Category Archives: Neglected History

January 22, 2021 · 12:08 am

FLASHMAN OF ARABIA – LOST FLASHMAN PAPERS

henry cavill good flashmanFor Flashman Down Under, Flashman in the Opium War & Flashman and the Kings click HERE  

For Flashman on the Gold Coast click HERE  .

Balladeer’s Blog now moves on to another Harry Flashman adventure referred to but never completed before George MacDonald Fraser’s death.

Lee Horsley Flashman

IF HE WAS BRITISH, LEE HORSLEY WOULD HAVE MADE A PERFECT HARRY FLASHMAN.

Projected Title: FLASHMAN OF ARABIA

Time Period: 1852-1854

The Setup: Sometime in the second half of 1852 Harry Flashman at last arrives back in England from his travels which began in 1848. The scandals he fled have fallen into relative obscurity and he’s getting some positive acclaim over his recent experiences during the Australian Gold Rush and earlier participation in a wagon train across America.

In addition he’s finally gotten to see his son “Havvy” (not Harry), the child his wife Elspeth was pregnant with when his travels began.

The Story: The one and only Richard Burton, viewing Harry as a kindred spirit, reaches out via correspondence and personally to encourage Flashman to write some papers and deliver public talks about his journey through America and Australia. Always ready to play to his public, and now discovering the raconteur side of his personality, Harry writes a (very) bowdlerized account of his adventures of the past four years and even delivers a few talks at which he meets Burton in person.  

Burton's bookThe duo enjoy diving into the darker and more forbidden side of life where sex, booze and other diversions are concerned. Flashman happens to be with Burton in Egypt in early 1853 when the famous explorer begins his journey to Medina and Mecca disguised as a Muslim.

We will learn he originally invited Harry to accompany him, since our protagonist was fluent in the necessary languages and was well-versed in Muslim customs from his military service in Afghanistan in the early 1840s. Flashman would have initially turned down the offer and stayed behind in Egypt until, getting into his usual trouble from boozing, whoring and gambling he would wind up fleeing for his life. Continue reading →

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January 21, 2021 · 1:04 am

MOTHER JONES: PRESIDENT TRUMP IS BRUBAKER AND OTHER HEROES

mother-jonesI consider President Trump the best president for the working class and the poor during my lifetime. Here’s a take from a true working class heroine. Mary Harris Jones, the legendary labor organizer from the 1890s onward, also known as “the Miner’s Angel” and “Mother Jones,” spoke to Balladeer’s Blog yet again, despite being dead since 1930. 

BALLADEER’S BLOG: Well, hello again! I always enjoy our talks.  

MOTHER JONES: I’m glad to hear it, sonny! I continue to be very impressed with the way President Trump – the new FDR and the new Harry Truman – fought with the same kind of plutocratic oppressors I always fought.

Trump is SerpicoBB: I admit the stench from Washington, DC is amazing. “Draining the Swamp” as it were, demonstrated the depth of corruption and outright criminal activity the Democrats and Republicans are responsible for. It took a de facto Third Party President like Trump to peel back the curtain.

MJ: You know it, young man! No Democrat or Republican would have rocked the boat like this! I think President Trump is like many heroes in one.

BB: It will be interesting to hear the kinds of comparisons you make regarding all this, but –

MJ: Yes, yes, I know you like to talk, but I want you to just listen for awhile.

BB: Okay.

Franklin RooseveltMJ: First off, President Trump is like Franklin Delano Roosevelt. FDR was looking out for the working class and the poor, so rich fat cat scum tried to destroy him like they’re doing with Donald Trump. They even tried the noted Businessman’s Coup plot against FDR.

Right now the way that rich pig Big Tech fascists are behaving is disgusting.   

SECOND, President Trump is like Harry S Truman. Harry gave ’em Hell every chance he could and weak-kneed sissy boys like today’s Mitt Romney and Mitch McConnell clutched their pearls and reached for the smelling salts. Trump shocks more Republican and Democrat trash in one week than good old Harry did in his entire presidency!  

BrubakerTHIRD, President Trump is like that Robert Redford fella when he played Brubaker! Like Trump, Brubaker was trying to clean out a virtual sewer of corrupt officialdom. Even if the scumbags fighting Trump oust him, it will be like the ending of Brubaker, when the prisoners – or American citizens in Trump’s case – gathered around to pay him respect.

The prisoners giving the departing Brubaker a slow clap of good bye was an acknowledgement that the man had tried to help them and to fight the crooked politicians and rich pigs abusing them. President Trump’s departure might be SYMBOLICALLY like that if the Establishment criminals succeed in driving him from office.

BB: That’s a very profound comparison. Even if – like Brubaker – President Trump’s bottom line accomplishment is to raise awareness in all of us about the NEED to fight the white collar criminals who have hijacked our political system, there is a certain dignity in that. A dignity that people like Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden could never understand.  

MJ: Good lad, Balladeer, but I have plenty more heroes to compare with President Trump, so pipe down.  Continue reading →

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January 16, 2021 · 10:01 pm

DYSTOPIA NATION – TECHNO TYRANTS

mascot sword and gun pic

BALLADEER’S BLOG

Here at Independent Voter site Balladeer’s Blog, I can’t help but reflect on how less than three full years ago when this blog post used America’s increasingly totalitarian Big Tech fascists as examples for dystopian literature, it seemed like the dire possibilities explored might come within a decade or just under.

Unfortunately, in less than those three years that I mentioned we’ve seen privileged white male one-percenters like Jack Dorsey and Mark Zuckerberg EXCEED many of the abuses I wrote about in what was then (2018) fiction.

If you enjoy the article below, HERE is a link to a 2018 article about AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL pointing out how Google and Facebook threaten human rights. And HERE is a link to another such article. The lesson being “Don’t try to say that Big Tech won’t abuse their money and power after all that we’ve seen.”

*

THE TECHNO-TYRANTS OF SILICON VALLEY (2018) – The modern-day versions of the disgusting old Robber Barons might well be the corporate fascists aka techno-fascists in assorted tech industries, not just regarding Silicon Valley but also privacy-violating rich pigs at Facebook and elsewhere.

In fact, you could make the case that people like Mark “Skippy” Zuckerberg and his fellow corporate fascists are even worse since I don’t recall bloated rich pigs like E.H. Harriman or Cornelius Vanderbilt trying to police other people’s every thought, word and deed. The invasive and ever-expanding tentacular reach of techno-fascists or in this fictional case Techno-Tyrants would make these villains a very credible threat to political freedom and freedom of expression. Continue reading →

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January 15, 2021 · 1:30 am

FLASHMAN ON THE GOLD COAST – LOST FLASHMAN PAPERS

For Flashman Down Under, Flashman in the Opium War & Flashman and the Kings click HERE   For Flashman of Arabia click HERE Balladeer’s Blog now moves on to another Harry Flashman adventure referred to but never completed before George MacDonald Fraser’s death. FOR MY COUNTDOWN OF THE TOP FIVE FLASHMAN NOVELS CLICK HERE.

elmina castleProjected Title: FLASHMAN ON THE GOLD COAST

Time Period: Third Ashanti War (1873-1874)

The Setup: Queen Victoria’s Empire – specifically the British Gold Coast – bought the Dutch Gold Coast from Holland in 1871. The nearby Ashanti People of Africa had been at peace with the Dutch for over 200 years but were wary of their “new neighbors” and were protective of their enormous wealth in gold. They invaded the British Gold Coast in May, 1873.  

flashman shieldIn June the advance of the Ashanti was halted at Elmina and back in England Her Majesty’s Government made plans to send additional troops to the Gold Coast to deal with the situation. By August 13th General Garnet Wolseley was chosen to lead the army.

The Story: Wolseley, personally familiar with Flashman from the Crimean War and the Great Mutiny, would draft the reluctant Colonel-on-Half-Pay into his campaign. Sir Harry’s knack for picking up languages and his years of experience as a colonial officer would convince Wolseley of our hero’s fitness for this type of warfare, no matter what excuses Flashman would try to use.  Continue reading →

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January 13, 2021 · 7:00 am

DEMOCRATS REFUSE TO LET THE REST OF US GET ON WITH OUR LIVES

Consider this an abbreviated version of my recurring Transgress With Me feature.

mascot donkey and republican heads*** I WAS PLANNING ON GOING TWO OR THREE WEEKS WITHOUT MAKING A BLOG POST ABOUT POLITICAL ISSUES BUT THE DEMOCRATS REFUSE TO STOP WITH THEIR HATE-FILLED AND DIVISIVE ANTICS. Yet, being Democrats, they simultaneously make with hypocritical lectures about “unity.”

*** THAT’S BECAUSE DEMOCRATS ARE SUCH EMPTY PEOPLE THAT THEY HAVE NO IDENTITY OUTSIDE OF THEIR POLITICAL OPINIONS. They feel that espousing those opinions makes them safe within the fascist mobs they call “home.” They certainly have no individual strength.

*** One of the reasons Democrats seem so desperate to act quickly against President Trump is because they just had 4 years of crying wolf against Trump and though they’re crying wolf AGAIN they hope that they can ram through some extreme foolishness before the passions they’ve inflamed have a chance to cool down … as happened with “Russian Collusion” and all their other lies up to and including their previous failed Impeachment Trial. Democrats and Republicans alike are terrified that a post-White House Trump may upset the corrupt apple cart of the two-party/ uniparty/ Republicrat system that lets them grift all kinds of money from the Federal Treasury.

*** Career Democrat politicians, apparently terrified that there are still people in the U.S. expressing opinions that they disagree with, are more determined than ever to push for a totalitarian system under which anyone who strays from the Democrat Party line must be eliminated.

*** The Republicans in office? Well, they’re too clueless, timid and impotent to do or say anything until they see which way the winds are blowing. Sometime around October of 2022 maybe they’ll release a terse message saying “Hey, c’mon now!” to the Democrats.

Democrat rat

DEMOCRAT PARTY

*** Career criminal HILLARY CLINTON of all people, proved to be utterly lacking in self-awareness by saying the Republicans should publicly say that senile groper Joe Biden won the election. This after Hillary and her supporters STILL claim she really won the 2016 election. And Democrat Stacey Abrams still calls for violence by claiming she really won the Georgia governor’s race.

*** AS LATE AS MAY 16th 2017 NANCY PELOSI TWEETED THIS ABOUT THE 2016 ELECTION –

Nancy Pelosi
@SpeakerPelosi
Our election was hijacked. There is no question. Congress has a duty to #ProtectOurDemocracy & #FollowTheFacts.    12:44 PM · May 16, 2017

*** AND REMEMBER, DEMOCRATS STILL CONSIDER IT OKAY TO POINT OUT THAT THE AWFUL GEORGE W BUSH STOLE THE YEAR 2000 ELECTION. They still make remarks like “Bush only won ONCE” when clueless Bush supporters say he was elected President twice. Obviously it does not result in “insurrection” to make such statements.

*** THE DEMOCRATS CONTINUE TO PRETEND THEY CARE ABOUT AMERICAN LANDMARKS LIKE THE CAPITOL BUILDING AFTER DECADES OF TELLING US IT WAS THE SEAT OF WHITE SUPREMACY AND SYSTEMIC RACISM. Prior to January 6th they always acted like people were patriotic hicks if they revered such “symbolic” institutions while they put on faux “intellectual” (LMAO) airs of contempt toward the U.S. government, claiming it was the greatest menace/ terrorist threat in the world.

*** Even worse, Democrats pretend to embrace the “symbolic” value of the Capitol Building after trashing it themselves in 2018. And they dare to lecture the rest of us about that symbolism while real people were killed and lost their livelihoods during the MONTHS-LONG JOE BIDEN RIOTS OF 2020.

*** IT ISN’T JUST THE SOCIAL MEDIA TOTALITARIANS LIKE JACK DORSEY WHO PROVE THAT DEMOCRATS LOVE CORPORATE FASCISM. THE NFL, NBA AND MLB WERE TAKING A PUBLIC RELATIONS BEATING OVER PERFORMANCE ENHANCING DRUGS AND DOMESTIC VIOLENCE YEARS AGO.

                     MAGICALLY, ONCE THEY MADE THEIR LEAGUES MOUTHPIECES AND CASH COWS FOR DEMOCRAT TALKING POINTS AND ORGANIZATIONS THE FASCIST CORPORATE MEDIA STOPPED COVERING THEIR BEATING AND RAPING OF WOMEN, THEIR CHEATING AND THEIR P.E.D. USE. Continue reading →

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January 11, 2021 · 3:39 am

POLLS: TRUMP APPROVAL RATING AS HIGH AS 51%

How about a headline that reads “PEOPLE WHO HATED TRUMP BEFORE LAST WEEK STILL HATE HIM, PEOPLE WHO LIKED HIM STILL LIKE HIM.” Independent Voter site Balladeer’s Blog as always feels WE NEED THIRD PARTIES given what jokes are the white-collar criminals who run the Mafia style bust-out operation masquerading as our government.

twitler And it goes without saying that the Techno-Fascists at Twitter, Facebook and elsewhere are even more zealously biased than ever before as they move to ruthlessly eliminate competitors while feigning concern over “safety”.

Presidential approval polls from Rasmussen and elsewhere have shown that de facto Third Party President Trump ended last week with approval ratings of anywhere from 51% to 48% despite all the frothing at the mouth from America’s notoriously inaccurate and corrupt media.

Since Rasmussen had the low with 48%, even if we go by THAT, it reveals how little people trust our corporate media, especially when it comes to their incessant attacks on Trump. Their take on events, like the make-believe “insurrection” (LMAO) at the Capitol last week, is shrugged off as the shrill, make that VERY shrill, propaganda that it is. Or it may also indicate that so many of us have tuned out the infamously biased (in one direction or the other) media that they aren’t really shaping anyone’s opinions like they used to.  Continue reading →

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January 9, 2021 · 4:58 pm

“HOW DO YOU SOLVE A PROBLEM LIKE THE DONALD?”

That is the question being pondered in Washington DC … 

Trump is like jfk

One by assassination, the other by vote fraud?

Not for several long decades has America had a non-career politician as president – not since Eisenhower. American career politicians are career criminals who spend their time in office just one step ahead of criminal indictments. They are a very closed circle of fascist authoritarians who were happy with the corrupt way things were run before de facto Third Party President Donald Trump crashed their party and spoke truth to power.

It’s a once in a century gift to have someone like the Donald who is wealthy enough to not be bought by America’s cesspool called a government AND who is thick-skinned enough to endure the non-stop attacks that the Democrats and Republicans and their media outlets will unleash on anyone who tries GENUINE reform like Trump has done.

The fascists in both parties proved how terrified they are of Trump and his millions of supporters by the way they have absurdly overblown the events of Wednesday. See my article HERE regarding the hilarious hypocrisy from Democrats who usually never see a protest or a riot they don’t encourage.

It is remarkable how much this man STILL strikes fear into the hearts of America’s hate-filled, divisive and totalitarian political and media establishment. I repeat, he is NOT a career politician and that’s why he has always been worth rooting for. He’s the kind of reformer that the left used to PRETEND they wanted. Continue reading →

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January 8, 2021 · 4:03 pm

ORION: THE ELVIS PRESLEY HOAX/ PUT-ON

5.1.2

It’s Battle of New Orleans Day AND Elvis Presley’s birthday! In the past I’ve posted my review of Change of Habit, the Elvis movie with him as a doctor, Mary Tyler Moore as a nun and Ed Asner as a cop. I’ve also posted about the musical in which Elvis IS Andrew Jackson – Rock ‘N’ Roll vs the Redcoats. (With an Ann-Margret drag queen as pirate Jean Lafitte. )

This blog post will dredge up the often-neglected Orion business from decades ago. It was a fun bit of nonsense that only the most far-gone Elvis Conspiracy Theorists take seriously. As always I consider conspiracy theories, put-ons, hoaxes and ARG’s to be modern variations of myth and folklore.

Yes, Elvis died in 1977. That’s not the point. The point is the way the whole Orion/ Jimmy Ellis/ Elvis Conspiracy rabbit hole deserves to be studied forever because of the way fiction and reality seemingly influenced each other to the point where they became almost inseparable.

Orion 2

I WANT EL SANTO AND I WANT HIM NOW!

If you’re new to these events get ready for the Elvis Presley equivalent of Orson Welles’ War of the Worlds radio broadcast. And let me make it clear I’m not accusing anyone of anything. I have no idea what anyone’s motives were regarding any aspect of the following.

I’ll present the tale in the style of the fictional Carl Kolchak – as “items” in a list:

ITEM: Elvis Presley died in August of 1977, yet in the years that followed an ever-increasing body of folklore and myth would develop regarding the late rock star supposedly faking his own death. His motives varied according to the theory.

ITEM: For a time Elvis sightings seemed to outnumber sightings of Bigfoot, UFOs and the Loch Ness Monster combined.

ITEM: The novel Orion was published. Conspiracy lovers often cite either 1977, 1978 or 1979 as the year of publication, so you can see how deep some of the rabbit holes run.

ITEM: Orion featured a very Elvis-like young man from the American south who becomes a sensation as a rock singer. In the end the character Orion is so weary of the stresses of stardom that he fakes his own death to get away from it all.

Orion RebornITEM: Claims are made that enigmatic power players managed to get the novel removed from bookstores. The claims are sometimes accompanied by insinuations that this was done because the book might have struck too close to reality with its “fake death” ending.   

ITEM: A masked singer – who looks like a standard Elvis  impersonator except for the mask – appears and calls himself Orion. He begins releasing albums and performing in public. This Orion’s first album, tantalizingly titled Reborn, is released in 1978. Continue reading →

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January 7, 2021 · 11:37 pm

SPARE ME THE HYPOCRISY

Democrat Mobs This Year

THESE BIDEN RIOTS WERE CALLED “MOSTLY PEACEFUL PROTESTS”

Anti-Trump fascists have sunk lower than ever over the past two days. We had MONTHS of Democrat mobs rioting and starting fires and causing literally BILLIONS of dollars of damage and the loss of lives while the media and Democrat political figures cheered them on. Biden’s organization as well as several celebrities even PAID BAIL to get their fascist rioters back out on the streets for more mayhem. (Kamala Harris and 13 Biden staffers even donated money to a bail fund for rioters in Minneapolis and encouraged other people to do so, ballooning the fund up into the millions.)

When Harris was on The Late Show she praised the Biden mobs, saying “They’re not going to stop. They’re not going to stop. This is a movement, I’m telling you. They’re not gonna stop. And everyone beware because they’re not gonna stop. They’re not gonna stop before Election Day and they’re not going to stop after Election Day. And everyone should take note of that. They’re not gonna let up and they should not.”

Biden RiotsSO DON’T TRY TO CLAIM PRESIDENT TRUMP IS TO BLAME FOR YESTERDAY IF YOU DIDN’T BLAME BIDEN, HARRIS AND OTHER DEMOCRATS FOR THE MONTHS-LONG WAVE OF VIOLENCE LAST YEAR.

When the White House was violently attacked for about 24 hours and many secret service agents were seriously injured, Biden and other Democrats said Trump “used tear gas against peaceful protestors”. Listen to those hypocrites today!
.
The night of May 31st, rioters set fires all over the capital of the United States. A mob of them gathered outside the White House and threatened to storm it. The president was said to have been moved to a bunker. Many on the left laughed at him and supported the mob. Never mind that the safety of the president, as a symbol of America and self-governance, goes beyond individual or party and should never be a laughing matter, like anti-Trumpers are sniveling about the Capitol.
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When Antifa animals caused destruction night after night the powers that be in America praised them as “heroes” and when they inflicted violence on innocent people the media made excuses for them. (Remember Cuomo’s remark “who said protests should be polite or peaceful?”) 

There were political and media pieces of garbage who pretended the months-long orgy of Democrat destruction was an example of “mostly peaceful protests” while buildings burned behind them as they said it. We were told those fascist marches were “93% peaceful” as CHAZ and other “autonomous zones” were declared, with violence and extortion being practiced within them.

In 2018 Nancy Pelosi said “I just don’t even know why there aren’t uprisings all over the country, and maybe there will be …” as just one of the many times Democrats called for the type of “insurrection” they now pretend to be appalled by. In 2019 Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said that “marginalized people” “have no choice but to riot.” Where was all this corporate outrage then?

The ONLY difference yesterday at the Capitol Building was that the would-be “Royal Houses” called Democrat and Republican career politicians finally got a taste of what they have inflicted on the rest of us month after month after month. If such events happen near YOU they’re fine with it and will spout abstractions to justify it. When it happens near THEM the narrative changes and their majesties feel that it’s just ever so wrong.

If you weren’t condemning Antifa and other fascist mobs these past several months don’t waste my time sniveling to me with faux outrage about yesterday’s events. Furthermore, everyone can see how phony the Democrat outrage is. Reverence for sites like the Capitol Building is the kind of thing they used to ridicule the political right over, painting them as clueless rubes while Democrats struck calculated poses of contempt for the U.S. and cheered terrorist vermin like the Weather Underground and other leftist groups. (Who by the way exploded ACTUAL BOMBS in the country, including in the Senate side of the Capitol building.)

But yeah, we’re supposed to pretend the Democrats are horrified at a protest overflowing into the Capitol Building, AS HAPPENED IN 2018 WITH A DEMOCRAT MOB. Continue reading →

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January 6, 2021 · 8:08 pm

LATEST POLITICAL CARTOONS & COMMENTARY

Trump is like jfk

One by assassination, the other by vote fraud?

As the stolen 2020 election joins the stolen 1876 and year 2000 election steals, Independent Voter site Balladeer’s Blog presents some of the latest political cartoons and a few links to commentary and news stories.

And remember, using Hillary as a guideline, Trump has more than 4 more years (and counting) to insist he was the real winner. 

Latest report on the technical side of some of the blatant vote fraud HERE. 

scalesA report on how poorly U.S. elections are run compared to other countries HERE. Continue reading →

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