Author: Kim du Toit

Welcome Mat?

Immigration

Here’s an interesting conundrum.  As Jews in Britishland are becoming increasingly (and justifiably) afraid of, well, being Jewish in Britishland, you have this mindset:

Truth is, I don’t know a single Jewish family in London who doesn’t speak openly and often about leaving. These are dyed in the wool Brits, who love this country. But they are watching the England they know disintegrate around them.

If ever there’s a group of people crying out for refugee status, therefore, it’s this lot.

Ordinarily, of course, there is always the option for them to move to Israel — and if ever there was a raison d’être  for the state of Israel to continue to exist, this is surely it — but what about those who don’t want to move to some piece of desert in the Middle East?  (In my opinion, not an unreasonable position.)

Well, for those who would prefer another option, how about right here in the U.S. of A. (you know, the huddled masses of people yearning to breathe free business)?

I mean, in the main these are wealthy and successful citizens, unlikely to require any welfare assistance and perfectly capable of buying their own health insurance, unlike some immigrant ethnic groups I could name.

Now granted, there are several downsides for us to throw out the welcome mat for this lot.  For a start, they are mostly of the Lefty persuasion (like so many Jews are in this country, inexplicably), and we have to ask ourselves whether we want more of that kind of person coming here.  (We don’t — well, I’m pretty sure that most conservative Americans, i.e. most of us, feel that way — and it has nothing to do with them being Jewish.)

We could overcome this issue, however, and make the change less jarring by resettling this bunch in a state where the government is more like the one they’d be leaving behind, e.g. Chicago’s northwest side (the “N. California Avenue axis“) where many Jews (Reform and Orthodox) already live, but with a stipulation of ten-year residence there before they can relocate to Florida.

If not Chicago, then I would suggest Detroit’s Boston-Edison area, with the same 10-year residency requirement.  Okay, Boston-Ed is right next door to Dearbornistan, but unlike in Chicago, these new settlers would be able to buy guns to protect themselves.  (If they don’t want to own those nasty gun things, they deserve everything that happens to them.)  Detroit probably needs a chapter of Lox And Loaded, anyway.  And given that, like Chicago, Detroit is a reliably-Democrat stronghold already, the appearance of a score or so thousand more Democrat voters there wouldn’t make much difference in the grand scheme of things.

Or if they refuse the offer, we could just say, “Enjoy that Middle Eastern desert thing, guys.”

Unexpected Pleasure Part 2

Books & Movies

I spoke before about reading Stieg Larsson’s The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo novel, the enjoyment I had reading it, and my intention to read the next two (Played with Fire  and Kicked A Hornet’s Nest ).

Well, last week I did just that.  And I enjoyed them both so much that I did something unprecedented:  I re-read the entire trilogy this week, a scant couple of days after finishing the third — and enjoyed the novels as much the second time around as I did the first.  Remarkable.

One or two things come to mind about the novels vs. the TV series argument.  Of course, the TV show is pared down quite a bit, with characters and scenarios cut out of the novels’ plots.  In the main, they make sense;  Erika Berger’s leaving Millennium  magazine to run a large daily newspaper, for example, was completely cut from the Hornet’s Nest  episode, and frankly that wasn’t a wrong decision because it had very little to do with the story’s main arc anyway.

One thing that did strike me — and it’s not altogether a bad thing — is the big difference between Mikael Blomqvist in the novels and in the TV show.  In the novels, he’s much more of a ladies’ man — he beds government agent Monica Figuerola for one:


Monica Figuerola (played by Mirja Turestedt)

…as well as both Harriet and her cousin Cecilia Vanger:

 

…but none of the three in the TV show — which gives rise to another issue.

Michael Nyqvist (who plays Blomqvist in the TV series) is a brilliant actor — you may remember him as the Russian mob boss bad guy in John Wick, to mention but one of his memorable roles — but to be perfectly honest, in the TV trilogy he’s kinda… too short, pudgy and ugly to play a ladies’ man.


Mikael Blomqvist (played by Michael Nyqvist — I know, it’s kinda confusing)

I know that chicks fall for famous men, and in the Millennium  series he’s certainly a famous journalist in Sweden, but I think it stretches one’s credulity to imagine him shagging his way around Stockholm.  Mercifully, I think, in the TV series he’s a lot more a serious character than a bed toy — he’s in a long-time affair with the married Erika Berger throughout the series:


Erika Berger (played by Lena Endre)

…and of course in the Tattoo  episode he beds the tortured and broken Lisbeth Salander — or rather, she beds him, and then only briefly.


Lisbeth Salander (played by Noomi Rapace)

Those two affairs are quite believable, but to feature Nyqvist as a Warren Beatty-Lothario might have been a terrible piece of miscasting.  And fortunately, we were spared that because, and I stress the point, it didn’t affect the storyline at all.  If anything, I think it made the story a lot stronger.  And having him jump into bed with the cool and businesslike Monica Figuerola might have been fun, but it would have slowed the story down to no good purpose, especially as by that time the tale was building to its wonderful climax.

Now that I’ve read all three novels, of course, all that remains is to re-watch the TV series.  And let me repeat the admonition from my earlier post:  do not watch the Netfux adaptation because in their usual fashion, they mess the thing up completely by cutting even more scenes and characters to the point where the story becomes almost impossible to follow.

Get the director’s cut on DVD, and have a good time.  I certainly plan to.

Problem, Solution

Eco-Warriors, Hippie Filth

From Insty:

In the interests of saving precious avgas, may I make a humble suggestion — because there’s no need to take them all the way over to Yurp, after all.:

I’m sure Doom Goblin* Greta Thunberg of all people would appreciate the IDF’s effort to save eeeevil fuel and thus pollute Gaia’s atmosphere less.

Just a thought.

*okay, who came up with that wonderful nickname for the little Swedish retard?

3 Voices That Can Just STFU

The Worst

From now on, I’m actually not interested in hearing anything that these three people have to say, about anything.

Tucker Carlson
I used to listen to what he said — thanks to a gift subscription to his channel — back before he went completely off the rails.  Carlson is not a conservative, he’s not a Republican:  he’s a loose cannon, and I don’t care much for cannons of the loose persuasion.  Which leads me to my next loudmouth.

Candace Owens
If you’re going to choose a hill to die on, then why FFS would you decide that hill to be “Brigitte Macron is actually a man” ?  I’ve always been a little suspicious of Owens, because she’s a perfect example of today’s “influencer” ethos, where people of little talent or intellect try to dominate the media just by being “famous” or “edgy”.  Yes, she’s said some things that I agree with — e.g. calling out Black Lives Matter — but in today’s fucked-up world, that’s not difficult.  STFU Candace and go away.  You’re not a conservative commentator, you’re an embarrassment.  So stop pretending to be one.

Lindsey Graham
Master of the art of bandwagon statements.  In other words, he’ll chime in only after others have said something which makes Republicans cheer.  And when he says something all on his own, it’s usually wrong or else just bullshit.

Begone, all of you.