SKYE’S LINKS 08/01/24
More and more information is coming out about the Trump assassination attempt – and notably, not from the sources it should be coming from. Things are not looking good for the USSS and FBI.
There’s also some good news concerning election security decisions, and some real hope for the US’s fiscal woes. Melei is modeling how that hope can be achieved, and then more great examples of Go Woke, Go Broke. Happy Thursday, everyone!
Nothing to see here, folks - just move along:
Down the Memory Hole: Google Hides Autocomplete Suggestions Related to Trump Assassination Attempt
IMPRESSIONISM’S ISLAND
Bangaram Atoll, Laccadive Islands, India. The “Lacquered” islands or Laccadives are legendary for the glossiness of the Indian Ocean surrounding them. There are three dozen of these coral atolls over 150 miles off the coast of southwest India – but moorkh Indian bureaucrats insist on calling them “Lakshadweep,” Sanskrit for “100,000. Go figure.
Paintings of the French Impressionists of the 19th century merged dreams and reality. Here that is for real. The beauty in the Laccadives can be so astonishing that it seems surreal – like when the ocean and sky merge into one in a palette of pastels straight from the brush of Monet. Come to Bangaram and you’ll find yourself living inside a painting. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #172 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
DOZENS OF WAGNER FIGHTERS KILLED AND RUSSIAN HELICOPTER DESTROYED IN MALI AMBUSH
Dozens of Wagner mercenaries were killed and a Russian helicopter was destroyed in an ambush by al-Qaeda-allied rebels in Mali.
Nikita Fedyanin, the editor and owner of the Grey Zone Wagner Telegram channel and a leading Kremlin propagandist, was also killed in the attack in the Sahara Desert.
Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimeen (JNIM), an al-Qaeda-linked group, claimed responsibility for the attack on the Wagner convoy near the desert town of Tinzawatene on the border with Algeria.
In one video, an Arab man, who appears to be a commander, can be seen inspecting a captured vehicle as Tuareg fighters, wearing flowing robes, turbans and sunglasses, celebrate.
THE GREAT ‘BORDER CZAR’ WHITEWASH
The amount of gaslighting that the Leftmedia is doing to elevate Vice President Kamala Harris in her new status as the likely presidential nominee of the Democrat Party is insane.
The legacy media’s latest attempt at memory-holing is to assert that conservatives were the ones inaccurately labeling Harris the “border czar.”
It was the Leftmedia itself that first hailed her as such.
Before that, though, in March of 2021, President Joe Biden said, “I’ve asked her, the VP, today — because she’s the most qualified person to do it — to lead our efforts with Mexico and the Northern Triangle and the countries that … are going to need help in stemming the movement of so many folks, stemming the migration to our southern border.”
Kamala Harris was tapped to be in charge of overseeing the border and “stemming the migration to our southern border.”
It was a job she completely failed at (though it’s obvious that the influx of illegals was the goal of this administration).
Much to the chagrin of the Democrats and their media allies, immigration is the top issue for the majority of Americans this election.
THE HANI RICE TERRACES
The Hani people in the mountains of Yunnan have been carving out rice terraces on dozens of steep mountainsides for over a dozen centuries. After the late fall harvest, in winter they flood the terraces in preparation for spring planting. At sunrise and sunset, the light reflecting off them creates a scene of phantasmagorical surrealism. Unknowingly, the Hani have created one of humanity’s most magnificent works of natural art the world has ever seen. What you see here is only one of hundreds of terraced areas. It is a sight beyond belief. Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #156 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
A GREAT CONVENTION — WITH ONE BIG MISTAKE
I have attended about a half-dozen national conventions, Republican and Democratic, and watched at least a dozen more.
And I can say two things: 1) They have all generally bored me. 2) The 2024 Republican National Convention didn't.
The RNC not only held my interest, it often moved me emotionally.
But both Trump and the Republican Party made one big mistake — a mistake I noted on my radio show during the convention and have pointed out for decades.
Virtually all the convention speakers focused their attention on President Joe Biden. The audience did the same, as when it would chant, "Joe must go."
For decades, I have pleaded with Republican office seekers to focus their attacks at least as much on the Democratic Party and the Left as on their opponent.
Not doing so at the convention has come back to bite them — just three days later. Now, "Joe did go." So, all the time and effort devoted to attacking Biden was utterly wasted.
I have never understood why Republicans always concentrate their fire on their Democratic opponent while ignoring virtually any mention of the threat posed by the Democratic Party and the Left.
CROWDSTRIKE OFFERS GLIMPSE OF POTENTIAL CYBER APOCALYPSE
Cyberattacks have truly become the digital equivalent of natural disasters -- sudden, catastrophic, and terrifyingly inevitable.
The recent CrowdStrike update debacle, which triggered a global meltdown affecting multiple critical sectors, was a glaring example of this modern reality.
Imagine hospitals unable to access patient records, emergency services offline, airports grounded, and banks in utter disarray.
This isn't the plot of a dystopian novel, but the grim reality faced by the world over the weekend following the compromised CrowdStrike update.
Reports on the ground detailed a scene of unprecedented chaos that unfolded as critical sectors went dark.
Experts suggest that this catastrophe likely stemmed from skipped checks during the update process -- a simple oversight with disastrous consequences.
It's a scenario eerily reminiscent of the infamous SolarWinds hack, where the attackers exploited the software update mechanism to infiltrate numerous high-profile organizations, including U.S. federal agencies.
THE GRAND PRISMATIC SPRING OF YELLOWSTONE
There are places in our world so staggeringly beautiful to have to see them to believe they exist. Yet those people walking along the foot bridge can’t see what you’re looking at. That has to be in the air, hovering from high above in a helicopter. We live in a world of such beauty it really does take your breath away. And best of all, the beauty of the Grand Prismatic Spring of Yellowstone is right here in America.
On Monday (6/07), we got a Glimpse of Horseshoe Bend in northern Arizona and reflected on how much more there was to experience in just that region of the American West. And that’s just one region, one part of one of the most spectacular places in all Creation.
Here we are at Yellowstone in Wyoming, a wonderland by itself. Just to the south are the Grand Tetons. To the west is the Sawtooth Range and the Middle Fork of the Salmon River – one of the best whitewater runs on the planet. It goes endlessly on and on. America the Beautiful is not just a song – it’s glorious reality. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World 135, photo ©Jack Wheeler
WHY LIBERALS ARE FASCISTS
[This Monday’s Archive was originally published on August 31, 2006. Although the names have changed, the words here 18 years are more relevant than ever to America today.]
TTP, August 31, 2006
Doesn't it seem odd that the kids who started the 60s anti-establishment protest riots on college campuses with the Free Speech Movement (Berkeley, 1964) are the college professors or politicians today who most vehemently suppress free speech among their students or constituents in the name of political correctness?
How can this be? How can worshipping at the shrines of Diversity, Tolerance, and Multiculturalism result in trials and expulsions for students, or jail for citizens, who express ideas with which the worshippers are not in agreement?
The answer is the intimate connection between Subjectivism and Fascism. As Mussolini made clear. In his 1921 essay Diuturna (The Lasting, that which endures), Mussolini made it clear that moral relativism was his rationale for Fascism:
“If relativism signifies contempt for fixed categories and those who claim to be the bearers of objective immortal truth, then there is nothing more relativistic than Fascist attitudes and activity. From the fact that all ideologies are of equal value, we Fascists conclude that we have the right to create our own ideology and to enforce it with all the energy of which we are capable.”Liberals follow Mussolini's conclusion to the letter. Preaching tolerance, they have no tolerance for anyone's opinions but their own. Anyone they disagree with they call ‘racist' or ‘sexist' or ‘homophobic' or some other denigration.