Quotulatiousness

January 1, 2021

“Wolfpack” Pt. 2 – The Torpedoing – Sabaton History 100 [Official]

Filed under: Germany, History, Media, Military, WW2 — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Sabaton History
Published 31 Dec 2020

The Allies had cracked the secret codes, deprived the German Kriegsmarine of their best U-Boat aces, and sunk more submarines than the Germans could replace. Yet the Wolfpacks returned. From the depth of the sea they continued their hunt, even far away from the busy routes of the Atlantic. On their way south, along the coast of Africa, Wolfpack “Eisbär” would engage in a fateful encounter. An encounter that would demonstrate how the old rules of conduct, honor and mercy had become a thing of the past.

Support Sabaton History on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/sabatonhistory

Listen to “Wolfpack” on the album Primo Victoria: https://music.sabaton.net/PrimoVictoria

Listen to Sabaton on Spotify: http://smarturl.it/SabatonSpotify
Official Sabaton Merchandise Shop: http://bit.ly/SabatonOfficialShop

Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by: Markus Linke and Indy Neidell
Directed by: Astrid Deinhard and Wieke Kapteijns
Produced by: Pär Sundström, Astrid Deinhard and Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Maria Kyhle
Executive Producers: Pär Sundström, Joakim Brodén, Tomas Sunmo, Indy Neidell, Astrid Deinhard, and Spartacus Olsson
Community Manager: Maria Kyhle
Post-Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Editor: Iryna Dulka
Sound Editor: Marek Kaminski
Maps by: Eastory — https://www.youtube.com/c/eastory
Archive: Reuters/Screenocean — https://www.screenocean.com

Sources:
– Design vector of baseball elements created by macrovector official – www.freepik.com

All music by: Sabaton

An OnLion Entertainment GmbH and Raging Beaver Publishing AB co-Production.

© Raging Beaver Publishing AB, 2019 – all rights reserved.

December 31, 2020

Louis Armstrong and the Beginning of the Jazz Age | BETWEEN 2 WARS: ZEITGEIST! I E.08 – Summer 1920

Filed under: Economics, History, Media, Sports, USA — Tags: , , , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

TimeGhost History
Published 30 Dec 2020

Louis Armstrong will be one of the greats of the American Century. But before that, others have to blaze a trail for him. No mean feat in a land of racial tension…

Join us on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/TimeGhostHistory

Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by: Indy Neidell and Francis van Berkel
Director: Astrid Deinhard
Producers: Astrid Deinhard and Spartacus Olsson
Executive Producers: Astrid Deinhard, Indy Neidell, Spartacus Olsson, Bodo Rittenauer
Creative Producer: Maria Kyhle
Post-Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Research by: Indy Neidell and Francis van Berkel
Edited by: Michał Zbojna
Sound design: Marek Kamiński
Colorizations: Mikołaj Uchman and Spartacus Olsson

Sources:
Some images from the Library of Congress

From the Noun Project:
world by Arafat Uddin
Stamp by Made
questions by Gregor Cresnar
Money by DARAYANI
Money Bag by HAMEL KHALED
people by Florent Lenormand

Soundtracks from Epidemic Sound:
“Epic Adventure Theme 3” – Håkan Eriksson
“You’re Trouble” – Rich in Rags
“1920s Chicago 2” – Magnus Ringblom
“It’s Not a Game” – Philip Ayers
“Weapon of Choice” – Fabien Tell
“On the Edge of Change” – Brightarm Orchestra
“For the Many STEMS INSTRUMENTS” – Jon Bjork
“Easy Target” – Rannar Sillard
“Step on It” – Golden Age Radio

Archive by Screenocean/Reuters https://www.screenocean.com.

A TimeGhost chronological documentary produced by OnLion Entertainment GmbH.

December 30, 2020

This is why the word “unexpectedly” gets such a workout in media these days

Filed under: Government, Media, Politics — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 03:00

David Warren on “unexpectedly” negative results from policies born of virtue-signalling “good intentions” by self-styled progressives:

The expression, “unintended consequences,” is a charitable dodge. It is what old-fashioned, polite, civic-minded people say about the fallout from progressive social policies. It implies that their authors have overlooked something, or made some innocent mistake. For unfortunately, the policies do the exact opposite of what was promised. Surely the “reformers” didn’t mean to force decent, reasonable people to do things that any decent, reasonable person would consider to be satanic. Yet somehow, that was the result.

By contrast, these reformers despise the tactics of the bourgeois. Rather than argue, they prefer to drown out their opponents with slogans. Rather than coherently reply, they characterize any asking questions as “fascist,” “misogynist,” “racist,” “hate criminals,” &c. Those who have exposed scandals are personally smeared, slandered, doxxed. This isn’t new. It is the way the Left has always “debated,” going back long before Lenin. Once they have the police working for them, opponents get the knock in the middle of the night.

There are, incidentally, two kinds of “reform,” corresponding to the two political persuasions. One happens without planning, and is an organic response to things no longer working properly. Try, in good faith, to make the old system work, and it will subtly change. The “problems” fix themselves, when they are allowed to. The other kind is “reform” according to a theory. A huge, mostly imaginary “problem” is created, so a “solution” may be imposed. Every tool must be applied, to get everyone onside for the task: fake news, fake science, fake history, and miscellaneous fakery. For as every godless person knows, “the end justifies the means.”

Luckier than most, raised in “liberal” environments, I was able to discern this from an early age. By chance I acquired many friends who were refugees from Communist (especially Soviet-occupied) countries. But it was not just that. Having been trained counter-culturally, by non-conformist “classically liberal” teachers, and also having learnt to read for myself, I was already fairly alert. The clincher for me was a native disposition, not only to think independently, but to resist being a putz. It was not in my nature to assume that the enemies of real liberalism (which requires honesty) had good intentions. Reason, and experiment, demonstrated that they had not.

For instance, I early realized that leftwing factions formed a Party of Privilege. Every policy they advanced favoured individuals with relatively more wealth and power, against individuals with less. Unions were a good example. They represented the better-paid. The labour laws they advocated were designed to exclude the young and the poor from labour-market competition. They secured the allegiance of thuggish union members through crassly self-interested schemes. They opposed legitimate rewards for labour; for skill and hard work. Instead they enforced universal mediocrity, and punished intelligent enterprise. Legitimate labour interests, once represented by cooperative and self-managing guilds, were replaced by the interests of (untalented) union organizers.

December 29, 2020

QotD: Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds

Filed under: Media, Quotations — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

Electric Ghost Magazine: Your thesis that Hitchcock’s The Birds depicts recrudescent “angry nature” forcing civilization into regression is very pertinent at this particular time of COVID-19, as we make bunkers of our homes like those in the Brenner house against the birds. What does Hitchcock’s film teach us about our current moment?

Camille Paglia: The analogy to today’s global virus crisis is very compelling. The Birds demonstrates the fragility and folly of all human artifice. When omnipotent nature turns on mankind, everything falls to pieces — from protective dwellings to personal dignity and social cohesiveness. Unleashing the birds like a black plague, Hitchcock attacks the sentimental illusions that allow us to survive and thrive in our daily routines. The film has a metaphysical sweep, exposing the terrifying great unknowns at the heart of human existence.

As for the present time, Western developed nations have become too smugly complacent about their advanced technology and prosperity. Our electronic systems and intricate international supply and distribution network function so smoothly that they have become invisible to the affluent upper-middle-class, comfortably working from home via computer. These arrogant masters of the machine attribute all human ills to unjust society — from hurricanes to global warming, as if puny mankind is capable of such staggering power. Like Greek tragedy, The Birds shows the grim reality — human helplessness in the face of nature and fate, as commerce, schooling, hospitality, and the pretty dance of courtship are reduced to horror and squalor.

“David G. Hughes talks to Professor Camille Paglia about her work on Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds (1963) and much more”, Electric Ghost, 2020-05-28.

December 28, 2020

Titania McGrath, unmasked

Filed under: Britain, Humour, Media, Politics — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

In The Critic, Andrew Doyle talks about creating the “Titania McGrath” persona on Twitter and what happened after he was “outed” as the writer behind the tweets:

My most recent “outing” was as the writer of Titania McGrath, an intersectional activist who began life on Twitter in order that she might chastise the unwoke for their moral impurity and proclaim her infinite virtue to the cybersphere. For those of you who are not on Twitter — that’s the 80 per cent of the country who actually value their time on earth — you may not be aware that such self-aggrandising behaviour is considered acceptable. On Twitter, it’s the norm. It’s effectively a digital playground in which grown adults toss their half-baked opinions around like pies in that scene from Bugsy Malone.

From Titania’s earliest appearance, I resolved to stay anonymous — not to cause mischief, but more for the fun of it. If people believed she was real, I reasoned, I could enter into dialogue with her detractors. This meant that the satirical impact would not be restricted to what Titania said, but how others reacted to her. Her tweets are designed to ridicule the excesses of the social justice left, but her interactions tend to expose the folly of those on the right who take her at face value and lose their temper. As such, her targets are not limited to one side of the political spectrum.

[…]

Having been revealed as the author, most of this venom was now channelled in my direction. The extent of the abuse was often unfathomable, and some even went so far as to send direct threats of violence. It’s a curiosity of our times that the most vicious and bullying online behaviour tends to be exhibited by those who claim to be on the side of empathy and compassion.

I have never quite understood the kind of anger that comedy and satire can provoke. As someone who has seen my fair share of stand-up, I have often found that the best response to a joke that does not amuse me is simply not to laugh. It would never occur to me to berate other members of the audience for their poor taste, or to take to social media and complain about the comedian in question. As someone who does not suffer from narcissistic personality disorder, I am well aware that my personal sense of humour is not the benchmark for the entirety of humankind. When it comes to comedy criticism, “that’s not funny” is about as insightful as “that’s not erotic”. Try telling a fetishist that studded PVC nuns’ habits are objectively devoid of sexual appeal, and he will probably be able to show you some homemade videos that will quickly prove you wrong.

It is of course entirely natural to feel displeasure when one’s worldview is being ridiculed. I do not blame the poor writer for the Observer who suggested that copies of Titania’s first book would be given to every person in Hell, and that “lampooning the language of social justice is a cheap shot”. I have some sympathy for her position. If I were absorbed in an ideology that mistrusts humour and perceives that jokes have the potential to “normalise hate”, I would doubtless be similarly vexed by anyone who had the temerity to mock it. But that’s the trouble with religious belief. However important it seems to one’s sense of personal identity, there is no way to protect our icons from desecration by unbelievers.

December 25, 2020

“Swedish Pagans” – Vikings & The Russ – Sabaton History 099 [Official]

Filed under: Europe, History, Media, Religion, Russia — Tags: , , , , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Sabaton History
Published 24 Dec 2020

It was a sword-age, a spear-age — an age when fearsome Northmen, savage Vikings, and mysterious pagans from across the sea haunted the shores of northern Europe. The Swedish pagans, believing in the fate of the old Norse gods, traveled south across the Baltic Sea and deep into modern-day Russia. With their sleek longships, they sailed along the big rivers, ever southwards to reach Miklagard. Miklagard — the Great City — that was Constantinople, where the Swedish Pagans sold slaves and goods from the north for silver and coin. Those who made the long hazardous journey and survived the treacherous country were to be rich men.

Support Sabaton History on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/sabatonhistory

Listen to “Swedish Pagans” on the album The Art of War: https://music.sabaton.net/TheArtOfWar

Listen to Sabaton on Spotify: http://smarturl.it/SabatonSpotify
Official Sabaton Merchandise Shop: http://bit.ly/SabatonOfficialShop

Hosted by: Indy Neidell
Written by: Markus Linke and Indy Neidell
Directed by: Astrid Deinhard and Wieke Kapteijns
Produced by: Pär Sundström, Astrid Deinhard and Spartacus Olsson
Creative Producer: Maria Kyhle
Executive Producers: Pär Sundström, Joakim Brodén, Tomas Sunmo, Indy Neidell, Astrid Deinhard, and Spartacus Olsson
Community Manager: Maria Kyhle
Post-Production Director: Wieke Kapteijns
Editor: Karolina Dołęga
Sound Editor: Marek Kamiński
Maps by: Eastory – https://www.youtube.com/c/eastory
Archive: Reuters/Screenocean – https://www.screenocean.com

Sources:
Swedish National Heritage Board
Kulturhistorisk museum
Museum of Cultural History, part of the University of Oslo, Norway
Pictures of Runestone courtesy of: Berig, RJürgen Howald & Bjoertvedt from Wikimedia
AU Library, Campus Emdrup, http://galleri.au.dk/aul/#14891850309…
Longship sketch with a keel courtesy of Cornelis from Wikimedia
Map from 878 courtesy of Hel-hama – from Wikimedia

All music by: Sabaton

An OnLion Entertainment GmbH and Raging Beaver Publishing AB co-Production.

© Raging Beaver Publishing AB, 2019 – all rights reserved.

Repost – “Fairytale of New York”

Filed under: Media, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Time:

“Fairytale of New York,” The Pogues featuring Kirsty MacColl

This song came into being after Elvis Costello bet The Pogues’ lead singer Shane MacGowan that he couldn’t write a decent Christmas duet. The outcome: a call-and-response between a bickering couple that’s just as sweet as it is salty.

Update: Looks like the video I’ve linked to has been taken down, so here’s a more recent version on the “official” Pogues YT channel.

QotD: Christmas movies

Filed under: Humour, Media, Quotations — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 01:00

Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse…

At which point, Sylvester the cat looks up from his long fruitless vigil outside the mouse hole in the baseboard and sighs with feeling to the narrator, “You’re not jutht whithlin’ Dickthie, brother.”

“Gift Wrapped” is like every Looney Tune or Merry Melody — a mere six minutes long. But with Christmas movies that’s a good thing. The western and the musical may be dead, but the charmless Xmas movie is now a genre all of its own and doing gangbusters. Do they teach it in film school? In fact, it’s really two genres: there are intentionally charmless Christmas movies like Bad Santa 2, and then the accidentally charmless ones, like that Ben Affleck flick where he’s some heartless yuppie who rents a bluecollar family for the holiday season so he can enjoy the authentic down-home Yule he’s never known. In such pictures, the great American Christmas, once the ne plus ultra of e pluribus unum, appears on celluloid an utterly exhausted seam.

So, besieged by such horrors, I thought I’d retreat to short-form holiday entertainment, or alternatively short-form holiday entertainment within long-form non-holiday fare. Any thirty seconds of “Gift Wrapped”, for example, is more rewarding than all three-and-a-half hours of Bad Santa 5 or whatever it is: six minutes of pure Looney Tunes pleasure in which Sylvester determines to land the only Christmas present he really wants — Tweety. The film opens with Granny slumbering upstairs and the impatient cat sneakily unwrapping his gift. It’s a rubber mouse and he’s not happy about it. “Why couldn’t I get thumthin’ practical?” he complains. “Like a real mouse.”

Mark Steyn, “A Frizzy Christmas”, Steyn Online, 2018-12-15.

December 23, 2020

No, Console Scalpers Aren’t Ruining Christmas

Filed under: Business, Economics, Gaming, Media — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Foundation for Economic Education
Published 22 Dec 2020

Support Out of Frame on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/OutofFrameShow

Check out our podcast, Out of Frame: Behind the Scenes: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCiS5…

As we enter peak holiday season, most people have their shopping done by now, but as always, many are scrambling last-minute for their purchases. And if you aren’t one of those early-birds fortunate enough to procure a PS5 or Xbox Series X, you can guarantee that you won’t be able to find one unless you’re willing to pay $1,200 to a scalper.

Many are understandably frustrated. How is it fair for people to buy up the consoles at $500 and sell for nearly double or triple the cost? “There ought to be a law” against that kind of thing — right?

Well, in short, there’s nothing wrong with scalping — and a few economic lessons will help explain why.

Scarcity is real and so is time-preference. Scalpers (and even bots) show that demand for some goods is so high that people are willing to pay several times the list price — which could provide a lot of information to Sony and Microsoft on how many consoles to produce and in what parts of the world. They could factor that information into the future, so there would be less problems with availability, but most retailers make this information exchange impossible.

______________________________
CREDITS:

Produced by Sean W. Malone
Written by Jen Maffessanti & Sean W. Malone
Edited by Paul Nelson
Asst. Edited by Jason Reinhardt

QotD: Christmas songs

Filed under: Media, Personal, Quotations, Religion — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

“Imagine” didn’t go over wild with the parents, who mumbled along unenthusiastically. To be honest, I’d prefer John and Yoko’s peacenik dirge, “(Happy Xmas) War Is Over”, though that might be a little premature and anyway that song suffers from the disadvantage of mentioning Xmas. On the radio you can hear “Frosty” and “Rudolph” and James Taylor’s new post-9/11 version of “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas”, but anyone with young children finds themselves exposed to a strange alternative repertoire of unseasonal favourites. My friend Tammy emerged from her daughter’s kindergarten concert in a rage: not just no Christmas carols, but no “Jingle Bells”. The only song she recognized was Lionel Bart’s spectacular melisma pile-up from Oliver!, “Whe-e-e-e-ere Is Love?”, which is not designed to be sung en masse. “They sounded like they were dying,” she fumed, before going off to beard the school board, who explained that “Jingle Bells” had been given the heave-ho on the grounds that it might be insensitive to those of a non-jingly persuasion.

On balance, I prefer the approach of the London Borough of Brent, one of Britain’s sternest loony-left councils but far more sporting than the Scrooge-packed school boards across the Atlantic. Back in the Eighties, Brent decreed that it would permit municipal performances of “I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus” as long as they were accompanied by a couple of non-heterosexist choruses of “I Saw Daddy Kissing Santa Claus”. That’s a lot less vicious than replacing the entire seasonal repertoire with obscurantist dirges for solstice-worshippers. Anyone can St-Nix “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town”, the hard part is finding something to put in its place.

There are very few good Hannukah songs, never mind Kwanza or the Islamic festivals of Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha. The reason for the dearth of Hanukkah songs is that for most of the last century the Jews were too busy cranking out Christmas songs — Irving Berlin wrote “White Christmas”, Mel Torme wrote “The Christmas Song (Chestnuts roasting on an open fire)”, Jerry Herman “We Need A Little Christmas”, Jule Styne and Sammy Cahn “Let It Snow! Let It Snow! Let It Snow!” and “The Christmas Waltz”, Johnny Marks “Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer”, “Have A Holly Jolly Christmas”, “Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree” and a zillion others. As far as I know, the only Christian to offer to return the compliment was stiff-necked Mormon Senator Orrin Hatch of Utah (whose “Come To The Manger” has been recorded by Donny Osmond). Senator Hatch confirmed to me during his short-lived presidential campaign in 1999 that he was working on a Hanukkah song. I don’t know whether he’s finished it, but I would have to say on balance that, musically speaking, the Christians got the better end of this deal.

Mark Steyn, “Imagine Christmas”, Steyn Online, 2019-12-23 (originally published in The Spectator, 2004).

December 22, 2020

Repost – The Monkees – “Riu Chiu”

Filed under: Media, USA — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Uploaded on 15 Dec 2015

The Monkees perform “Riu Chiu” from Episode 47, “The Monkees’ Christmas Show”.

H/T to Kathy Shaidle for the link.

Shakespeare Summarized: Twelfth Night

Filed under: Humour, Media — Tags: , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Overly Sarcastic Productions
Published 13 May 2014

It’s a comedy! It’s got errors! It’s a comedy of errors!

This is Shakespeare’s comedy of crossdressing. I thought it was hilarious. This movie version is the 1996 one, and it’s really good.

PATREON: www.patreon.com/user?u=4664797

Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/OSPyoutube/

MERCH LINKS:
Shirts – https://overlysarcasticproducts.threa…
All the other stuff – http://www.cafepress.com/OverlySarcas…

December 21, 2020

Horrible Christmas music in retail stores – X-mas Music

Filed under: Business, Humour, Media — Tags: , , , — Nicholas @ 04:00

Viva La Dirt League
Published 14 Dec 2020

Rowan thinks its a good idea to play X-mas music in the store for the entire Christmas period … and the staff aren’t happy

Get a 12% discount off all SteelSeries products by using our code VLDL12. Not only do you get a special discount but we make 8% on all sales! So get a great deal and help support us!
Link: https://bit.ly/31ltYT2
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WATCH MORE SKITS HERE: https://bit.ly/34oAolt
SUPPORT ON PATREON: https://bit.ly/36Hg7ZY
DISCORD: http://discord.gg/VLDL
TWITTER: https://bit.ly/36R84dt
INSTAGRAM: https://bit.ly/2EoniKD

———————————- TWITCH ——————————-

https://www.twitch.tv/team/vldl

———————————– MERCH——————————–

Merchandise: https://bit.ly/2DQm3GX
Songs: https://bit.ly/2OBeB4O

BUSINESS ENQUIRIES – vivaladirtleague@gmail.com

Postal Address:
Viva La Dirt League
PO Box 41378
Mt Roskill
Auckland 1440
NEW ZEALAND

QotD: The evolving style of John Coltrane

Filed under: History, Media, Quotations, USA — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 01:00

No jazz musician incarnates the legend of late style more than the saxophonist John Coltrane. His early style is undistinguished; he was a bluesy sideman whose grasp of the instrument falls short of the reach of his ear. His middle style, stertorous and ambitious, began in his mid-1950s stint with Miles Davis’s quintet. Coltrane in this period is still less melodious than Hank Mobley and less witty than Sonny Rollins, but his chops are catching up with his ear. Only Johnny Griffin has fleeter fingers and only Rollins can beat him for persistence. Coltrane thinks aloud and never stops thinking; he is the perfect foil for Davis, who is also ironic and intellectual, also latent with eroticism and violence, but who never shows his working, only the finished idea. Coltrane’s sound waves are square and heavy, metallic and dark like lead. He is both implacable and lazy, like a bull elephant: You never know where the charge will take him, only that — as he himself admitted to Davis — once he gets going, he doesn’t know how to stop.

Coltrane’s late style emerged in his 1960s quartets. Now leading and writing for his own group, and newly clean of drink and drugs, he was finally able to pursue his vision and the possibilities of the music to the limits of form and expression — and ultimately beyond both. The further he went, the more ambitious and less accessible the music became, until it was incomprehensible to almost all of his audience and even to some of his closest collaborators. In the logic of modernism, further means better. But “faster” and “louder” aren’t necessarily better, so why should “further” be the supreme critical value? To judge Coltrane’s late-style art is, in an important sense, to judge modernism itself, and especially American modernism.

Dominic Green, “John Coltrane and the End of Jazz”, The Weekly Standard, 2018-08-26.

December 20, 2020

QotD: Online literacy

Filed under: Education, Media, Quotations, Technology — Tags: , — Nicholas @ 01:00

In the various fora and social media circles in which I run, there’s a self-selecting bias toward literacy. Thoughts tend to be expressed in complete sentences with reasonably correct grammar and punctuation.

But sometimes I’ll find myself looking at the posts of a Facebook friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend and I see these random aggregations of misspelled words. They have the occasional capital letter or punctuation mark thrown in, as though the writer knew they were supposed to include those, but not how or why.

And I find myself wondering “What’s it like inside their head?” I mean, you’d probably be going through life slightly angry, thinking everybody was secretly laughing at you behind their hands, that there was some arcane code of keyboard use you were violating. The whole internet would be like one of those fancy restaurants with too much silverware and you never know which implement to use to eat which dish.

Tamara Keel, “I’ve always wondered…”, view from the porch, 2018-08-24.

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