Author: Kim du Toit

News Roundup

Good Stuff

Wherein I summarize the news of the recent past.  (Warning:  I’m in an irreverent mood today…)

1) TV presenter gives up booze — and becomes the world’s most boring woman.  (Caution:  link contains Piers Morgan.)

2) Gang-rape victim reports crime, gets raped again by a cop — guess it just wasn’t her day, was it?  (Come on:  it happened in Pakistan, that bastion of civilization where all women are revered.)

3) Dallas gang beats up trannie — guess the race of the attackers… nope, ’twasn’t Muzzies; not this time, anyway.

4) Notre Dame Cathedral destroyed by fire — I guess the BVM was busy doing something else at the time, huh?  (I warned ya.)

5) Rich farts in CT can’t sell their houses at inflated prices — ‘cos all the would-be buyers have fled to low-tax states already.

6) Naked stabber killed by security guard — wait, McDonald’s has security guards now?  Oh yeah… southern California.  Never mind.  And finally, from the Department of Good News:

7) Hollywood sees revenues plummet — see pic above.

Quote Of The Day

QOTD

From John Derbyshire:

“Every totalitarian power cult needs a vocabulary of vituperation—some way to talk about the enemies of the people: those wreckers, saboteurs, and counter-revolutionaries who are always trying to slow or divert society’s righteous march forward to a radiant future.”

Hence the current Congressional hearings about “White nationalism”.

BAG Day

The Gun Thing

Today is April 15th, which the Feddle Gummint refers to as “Tax Deadline Day”, but which Real Murkins refer to as “Buy-A-Gun Day” (hence the title of this post).

I haven’t made up my mind yet, but it’ll be something small and concealable, with no paper trail.  (And therefore will not appear on these pages, sorry.)  I invite my Readers Of Similar Persuasion to do the same.

Feel free, however, to be like the guy who embraced the concept fully*:

But if you feel that you have enough guns (okay, you can all stop laughing now), feel free to lay in some canned goods instead:

(That’s not Ye Olde Ammoe Locquer, by the way, but it’s not far off.)

*My only quibble:  way  too much plastic in there.

Not Just The Weather

Bad News, Gummint, Nature, Weather

A while ago, I drew attention to the floods which have inundated the Upper Midwest states like Iowa and Nebraska.  What I did not know at the time (but should have), is that when there is catastrophe, can the fat finger of government be far behind?

 There is much more to the “management” of the Missouri River basin than just how and when to drain water.
In the interest of habitat restoration, etc. (the highest priority since 2004), tens of thousands of acres surrounding the river and more than a thousand miles of riverbank have been mechanically altered by the Corps — not with an eye to controlling flooding, but rather to facilitate the “reconnection of the river with its floodplain,” believed to be a necessity in achieving the goal of species and habitat preservation and restoration.
When the Corps believed that protecting people and property was a more worthy aim than fish and wildlife, the riverbanks were stabilized, shored against erosion and high-water events. The channels were kept largely free of silt infill to facilitate the draining efficiency of the river that essentially deals with the runoff of vast millions of square miles of mountain and plains snow and rain.
Dikes were built and maintained. Levees, too. Chutes (secondary channels of a meandering river) were closed to inhibit the ability of the river to overcome its banks in seasons of high-water. All these things (and more) combined to permit millions of Americans to develop the reclaimed lands, for farming, ranching, and homes. Indeed, these millions of Americans were encouraged to do so by their elected representatives, who happily took credit for the resulting economic benefits and increased tax revenues.

And then in 2004, it all changed.  Read the whole thing, and be enraged.

Cast-Offs

Bad News

I remember a cartoon from a long-ago MAD Magazine (back when it was still at least marginally funny) which depicted a young woman trying on an expensive dress.  When reproached about its cost, she said, “But it’s something that my daughter, and her daughter, can wear on their wedding days.”  And when it’s suggested she use her own grandmother’s wedding dress instead, she snaps:  “Oh, who wants to wear that old thing?”

Things pass, and the tragedy is that often what was beautiful, or majestic, or seemed destined for immortality, doesn’t end up that way.  And few better examples can be found than among magnificent ruins such as these.

…and these deathless words spring to mind:

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert… near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed;

And on the pedestal these words appear:
‘My name is Ozymandias, king of kings;
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!’
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

Ozymandias, by Percy Bysshe Shelley