URLs du Jour

2018-12-26

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Hope everyone had as nice a Christmas as I did. Now back to our regularly scheduled content…

  • At NR, Kevin D. Williamson has (NRPlus, sorry) advice for Mark Zuckerberg & Facebook.

    ‘Out of control” is how Senator Brian Schatz (D., Hawaii) describes Facebook.

    If only that were true. It would be an enormous improvement.

    Facebook was everybody’s favorite thing in the world five minutes ago. It isn’t any more. Democrats have decided to blame Facebook for the election of Donald Trump, as though Mark Zuckerberg were the one who advised Herself to take Wisconsin and Pennsylvania for granted. The alternative — that Donald Trump was freely elected president of these United States because a great many Americans preferred him to that dusty sack of vipers the Democrats nominated — is too terrible to contemplate. Must have been some kind of high-tech conspiracy involving Facebook, the Kremlin, and a bunch of knuckleheads who talk like characters from early drafts of Glengarry Glen Ross.

    Kevin also takes a look at the gathering outrage against Dolce & Gabbana, of which I was unaware, but is easy to Google. But the actual point is what Senator Schatz implicitly implied: he would prefer….

    Out of control? The alternative is to be under control. Whose control? Have a gander at Senator Schatz’s curriculum vitae: It’s a miracle that he ever negotiated the chasm between Pomona College and a hot meal. He held a series of low-level nonprofit jobs before entering what we now euphemistically call “public service.” He’s a hack who makes Barack Obama’s pre–White House résumé look like Dwight Eisenhower’s. If the alternative to being out of control is being under the soft little thumb of a nobody like that, then out of control is where it’s at.

    I wonder if Kevin has a novel in him? Something in the niche of Atlas Shrugged without the hit-me-over-the-head lecturing?


  • One problem with the Google LFOD News Alert is that it mindessly beeps whenever someone out there writes a story where the fourth movie in the Die Hard series is mentioned. I should really get around to tweaking that search string…

    But today brings a host of McClane-free LFOD stories. First up is from a site run by one Brian Dunn, "Rogue Media Labs", and he has a bone to pick with "Citizens Count": Citizens Count Caught Censoring Online Political Commentary.

    If you’ve read my biography under the editors section here on this website you would see that I included a sentence or two about being a featured author on the New Hampshire based political website Citizens Count, formerly known as The Live Free or Die Alliance. Admittedly, after attempting to flee the country and move to the Bahamas this April, I havedn’t checked in lately. But today I decided to stop by and post my first comment in nearly 8 months, only to have it immediately deleted off the web page entirely.

    Interestingly enough, I couldn’t help but notice that Citizens Count has also had their official Facebook verification badge removed/revoked since the last time I visited, suspectedly because of this very behavior. In retrospect, it was probably even a worse idea to delete my comment, the comment of a verified news website owner, because now I am going to throw a mini hissy fit about it and start writing a story about it. If they are lucky, I may even pay to boost it throughout New Hampshire – lulz.

    While the message has since been deleted, I had wrote [sic] about why I stepped away from the website for so long. Explaining that I was forced to apply for political asylum in two countries after being endlessly persecuted by liberal extremists and corrupt police officers in Henniker, NH. Adding that I am now more focused than ever because of the experience, and now have every intention of coming for every single one of these peoples jobs in the future. If Citizens Count has any doubts as to the validity of my statements, I invite them to ask the US Federal Bureau of Investigation. In written statements on record, under penalty of perjury, I was willing to testify how the Henniker Police force was a corrupt and nepotists police department, full of officers whom refused to do their jobs or arrest people if it involved personal friends or family – statements I also re-affirmed with International Police in Lyon, France, also on record, earlier this summer.

    "Citizens Count? What, up to ten?"

    Anyway, the Citizens Count site is officially non-partisan with a healthy array of corporate sponsors. (Try to find out who's actually running things—I couldn't.)

    I can't imagine why they might not want to be associated with a guy who attempted to "flee the country".


  • But LFOD makes it's way into places far away from Henniker. The (UK) Independent features a story of African unrest by Borzou Daragahi: Anger at price of bread explodes into nationwide protests in Sudan.

    Protests in Sudan that began last week over bread prices have mushroomed into a nationwide protests against the nearly three-decade rule regime of Omar al-Bashir, the country’s 76-year-old autocrat.

    At least 22 people have reportedly died in the protests, which began 19 December in the northern Nile River city of Atbara, but have since spread to the capital, Khartoum, 350 kilometres to the southwest, and across the country.

    Well, that's rough. What about LFOD? Ah:

    “Down, down with military rule,” they demand. "We either live free or die like real men."

    Sudan currently ranks number 157 (of 162) on Cato's Human Freedom Index. It's tough not to sympathize.


  • Back here at home, I detect a shade of wimpiness in this Union Leader article: 2018 saw most traffic fatalities in 13 years.

    With some of the busiest holiday travel days still to come, 2018 has become the deadliest year on New Hampshire’s roadways in more than a decade.

    As of Thursday, there had been 128 crashes causing 141 deaths, according to Department of Safety data. That was up 36 and 44 percent, respectively, from last year, when there were 92 crashes and 97 deaths.

    And the year's not over yet! So we still have a shot at breaking the 2005 record.

    With Democrats in firm legislative control, you can see what's coming down the [turn]pike:

    The state Legislature has rebuffed several attempts by advocates to pass a seatbelt law, most recently last year.

    The bill, proposed by Rep. Mary Jane Mulligan, D-Hanover, didn’t make it out of the House Transportation Committee. Opponents testified that 1 percent of traffic deaths in the nation can be attributed to seatbelts — usually when a car catches fire or is submerged in water — and that a statewide mandate would impinge on Granite Staters’ right to live free or die.

    Hedegard said that Buckle Up New Hampshire, a coalition of seatbelt advocates, plans to spend 2019 educating the new crop of lawmakers with the intention of introducing seatbelt legislation in 2020.

    I, for one, will not rest until our state mandates that all drivers wear motorcycle helmets and full-body bubble wrap.


  • And Conservative Daily News asks the musical question: Is auto insurance mandatory?. Depends where you live, bunkie.

    However, there is currently one state, with its ‘live free or die’ attitude, that feels it doesn’t need this mandatory auto insurance for all drivers- the New Hampshire state. In this state, the only thing that driver are required to do is to justify that they have the ability to compensate for any damages that occur from an accident and they are found responsible. The drivers who decide not to purchase car insurance policy in this state must pay cash or post a bond that is equivalent to the cost of damage caused during the accident. Drivers responsible of an accident in this state pay for the damages of up to $25k for property damage and $50K for liability. In case the driver is unable to compensate or pay for these damages, their registrations and driver’s licenses may be suspended.

    I'm a LFOD fan, but I'm also a fan of Flo. Despite her employer's name.


Last Modified 2024-01-24 11:52 AM EDT