Quotulatiousness

February 24, 2023

“… they are all weedy, weird sylphs who are essentially un-people, without any wisdom or sense”

Elizabeth Nickson on the current cohort of raised-in-a-vat, cloned “leaders” of most of the western world:

Easily the most destructive cohort in the culture is the financially secure, semi-educated female on the cultural left. She reads nothing but literary fiction, is a book and knitting club member and knows absolutely nothing about the real world. But she is “bold” and “powerful” and never shuts up. Her views are confirmed, amplified and imposed by corporate media, for whom she is the aspirational shopper from whom all wealth flows.

It is the opposite of a virtuous circle. Ignorant protected women of all colors are courted by corporations because she makes 90% of buying decisions (and less fortunate women emulate her). Corporations force the press to slavishly pander to her every stupid whim and deep feel of the month so their adverts work like charms.

All the above leaders [Jacinda, Trudeau, Nicola, Rishi, and Macron] are manufactured in some MKULTRA facility to appeal to her ignorance, her prejudices, her over-weening self-regard. With the exception of the vegetable in the White House, they are all weedy, weird sylphs who are essentially un-people, without any wisdom or sense. They’ve lived their lives in classrooms and meeting rooms. They serve as pretty, platitudinous ciphers on which to project a profound political ignorance and emotional immaturity.

Our girl, for she has never grown up, has abandoned adult responsibility to luxuriate in narcissism.

She is ruthlessly used by the vicious communist left (as described below) and she has no idea who or what they are. She is the stupidest person on the planet.

And Michelle Obama? If you are thinking of running, think again. Because the hell we will unleash on your ignorant self will make Jacinda tremble with PTSD.

Let someone far less impassioned and far more knowledgeable than me describe Ardern’s humiliating failures below. The damage she caused to her people, to her party, to her country’s economy was as titanic as her ego. Every single other leader listed in the head of this piece is following the same dictated-from-above public policy initiatives. Their fate and that of their citizenry will be the same.

By their fruits ye shall know them.

If you want to know more about the rise and fall of Justin Trudeau’s New Zealand counterpart, Elizabeth’s post includes an extensive discussion of Jacinda Ardern’s career from Dr Muriel Newman of the New Zealand Centre for Political Research.

February 19, 2023

The Destruction of Monte Cassino – Week 234 – February 18, 1944

World War Two
Published 18 Feb 2023

The Allies bomb the monastery atop Monte Cassino in Italy, but just to the Northwest it’s the Germans attacking them at Anzio this week. In the Soviet Union, the Axis break out of the Korsun Pocket, but at great cost, and in the Pacific comes a major Allied raid on the Japanese base at Truk and landings on Eniwetok Atoll.
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December 18, 2022

A Super Bomber to Break Japan – WW2 – 225 – December 17, 1943

World War Two
Published 17 Dec 2022

This war has now lasted as long as the Great War did, but there’s no signs of it slowing. The Soviets have three offensives going on on the Eastern Front, in Italy the Allies are attacking at San Pietro and over the Moro River, in the Pacific there are Allied landings on New Britain, but in Pacific Command, the big talk is all about a new super bomber.
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December 11, 2022

An Amphibious Landing to take Rome? – 224 – December 10, 1943

World War Two
Published 10 Dec 2022

There are plans afoot to hit the enemy from behind in Italy. Allied leaders are meeting again in Cairo to go over other plans, notably what to do about China and Burma. There is active fighting on two fronts in Italy too, though this week it doesn’t go particularly well for the Allies. Attacks in the USSR are unsuccessful for the Soviets, but do go well for the Germans, and there are Allied attacks by air in the Marshall Islands and over France.
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November 15, 2022

New Zealand’s “splintered reality”

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

Earlier in 2022, when most of us were distracted by the Freedom Convoy in Ottawa, New Zealand was having its own populist protest moment, as Chris Bray recounts:

Back in February, protesters gathered outside New Zealand’s parliament began warning that police were using LRAD sound cannons to disrupt their protest. To the news media, it was evidence of how stupid and crazy the protesters had become, and still more proof of the obvious silliness of the anti-vaccine mandate protests in general.

Here are the first three paragraphs of that news story, laying it on thick with baseless claims and tinfoil hats:

    Wellington anti-mandate protesters have been seen wearing tin foil hats, as some baselessly claim they are being targeted by “tech weapons” directed at them.

    A video posted on Facebook on Thursday under the name Carlene Louise has attracted attention on social media.

    In the video, the protester said people at the occupation site in Wellington are getting ill and claims without any evidence that the cause is “EMF machines”, “radiation machines” and “technological weapons” being directed at the occupation.

Four months later, police confirmed that they had used LRAD cannons against the protesters, though they claimed they didn’t use them until March. See, so it totally was a baseless conspiracy theory. Tinfoil hatted morons! Falsely claiming that the police did … what they … did. Hold on a second.

This nice bookending of claims and facts, and many other extraordinarily insightful juxtapositions, comes from a short documentary that, unfortunately, appears to only be available on YouTube:

In just half an hour, this is the whole thing, a perfect depiction of the “disinformation” project as it works everywhere. Note the moment when a news anchor and New Zealand’s bizarre prime minister are having an exchange about the viciousness and terrifying blood thirst of the far-right anti-government protesters, and the camera cuts away to show the protest, undercutting the description in real time. Note the moment when the disinformation expert tells an interviewer that she has determined that the protests are violent and dangerous, and then explains that people inside the protest believe that they’re engaged in a project of peace and love — a frightening example, she explains, of the splintered reality these people occupy inside their echo chamber. Note the moment when a member of parliament warns that anti-mandate protests are “fascist”.

And note, above all, how confused the news media figures are as they discuss the way their accurate and factual reporting from the perimeter of the protest, responsibly informed by experts and authorities, is being irresponsibly contradicted by livestreaming from inside the protest.

October 30, 2022

Fresh German Armor in the USSR! – WW2 – 218 – October 29, 1943

World War Two
Published 29 Oct 2022

Erich von Manstein finally gets the reserve armor he’s been begging Hitler for, so he can carry out his counteroffensive in Ukraine. The Soviets are still on the move themselves though. In Italy, though, the Allies are moving at a crawl since the Germans have mined and booby trapped everything. There’s also new action in the Solomons and a celebration in Japan.
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September 22, 2022

RAF Coastal Command vs U-Boats

The History Guy: History Deserves to Be Remembered
Published 5 Oct 2020

The contest between aircraft and U-Boats during the Second World War was one of competing technological innovations, culminating with a decisive struggle in the summer of 1943. The History Guy tells the forgotten story of the development of anti-submarine warfare and the contest between the aircraft of RAF Coastal Command and U-Boats of the Kriegsmarine in the Bay of Biscay.
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April 10, 2022

Mussolini is Tired of War – WW2 – 189 – April 9th , 1943

World War Two
Published 9 Apr 2022

Adolf Hitler meets with Benito Mussolini to hopefully restore his flagging morale and convince him that the Axis can hold out in North Africa, but the situation there grows more precarious and this week there the Allies advancing from the west and the east link up for the first time. The Axis are also holding out in the Caucasus, as new Soviet attacks to take Krymskaya begin.
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August 8, 2021

Australia’s FAL-Based L2A1 Heavy Automatic Rifle

Filed under: Australia, Britain, Cancon, History, Military, Weapons — Tags: , , , , , — Nicholas @ 02:00

Forgotten Weapons
Published 21 Apr 2021

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Many the nations that adopted the FAL (or L1A1, in Commonwealth terminology) opted to also use a heavy-barreled variant of the same rifle as a light support weapon. In the Commonwealth, this was designated L2A1 and it was used by Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. The Australian model was build at Lithgow and supplied to the Australian and New Zealand forces, as well as being exported to a variety of other nations including Ghana, India, Singapore, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, and others (total Lithgow production was 9,557). It has a 21″ heavy barrel and a distinct folding bipod with wooden panels that act as handguard when the bipod is folded up. Doctrinally, the L2A1 was intended to be used in semiauto most of the time, with the bipod and heavy barrel allowing greater sustained semiauto fire than a standard rifle.

A 30-round magazine was developed and issued, but abandoned before long. It was found to be insufficiently reliable, interfered with prone shooting, and contributed to overheating of the guns. Interestingly, Australia also opted to not have an automatic bolt hold open functionality in their FAL type rifles. The control can be used manually, but the rifle does not lock open when empty. This was presumably done in favor of keeping the action closed and clean at the expense of slower reloading (the same compromise was made on the G3 family of rifles).

This particular example is a registered transferrable machine gun made on a Lithgow receiver imported by Onyx in 1985 with other Lithgow-produced parts, including a 1960 bolt, 1961 carrier, and 1961 lower receiver from an L1A1 originally exported to Malaysia.

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May 15, 2021

Baelin’s Route review, a discussion on why Viva La Dirt League’s Baelin’s Route is such a great story

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

Writers Block
Published 10 May 2021

In this video we will discuss why Viva La Dirt League’s movie Baelin’s Route is such a masterpiece of story telling.

Viva La Dirt League — Baelin’s Route https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PEe-Z…

May 10, 2021

Baelin’s Route – An Epic NPC Man Adventure

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

Viva La Dirt League
Published 9 May 2021

Baelin (Rowan Bettjeman), a simple background NPC in the video game Skycraft has been walking the same route for as long as he can remember. However, his peaceful (and mindless) routine is violently shaken as a short-tempered Adventurer (Ben Van Lier) drags him off his path and into a dangerous quest to escort a mysterious NPC girl named Willow (Phoenix Cross) across the harsh world of Azerim.

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From the comments:

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36 minutes ago
Okay, I know people keep talking about how good the choreography is … and we need to discuss that a little further. That was almost a full minute of a single take of a fight scene from guys who make comedy videos. That in itself is impressive and should be lauded as one of the best action scenes on YouTube.

February 23, 2021

Hitler’s Raiders in the Pacific

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

Kings and Generals
Published 21 Feb 2021

Get your free trial of MagellanTV here: https://try.magellantv.com/kingsandge…​. It’s an exclusive offer for our viewers: an extended, month-long trial, FREE. MagellanTV is a new kind of streaming service run by filmmakers with 3,000+ documentaries! Check out our personal recommendation and MagellanTV’s exclusive playlists: https://www.magellantv.com/explore/hi…​

Kings and Generals 3d animated historical documentary series on modern warfare continues with a video on the German naval raiding vessels which attacked Australia, New Zealand and other Allied territories in the Pacific Ocean during the early portions of World War II. This episode focuses on the exploits of Orion, Komet, Pinguin, and Kormoran, explaining how the Kriegsmarine‘s vessels attacked the targets in the Pacific Ocean, especially Nauru and its phosphate facilities.

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August 21, 2020

Geography works against CANZUK ever happening

Filed under: Australia, Britain, Cancon, Economics — Tags: , , , , — Nicholas @ 05:00

Ted Campbell is a big fan of the CANZUK scheme (Canada-Australia-New Zealand-United Kingdom) to create an “anglosphere” power alongside the current economic big-hitters on the world stage like the United States, China and the European Union. I agree it has historical, nostalgic appeal, but as Aris Roussinos points out, geography is a big stumbling block to it ever being much more than an idea:

Since losing the empire, Britain has notoriously struggled to find a role on the world stage. Initial attempts to piggyback on the power of our successor as global hegemon, the United States, by acting as a guiding force — a Greece to America’s Rome, in Harold Macmillan’s phrase — faltered due to the total absence of interest ever shown in this arrangement by any American administration.

The subsequent attempt to remould Britain as a European power acting in concert with its continental neighbours through the European Union was an unhappy marriage, and has ended in a rancorous divorce whose final settlement is still to be determined. Adrift on the world stage, we are in need of good ideas.

Instead, we are offered CANZUK, a reheated Edwardian fantasy of a globe-spanning Anglosphere acting as a world power which excites the enthusiasm of a small coterie of neoliberal and neoconservative ideologues, if no one else.

In a recent piece for the Wall Street Journal, the historian and Churchill biographer Andrew Roberts argued that the CANZUK nations — Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the UK — ought to establish “some form of federation among them” as a “second Anglospheric superpower” combining “free trade, free movement of people, a mutual defense organization and combined military capabilities” , which would “create a new global superpower and ally of the U.S., the great anchor of the Anglosphere”.

One cannot fault Roberts for the grandeur of his vision, even if the details of how this would actually work are left to others to fill in. Instead, we are reassured, this would not be a centralising project like the hated EU; rather, “its program for a loose confederal state linking the Westminster democracies would be clearly enunciated right from the start.” Already, we see the harsh hand of reality ready to crush this initially appealing vision. On the one hand, CANZUK is a globe-spanning superpower ready to be born; on the other, it is merely a loose grouping of separate national governments, which would, like all national governments, act according to their own interests above all.

By totting up the different GDP figures of the various CANZUK nations, Roberts claims that his proposed Empire 2.0 “would have a combined GDP of more than $6 trillion, placing it behind only the U.S., China and the EU,” while “with a combined defense expenditure of over $100 billion, it would also be able to punch above its weight”.

Yet the flaws of this argument are obvious. As other critics have noted, only a minuscule proportion of the CANZUK nations’ trade is with each other, save New Zealand, an economic satellite of Australia. Australia is a great East Asian trading power, and will remain so. Canada is enmeshed in the greater North American trading sphere, as are we with Europe, whatever Brexiteers may wish. As always, the simple matter of geography trumps the affective bonds between far-flung kith and kin, whatever their emotional appeal.

May 26, 2020

QotD: Our sister Dominions on the other side of the world

Filed under: Australia, Cancon, History, Quotations — Tags: — Nicholas @ 01:00

I used to write from time to time about how strange it is that we Canadians don’t pay more attention to politics in Australia, our nearest sibling as a historic Dominion of the British crown. But this has changed a bit in the last few years. Editors have learned that Australia’s rough-and-tumble party politics and leadership “spills” make terrific entertainment. Canadian election reformers praying for proportional representation have given Oz more attention as a teaching example. Australia gets more column-inches, or at least koala GIFs, than it once did.

But, of course, the real joke here is on New Zealand. It’s the Dominion too easily forgotten for someone like me to remember to point out how forgotten it is.

What’s interesting about this is that, over the past 40 years or so, New Zealand has probably exercised a more significant political influence on Canada than Australia ever did. New Zealand’s 1980s neoliberal revolution, led by Finance Minister Roger Douglas, helped teach politicians everywhere (and especially in Alberta) tactics for deregulating, privatizing, lowering marginal tax rates, and generally blowing the dust off of planned economies.

Colby Cosh, “An ounce of Canadianity for a less-radical junior Dominion”, National Post, 2018-02-27.

May 24, 2020

Invasion of Crete: a Bloody Mess – WW2 – 091 – May 23 1941

World War Two
Published 23 May 2020

Operation Mercury commences as fallschirmjäger airborne troops land on the Greek island of Crete. A bloody and messy battle follows as it turns out to be costly in more ways than one.

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Sources:
– Imperial War Museum: A 28473, E 3064E, A 4154, A 4153, A 4149, A 4144, E 3066E, E 3023E, A 4156, E 6066
– Archives municipales de Brest
– Museums Victoria
– Bundesarchiv, CC-BY-SA 3.0: Bild_141-0816, Bild_183-L04232, Bild_101I-166-0527-10A, Bild 101I-166-0527-22 / Weixler, Franz Peter, Bild_183-L19019, Bild 146-1977-115-04, Bild 141-0823, Bild_101I-166-0512-39, Bild_146-1981-159-22, Bild_146-1980-090-34, E 3022E

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