The big shutdown

Definite le nuove misure nazionali di contenimento dell'emergenza. Nell'articolo 1 della bozza del nuovo decreto del governo compare il divieto di ingresso e di uscita dalla Lombardia e da altre 11 province, e l'estensione delle zone controllate a Piemonte ed Emilia-Romagna. Nel dettaglio, le province diventate "zona rossa" sono le seguenti: Modena, Parma, Piacenza, Reggio Emilia, Rimini, Pesaro e Urbino, Venezia, Padova, Treviso, Asti e Alessandria. Tutte le nuove disposizioni sono valide da oggi marzo fino al 3 aprile.

No travel into or out of Lombardia and a number of other provinces until April third, which is a quarantine of 16 million people. Good thing we've got the wine cellar well-stocked through September, at the very least! Seems like a bit of an overreaction to me, but we'll see. In the meantime, I anticipate most Italians will consider this to be a grand holiday of sorts.

And no, I'm not particularly concerned despite the drastic measures being taken. The country with the largest known test sample, South Korea, is seeing a mortality rate of 0.6 percent, which is only four times more lethal than the average flu. And while the 4 percent death rate based on the official numbers in Italy looks bad, the fact is that most people who have been infected don't know they have it and have not been counted as an official case.

I strongly suspect something that we simply don't understand is taking place, and that we'll eventually be able to put the pieces of the puzzle together. In the meantime, get plenty of sleep, drink plenty of fluids, and take vitamins C and D.

Besides, it's still not a pandemic, right?

UPDATE: While the government has announced the quarantine of Lombardia as well as parts of the Veneto, Emilia Romagna, and Piemonte, they aren't shutting down the roads or the airports yet. They haven't even closed the borders with France or Switzerland at this point.

Mailvox: Ignoring is not passive-aggression

An emailer reveals a number of assumptions:

Emails. The gamma can't help but type novels. So, help me understand this about the hierarchy: I've always thought that most people ignore emails out of passive-aggressiveness, to control conversations, and because they're cowards.

Clearly though, there's a time to ignore people. However, I hate to do it, because I don't want to be the above mentioned things. I'm fine being an asshole, but a coward... no.

How do you choose when and who to ignore? You obviously engage annoying people privately at length. Why?

I'll leave it to the readers here to point out the obvious ironies here, but I will correct a misapprehension and point out that I do not engage annoying people privately at length, ever. Most of my private replies are very short and I very seldom respond to a second email. The only place I provide longer responses is here on the blog.

And for any even modestly public figure, the correct time to ignore emails is every single freaking day. You know those people who say that although they don't respond to every email, they do read all of them? Rest assured, most of them don't even do that.

The Book of the Month

This month's Replatforming book is timely, in light of the global pandemic taking place just as spring approaches. It is, of course, GROW OR DIE: The Good Guide to Survival Gardening by David the Good. Now you can acquire it for as little as $1 and join the Replatforming in one fell swoop.

What if everything collapsed tomorrow? What if the shelves on the supermarket were empty? What if you couldn’t get gas for your tiller? What if you didn’t stockpile fertilizer… or water? What if you’ve never even planted a garden in your life… and your life depended on growing your own food?

Don’t panic!

GROW OR DIE: The Good Guide to Survival Gardening has the answers. From hand tools that will till the ground better than a tractor to plans for growing all the calories you need in a crisis to easy-to-follow crop rotations that will beat the pests, this book is the cheapest insurance you can own against the crash we all know is coming sooner or later.

You’ll discover how to scrounge for seeds in unlikely places. How to till without a tiller. How to preserve your harvest. How to beat pests without poison. How to convert a lawn into a food factory. How to garden to survive in emergencies and crises.

Join the Replatforming here. Ebook, audio, and paperback. If you're already a Replatformer, please note that today is the last day you can redeem your coupons and download WARDOGS INC. #1. The February paperbacks will go out next week.

Mailvox: maybe I do have a point

A critic apologizes for assuming my nonexistent heresy:

I wrote you a letter concerning the trinity of God and I want to apologize for scolding you. I have come to understand the revelation of The Bible better these past few days and I admit I jumped the gun in criticizing your argument about the trinity. There are apparent contradictions between The Bible and the teaching about The Trinity like many believe it. I think this stems from the wrong interpretation that the catholic church presents about God. I also went over your argument again and admit that there is a contradiction between The Word of God and this belief in The Trinity as it is many times taught in different circles.

Accepted. As I frequently point out, any time an argument is reliant upon an observable falsehood or deception, it is usually being made in defense of a false position. The mere fact that I am frequently and erroneously criticized for not subscribing to "the Nicene Creed" when I am in fact the one subscribing to the actual Nicene Creed of 325 as opposed to the Niceno-Constantinopolitan Creed of 381 that most Christians wrongly believe to be "the Nicene Creed" should be sufficient to give the average critic pause.

It is also worth noting that the third Ecumenical Council of 431 reaffirmed the original 325 version of the Nicene Creed and rejected the later pseudo-Nicene version. And finally, you may wish to consider the fact that Sir Isaac Newton independently came to the same conclusion that I did. As for me, I could not care less if all the modern theologians from all the modern sects and churches and denominations declare otherwise. Given their assertions on various other theological matters, I tend to rather like our odds of being the party more in line with the truth.

Operation Spring Shield

The recent Turko-Russian war you didn't hear about:

Over the course of a week, from February 27 through March 5, Syria’s Idlib province transitioned from being ground zero for a war between the Syrian army and allied forces, and heavily armed groups opposed to the rule of Syrian President Bashar Assad, into a geopolitical powder keg that threatened to pull the Turkish and Russian militaries into direct conflict with one another. On March 1, Turkey, following up on threats previously made by President Erdogan to drive the Syrian Army and its allies back to the line of demarcation set forth in the original Sochi Agreement, unleashed a major offensive, dubbed “Operation Spring Shield” and involving thousands of Turkish troops fighting alongside anti-Assad formations.

This operation soon fizzled; not only was the Turkish advance halted in its tracks, but the Syrian Army, supported by Hezbollah and pro-Iranian militias, were able to recapture much of the territory lost in the earlier fighting. Faced with the choice of either escalating further and directly confronting Russian forces, or facing defeat on the battlefield, Erdogan instead flew to Moscow.

The new additional protocol, which entered into effect at midnight Moscow time on Friday, March 6, represents a strategic defeat for Erdogan and the Turkish military which, as NATO’s second-largest standing armed force, equipped and trained to the highest Western standards, should have been more than a match for a rag-tag Syrian Army, worn down after nine years of non-stop combat. The Syrian armed forces, together with its allies, however, fought the Turks to a standstill. Moreover, the anti-Assad fighters that had been trained and equipped by the Turks proved to be a disappointment on the battlefield.

One of the major reasons behind the Turkish failure was the fact that Russia controlled the air space over Idlib, denying the Turks the use of aircraft, helicopters and drones, while apparently using their own aircraft, together with the Syrian Air Force, to pummel both the Turkish military and their allied anti-Assad forces. In the end, the anti-Assad fighters were compelled to take shelter within so-called ‘Observation posts’– heavily fortified Turkish garrisons established under the Sochi Agreement, intermingling with Turkish forces to protect themselves from further attack. Operation Spring Shield turned out to be a resounding defeat for the Turks and their allies.

This marks the second time in two years that Russia has orchestrated the defeat of a concentrated anti-Assad military action, and done so without triggering the US-Russian war that the neocons are desperately hoping to spark.

It also offers more evidence that the US military's capabilities are more limited than anyone presently understands. The US military and its allies have been heavily dependent upon air supremacy since 1944, but that is no longer necessarily the case.

Modernity's Frankenstein

William S. Lind believes that Corona-chan heralds the eventual end of globalism.

We have to face the fact that in the face of new plagues, Globalism is suicide.  The only thing that works is quarantine. In the Middle Ages, some Italian towns saved themselves from the plague by a policy of immurement: any house where plague appeared was bricked up, with the people inside.

The equivalent for us now is to shut down all international travel.  No one may enter the United States without going through a period of quarantine.  The current wisdom is that a two-week quarantine is sufficient. That may change. With future genetically engineered plagues, the quarantine may have to be longer.  In Thomas Hobbes’ novel Victoria, entry into Europe requires a three-month quarantine on Heligoland Island.  Of course, anyone illegally attempting to enter the country and thereby avoiding quarantine must be shot dead.

In future cases, it may also be necessary to prohibit all imported goods.  It should not be too difficult to create plagues that are transmitted by things: by food imports, by cars or car parts, by anything that an American might end up handling.  The toxins would be designed, at least initially, to come through the skin. With genetic engineering, there is almost no limit on hideous characteristics a disease can be given.  Modernity, meet your Frankenstein.

If he's right, we'll all be saying "thank you, Corona-chan!" Eventually.... And remember, by their fruits, ye shall know them. The fruits of globalism are observably evil.

Move away, Swedes

It is their country now:

Two Muslim women with opposing views on a headscarf ban in schools clashed in a fierce TV debate in Sweden. The teacher told the politician that people uncomfortable with the veil should just leave the country.

The heated exchange between Naouel Aissaoui, a school teacher in the Swedish municipality of Skurup, and local politician Loubna Stensaker Goransson was over a ban on veils in public schools, which Goransson and other council officials enacted in December. The decision angered many educators, and Aissaoui is among those leading the pushback.

"Move away if it annoys you," Aissaoui said during a TV debate after her opponent said she disliked seeing little girls wearing the veil. "This is my country, too."

Move where? All they are going to do is follow you. Better to sink the ships, reject the refugees, end the subsidies, repatriate the immigrants, and stay where you are.

It is absolutely immoral to allow refugees to settle in your country. And the Bible is one long lesson about the horrific consequences of permitting even moderate numbers of foreigners to live among you, beginning with Egypt and Canaan.

Immigration is rather like free speech. Both are scams that are intended to convince the target to lower its natural defenses until the balance of power is sufficiently altered. Then the vital importance of minority feelings and cultural norms abruptly disappear.

The moment I've all been waiting for

Warren retires to the reservation

Super Tuesday took out Elizabeth Warren too.

Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts plans to drop out of the presidential race on Thursday and will inform her staff of her plans later this morning, according to a person close to her, ending a run defined by an avalanche of policy plans that aimed to pull the Democratic Party to the left and appealed to enough voters to make her briefly a front-runner last fall, but that proved unable to translate excitement from elite progressives into backing from the party’s more working-class and diverse base.

Creepy Joe vs Socialist Jew. It's not a contest, since the black vote is much more important in the Democratic primary than it is in the general election. That means Creepy Joe wins the right to be ritually offered up to the god-emperor.

Enjoy the Trumpslide.

Mailvox: the new Gamma

A woman in a female-dominated company writes about the reaction of her fellow employees to a new Gamma male:

Repellant to women. That phrase just keeps coming back to me, as it perfectly describes the reaction of nearly everyone at my workplace to the recent hiring of a Gamma.

We work in a small office with around 20 people, only three of whom are men. I would assess two of them as Deltas: hard working, polite, able to give – and take – a joke without causing or taking offense. The girls all love them in a brotherly sense, have little inside jokes with them, etc. However, the New Guy™ is an entirely different story. He perceives himself to be charming, witty and attractive, tries to engage all of us with “witty bon mots” and other conversational gambits.

Scuttlebutt around the lunch table yesterday consisted of, “He’s not going to last long.” “Well, I wish he would hurry up and quit then. “ “I don’t like him.” “I don’t appreciate his sense of humour”. As well as comments about what a girls’ blouse he was for nearly bursting into tears when one of the girls complained to the boss (he was eavesdropping) about how she found his habit of asking for too much personal information unsettling. He stormed out, and then had to be talked into returning to work. They should have just let him leave. I also heard through the grapevine that the reason his nose “looks like that” is that he has been punched in the face so many times over the years that it has been broken more than once.

Every afternoon I find myself muttering shut up-shut up-shut up-shut up-shut up under my breath, as his talking escalates toward the end of the day.

I’m counting down the days until the petty sabotage begins. It’s going to be awful.

If you're a gentleman who considers himself to be witty and charming, respectful of women though just ever-so-slightly roguish, and always capable of dropping the perfect movie quote at just the right moment, you should probably take this advice to heart. Yes, she is absolutely talking about you.

And shutting up is a very good place to start.

Castalia Library update

Book 01 (NOV/DEC) THE MISSIONARIES by Owen Stanley is being bound. The books are anticipated to be shipped the week of March 23-27. The Library print run is 500.

Book 02 (JAN/FEB) THE MEDITATIONS by Marcus Aurelius is being printed. The books are anticipated to be shipped in April. The Library print run is 650.

Book 03 (MAR/APR) AWAKE IN THE NIGHT LAND by John C. Wright is being laid out and the interior illustrations are being prepared. The print run is undetermined.

Book 04 (MAY/JUN) is being selected. It will either be the first volume of PLUTARCH’S LIVES or INFERNO by Dante.

For future reference, please check the Arkhaven blog for regular updates concerning Castalia Library and the fulfillment of the various crowdfunding projects.


CLARIFICATION: Because, apparently, it is not entirely obvious from the observable evidence, if you do not subscribe to SOMETHING for more than $5 per month that does not involve substantial built-in costs in its own right, (translation: Hero of the Revolution), you are not eligible for a SocialGalactic subscription. If you are involved in one-off flat-free projects such as a crowdfunding campaign, that is recognized in the SG world by the relevant badge and can receive an invitation by subscribing to either UATV or directly to SocialGalactic.

I am, after all, an economist by training, and therefore not inclined to make the obvious mistake of putting SG in a position of taking on unlimited expenses on the basis of fixed revenues.

Bloomberg bows out

As I mentioned prior to the Super Tuesday voting, Mini-Mike didn't get into the presidential race in search of public humiliation. He almost certainly thought he was going to have his "elevator moment" and trump the god-emperor because he has even more money. Needless to say, he was wildly incorrect, which is why he is jumping out as quickly as he jumped in.

Billionaire Mike Bloomberg ended his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination on Wednesday and endorsed former Vice President Joe Biden. It was a stunning collapse for the former New York City mayor, who had his 2020 hopes on the Super Tuesday states and pumped more than $500 million of his own fortune into the campaign.

Bloomberg announced his departure from the race after a disappointing finish on Super Tuesday in the slate of states that account for almost one-third of the total delegates available in the Democratic nominating contest. He won only the territory of American Samoa and picked up several dozen delegates elsewhere. Biden, meanwhile, won big in Southern states where Bloomberg had poured tens of millions of dollars and even cautiously hoped for a victory.

Even tens of billions are less powerful than the socio-sexual hierarchy. You literally can't buy Alpha, no matter how hard the Gamma tries.

Note that the media and the professional analysts, to say nothing of all the armchair experts in the comments, almost all said that Bloomberg was in it until the convention. And they were completely wrong. That is the result of failing to grasp the difference between capability and character. Bloomberg is an oversensitive billionaire who underrated the difficulty of public performance. He has probably wanted to get out of the race about twenty minutes into the Las Vegas debate, and his pathetic performance yesterday only underlined his desire to get out of the spotlight.

UPDATE: "I’m sorry we didn’t win but it’s still the best day of my life and tomorrow’s going to be even better."

Total Gamma statement. The joke's on them! The Secret King won again!

Italy don't need no education

All the schools and universities in Italy are closed until the Ides of March:

Scuole e università chiuse per coronavirus in tutta Italia dal 5 al 15 marzo.

I can't even imagine how happy this would have made me as a kid.... In considerably more important news, Serie A will continue, but the games will be played a porte chiuse, which is to say, in empty stadiums.

Biden won, Bloomberg's done

Creepy Joe was the big winner of Super Tuesday 2020:

Biden won nine of the 15 primary contests at stake tonight, pulling off a number of upset victories, including a win in Minnesota (we’d projected Sanders would win there), a win in Massachusetts (Sanders again), and a win in Texas (that was more of a toss-up going into tonight), but basically Biden cleaned up across the board. He performed well in states where he wasn’t even really competing, and he proved he’s more than a regional candidate.

Sanders, on the other hand, did not have a great evening. He won just three states outright (Colorado, Utah and Vermont) and underperformed expectations. So far, he does seem on track to win delegate-rich California, though we won’t know the exact margin for a while yet.

The complete delegate totals and how they compared to the pre-primary projections:

• 513/484 Biden
• 461/463 Sanders
• 53/222 Bloomberg
• 53/162 Warren

That's a huge and very public humiliation for Bloomberg, whose electoral appeal is obviously even more miniaturized than his stature.

The Democratic Party is coalescing around Joe Biden, whose campaign has been defined by many awkward gaffes and one incredible comeback. It was perhaps fitting Tuesday night that when Biden took the stage in Los Angeles to celebrate his historic day of victories, the first thing he did was accidentally confuse his wife and sister.

Super Tuesday

Today's primaries should eliminate Bloomberg and provide some indication as to whether Democrats are looking to offer up the creep or the socialist as an offering to the God-Emperor:

It took a little longer than it sometimes does, but the early primary and caucus states performed their traditional role in the process of winnowing the field of candidates. The results of Super Tuesday will answer some big questions about the race.

First, the results today will tell us what the two main coalitions really look like. The first four small states offered clues, but the total number of voters in the 14 Super Tuesday states is exponentially larger. Sanders seems to have failed to grow his support among African Americans much beyond his 2016 percentages, but he has made inroads among Latino voters. He remains dominant among young voters and does better on the coasts and in the northeast. Biden is the candidate of African Americans, suburban moderates, the South, and older voters.

Many of the differences between these two groups are cultural, not ideological. But inside the Democratic Party there is a debate not unlike the one that divides the two main parties about the breadth of change that Washington should pursue. The Democrats’ moderate wing, which is now anchored by older black voters in the south, remains deeply skeptical of Sanders-style socialism, while the New New left, powered by young radicals in big cities, is repelled by the incrementalism of Biden.

Translation: the usual suspects have lost control of the party to the diversity. And let's not forget 538's final projections before they are vanished in the aftermath of the actual results:

• 484 Biden
• 463 Sanders
• 222 Bloomberg
• 162 Warren

UPDATE: initial returns look good for Biden, flat for Sanders, poor for Bloomberg.

UPDATE: Biden is projected to win both Virginia and North Carolina. With the projections this early, that means he's winning them handily.

ASCENDANT kickstarter

Comic book RPGs tend to be sub-divided into “descriptor-based” and “effect-based” games. “Bolt of Fire” is a descriptor, while “Ranged Attack that 50 points of damage to one target” is an effect. A descriptor-based game prioritizes the descriptor over the effects. An effect-based prioritizes the effects over the descriptor.

Ascendant strives to be neither a descriptor-based nor effect-based game. It is, rather, a physics-based game. The game mechanics are intended to be the physics engine of the game world. Powers have both descriptors and effects. Some effects are precluded by the logic of the descriptor, and some descriptors inevitably entail certain effects. The mechanics are elaborate and detailed (as in an effect-based game) but they are also broad and universalized (as in a descriptor-based game). Players are expected and encouraged to use their powers in whatever manner makes sense within the physics of a comic-book world, but not in ways that don’t make sense.

If a descriptor-based system aims to let players experience a comic-book story; and an effect-based system aims to let players play a superhero game; our physics-based system aims to let players simulate a comic book world. To do so, we have created logarithmic chart-based universal mechanics, a style of design that has not been widely used in the last two decades, but which will be instantly familiar to fans of the classic FASERIP and MEGS RPGs from the 1980s. 

ALT-HERO fans will be pleased to know that although it is an entirely different superhero universe, ASCENDANT is based on the same set of brand new superhero RPG rules that the forthcoming ALT-HERO RPG is using. If you'd like to back our friends at Ascendant, you can do so here.

Immigration is war

What part of the tautology is hard for people to understand?

Europe has been put to test after Turkey provided free passage for scores of migrants heading westward, Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said, describing Ankara’s move as an “attack on the EU.”

The latest move by Turkey to allow migrants to leave its territory over the weekend was an attack “on the European Union and Greece,” and also a “test for the EU,” Kurz said on Tuesday. If European countries cave in to Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s pressure, then 13,000 migrants desperately waiting at the EU border will only be “the beginning,” the Austrian Chancellor warned. According to Kurz, the migrants that amassed on the Greek border didn’t come from the war-ravaged parts of Syria as their exodus was “deliberately organized” by Turkey.

Germany’s former defense minister and European Commission’s sitting chief Ursula von der Leyen said that allowing potentially millions of migrants to enter Europe “cannot be an answer or solution” to Turkey’s problems in Syria.

Meanwhile, Greek authorities who struggled to hold back the wave on their borders, described it as “an invasion.” Greek police fired tear gas at migrants attempting to storm the border fence, while the coast guard tried to stop refugee dinghies by pushing them away outside the country’s southern islands.

Immigration has always been war. Whether it was the Mongols migrating to India, the Germans migrating to Italy, the Goths migrating to Byzantium, the Normans migrating to England, the Europeans migrating to the Americas, the Japanese migrating to China, the Germans migrating to Eastern Europe, or the Jews migrating to Canaan, the result has always been military occupation, followed by the large-scale slaughter and suppression of the native population.

And because immigration is war, open borders is surrender.

A non-entity vanishes

Sportswriter Jim Klobuchar's daughter has abandoned her no-hope campaign:

Amy Klobuchar is ending her presidential campaign and will endorse Joe Biden later on Monday, according to a campaign aide, making her the third Democrat in three days to exit the race after Biden’s big win in the South Carolina primary.

The only reason she was a U.S. Senator in the first place is because Al Franken is a perv. She had absolutely no business running for President.

It is interesting that they're all bowing out and endorsing Biden, though. Apparently the Democratic Party elders really don't want to see the socialist jew blown out by the God-Emperor.

Sink the ships or else

The globalist media is attacking Greece for defending its borders against hundreds of thousands of hostile invaders:

Greek border police have shot dead a Syrian migrant attempting to reach Europe as clashes grow following Turkey’s announcement that the border was “open.”

The Greek border is being besieged by thousands of migrants convinced they can reach EU welfare havens following Ankara’s decision to stand down. Following clashes that saw migrants pelt police with rocks and other objects, one victim was shot through the mouth and died at the scene.

 "Open war is upon you whether you would risk it nor not."  

I could use a week off

An enforced vacation from the gym:

Nella regione Lombardia e in provincia di Piacenza
In tali territori si applica altresì la misura della sospensione delle attività di palestre, centri sportivi, piscine, centri natatori, centri benessere, centri termali (fatta eccezione per l’erogazione delle prestazioni rientranti nei «livelli essenziali di assistenza»), centri culturali, centri sociali, centri ricreativi.

The schools are also closed through 8 March. Keep in mind that something like this is probably going to happen near you, sooner or later, if the situation in Washington is not unique.

The coronavirus has been circulating undetected and has possibly infected scores of people over the past six weeks in Washington state, according to a genetic analysis of virus samples that has sobering implications for the entire country amid heightening anxiety about the likely spread of the disease.

The researchers conducted genetic sequencing of two virus samples. One is from a patient who traveled from China to Snohomish County in mid-January and was the first person diagnosed with the disease in the United States. The other came from a recently diagnosed patient in the same county, a high school student with no travel-related or other known exposure to the coronavirus. The two samples look almost identical genetically, said Trevor Bedford, a computational biologist at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle who announced the results of the research on Twitter late Saturday night.

“This strongly suggests that there has been cryptic transmission in Washington State for the past 6 weeks,” Bedford wrote. “I believe we’re facing an already substantial outbreak in Washington State that was not detected until now due to narrow case definition requiring direct travel to China.”

Goodbye, Little Gay Pete

To absolutely no one's surprise, Little Gay Pete didn't make it to Super Tuesday.

Three people with knowledge of Buttigieg’s decision told The Associated Press he began informing campaign staff on Sunday. They were not authorized to speak publicly and requested anonymity. His campaign said Buttigieg will speak Sunday night in South Bend, Indiana.

I expect Warren is only sticking around in the hopes of a vice-presidential nomination. It's really down to Biden vs Sanders now; no one is going to support Bloomberg no matter how much Mini-Mike spends.

The truth about the Douma Report

Peter Hitchens helps two whistleblowers publicize their critique of the document that was used to justify US and British bombings in Syria:

The investigation report is a bait and switch tactic that creates the illusion of a report about a breach of confidentiality, when in fact it is little more than a public defence of the scientifically questioned Douma Report. Ironically, the defence, from a highly technical and scientific body, is not founded on science or logic, but on ad hominem attacks on two of its former inspectors, who had raised concerns about the scientifically indefensible manner in which the Douma investigation was conducted. It is classic ‘if you can’t get the ball, get the man’.

In another classic ruse, the Technical Secretariat tries to distract from the serious concerns of A and B, by trying to portray them as “individuals who could not accept that their views were not backed by evidence”. This is demonstrably false and conspicuously the report never says what those ‘views’ are supposed to have been. As a technical body the TS will be aware that inspections, verification, or investigations are never about ‘views’. Views are subjective by definition. They are not the currency of scientists and engineers who (should) only deal in facts, evidence and hypotheses.

It is about the suppression and cherry-picking of these facts and evidence, and the refusal to test alternative hypotheses, which is scientifically questionable, that Inspectors A and B have raised concerns with senior management. These concerns are not exclusive to A and B. Other inspectors involved in the Douma investigation have the same, but because of their contractual relationship with the Organisation are not free to raise them without fear of repercussion.

It's a brutally-effective fisking. As usual, the Official Story and the mainstream narrative are both false.

Extremists vs moderates

The Z-Man explains a pair of natural divides. I point out a third.

Michelle Malkin is a good example of why civic nationalism must inevitably lead to someone like Ben Shapiro lecturing you about the creedal nation. Her speech was pretty much what Ben Shapiro says, except she strongly opposes immigration and what she calls globalism. For obvious reasons, Malkin must argue on ideological grounds, rather than from nature. Her brand of dissident politics must be open to everyone, who accepts the ideological points of her program.

It’s one of those things that sounds good in theory, but in reality it is impossible to police ideological borders. The Left has been trying to solve that puzzle since the French Revolution and it always ends in disaster. The right-wing effort at it led to Buckley conservatism and eventually David French. For now, ideology and argument are the tools required to win people to our side, but ultimately the goal must be boundaries that do not require constant maintenance…

Listening to Fuentes speak, I was thinking about how this spasm of white identity politics has mirrored previous iterations. The alt-right split in two. One group is seeking to operate above ground and gain legitimacy. The other group retreated into a self-imposed ghetto. The TRS crowd is really just a younger version of the old Stormfront community that formed up after the Buchanan movement. Go back further and it is a replay of the Bircher-Buckley split.

Fundamentally, these splits are over presentation. The “optics” side cannot fathom why the hardcore cannot understand the need to make a good presentation. The hardcore cannot understand why the optics guys don’t see the dangers of compromise. Both sides are right, but both sides have always failed. The hardcore ends up in something similar to a cult and the optics guys get gobbled up by the system. There really needs to be a different approach to this in order to avoid a repeat of the past…

The reality is that every successful movement requires both its extremists and its moderates. See Sinn Fein and the Irish Republican Army, or the Palestine Zionist Executive and the Irgun. In this case, the core problem that the moderates face is that no matter how flawless their optics might be, their position simply isn't a viable one. Like communism, like socialism, like secular humanism, civic nationalism has been thoroughly tried and tested. And it has failed, even more spectacularly than these other ideological catastrophes.

Of course, the one thing the political activists of every stripe never seem to grasp is that the political philosophers simply aren't interested in activism of any kind. In my case, both the activists and their enemies alike fail to grasp that I'm neither interested in joining a cult nor in being gobbled up by the system. I'm not interested in joining anything, least of all a mass movement. There are no shortage of opinion leaders who seek attention and influence in pursuit of their ideals, and that is well and good, but there should always be someone to observe the events and make sense of them in a historical context too.

Those who venerate Aristotle, Virgil, and Thucydides are seldom inclined to follow the paths of Alexander, Caesar, and Alcibiades.

Creepy Joe claims the black vote

Diversity is coming back to bite the Democrats, hard. The South Carolina primary results:

48% Biden
19% Sanders
11% Steyer
08% Buttigieg
07% Warren
03% Klobuchar

Blacks simply will not vote either Sanders nor Bloomberg, which is why neither of them has a ghost of a chance against anyone in the general election, let alone the God-Emperor Donald Trump I.

Fake news about the fake pope

This would be almost Biblical if it were true:

The Vatican has confirmed in a statement that Pope Francis and two of his aides have tested positive for the novel Coronavirus. The three new cases add up to the over 400 cases confirmed in Italy under a week. Pope Francis missed a planned Mass with clergy in Rome yesterday after showing Coronavirus-like symptoms.

However, I haven't seen any mention of this in the Italian media or from the Vatican press office site, so I'm highly dubious.