The year 2020 will be a year featuring plenty of Top Twenty lists here at Balladeer’s Blog. To start things rolling on this second day of the new year is this list of great items for the working class and the poor of all colors:
Low-income wage earners have seen the biggest earnings increase – Click HERE
From CBS News – Funding for Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Opportunity Zones for black communities, First Step and more – Click HERE Continue reading
Filed under LIBERALS AND CONSERVATIVES, Neglected History, opinion
Democrats are in SERIOUS need of introspection and soul-searching, yet refuse to venture out of the pompous haze of self-infatuation that they wrap themselves in 24 hours a day. THEY are the 21st Century’s “Ugly Americans” who prance along oblivious to all of their faults while fancying themselves to be THE moral models for the rest of us. (For the Republicans see below)
We are long past the time when America’s pompous, pretentious asses called Democrats need to be called out on their ridiculous airs. Let’s dare to blaspheme against the Democrats’ most sacred deities – Themselves:
*** GROW UP, ALREADY! YOUR PERCEPTIONS HAVE BECOME NOTHING MORE THAN WISH FULFILLMENT OR DELUSIONS TO STROKE YOUR OWN EGOS AND TELL YOURSELVES HOW WONDERFUL YOU CONSIDER YOURSELVES TO BE. (Over and over again, too, until you become unbearable. Then when you drive people away you despairingly moan how you think everyone you know is becoming right-wing.)
*** YOU HAVE A SIMPLE-MINDED, COMIC BOOK-LEVEL WORLDVIEW IN WHICH LIFE IS A CHILDISH FANTASY ABOUT GOOD GUYS AND BAD GUYS WITH YOURSELVES CONSTANTLY PAINTED AS THE GOOD GUYS AND EVERYONE WHO DISAGREES WITH YOU AS THE BAD GUYS.
*** YOU INSIST ON CASTING ALL OTHER ADULTS AS SUPPORTING PLAYERS IN YOUR INCREASINGLY JUVENILE DRAMAS, WITH YOU AS THE CORRECT-THINKER SETTING STRAIGHT THE VILLAINS OF THE PIECE.
*** AND IT ISN’T JUST THAT YOU PERPETUAL CHILDREN CAST EVERYONE ELSE AS SUPPORTING PLAYERS IN THOSE DRAMAS, IT’S THAT YOUR LIMITED IMAGINATIONS CAN ONLY CONJURE UP SUCH FOURTH-RATE DRAMAS. Continue reading
Filed under LIBERALS AND CONSERVATIVES, Neglected History, opinion
Balladeer’s Blog’s end-of-year retrospective continues with this look at August’s best. Enjoy your Christmas leftovers of 11 + Sauce and read:
DELL SUPERHERO PANTHEON – From World War Two to the Cold War, a look at the Dell Comics pantheon of superheroes. CLICK HERE
DAVID J HARRIS, JR – Looking at yet Another Martin Luther King Person of Courage. CLICK HERE
HAMMETT (1982) – A review of the movie depicting Dashiell Hammett mixed-up in a murder investigation. CLICK HERE
TOP MYTHOLOGICAL PANTHEONS COVERED HERE AT BALLADEER’S BLOG – My look at the gods of the Vietnamese, Ainu, Navajo, Hawaiian, Inuit and more. CLICK HERE
FACULTY LOUNGE FASCIST ROUNDUP – The August 24th edition HERE
ETHAN VAN SCIVER: THE FUTURE KING OF ALL MEDIA? – A look at the mad genius Ethan Van Sciver and his YT shows about pop culture. This man is a MUST watch. CLICK HERE
ANCIENT GREEK COMEDY: COTHURNUS (circa 405 B.C.) – An examination of the comedy by Philonides. CLICK HERE Continue reading
Balladeer’s Blog’s year-end retrospective continues with this look at June’s best:
DARK SHADOWS: A review of the Phoenix storyline from Dark Shadows HERE plus the Leviathan Cult and more HERE
THE CHOICE OF THE WORKING CLASS AND THE POOR – The title says it all. CLICK HERE
FLASHMAN’S GUIANA – Harry Flashman on the hunt for gold in the part of British Guiana being fought over by Great Britain and Venezuela. CLICK HERE
KILLRAVEN: WAR OF THE WORLDS – The first part of my ongoing look at the 1973-1976 Marvel Comics science fiction series about heroic rebels fighting Earth’s alien conquerors. CLICK HERE
FACULTY LOUNGE FASCIST ROUNDUP: JUNE 6th – Another look at the Theater of the Absurd called the American “educational” system. CLICK HERE
GLADIATOR: AN OPERA VERSION OF THE 1930 PHILIP WYLIE NOVEL – An opera about a man granted paranormal abilities by science. CLICK HERE
FIRST BATTLE OF MACHIAS – A forgotten Revolutionary War action. CLICK HERE
HARRISON FLOYD: A MARTIN LUTHER KING PERSON OF COURAGE – A courageous iconoclast. CLICK HERE Continue reading
Balladeer’s Blog’s end of year review continues:
CHINATOWN CONNECTION (1990) – A review of one of the most hilariously lame “buddy cop” movies ever made.
Starring Lee Majors’ son. CLICK HERE
FOOL KILLER PART FOUR – The neglected Nineteenth Century folk figure takes on the Ku Klux Klan and political corruption in the Reconstruction South this time around.
The greatest impact comes from the fact that this is from 1870. CLICK HERE
POLITICIZING THE WORD “INTELLECTUAL” – The title of this particular piece pretty much says it all. CLICK HERE
CURSE OF THE CRYING WOMAN (1961) – My review of this Mexican horror film, just in time for the release of La Llorona. CLICK HERE
SECRET EMPIRES: HOW THE AMERICAN POLITICAL CLASS HIDES CORRUPTION AND ENRICHES FAMILY AND FRIENDS – Peter Schweizer’s latest book on American political corruption. – CLICK HERE
POLO: THE 2019 U.S. OPEN – Polo is the world’s oldest team sport and had already been around for centuries when Alexander the Great’s men played it. One of the reasons I cover contemporary polo is because of the way men and women can play on the same team. CLICK HERE
AMERICA AS PART OF THE ALIEN FRANCHISE – A humorous look at the similarities. CLICK HERE
SLAUGHTER HIGH (1986) – A review of the April Fool’s Day themed slasher film with horror icon Caroline Munro. CLICK HERE
FACULTY LOUNGE FASCIST ROUNDUP: APRIL 10th – The latest edition. CLICK HERE Continue reading
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Filed under Bad and weird movies, Neglected History, opinion, Polo, Superheroes
From somewhere the late fascist FBI Director J Edgar Hoover must have been very pleased with the biased Horowitz Report from the Inspector General. Once again an IG report detailed a long list of seemingly intentional abuses by the FBI and the FISA Court process but in an O Henry twist that is no longer the least bit surprising found “no political bias.”
After the sadly predictable media rush to misconstrue and misrepresent this investigation BY corrupt bureaucrats OF corrupt bureaucrats, even a few of the most anti-Trump figures in the “news” business finally realized something: Donald Trump won’t be president forever, and even if he gets reelected, he’ll be gone after four more years but the rot uncovered at the FBI will still be festering.
Back when I was a Democrat, before I left the party to become an Independent voter, I liked the party’s skepticism and criticism of the FBI, CIA, NSA, etc. Unfortunately the party sold its soul and decided that when those organizations’ corrupt behavior benefits Democrats they’re just fine with it.
ROLLING STONE REPORTER MATT TAIBBI, who is very anti-Trump, has once again risen above his own feelings – like reporters are SUPPOSED TO DO – and pointed out that the IG report actually verified the claims made by Congressman Devin Nunes and President Trump himself about the FBI’s political assault on Trump. Taibbi’s Rolling Stone piece shows how damning the IG report was for the FBI, Schiff and the Democrats’ media outlets. “Democrats are not going to want to hear this” are the most appropriate words in his article.
In a previous article, Taibbi (like Sharyl Attkisson one of the few actual “journalists” left in the country) pointed out that the “Russian Collusion” nonsense was “WMD’s times a million” (CLICK HERE ).
Now, in his latest article, Matt points out how the anti-Trump forces need to stop deluding themselves that there isn’t something deeply wrong at the FBI and with the entire FISA process. The link is below, but first some excerpts:
“Horowitz describes at great length an FBI whose “serious” procedural problems and omissions of “significant information” in pursuit of surveillance authority all fell in the direction of expanding the unprecedented investigation of a presidential candidate (later, a president)” (NOTE FROM BALLADEER: The fact that the Democrats are willing to ignore this Gestapo-style approach by the FBI just because they hate the man being investigated shows how low that party has sunk.)
“…Officials on the “Crossfire Hurricane” Trump-Russia investigation went to extraordinary, almost comical lengths to seek surveillance authority of figures like Trump aide Carter Page”
“…Likewise, the use of reports by ex-spy/campaign researcher Christopher Steele in pursuit of Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) authority had far-reaching ramifications. Not only did obtaining a FISA warrant allow authorities a window into other Trump figures with whom Page communicated, they led to a slew of leaked “bombshell” news stories that advanced many public misconceptions, including that a court had ruled there was “probable cause” that a Trump figure was an “agent of a foreign power.” There are too many to list in one column, but the Horowitz report shows years of breathless headlines were wrong.” (NOTE FROM BALLADEER: Yes, those headlines were VERY wrong.)
“Press figures have derided the idea that Steele was crucial to the FISA application, with some insisting it was only a “small part” of the application. Horowitz is clear: ‘We determined that the Crossfire Hurricane team’s receipt of Steele’s election reporting on September 19, 2016 played a central and essential role in the FBI’s and Department’s decision to seek the FISA order.”
“… The Steele report reads like a pile of rumors surrounded by public information pulled off the Internet, and the Horowitz report does nothing to dispel this notion. At the time the FBI submitted its first FISA application, Horowitz writes, it had “corroborated limited information in Steele’s election reporting, and most of that was publicly available information.”
“Horowitz says of Steele’s reports: “The CIA viewed it as ‘internet rumor.’” Worse (and this part of the story should be tattooed on the heads of Russia truthers), the FBI’s interviews of Steele’s sources revealed Steele embellished the most explosive parts of his report.” (NOTE FROM BALLADEER: And this is exactly like the way J Edgar Hoover’s FBI would allow even the most salacious and unconfirmed rumors about his political targets to be included in FBI files, knowing that to laymen the fact that something comes from “an FBI file” lends it undeserved credibility.) Continue reading
Filed under LIBERALS AND CONSERVATIVES, Neglected History, opinion
Balladeer’s Blog’s look back at 2019 continues:
THREE NEGLECTED SWASHBUCKLER NOVELS FROM ALEXANDRE DUMAS – Reviews of Georges, in which a master swordsman fights slavery in Mauritius; Captain Pamphile, another anti-slavery tale from Dumas, this one about a pirate captain; and La Dame De Monsoureau, about a 16th Century rogue and his bed & battle adventures. CLICK HERE
DISSENTER.COM, FIGHTING FOR FREE SPEECH ONLINE – A look at Dissenter.com and its underdog battle with the Techno-Fascists at google, facebook and twitter. CLICK HERE
MARDI GRAS MASSACRE (1978) – A review of a classically bad seasonal slasher movie which featured human sacrifices and inept police work during Mardi Gras. CLICK HERE
AMERICAN COMEDIANS: INSULTING BEGGARS TO MAKE KINGS LAUGH – 21st Century American comedians would much rather serve as sycophantic court jesters for the powers that be instead of siding with the underdogs. CLICK HERE
POST-APOCALYPSE MOVIES – Balladeer’s Blog’s reviews of 1980s imitations of Mad Max.
It’s Endgame, about a futuristic gladiator leading mutant fugitives to freedom; and the Empire of Ash Trilogy, three films featuring sufferers of an atomic blood disease hunting down healthy victims to extract their bone marrow. CLICK HERE and HERE
MARK ZUCKERBERG LOOKS AT POETRY – A comedy bit about humanoid Techno-Fascist Mark Zuckerberg using algorithms to translate poetry. CLICK HERE
ADAM WARLOCK, THANOS, GAMORA AND DRAX – A review of the 1975 tale of Adam Warlock tangling with the Magus and his 1,000-world empire. Featuring the VERY FIRST appearance of GAMORA. CLICK HERE , HERE and HERE
COURAGEOUS MEGAN HARRIS – A look at another brave woman of the 21st Century. CLICK HERE
THE FOOL KILLER – Balladeer’s Blog’s exhaustive examination of 19th and 20th Century Fool Killer folklore, beginning with the Fool Killer Letters in the Milton Chronicle in the 1850s.
A look at a fascinating yet neglected folk figure. CLICK HERE Continue reading
Filed under Bad and weird movies, humor, LIBERALS AND CONSERVATIVES
For assorted reasons the potential of a new Supreme Court vacancy has been much discussed in recent months. Balladeer’s Blog takes a look at the various Supreme Court nominees who were REJECTED by the Senate. I’m omitting John Rutledge since – because he was a recess appointment – he actually served as Chief Justice for one of the Court’s terms before the official Senate vote rejecting his nomination by President Washington.
ALEXANDER WOLCOTT
Gang Affiliation: Democratic-Republican Party
Senate Vote: On February 13th, 1811, the Senate rejected Wolcott’s nomination by President James Madison by a vote of 24 nays and 9 yeas.
Ostensible Reasons For The Rejection: The Federalist Party Senators and the Federalist Party media outlets clobbered Wolcott over his enforcement of the controversial Embargo and Non-Intercourse Acts while serving as Customs Inspector in Connecticut.
Second – and most importantly – his limited legal experience was cited as a definite hindrance to serving on the highest court in the land. (Ya think?)
JOHN C SPENCER
Gang Affiliation: Whig Party
Senate Vote: On January 31st, 1844, the Senate rejected Spencer’s nomination by President John Tyler by a tight vote of 26 nays and 21 yeas.
Ostensible Reasons For the Rejection: Spencer had accepted the position of Secretary of War and later Secretary of the Treasury under President Tyler, alienating fellow Whigs who saw him as a traitor for not showing solidarity with them against Tyler. This rejection was part of a virtual war between the Executive and Legislative Branches following John Tyler’s succession to the presidency following the death in office of Whig President William Henry Harrison. Continue reading
Filed under Neglected History, opinion
Welcome back to Independent Voter site Balladeer’s Blog. I’ve made no secret of the fact that I feel neither Bill Clinton nor Donald Trump deserved impeachment. It’s a cheapening of the process.
My reasons can even be found in the Democrats’ own Washington Post. Links are below but first some excerpts:
Kathleen Parker noted that “to (her) disappointment,” “the case for impeachment simply isn’t there.”
The even more fiercely anti-Trump David Von Drehle took shots at Democrats Adam Schiff and Jerry Nadler for their strategy and tactics in this debacle which I feel has not convinced anyone that wasn’t ALREADY a Trump-hater.
Per Von Drehle: “This offense that House Democrats can’t be bothered to fully investigate, can’t be troubled to thoroughly document, can’t discipline themselves to coil into a mortal blow – this is the very worst thing any president could conceivably do?”
David also pointed out that Schiff has failed to pursue this investigation through the courts. (NOTE FROM BALLADEER: That’s because there is absolutely no proof of anything and Schiff seems to know it.) Continue reading
Filed under LIBERALS AND CONSERVATIVES, Neglected History, opinion
I will point out once again that America’s Democrats don’t understand what the words “debunked” and “discredited” mean. They seem to think that as long as there is ANY alternate point of view to any information or argument being put forth that that means the information has been debunked or discredited.
When their politicians are caught in corruption scandals and the politician in question offers an excuse or some sort of explanation – no matter how feeble – Democrats and their media outlets begin insisting that the scandal or accusation has been debunked or discredited. That’s not how it works. Continue reading
Filed under LIBERALS AND CONSERVATIVES, Neglected History, opinion
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