An explanation…

Of what is happening… h/t to my friend Stretch for the words…

If you are shocked by the Democrats panicked response to the probing of President Trump’s Emissary of Justice, Elon Musk, there is a way to frame it that makes it understandable.

    First, we need to come to terms with the fact that contemporary Democrats, no matter what they choose to call themselves, are socialists at best and full-blown Marxists at worst.
    In the same way a drug addict denies their addiction until they come to terms with what they are, Democrats have progressively increased their intake of various degrees of collectivist dogma until they are fully addicted. The gateway to collectivism is the idea of the “greater good,” from that they move on to socialism, then to Marxism, then finally in the end stages, communism – just as Marx prescribed and predicted.
    Not only does this addiction have physical ramifications, but it also changes their mental state.
    There is a word we all should know. That word is statolatry.
    Economist Ludwig Von Mises coined the word to describe the literal worship of government. He said: “People frequently call socialism a religion, It is indeed the religion of self-deification.”
    Statolatry is about worship for the state to replace a God they have rejected, a relationship with some entity more powerful than themselves to which they swear their love and fealty, the goal of which is to receive blessings (which are drawn the public till).
    The people on the statolatrist left have landed on a toxic mixture of statism, politics, mysticism, and atheism rolled up into a loose ball called “progressivism” as a substitute for Judeo-Christian theology. Progressivism is as much a religion as Catholicism, it just replaces a Pope with government, counting on the senior leadership of the Democrat party to be their High Priests.
    And in the process, this new religion became a very curious mix of the Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition (nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!) and the Flagellants, the 13th century group of Roman Catholics who practiced mortification of the flesh by various means. Statolatrists find pleasure in their self-inflicted pain but really enjoy dosing it out to non-believers as well. It is also the harshest of mistresses – if a believer questions any tenet, there is no force on the planet that can protect them from the fury of the scorned. If they show less than total subservience and compliance, they are declared apostates and excommunicated immediately.
    The problem is that no one really knows the rules of this new religion – they change to meet the needs of the moment. Often You can be right and wrong at the same time. What you can say or think and who you can say or think certain things about changes every minute – what was acceptable yesterday is not acceptable today and that random asymmetry makes it very difficult to fight on an individual level, so one must attack where the asymmetry is less and where their power resides, where it is concentrated.
    With that framing, it becomes clear why Democrats have lost their minds about Elon and the DOGE Boys.
    It is not just that their religion is being attacked, their god is under assault, and it is being attacked inside one of its temples no less – the House of USAID.
    These temples are the repository of Democrat power, money and influence.
    They also know this is only the first wave. President Trump intends to send his Muskian warriors raging and rampaging through the rest of the temples – Department of Education, the DOJ, the IRS, the Federal Reserve, and others – stripping them naked and laying them bare in public for all to see. Once and for all, the intent is to raze the temples to the ground and scatter the priests, acolytes, and minions to the four winds thereby ending this religion forever.
    They also know the boldness, aggression, and Blitzkrieg-like fury of President Trump’s offensive has drawn even former enemies to his cause, he has massed a cadre of leaders from across the spectrum, some former priests themselves, all with a shared goal – to do what is right for the people, not the priests.
    This is an existential event for statolatry, and perhaps even the Democrat Party.
    And it is beautiful.

And also long overdue, this is effectively a ‘zero based budgeting’ review of .gov spending!

Husar’s Axioms…

  1. Hiring consultants to conduct studies can be an excellent means to turn problems into gold – your problems into their gold.
  2. Auditors always reject any expense account with a bottom line divisible by 5 or 10.
  3. Is it progress if a cannibal uses a knife and fork?
  4. The race is not always to the swift or the battle to the strong, but that is the way to bet.
  5. If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will get you there.
  6. Most projects start out slowly – and then sort of taper off.
  7. Help strikes again.
  8. No matter what goes wrong, there will always be somebody who knew it would.
  9. No good deed goes unpunished.
  10. Good judgment comes from experience, and a lot of that comes from bad judgment.
  11. If you’re riding ahead of the herd, take a look back every now and then to make sure it’s still there.
  12. Don’t squat with your spurs on.
  13. Always drink upstream from the herd.
  14. There are three kinds of men. Those who learn by reading. Those who learn by observations. The rest of them have to pee on the electric fence for themselves.
  15. Law of gravity: Any tool, nut, bolt, screw when dropped, will roll to the least accessible corner.
  16. Law of Probability: The probability of being watched is directly proportional to the stupidity of your act.
  17. Variation Law: If you change lines (or traffic lanes) the one you were in will always move faster than the one you are in now (works every time).
  18. Law of Close Encounters: The probability of meeting someone you know increases dramatically when you are with someone you don’t want to be seen with.
  19. Law of Result: When you try to prove to someone that a machine won’t work, it will.
  20. Law of Biomechanics: The severity of the itch is inversely proportional to the ability to reach it.
  21. Law of the Theater: At any event, the people whose seats are furthest from the aisle arrive last.
  22. Murphy’s Law of Lockers: If there are only two people in a locker room, they will have adjacent lockers
  23. Law of Physical Surfaces: The chance of an open-faced jelly sandwich landing face down on a floor covering are directly correlated to the newness and cost of the carpeting.
  24. Doctor’s Law: If you don’t feel well, make an appointment to go to the doctor, by the time you get there you’ll feel better.  Don’t make an appointment and you’ll stay sick.
  25. Sometimes the best solution to a morale problem is just to fire all of the unhappy people.
  26. When you earnestly believe you can compensate for a lack of skill by doubling your efforts, there’s no end to what you can’t do.
  27. There is an island of opportunity in the middle of every difficulty. Miss that, though, and you’re pretty much doomed.
  28. There are no stupid questions; but here are a lot of inquisitive idiots
  29. If the enemy is in range, so are you.
  30. Whoever said the pen is mightier than the sword obviously never encountered automatic weapons.
  31. Never trade luck for skill.
  32. You get what you inspect not expect.
  33. No plan survives first contact with the enemy.
  34. Live each day like it’s your last. One day you’ll get it right.
  35. Health is merely the slowest possible rate at which one can die.
  36. Give a person a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach that same person to use the Internet and he won’t bother you for weeks.
  37. He who hesitates is probably right.
  38. If you can smile when things go wrong, you have someone in mind to blame.
  39. Birds of a feather flock together and then shit on your car.
  40. An expert is like a eunuch in a harem – someone who knows all about it but can’t do anything about it.
  41. Anything worth doing is worth doing in excess.
  42. Husar’s rule of Life: You have two chances, slim and none (and slim just left town).
  43. Never try to teach a pig to sing; it wastes your time and it annoys the pig.
  44. A leader should not get too far in front of his troops or he will get shot in the ass
  45. If it looks too good to be true, it is too good to be true.
  46. Common sense and common knowledge are the two most uncommon things in       the world.
  47. If at first you don’t succeed, try again. Then quit.  There’s no use in making fool of yourself.
  48. Someone who borrows your watch to tell you what time it is then walks away with your watch.
  49. The problem drinker is the one who never buys.
  50. Husar’s Rule of Survival: Pack your own parachute.
  51. If it works right the first time, you’ve obviously done something wrong.
  52. Jesuit Principle. It is better to beg for forgiveness than ask for permission.
  53. A fool and his money are welcomed everywhere.
  54. Don’t try to solve all life’s problems at once – learn to dread each day as it        comes.
  55. A man can have more money than brains; but not for long.
  56. If you have to travel on a Titanic, why not go first class?
  57. You’re only as old as you feel — the next day.

Really???

Wired is having a hissy fit!

Elon Musk’s takeover of federal government infrastructure is ongoing, and at the center of things is a coterie of engineers who are barely out of—and in at least one case, purportedly still in—college. Most have connections to Musk, and at least two have connections to Musk’s longtime associate Peter Thiel, a cofounder and chair of the analytics firm and government contractor Palantir who has long expressed opposition to democracy.

WIRED has identified six young men—all apparently between the ages of 19 and 24, according to public databases, their online presences, and other records—who have little to no government experience and are now playing critical roles in Musk’s so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) project, tasked by executive order with “modernizing Federal technology and software to maximize governmental efficiency and productivity.” The engineers all hold nebulous job titles within DOGE, and at least one appears to be working as a volunteer.

Full article, HERE from Wired.com

So they effectively doxxed these young men as part of the hissy fit…

And the left is whining and crying about people having, GASP, access to medical histories, personally identifiable information, workplace evaluations, and other private data!

As if OPM data hasn’t already been compromised by China, unknown number of hackers, etc. I KNOW my data has been compromised at least twice, because I’ve gotten formal letters from OPM about it…sigh

But, but, THIS is different, it’s not the left pawing through the data for who knows what and sending it to who knows who for what purposes.

When you add this to the USAid scramble, the ‘issues’ with access to the Treasury database of who got what and who approved what, this just means the dominoes are falling and when the results get released, there will be names named, and I’m willing to be there will be court cases in the future.

And IMHO, this is LONG overdue. How many trillions of dollars has gone to the third world to be scraped off by NGOs, warlords, and governments in power that did NOTHING for their citizens?

How many years has ‘aid’ in the form of $$$ and food gone into Africa, Central America, and other locations with no measurable improvement?

If you’ve been in the third world, and walked through a bazaar or Souk, you’ve seen USAid wheat and other food products STILL IN THE ORIGINAL BOXES for sale to the highest bidder…

And did anybody else see Chuck U Schumer’s presser about the price of beer and guac? Did you notice how he was smiling??? Corona is cheep beer in Mexico, and California has bigger/better avocados, but the Mexican ones are cheaper, just like tomatoes, and other produce… Or they were…

If the last couple of weeks are any indicator, what is going to come out in the next four years should be really interesting!

I need more popcorn!!!

A little humor…

For your Monday…

How important does a person have to be before they are considered assassinated instead of just murdered?

Why do you have to ‘put your two cents in’.. But it’s only a ‘penny for your thoughts’? Where’s that extra penny going to?

Once you’re in heaven, do you get stuck wearing the clothes you were buried in for eternity?

Why does a round pizza come in a square box?

What disease did cured ham actually have?

How is it that we put man on the moon before we figured out it would be a good idea to put wheels on luggage?

Why is it that people say they ‘slept like a baby’ when babies wake up like every two hours?

If a deaf person has to go to court, is it still called a hearing?

Why are you IN a movie, but you’re ON TV?

Why do people pay to go up tall buildings and then put money in binoculars to look at things on the ground?

Why do doctors leave the room while you change? They’re going to see you naked anyway.

Why is ‘bra’ singular and ‘panties’ plural?

Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a horrible crisp, which no decent human being would eat?

If Jimmy cracks corn and no one cares, why is there a stupid song about him?

Can a hearse carrying a corpse drive in the carpool lane ?

If the professor on Gilligan’s Island can make a radio out of a coconut, why can’t he fix a hole in a boat?

Why does Goofy stand erect while Pluto remains on all fours? They’re both dogs!

If Wile E. Coyote had enough money to buy all that ACME crap, why didn’t he just buy dinner?

If corn oil is made from corn, and vegetable oil is made from vegetables, what is baby oil made from?

If electricity comes from electrons, does morality come from morons?

Do the Alphabet song , Bah bah Black Sheep, and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star have the same tune?

Why did you just try singing the songs above?

Why do they call it an asteroid when it’s outside the hemisphere, but call it a hemorrhoid when it’s in your butt?

Did you ever notice that when you blow in a dog’s face, he gets mad at you, but when you take him for a car ride, he sticks his head out the window?

Did you ever wonder why you gave me your e-mail address in the first PLACE?

When in doubt…

Follow the money…

When Episcopal Bishop Mariann Budde lectured President Trump and Vice President Vance about immigration during her sermon at the National Prayer Service on the day after they were inaugurated, leftists hailed Budde for standing on principle and giving the Bad Orange Man a good scolding. As it turns out, however, Budde may have motivations that were a bit more tangible than principle: her church’s Episcopal Migration Ministry (EMM) rakes in millions from a number of taxpayer-funded entities for bringing the migrants. And the Episcopal Church is by no means alone in this: other churches that have recently taken principled stances against Trump’s immigration policies are in on the gravy train as well. 

Full article, HERE.

Lemme see, 53M divided by 3600…$14,722, somehow I don’t think they spent that much on each one of those illegals!

So, where did the money actually go???

And Catholic Charities claim they LOSE money every year, but got $1.4 billion in taxpayer dollars in 2021…

Some interesting dichotomy here, and it poses more questions than it does answers. I think it will be interesting to see what happens with this funding ‘pause’, and what these supposed ‘charities’ do when they don’t get their dole from the government trough.

Will they continue to pay for plane tickets, new iPhones, etc? Or will the illegals suddenly be ‘poor downtrodden’, yada yada???

And I added this because it was sent by a former Episcopalian who is now a Baptist deacon…

Not a good week…

First it was the crash in DC with the CRJ and VH-60 with 67 souls lost

And last night, an Angels flight Lear 55 apparently with 6 on board crashed in north Philadelphia.

As a retired Naval Flight Officer, my heart goes out to those families who’ve lost loved ones, and I pray for those and the officials conducting the recovery in DC, and the firefighters, medics, and others in Philly. I’ve been through the pain of loss of friends in military crashes, and accident investigation boards, and it is NOT fun.

It is too early to know the details of either incident, contrary to what the MSM and ‘experts’ are spouting. EVERYTHING is conjecture right now, other than the facts that we can see. And frankly, I’m tired of the ‘internet experts’…

The NTSB has a ‘Go Team’ on site in DC, and I’m sure there will be another in Philly sometime this morning, if they aren’t already there.

They will be examining everything pertaining to both instances, and I have to say I was impressed by investigator’s DC interview yesterday. He absolutely shut off speculation, and pointedly told reporters that he would NOT answer their ‘hypotheticals’, nor release any information about the controller or any other people they were interviewing.

The NTSB takes however much time it takes to do their investigation and put their reports together, normally about a year. So, we’re not going to know the outcome in the next week…

And the politicians (ALL of them), need to shut up and let the NTSB do their job(s) to find out what happened. Inserting themselves into the process isn’t helping anyone, and their 15 seconds of ‘fame’ may come back to bite them.

Writers vs…

Readers, and ‘others’…

Y’all can read a LOT faster than we can write, which is a given. A lot of folks will read a 90,000 word novel in 3-6 hours.

However, writers work at different ‘speeds’ if you will. I am happy to get 4-6000 words a week when I can write (not on pain meds), or doing a convention (another week/con). I know other folks that will do that in a day! They can pump out a novel a month.

I can’t do that, because it would be garbage, and I’m not going to even try. I have to do research…and I want to put out as good a novel as I can…sigh

And it’s worse when you write in more than one genre or series. I have to go back and reread the previous books to ‘reset’ the characters in my head, so that takes a week or so. At let’s say an average of 6000 words/week, assuming 90,000 word novel, that’s 15 weeks or 4 months.

Then I send it out to my alpha readers, get feedback, fix the errors they catch, so another 3 weeks. Lather, rinse, repeat for the beta readers. And then it goes to the editor (roughly 2 weeks to a month).

I’m also sending the rough to my cover artists, so they are working on a cover while all this is going on. So (doing math), 6 months IF everything comes together. As an Indie author, the next thing is putting it up on Amazon, which usually takes about a week. If I were trad pub, that novel would probably not be released for a year, AFTER I did all the work and submitted a finished product.

I know I haven’t put out a full novel in over a year, but I’ve been dealing with physical issues, sorry.

The other thing that interrupts is when you get invited to submit for an anthology- Those are mostly 8000 words, so I can usually knock them out in a little over a week, if I push it. Another interrupter is reading other people’s work as either an alpha, beta, or rough editor. Those can eat a few days, too. And Ghod forbid we take a vacation…LOL

The other problem is writing in more than one genre, I ‘try’ to alternate genres with my releases. I’m stuck on the next Bell Chronicles right now, but the Rimworld novel is going great guns. Of course you readers ‘want’ to get ‘your’ series book…yesterday…

Soooo, yes I’m whining here. But I also want y’all to ‘understand’ that I’m not blowing y’all off, it’s just that I’m slow. 🙂

Oh yeah, and I was asked why I put up snippets (by someone that WILL NOT read snippets). I do that because YOU are my customers. And I value your feedback and comments, I do listen, and I do make changes based on your comments.

Thank you for your time this morning. And yes, I’m writing today (and try to every day).

 

Book promo…

First up, Cedar Sanderson has just published her long awaited 2nd book in the Tanager series- Tanager’s Flight  

As always, click on the cover for the Amazon link!

a

The blurb-

Captain Jem Raznick of the Tanager dreams of nothing more than sailing the stars with his crew—a family forged in the vacuum of space. When a mysterious pirate threat looms, what seems like a routine trading run spirals into a cosmic adventure!

Family isn’t just blood—it’s the bond that holds the galaxy together.

Every time the enigmatic Jade Star enters their orbit, routine turns upside down. Jem must outwit the treachery that lurks in the shadows of space to keep his crew alive. Prepare for a journey between planets where loyalty, betrayal, and survival are the only constants. Join Captain Raznick as he navigates through danger, deceit, and the deep, dark unknown!

Next up is Raconteur Press with another anthology-

The blurb-

Drinks! Since humanity first began, we have been experimenting with beverages beyond simple water. Fermenting fruit, milk from various mammals, mashing berries…and later experimenting with getting desired effects by mixing things together in different ways; potions concocted to evoke certain feelings, heal an ailment, erase memories, or inspire strong emotions. Across many cultures & oceans we find different myths of fountains of youth, elixirs of life, amrita, blessed mead, holy ale, love potions, sanctified wines, & potent poisons.

Come! Drink from a cup of stories varied! Dare to follow these epic quests, potions with unintended consequences, ales holy, wine deadly, and toast…to adventure!

Tell me, friend, will you drink?

And last and least…LOL One of my readers, TOS, reminded me we’d done an anthology about California exiting the USA. Well, guess what’s in the MSM right now? Yep, California talking about seceding… So, a flashback to 2017- Calexit, the anthology

Rather than the blurb, I’d offer the review from fellow author Joseph F. Collins

We’ve all heard of “Brexit” where Great Britain voted to leave the EU. That stirred up some debate in California about them possibly seceding from the Union. The recent events in Catalonia attempting to do the same from Spain with the resulting brutal government crackdown makes this book even more timely when I purchased it and rapidly read through it. (You might have not heard anything about Catalonia in the MSM but need to look for your news in other places!) My own personal interest comes from studying the “Basque Conflict” terrorism which started in 1959.

What would happen if California left the USA so they could follow their own agenda which in many cases is completely different from the rest of us? Based on the stories in this book it wouldn’t be very pretty of which I agree. California as a state is already on the brink of financial collapse for a number of reasons which aren’t relevant here. For me it might be a nice place to visit (certain sections) but not a place where I would live for as they say “All the tea in China.” Sorry I’ll put up with sometimes brutal Midwestern winters and often changing weather to stay out of a state where I would be taxed almost to death to support policies which make no sense to me at all.

Of interest the stories could also postulate a horrific future for us as a country and we had continued upon some of our past paths. Except there would probably be an armed civil war as a result tearing the country completely apart.

So let’s say California left the Union? There are a lot of military bases in the state. What would happen to them? There are also a number of people like police, fire and EMS who regularly put their lives on the line for strangers. What would a state look like if they left? How about the malcontents who make living interesting wherever you go? What would they do? Those questions and many thought provoking others are answered in this book.

The beginning is approached from several different angles and the end is interesting but still leaving a lot of room to explore in hopefully future volumes.

I sensed the deft guiding hand of the editor in many of the stories without the heaviness of someone who edits for a living. The stories are interesting and told from perspectives that informed me of things I really didn’t know before like how to fix the brakes on a 737 without a massive information dump often seen as written by inexperienced writers.

Of the dozen books I’ve read this week, this one was the most thought provoking and interesting often taking me away from my own writing as I eagerly read each story to the end.

Highly recommended!

I can recommend all of them highly! 🙂

A little humor…

For the week… Laws and their impact(s)…

Law of Mechanical Repair – After your hands become coated with grease, your nose will begin to itch and you’ll have to pee.

Law of Gravity 
– Any tool, nut, bolt, screw, when dropped, will roll to the least accessible place in the universe.

Law of Probability 
– The probability of being watched is directly proportional to the stupidity of your act.

Law of Random Numbers 
– If you dial a wrong number, you never get a busy signal; someone always answers.

Variation Law 
– If you change lines (or traffic lanes), the one you were in will always move faster than the one you are in now.

Law of the Bath 
– When the body is fully immersed in water, the telephone will ring.

Law of Close Encounters 
– The probability of meeting someone you know INCREASES dramatically when you are with someone you don’t want to be seen with.

Law of the Result 
– When you try to prove to someone that a machine won’t work, IT WILL!!!

Law of Biomechanics
 – The severity of the itch is inversely proportional to the reach.

Law of the Theater & Hockey Arena 
– At any event, the people whose seats are furthest from the aisle, always arrive last. They are the ones who will leave their seats several times to go for food, beer, or the toilet and who leave early before the end of the performance or the game is over. The folks in the aisle seats come early, never move once, have long gangly legs or big bellies and stay to the bitter end of the performance. The aisle people also are very surly folk.

The Coffee Law 
– As soon as you sit down to a cup of hot coffee, your boss will ask you to do something which will last until the coffee is cold.

Murphy’s Law of Lockers 
– If there are only 2 people in a locker room, they will have adjacent lockers.

Law of Physical Surfaces 

The chances of an open-faced jelly sandwich landing face down on a floor are directly correlated to the newness and cost of the carpet or rug.

Law of Logical Argument 
– Anything is possible IF you don’t know what you are talking about.

Law of Physical Appearance 
– If the clothes fit, they’re ugly.

Law of Public Speaking — A CLOSED MOUTH GATHERS NO FEET!

Law of Commercial Marketing Strategy
– As soon as you find a product that you really like, they will stop making it OR the store will stop selling it!

Another own goal…

By Newsome…

California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s administration shut down a highly trained, all-volunteer team of certified firefighters in early 2024—a move that rendered the California National Guard incapable of sending a complete firefighting force to Los Angeles until 10 days after the deadly fires broke out in the city, the Washington Free Beacon has learned.

Launched in 2020, Team Blaze was an on-call strike force staffed entirely with certified firefighters of the California State Guard, a volunteer militia force that reports directly to Gov. Gavin Newsom. Former State Guard commanding general Jay Coggan said its members attended regular trainings at their own expense, and an outside charity procured much of the team’s firefighting equipment at no cost to the state. California was obligated to pay Team Blaze only when the unit was activated to fight a wildfire, and by 2023 Coggan had plans to expand its ranks to 1,000 certified volunteer firefighters on standby all across the state.

But in January 2024, the Newsom administration disbanded Team Blaze after barring its charitable benefactor from providing free firefighting equipment to its volunteers.

Full article, HERE from the Washington Free Beacon.

This one truly makes NO sense to me. They were given free equipment, did training on their own time, and fulfilled their Guard duties. What was not to like???

They were a trained quick response team that could be on scene in literally 24 hours anywhere in CA, and were probably loaned out to other states if requested.

This one sounds like another penny wise pound foolish move, but I can’t help but wonder ‘what’ prompted this, unless the benefactor was a ‘threat’ to Newsome in some way.

Sigh… I feel for those folks, and those who have lost lives, homes, and belongings to what seems to be an avalanche of bad decisions that rolled from Sacramento all the way down to LAFD.