ANDY TIFA’S FEET ON FIRE
Andy’s comrades tried ineffectually to extinguish the flames which the police efficiently put out. There are other videos of Antifa people injuring themselves or each other, but this one has legs (burning legs, if you will).
There's a reason for its popularity: that short video encompasses everything wrong with Antifa, and it's okay to laugh because no one was seriously hurt in the making of that video. Don’t know about Andy, though
From the beginning, there's been a duality about Antifa.
DEMOCRATS WALLOWING IN SLIME
In terms of political ethics and tactics, the Democrats have hit rock bottom.
The Atlantic has worked hard to become a third-rate New Yorker in terms both of literary quality and the vitriol of its hatred for President Trump; the magazine has probably confirmed its position with the confection of the uncorroborated and totally implausible allegation that Trump disparaged American World War I veterans who died in France as “suckers” and “losers.”
It is indicative of the fact that the Democrats are much less overconfident than they were four years ago. In this latest incident, many people, including almost everyone who would have been present, have all denied that any such utterance had been made. It is inconceivable that this president would think or say anything of the kind.
But the odium of the incident is magnified by the fact that it was clearly staged in a tight sequence coordinated between the Biden campaign and its most rabid media partisans.
THE WORLD’S MOST SACRED MOUNTAIN
This is the North Face of Mount Kailas (6,638 m/21,778 ft) in a remote region of far western Tibet inhabited only by Changpa nomads. For 22% of all people on Earth – 1.2 billion Hindus, 510 million Buddhists and many millions of others – it is the spiritual Center of the Universe, the Navel of All Creation.
Kailas and surrounding glaciers are considered the source of four of Asia’s great rivers radiating out from it: the Indus, Tsangpo-Bhramaputra, Sutlej, and Karnali-Ganges. As a sacred mountain it has never been climbed.
For thousands of years, people from all Asia have made the arduous pilgrimage to Kailas to perform the sacred act of circumambulating around the mountain – most clockwise, counterclockwise for others such as the Changpa adhering to the ancient Bön Tibetan religion.
It is not easy. Huffing over the high point of the pilgrimage route with TTPer Big John Perrot, our altimeter said we were as high as Kilimanjaro, over 19,000 feet. The highlight, however, is being among so many pilgrims from so many diverse cultures. This is one of our world’s thrilling adventures, and such a privilege to participate in. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #38 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
TIME TO LOCKDOWN THE LOCKDOWNS
Take off the masks and remove the “social distancing” circles from the floors. Open the schools, liberate college campuses, fill the restaurants and the gyms and the churches and the salons. Enough.
In mid-March, Americans were asked to suspend their personal freedoms, business pursuits, and schooling for 15 days to “flatten the curve” of rising cases of the novel coronavirus. Americans, fearful of the unknown and willing to do what they imagined was the right thing to protect themselves and their family, acquiesced.
That was 175 days ago. What has happened since will be studied and debated for decades with one likely conclusion: Global lockdowns, particularly in the United States, were one of the costliest man-made disasters of all time.
The decision was rooted in unscientific hocus pocus that resulted in economic, educational, mental, physical, and emotional catastrophes on a scale that can never be fully quantified—not to mention the way stay-at-home orders fueled racial and civil unrest across America months before a national election.
DESPERATE DEMS’ DERAIL DONALD FAIL
The effort to stop President Trump is growing comical.
One always expects the media surprise leak of a purported hidden scandal as a presidential campaign winds down. Remember the October 7, 2016 effort of the Washington Post to publish the hoarded 11-year-old “Access Hollywood” tape, just two days before Donald Trump’s second debate with Hillary Clinton?
We should expect lots of these “bombshells” and “walls are closing in” pseudo-derailments. Except Trump has been the most widely investigated, probed, attacked, and smeared president in history.
And so the scandal-field has pretty well been picked over. In Jussie Smollett fashion, the demand for scandals is outrunning the supply and time grows short.
THE GREAT BLACK OF MAKALU
The 5th highest mountain on earth at 8,463 meters/27,765ft, Makalu is Sanskrit for “Great Black” – a name for Shiva, the Hindu god of creative destruction, as here is one of his homes. You’re looking face on the Southeast Ridge (the right side in sun, the left side in shade), which is the primary climbing route.
You’re seeing the entire south side of Makalu in Nepal, while the north side is in Tibet with the border running along the horizon crestline. Makalu Base Camp lies below the bottom right corner of the photo. This was taken at over 20,000 feet on our approach from Everest and Lhotse – 12 miles away – during our Himalaya Helicopter Expedition, or “HHE.”
Everyone is understandably entranced with Everest – yet the other 8,000 meter Himalayan giants are breathtakingly magnificent in their own right, and you can see why with Makalu. On our HHE, we go to them all! (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #37 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
NO FEAR OF THE EVIL EYE – Books That Changed My Life
Author at age 17 in the mirador ©Jack Wheeler
Fourth installment: Chapter Four of Part I: Envy. Your Forum comments are really appreciated!
BOOKS THAT CHANGED MY LIFE
I read a lot. Ever so often, I come upon a book that is seminal for me – profoundly affecting my view of the world.
Reading Richard Halliburton’s The Complete Book of Marvels did that to me when I was 14. Halliburton was a famous adventurer in the 1920s and 30s whom the world had long forgotten when I read a twenty year-old book of his in 1958.
I was a kid in Glendale who knew next to nothing about the rest of our planet. Halliburton opened my eyes to see a world of endless wonders and magical experiences. I still see the world in that way to this day.
That’s what motivated me to climb the Matterhorn at 14, live with the Jivaros and swim the Hellespont at 16, and how I found myself in a “mirador” – a small hunting blind of branches and leaves – in the jungles of South Viet Nam at 17 waiting for darkness in hopes that a man-eating tiger would show up.
THE ARK OF BUKHARA
The ”Ark” was the palace-fortress of Bukhara rulers since 500 BC. The ancient Silk Road oasis has a history of 5,000 years. Today Bukhara is in Uzbekistan, one the Five Stans of Central Asia. Each of the five – Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrghizstan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan – are uniquely enchanting. Together they comprise one of the most culturally, historically, and scenically spectacular, yet mysterious and unknown, regions on our Earth. Let me know if you’d like to experience all five with me this coming May 2021. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #36 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
HFR UPDATE!! PRESIDENT TRUMP AND THE HFR HERO OF THE WEEK
Friday’s HFR (9/04) closed with Casey Petersen of Sandia Labs declared HFR Hero of the Week.
He had the courage to email all 16,000 Sandia employees a video he had made denouncing the Sandia Human Resources Department’s narrative of modern systemic racism and white privilege.
Early this morning (9/05) – thanks to TTPer Yasuhiko Kimura – we learned that after the HFR was posted yesterday evening, President Trump directed White House OMB Director Russell Vought to issue an order to all federal agencies – which includes Sandia – to “cease and desist from using taxpayer dollars to fund these divisive, un-American propaganda training sessions.”
That specifically includes “all contracts or other agency spending related to any training on ‘critical race theory,’ ‘white privilege,’ or any other training or propaganda effort that teaches or suggests either (1) that the United States is an inherently racist or evil country or (2) that any race or ethnicity is inherently racist or evil.”
The directive concludes: “The divisive, false, and demeaning propaganda of the critical race theory movement is contrary to all we stand for as Americans and should have no place in the Federal government.”
The full White House directive is here: https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/M-20-34.pdf. Read it with celebration.
Late this morning, President Trump began issuing a full court press Tweet barrage attacking the anti-America racism of “critical race theory” and “white privilege” that Black Lives Matter and Antifa use to justify their existence. There are at last count over 20 tweets, starting with:
You can enjoy reading them all here: @realDonaldTrump.
POTUS has launched a gut-punch, nads-kick, all-out offensive on the Marxist ideology that has completely taken over the Democrat Party, the Biden Campaign, and the entire “Mainstream Media.” They all are going to lose their minds over finding themselves flat-on-their-backs defenseless.
And what catalyzed this now, at this moment? An electrical engineer at a science lab in Albuquerque, New Mexico. He had the brains and moxie to make an incredibly well-thought and argued video, then sent it out to his 16,000 co-workers: Pushing Back on the Narrative of Modern Systemic Racism & White Privilege.
When the President of the United States saw this and the positive response from Casey’s co-workers, he knew now was the time to strike.
What a lesson of the power of one unknown individual to help change the world for the better. Casey Peterson, American Hero. And thank you, President Trump.
A WOMAN CAN MAKE A HUGE DIFFERENCE IN YOUR STRESS LEVEL
Both men are the same age, 74 years old