Trumpism as performance art

The pundits are up in arms over President Trump’s announcement that he intends to “recognize” Jerusalem as the capital of Israel – and on the eve of the supposed renewal of the Israeli-Palestinian “peace process.” What, they cry, can he be thinking?! Is he crazy? (Of course he is!) Are we to be spared nothing? (Of course we aren’t.)

Oh yes, the pundits are up in arms a lot these days: attacks of hysteria, on an almost daily basis, are one of the major symptoms of Trump Derangement Syndrome. And so when the President goes into one of his stream of consciousness riffs – will Joyce scholars ever recognize their literary provenance? – they take to Twitter, alarm bells ringing.

Ignore them.

As Trump would put it, it’s “fake news!” Because “recognizing” Jerusalem as the capital of Israel is a concept without content: Congress has already voted on several occasions over the years to proclaim such “recognition,” and to demand that the US embassy be moved there from Tel Aviv. Every president since Reagan has vowed to do precisely that – and wound up leaving the embassy right where it is. Trump will prove to be no exception, and here’s why:

“President Donald Trump will recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital on Wednesday, while also delaying moving the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to the holy city, officials said.

“Though Trump will not relocate the embassy any time soon – one White House official told reporters it could take years – the president still intends to fulfill that promise made early in his administration.

“Senior administration officials called Trump’s expected recognition of Jerusalem an affirmation of ‘reality’ – both historical and current, pointing out that the city is already home to Israel’s parliament, supreme court and other government sites.”

What in the real, actual, physical world will change as a result of this empty “recognition”? The answer is: nothing. The embassy will stay where it is. The Palestinians will remain in their prison-like condition, and their Israeli jailers will continue to praise the President in public while continuing to guard their own interests even when it comes at the expense of the Americans.

To continue reading: The Curtain Rises On Trump Theater

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Hollywood is America’s Conscience or Something, by Kurt Schlichter

Posted on October 9, 2017 | Leave a comment

There is no easier target than Hollywood; Kurt Schlichter doesn’t even have to aim. From Schlichter at theburningplatform.com:

I am one conservative who is thankful for Hollywood’s collective inability not to say stupid things because I’m a columnist and these idiots are the gift that keeps on giving. Tired of writing about failing, fussy Fredocons and goose-stepping libs with a beef against the Bill of Rights? Well, like clockwork some genius will take to Twitter leveraging his GED and his supporting role as the sassy sidekick in a CW teen vampire dramedy to offer his super-insightful political/cultural insights to us normals and … BOOM! I have the launching pad for another sensational column.

And this week has been exceptional, truly exceptional, as Hollywood has attained peak fail. Much like how Washington, D.C., is Hollywood for ugly people, with notable exceptions, Hollywood is Washington, D.C., for stupid people.

And wow, have these Tinseltown twerps ever been stupid.

Let’s start with Jimmy Kimmel, the Johnny Carson of the semi-employable cargo shorts and Corona set. A few weeks ago he was weighing in on health care policy because, apparently, he’s for health care. Exactly what policy he’s for is unclear, because when Jimmy does his thing in front of the fin-slapping trained seal caucus in the studio bleachers, he’s not actually being about policy. He’s being about posing. He’s in favor of health care, damn it, and he doesn’t care whose toes he steps on when he speaks truth to power to all those awful people who are, well, against health care or something. Because conservatives hate health care, just like they hate science.

To continue reading: Hollywood is America’s Conscience or Something

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2001: A Space Odyssey of Transcendent, or Transcendental, Evolution? by Doug “Uncola” Lynn

Posted on September 10, 2017 | 2 comments

Here’s another intriguing think piece, combining cinema, science, art, philosophy, and a wildly creative imagination, from Doug “Uncola” Lynn at theburningplatform.com:

By Doug “Uncola” Lynn via TheBurningPlatform.com

The screen is dark.  Eerie and oddly dissonant music begins to play. The screen remains black.  At two-minutes and fifty seconds the music stops, followed by six seconds of silence over the blank nothingness before the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer MGM logo fills the screen as the symphonically ascending chords and drumbeats of Richard Strauss’ Also Sprach Zarathustra increase in volume.  In a view from the moon, the sun rises behind and then above the blue sphere of the earth.

The Dawn of Man

A series of colorful still-shots reveal a primordial sunrise then transition to daylight shots of desert scenes, against the isolated sound of the wind howling.  White bones are shown on the dry, rocky ground under mammals resembling pigs that are rooting in near proximity to prehistoric monkey-men. Two separate tribes of the ape-like creatures scream and wildly gesticulate on each side of a watering hole before one side cautiously retreats.  An ancient ancestor of the leopard lies prone over the neck of its dead zebra prey; the leopard’s eyes reflective, like mini-suns embedded in the shadow of its skull, ever watching.

The viewer feels a part of the experience, eons ago, sensing the danger and harsh living conditions of multitudinous mammals teeming on the austere earth beneath the strangely serene, ancient sky. The nights appear cold in blue moonlight as the tribe of monkey-men huddle in a cave, listening to the guttural growls of predators nearby.  Primeval primates, male and female alike; waiting anxiously, their bloodshot eyes shifting in apprehension.

To continue reading: 2001: A Space Odyssey of Transcendent, or Transcendental, Evolution?

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We had just experienced exactly the type of free and honest fight club conversation that ZeroHedge enables, by Hedgeless Horseman

Posted on June 21, 2017 | 5 comments

I attended the conference that is the topic of this article, and made a presentation on “Breaking the Alternative Media’s Dependence on the Mainstream Media.” Soon I will release the text of that presentation, probably in parts since it was about a 45-minute speech. It was a great conference, and Hedgeless Horseman and Zero Hedge deserve a world of credit for hosting it. From Hedgeless at zerohedge.com:

At the time, my life just seemed too complete, and maybe we have to break everything to make something better out of ourselves.” 

-Chuck Palahniuk, Fight Club

I am still trying to interpret and integrate all that I experienced and learned about disintermediation, about myself, and about y’all at last week’s First ZeroHedge Symposium and Live Fight Club in Marfa, Texas. I hope that writing this after-action report will help me to better assimilate it.

Last Wednesday, I picked up the aquaponics speaker, Tim, upon his arrival from Hawaii at the airport.  My family and I got to know him well during our short 10.5 hour drive out to Marfa, and over the course of the next 6 days.  We now grok the differences between aquaponics and hydroponics, and the similarities between our two families.

For us, staying in the tepees, tents, and vintage aluminum trailers at El Cosmico proved to be a very good choice.  ZeroHedgers arrived and immediately coalesced around the open-air showers and community kitchens.  Usually the question of, “Are you here for the symposium?” was answered with a yes, a big smile, an offer of a beer or mescal, and an introduction such as, “Hello, I am hedgeless_horseman.”  

[The guy in the picture is Hedgeless Horseman]

Some of us had come a day early to tour the art at the Chinati Foundation.  I had very high expectations based on the reading I had done, and they were exceeded.  It was sublime to experience Donald Judd’s 100 untitled works in milled aluminum, in that particular light, architecture, and environment.  Another favorite was Robert Irwin’s relatively new permanent installation where we literally moved out of the darkness and into the light.  The full-day tour served as the perfect appetizer to clear, open, and prepare my mind for the three-day symposium.

Thursday afternoon, I learned from our gracious hosts in Marfa that a few special snowflakes, which had only recently fallen in this hot and dry desert, had started a petition for the city to ban us from holding the symposium in “their” town. I asked what the perceived problem was, and was told that they were afraid we were violent and white supremacists.  We all laughed, especially the non-whites and pacifists.  Someone asked if the special snow flakes were able to read the list of speakers and topics.  Apparently not.  However, I immediately suspected that their concerns and petition were just another clear case of FEAR, False Evidence Appearing Real.  This was confirmed when I agreed to be interviewed by one of them, a young woman from New York, who also claimed to be a freelance journalist.

To continue reading: We had just experienced exactly the type of free and honest fight club conversation that ZeroHedge enables

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Posted in Capitalism, Civil Liberties, Collapse, Culture, Economy, Entertainment, Environment, Financial markets, Government, History, Humor, Imperialism, Media, Other Views, Philosophy, Politics, Psychology, Society

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