Monthly Archives: January 2026

Governor Walz (D-MN) just announced he’s not running for re-election, which would be his third term, so once again Minnesota will not have a three-peat governor.

I’ve been wondering if Walz was going to be stubborn and drag down the Minnesota Democrats, as while I doubt there was an intent to permit the crimes, it has become big enough to suggest a failure to manage effectively. By exiting the race, voters can vote for whoever wins the primary. Lt Governor Flanagan (D-MN), currently running for Senator Smith’s (D-MN) seat, might consider running for the governor’s seat, which may be more attainable.

We shall see.

Long-term readers will remember the prediction that the Republicans would accelerate right as they fight to move up the social prestige ladder of the conservatives. Because the right has been successfully trained to consider purity golden and compromise loathesome, the ambitious, arrogant gits on the right would have de facto contests to show who is most pure and, thus, claim for themselves a golden calf to sit upon.

Yes, I did write golden calf, and that’s to emphasize the role the clerics have played in relentlessly telling their base that the Divine is on their side, even though he doesn’t speak to them, and, of course, Neither the clerics nor the base can be wrong. As Senator Goldwater (R-AZ) said back when I was a kid (the 1960s):

Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the [Republican] party, and they’re sure trying to do so, it’s going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can’t and won’t compromise. I know, I’ve tried to deal with them.

Back on point, here’s the latest subject of a right-winger trying to move up the right-wing social ladder through a demonstration of purity:

In case this X post disappears:

BREAKING – Streamer Asmongold says the Somalian fraud is far larger than just arresting a few Somalians, that entire families must be denaturalized and deported, and that the officials who allowed it to happen must face treason and capital punishment charges or he is done voting.

Followed by a stream from ‘Asmongold,’ aka Zack Hoyt. I didn’t actually listen to the stream, as the summary seems enough for me. Ja’han Jones of MS NOW contributes this:

“If JD Vance does not push for treason with capital punishment against Tim Walz, do not vote for him,” [Hoyt] said. “If Trump does not deliver that, do not vote for him. Unless the most extreme, dramatic, brutal, aggressive option is on the table, I’m staying home.”

Elon Musk joined in, as did others, according to Jones.

Where does this go now? Well, it’s up to the conservative base. If they desert Hoyt, rejecting him as the power-hungry fool he appears to be, then we may be on our way back to sanity. That base is already suffering shocks from President Trump’s tariffs, foreign wars, deeply embarrassing Cabinet, and the symptoms of dementia he puts on display every day. Calls for capital punishment for failing to prevent fraud is so utterly ridiculous that they should reject it, and those who call for it.

But they may cling to their allegiances, because falling down the social prestige ladder is a real blow to the ego. What I see as a truly shattering blow to the plausibility of Trump and MAGA may not be enough drive them away just yet. If so, I fear we’ll be seeing more wild-eyed propositions from idiots.

Sheesh.

… it is known, for example, that hurricanes tend to kill more people if they have feminine names, because they are perceived as less dangerous, meaning people are less likely to take adequate precautions. [“Why do we feel the need to humanise everything, from dogs to cars?“, Elle Hunt in a book review, NewScientist (27 December 2025, paywall)]

I suppose if we labeled them with numbers some folks would think that’s a severity rating; animal names, danger ratings; etc. Our tendency to look for hierarchies here in the West is either inborn or a product of society.

And does it really need a re-think?

When it comes to the United States kidnapping of Venezuelan leader Maduro, which I look at as simply one bad guy knocking off another bad guy, I’m starting to see flags that my thought that this is a distraction from the Epstein Files is true.

The lack of details about what comes next led some U.S. officials to question why there was no detailed plan in place well before deposing Maduro. [Wall Street Journal/MSN]

While extremists on the right apparently do not plan much, this report is also congruent with a panicky attempt to distract from the Epstein Files. And I see Senator Murphy agrees:

This is about satisfying Trump’s vanity, making good on the long-standing neoconservative grudge against Maduro, enriching Trump’s oil industry backers, and distracting voters from Epstein and rising costs.

Assuming the email is authentic, of course.

In case you’ve run across one or more articles claiming fascism can’t be stopped once it’s underway, Daily Kos‘ GoodNewsRoundup has a diary entry purporting to refute the claim. I’d seen, but not read, one or two such claims on DK of late, but the author struck me as new, so I hadn’t paid much attention; GoodNewsRoundup’s article I skimmed. If you’re alarmed or depressed, this might serve to lift you out of a hole. Money quote:

Someone reposted an old post on here arguing that no one has ever stopped fascism.

Good lord. How is that helpful?

Or at all true?

It is useless and inaccurate doomerism.

I am dismayed and disappointed to see, this morning, that we’ve invaded Venezuela overnight. A lot can be said about this, from both news and opinion perspectives, but here I’ll address the three issues that came immediately to mind on hearing that the United States and its government is making a horse’s ass of itself.

1. The putative problem for which this action is promulgated is not effectively addressed in my mind. We’re talking supply and demand, the supply of drugs, allegedly, by Venezuela in order to satisfy demand, the demand of American consumers, who continue to self-administer recreational drugs which consume their time, their minds, their families, and their wealth. Stipulating to Venezuelan drugs, destroying Venezuelan drugs does not destroy American demand; they’ll just switch to, say, Honduran drugs, or Chilean drugs. American demand is not caused by the presence of drugs, foreign or domestic. At this juncture, the common continuation might be A defect in American society causes American demand, but that suggests it’s a fixable problem, and I am unconvinced of the possibility. I think it’s a byproduct of how we run our society, an inevitable byproduct, and fixing it might cause a different problem involving excess timidity. Or perhaps not, it’s a difficult question.
2. Venezuelan President Maduro simply did not properly manage President Trump. Readers should remember Juan Orlando Hernández, former President of Honduras, who, being convicted in an American court of drug smuggling, was pardoned by President Trump in November of last year. GovFacts suggests this was a reward for supporting Trump’s recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital in 2021, and for signing an Asylum Cooperative Agreement. GovFacts also suggests Trump’s fear of leftist governments motivated this action, in combination with a recent Honduras Presidential election and a dismayed National Party (conservative); I should not doubt that some dollars from Hernández were also involved. Maduro should have arranged to support Trump, making it difficult for Trump to use the justification of drug smuggling, an unproven accusation, for attacking Venezuela, even if the Venezuelan nationalization of the oil  industry (1976) is of overwhelming importance to the Republicans, who are still outraged at the Cuban nationalization of various American properties in Cuba.
3. How long will Trump hide behind Venezuela in order to avoid the Epstein Files issue? Historians must be licking their lips.

Whatever else I think, this’ll have knock-on effects for years to come, and that those may be unmanageable is what President Trump and his minions don’t get, an inevitable conclusion in light of issue #1, above. Confusing supply and demand is a simple mistake that should not have been made, and that they did….

Well, the future should be fascinating, but dreadful if you’re Venezuelan.

Doc, I can tell you just ate a popsicle.

Hands of a Murderer (1990) is an odd case. A good, twisted story from the Sherlock Holmes extended canon, by which I mean no source story by Doyle himself; technical aspects of the movie seem to lack nothing; brother Mycroft appears in what seems an authentic and substantial role, which I enjoyed; Professor Moriarty is in a critical role; and, yet, I saw it a week or two ago and am finding I have to view it again to compose this review.

Perhaps it is the presence of what many consider magic: hypnosis. In a series popularized by an adherence to close observation and application of logic, the power of hypnosis, magnified as it is in this story, bypasses logic and enables the story while obscuring audience deduction.

Or it may be that the semi-regular character of Inspector Lestrade is played as a buffoon, and an annoying buffoon at that. It’s one thing to be outclassed by an outré mystery, but when mystified that a lack of dust in an empty house means anything, one has to wonder how this Inspector earned the description … the pick of a bad lot.

Another source of irritation is that of the character Sophie DeVere, possibly a Baroness, who has sunk into the depths of evil and has a romantic fascination with Professor Moriarty. An inquiry is forced into either point: evil requires a monstrous ego and arrogance that often denies romantic fascination with others.

Colonel Gould, too, falls into the magical category in that too little is known of him to predict his later actions. He is … convenient to the storytellers.

In the end, it’s simply too twisted, with too little logic, to fix one’s attention. It’s not awful, or even bad. But for many viewers, it will not reach the established standards.

The hand continues to heal, and normal typing may soon be possible. Back to work on Monday.

In other news, I’ve taken up Mystery and Manners, a collection of odd bits of prose by the late Flannery O’Connor. I had read her novel, The Violent Bear It Away, years ago, but either forgot her gift for writing a simple sentence that affects all out of scale, or she does not employ that talent in her fiction. I am fascinated, whatever might be the case.

If my readers decide my prose has improved, credit Miss O’Connor and not myself. If no improvement is discernible, credit my chronically disordered mind.

Seen in MSN/Newsweek:

A former Iranian Air Force pilot on Thursday urged those in the country’s military to safeguard Iranian citizens and not the interests of the government, as protests turned deadly.

In a video shared by Reza Pahlavi, the exiled crown prince of Iran, Colonel Fereydoun Ezzedasti said that while he wore a military uniform many years ago, his service never ended.

“A soldier is responsible for safeguarding the life, security and honor of his own nation until his last breath,” Ezzedasti said in the clip. “Today, the noble nation of Iran, weary yet steadfast, has pinned its hopes on you. You have donned this uniform to defend your fellow countrymen; not to suppress them.”

The video message came as protests erupted across Iran over a failing economy, with Iranian forces seeking to end the unrest, while President Masoud Pezeshkian said earlier Thursday that officials needed to listen to the concerns of Iranians or face going to hell.

All year, Iran has not been covered on the front page by the American press unless it’s a military target of the Administration, until yesterday, when CNN began noting uproar in Tehran. I’ve been seeing reports of a water shortage, political repression, and economic degradation for years.

It’s the latter issue that’ll trigger the Administration to proclaim it as a Trumpian accomplishment, strutting about with their chests prominent due to the military strike on Iranian nuclear sites this year, but the truth of the matter is that multiple Administrations have contributed to the suppression of the toxic Iranian regime which may now be collapsing. Call it all softening it up.

Whether this means the restoration of the monarchy or some sort of democracy is unclear, and I have no idea of the preferences of the Iranian people.

Me staring at You staring at Her. Uh oh.

The Magic Flute (2022) is based on the opera of the same name, but it is not presented in the same way. Instead, we follow the story of Tim Walker, British music student, who is sent to a legendary music school in Switzerland, where they apparently speak American English, called … I forget. Not important.

He encounters various students, barely sketched in, the headmaster, and a magical book case that, properly cued, spirits him away to … the land of The Magic Flute.

And Tim is now Prince Tamino.

This has the flavor of a Harry Potter movie, an inevitability given the trope of heading out of town for school, but a little work will push it to the rear and let you decide if the presentation of The Magic Flute, with which I had no experience, is to your taste or not.

I enjoyed it, even as I was given to understand it was fragmentary. It could have been better, as certain characters seemed wasted, but it remained fun.

I don’t know if the numbers are true, but this can be disturbing:

The AI bubble will pop, and take the economy down with it.

— LisaLisa (@lisalisa42.bsky.social) 2025-12-27T05:13:09.930Z

Which makes the numbers for the Trump economy, as we label this composite and heterogenuous effort, suspect and opaque. But is it true?

Michelle Singletary tangentially confirms:

This movie was an excuse for showing off captive polar bears, wasn’t it?

Cthulhu (2007) gets off to a good start as young history professor Dannie Marsh returns home to a small town in Oregon to bury his mother and not begin the process of re-establishing ties with his family. It’s the year of big, clunky AT&T phones, and so his homosexuality doesn’t play well in the town.

But father and cult leader Rev Marsh is convinced Dannie, his son, is the key to eternal life, and this isn’t the Christian eternal life, either. From here the movie begins to drain off into the usual dips of the horror genre into the river of irrationality and magic, and, for someone like me, the movie becomes a crime, a duty to finish but not enjoy. There’s not even a Cthulhu to enjoy. Too bad, there was a bit of scenery-chewing, but the acting wasn’t too bad.

But I must admit that, at some point, I figured it was time to call in Hellboy to settle the situation. Cross-referencing to another, unrelated story is not a good sign.

In the end, at least for me, this was a waste of time. May it not be for you.

Exclaustration:

In the canon law of the Catholic Church, exclaustration is the official authorization for a member of a religious order (known as a religious) bound by perpetual vows to live for a limited time outside their religious institute, usually with a view to discerning whether to depart definitively. [Wikipedia]

Noted in the video The legendary ‘miracle’ rings of Ourense, by the BBC.

As Bitcoin labors under the shadow of $TRUMP, the year comes to an end. Here’s the 1 year chart from CoinMarketCap:

That’s about a 30% drop from high to today, and volatility not really viable for a currency-pretender, especially over 2-3 months. I remain skeptical of Bitcoin’s long-term viability.