Two Choices

Well, here’s confirmation of something we’ve all been suspecting for a while:

Our government is preparing to monitor every word Americans say on the internet—the speech of journalists, politicians, religious organizations, advocacy groups, and even private citizens. Should those conversations conflict with the government’s viewpoint about what is in the best interests of our country and her citizens, that speech will be silenced.

Research by The Federalist reveals our tax dollars are funding the development of artificial intelligence (AI) and machine-learning (ML) technology that will allow the government to easily discover “problematic” speech and track Americans reading or partaking in such conversations.

Then, in partnership with Big Tech, Big Business, and media outlets, the government will ensure the speech is censored, under the guise of combatting “misinformation” and “disinformation.”

Originally used as a marketing tool for businesses to track discussions about their brands and products and to track competitors, the DOD and other federal agencies are now paying for-profit public relations and communications firms to convert their technology into tools for the government to monitor speech on the internet.

The areas of the internet the companies monitor differ somewhat, and each business offers its own unique AI and ML proprietary technology, but the underlying approach and goals remain identical: The technology under development will “mine” large portions of the internet and identify conversations deemed indicative of an emerging harmful narrative, to allow the government to track those “threats” and adopt countermeasures before the messages go viral.

One would hope, of course, that this gross breach of the First Amendment would not pass judicial muster, but in true fascist form, the State has simply farmed its bastardy out to the private sector, thus creating a Clinton-like “technicality” that creates plausible deniability.

I also have no faith — none — that the Supreme Court will act in the Constitution’s best interests.  (Okay, maybe a couple of the conservative  justices may throw a hissy fit, but let’s just say that I wouldn’t put money on a full court decision because the Communist bloc will never vote against the socialist government, and the chief justice is a craven little fart who seems to caste his vote according to the New York fucking Times  editorial opinion.)

The two choices one faces in confronting this looming catastrophe are therefore:

  1. Try to go “underground” (e.g. using the Soviet-era samizdat  method) and hope that one can go undetected by the feral ferrets, or
  2. Stand astride the barricades, shouting “FUCK YOU!” at the top of your voice, at every opportunity.

The first choice is probably doomed to failure, if The Federalist is to be believed, because these bastards have already the tools to do what they want to do.  Remember, the power of samizdat lay on the fact that it used actual paper — hidden printing presses and such — to spread the counter-State “disinformation”.  Consider that your Epson or Brother printer already records everything you print and can therefore point a finger right at you, if you are judged to have written doubleplusungood crimethink, and the paper option disappears pretty quickly.

Longtime Readers will know that I’m far more likely to take the second choice, simply because that’s the path I’ve always chosen.  Yes, it’s most likely a stupid, futile gesture just like the Delta frat’s destruction of the Animal House town parade;  but always remember that in such a situation the Niedermayer character — the State — won’t be the only one carrying live ammunition.

And as I’ve said several times in the past that when it comes to dying I’d prefer to die in my wife’s arms;  but spitting and cursing at the State from the barricades surrounded by expended brass doesn’t hold much terror, either.

I’m speaking figuratively, of course, in the latter scenario — but unfortunately for the State apparatchiks, I took an oath when I became a U.S. citizen, and I take that oath really seriously.  My allegiance is not to the State — in whatever flavor it comes — but to the ideals and promises contained in the Constitution.

And I don’t need the fucking lawyers on the Supreme Court to interpret them for me.

Failed States

From Reader Tony H. comes this little bit of realism, South Africa’s Brave New World.  It’s a long but very clear-headed look at what has happened in post-apartheid South Africa since the sainted Nelson Mandela came to power, and his political descendants’ activities.  Here’s a brief taste:

That whole “sophisticated economy and infrastructure” that got “handed over intact” now by and large no longer exists. Consider something as basic as running water: in 1994, South Africa had some of the most sophisticated water infrastructure on earth, with a whole system of dams, reservoirs, and long-distance inter-basin conduits working together to conquer the geographical challenges of having several major cities and mining centers located on an arid plateau. All of this water was safe, drinkable, and actually came out of the tap when you turned the handle. This picture was marred of course by poor delivery to black rural communities and squatter camps, but in the early 90s the government was making rapid progress towards serving more of those people too.

That water system is now basically non-functional. It’s estimated that something like 10 million people no longer have reliable access to running water. When the water does run, it’s frequently filthy and contaminated with human sewage. South Africa had its first urban cholera outbreak in the year 2000, and they are now a regular occurrence. Again, this isn’t for lack of money or effort. The state has spent billions on trying to fix the water problems, and the government’s water bureaucracy has tripled in size since 1994. Something else has gone wrong.

And that’s just part of the story.  I urge you to read the whole review.

And now, part 2.  With the above reading in mind, please read Victor Davis Hanson’s Life Among The Ruins.  Again, a taste:

How did all of this so quickly erode our great country? Our crisis was not the next generation of foreign Hitlers and Stalins. It was not earthquakes, floods, or even pandemics. It was not endemic poverty and want. It was not a meager inheritance from past generations of incompetents. Nor was it a dearth of natural resources or bounty.

Instead our catastrophe arose from our most highly educated, the wealthiest and most privileged in American history with the greatest sense of self-esteem and sanctimoniousness. Sometime around the millennium, they felt their genius could change human nature and bring an end to history—if only they had enough power to force hoi polloi to follow their abstract and bankrupt theories that they had no intention of abiding by themselves.

Feel free to draw the many parallels between South Africa and the United States, as the two nations have become similarly degraded.  The methodologies may have been somewhat different, but the outcomes are eerily similar.

And now, if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to the range.

One More Thing

When I mentioned above that I’m sick of writing about politics, I should have mentioned that chief among these are articles describing how California has fucked up and how terrible things are going to be.

Yawn.

Even articles by brilliant writers (Jennifer Hernandez, Victor Davis Hanson, Heather Mac Donald etc.) get short shrift from me when the topic is Fucked-Up California.

We all know how the Golden Shower State is in thrall to Lefties, race hustlers, criminal apologists and other such filth.  We all know that California’s heading down the tubes to such a degree that The Big One is more likely to be a blessed relief than a catastrophe.  And we all know that Californian cities have become dystopian pits, drowning in shit, needles, crime and rampant homelessness, almost all of which can be ascribed to their insane laws and regulations.  It’s all going to crash and burn, and California will end up worse off than New Mexico, and become America’s Greatest African Paradise.

And I, for one, no longer care enough to write about it.

Family Tree

We’re all used to “non-White” women who turn out to be, well, snow White (Elizabeth Warren and Rachel Dolezal, to name but a couple).

How about a “descendant of slaves” radical Marxist Black activist whose actual ancestor was one of the Mayflower Pilgrims?

It’s not often a news item gets me chuckling, but this one sure as hell did.

Oh, That’s Okay Then

I am truly heartened that no less luminary than Nicholas Fuckface Kristof of the NYFT  has promised, cross his little Commie heart, that Gun Confiscators Inc. has no intention of messing with my sporting activities.

Thus we should reassure gun owners that we’re not going to come after their deer rifles or bird guns. That makes it politically easier to build a consensus on steps to keep dangerous people from lethal weapons like 9-millimeter handguns.

Ummm no, sorry.  And let’s not be sidetracked by the “dangerous people” trope, because only he (or the “authorities”) will get to define what constitutes “dangerous”.  If he means “criminals”, well, that’s already illegal (for all the good it does in stopping criminals from getting hold of guns).

No, let’s be in no doubt that his (and no doubt the Gummint’s) definition of “dangerous” will, with absolute certainty, include people like me, with our “dangerous” views on Second Amendment rights.

Not that I care — at least in the 9-millimeter sense — because I prefer the manly .45 ACP and .357 Mag calibers over the Europellet anyway but even in jest, let’s not give him and his kind the benefit of the doubt on this, because we know they’re all fucking liars, and they consider any cartridge objectionable.

Kristof, if you think that your transparent little platitude is going to win over the “only hunters” group (a.k.a. the “Fudds”, as we call them), you could not possibly be more wrong, and your efforts to confiscate / ban guns of any description will never be “politically easier”.

So fuck off and die, because we’re not ever going to compromise on the gun issue — 20,000+ existing gun laws means that we’ve already (over-) compromised — and your job from here on is going to be progressively [sic]  more difficult, actually impossible.

That’s our promise to you.