Here’s a nice, short rant from Paul Chato (who I’d not heard of before) on why Disney’s social justice re-imagining of classic franchises fail: It’s not just their woeful ignorance of their own franchise, it’s the woeful ignorance of the vaster connected universe of fandom/geekdom/nerdom.
“The thing that really ties those of us who grew up reading comic books together is not the primary properties like Superman, Batman, Spider-man, or even Lord of the Rings, but the peripheral stuff or peripheral interests. When we talk to each other, we’ll also reference video games, anime, manga, computers, astronomy, network protocols, synthesizers, cars.”
Put a bunch of us nerds together, even complete strangers, into a room, well, Heaven help you, and soon we’ll be talking about Cowboy Bebop or Akira Kurosawa, or NES, Atari, ColecoVision, Ultraman, Kirby, Adams, McFarland, Studio Ghibli, second breakfasts, Plan 9 From Outer Space, Fireball XL5, Scooby-Doo, The Day The Earth Stood Still, Matrix (only the first one), Terminator, Blade Runner, Aliens, Herge, Miller, Robert E. Howard, Harryhausen, Lasseter, good scotch. Has anyone heard Kathleen Kennedy talk about any of those things? Of course not, and I can hear you laughing.
That’s a pretty good name check list, though I’d add Robert A. Heinlein and H. P. Lovecraft (among others).
But it’s an interesting point: Social justice showrunners are woefully ignorant of vast swathes of knowledge held by the fandoms they hold in such withering contempt.
Evidently it is the deepest desire of Democratic Party activists to turn the streets of American cities into needle-strewn wastelands of drug addicts openly shooting up and shitting on the street. Because that’s the results that the Democratic Party drug- and crime-tolerant policies create time and time again.
Here’s a video of the Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia.
“This is Kensington Philadelphia the center of America’s drug epidemic overrun with a drug known as tranq, a mixture of horse tranquilizer and Fentanyl that’s turning people there into real life zombies.”
Needles are everywhere on the streets, despite the remaining law-abiding occupants and shop owners sweeping them up in the morning.
“People come here from all over. They drive here and then they never leave. So everyone comes out here to get drugs. This is the hub, and you can shoot them up and cops wouldn’t do anything about it.”
“It’s crazy. You’ll see one block that looked clean, and then you go to the next block over: feces.”
“A new problem 24/7 gambling [machines]…they’re in every store.”
“Everyone’s using tranq.”
Even the drug addicts call frforom bringing the military in to clean up the place.
Unmentioned: Philadelphia’s DA is Larry Krasner, another George Soros-backed stooge. Vote for a Soros stooge, get 24/7 open air drug markets in your city, absolutely free!
The Ukrainian military has launched a long-anticipated counteroffensive against occupying Russian forces, opening a crucial phase in the war aimed at restoring Ukraine’s territorial sovereignty and preserving Western support in its fight against domination by Moscow.
Ukrainian troops, including specialized attack units armed with Western weapons and trained in NATO tactics, intensified their strikes on front-line positions in the country’s southeast on Wednesday night, according to four people in the country’s armed forces, beginning a significant push into Russian-occupied territory.
By “southeast” they mean “Zaporizhzhia,” where most observers have expected the main counteroffensive operational push to come.
Reasons for expressing some skepticism is the MSM source, but everyone has been expecting the counteroffensive to kick off for months. Another reason to assume the counter-offensive is real: Western armor has finally been definitively spotted among Ukrainian forces, including Leopard 2s, Bradleys and French AMX-10s.
“More worryingly was what we saw with the tactics of the armored group. Grouping vehicles closer together like that is just asking for trouble.” But Suchomimus notes we saw some stumbles like trhis at the beginning of the very successful Kherson offensive as well.
Independent journalist Wayne Dolcefino alleges that Lina Hidalgo’s hand-picked election coordinator Clifford Tatum deliberately shorted paper ballots to Republican precincts.
“If you’re a Democrat, you didn’t like the KHOU investigation that cites more than 120 locations that were under supplied with ballot paper, while millions of ballot sheets were available in a warehouse.”
Lots of precinct judges, of both parties, testified that locations ran out.
“It’s not just ballot paper problems. Election judges reported 119 polls, nearly 15%, that didn’t open up on time on election morning. Late in the day, a district judge ordered that polls stay open until 8 PM, but a lot of election judges either didn’t get the message, or didn’t care when they did. 64 polls closed at 7 PM even after the judge’s order.”
“It should force judge Hidalgo to release all remaining public records.”
Of course, she’s waging a lawsuit to prevent just that…
Russia is doing what it always does: Lying about its battlefield achievements. Recently they claimed to have taken out a Patriot missile defense system sent to Ukraine. YouTuber Suchomimus has looked into their claims by comparing them with several relevant satellite images of the site and determined: Not so much.
Update on “the May airstrike in which Russia claimed to have hit two Patriot SAM launchers: we’ve had some newly released satellite imagery which does show signs of damage at the air base in question. However, is not as it seems.”
Satellite images show that one of the two impact craters were present before the Patriot system was installed.
A time sequence shows that the other crater was not in any of the locations where newly dug emplacements showed where new Patriot equipment was stationed.
The U.S. admitted that a Patriot was damaged by the attack, very possibly from shrapnel, but that it was minor and quickly repaired. Satellite image analysis supports this claim.
“While these satellite images are interesting, and they do confirm an impact at the airport, they don’t show evidence of a destroyed Patriot.”
We’ve already covered why Russia’s T-14 Armata tank isn’t all that. Here’s a somewhat more balanced look from David Willey of The Tank Museum:
The first ten minutes covers the basics of Soviet tank design (the philosophy of favoring firepower over just about everything else, and how political rivalries led to various Soviet tank designs). Then he goes into the details of the Armata.
Much of the Armata comes from the abandoned T-95 project. “Although the T14 is looked at as new, it actually relies on systems and ideas from some much earlier projects.”
“The smoothbore 2A821M 125mm cannon is an upgrade from the weapon on the T-90. Russian sources claim its muzzle energy is far greater compared to the Rheinmetall 120mm gun.”
The unmanned turret means no need for a fume extractor.
Theoretical fire rate of 10-12 rounds a minute. I suspect this is highly optimistic and the fire rate is probably the slower one round every ten seconds we already covered.
“The new Vacuum One armor-piercing, fin-stabilized, discarding-sabot round is fitted with a 90cm [900mm] long rod penetrator. That’s unusually long. It is said to be capable of penetrating one meter of rolled homogeneous armor at about 2000 meters.” That is quite long. The rod penetrator on the U.S. M829 APFSDS round is 684mm long. Western consensus seems to be that the Vacuum One and Vacuum Two penetrator cores are made of depleted uranium or tungsten.
“The A853 engine was a copy of a German x-shaped engine from the war years…the A853 was not however a reliable product, and from all reports it seems to have had major issues.”
When working, it theoretically has twice the horsepower of a T-72 engine and capable of reaching 56 miles and hour with a range of 500 kilometers.
“The T14 has new 70 centimeter diameter road wheels, and an electronically adjustable suspension system on at least the first two road wheels, and possibly the last ones, and [that’s] called an active suspension system but is fitted over a main torsion bar suspension. It also has rubber-blocked tracks.”
The Armata’s sealed crew compartment will have air conditioning, which was introduced in Russian tanks with the T-90M in 2016. (Starting with M1A2 SEPv2, the Abrams has cooling, but it’s mainly geared toward cooling the electronics.)
Digital screens with remote cameras.
“The gunner can see his target, but he can also choose through those screens a relevant ammunition type.”
“The chassis and turret are equipped with a ‘Malachit’ dual explosive reactive armor system, and on the front sides and the top there’s stealth coatings.” Assuming the ERA is actually there and not fake, as on so many captured and destroyed Russian tanks in Ukraine.
“The active protection system has a radar to detect and tract incoming anti-tank munitions it states a maximum speed of incoming interceptable target is 1700 meters a second, or Mach 5.” Let’s just say I have grave doubts that it actually works. The Pentagon went with Israel’s Trophy active protection system over Raytheon’s homegrown Quick Kill system for M1A2 SEPv3, and Raytheon is good at developing reliable, high tech weapons. Unlike Russia.
“The top of the vehicle is still vulnerable to top attack munitions.” So much for defense against Javelin. Which first entered service in 1996.
“However, on closer inspection a number of these technologies and features are not fitted to some of the vehicles. Some you can see there’s covers where the technology or that piece of equipment should be on others is fitted for, but not with.” And that was on parade demonstration vehicles before sanctions. Odds that Russia would have enough parts to fully equip high tech parts to all Armatas supposedly in Ukraine would appear to be slim.
Though reusing a lot of features from the abandoned T-95 project, “the new T14 tank is a radical departure in sense of its scale, its layout, its design features and technology from that era of evolutionary Soviet-designed vehicles.”
“Originally intended to replace all Russian army tanks, the Russian military had planned to acquire about 2,300 T-14s between 2015 and 2020…but by 2018, delays were announced until at least 2025. Subsequently announcements indicated the apparent cancellation of the main production run.” In between it announced it was going to build 100 of them, though that number may have included other armored vehicles using the same platform.
“The [Russian] Deputy Minister of Defense said, quote, there is currently no need to mass produce the Armata when it’s older predecessors, namely the latest variants of the T-72, remain effective against American, German, and French counterparts.” Here the Deputy Minister of Defense is engaged in a time-honored Russian rhetorical device known as “lying his ass off.”
“The gradual tightening of sanctions, and then with the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the problem of sourcing the essential microelectronics has come to the fore. Russian industry has been critically dependent on foreign microelectronics and associated technologies. These are no longer available due to sanctions.”
“The sights from France and other components are no longer available.”
“Other issues come into play that affect the wider Russian defense industries. One is the perennial Russian problem of corruption. Since 2011, a staggering 72,000 officials have appeared before the course on corruption charges.”
“The mythic way many Russian military systems and products have been promoted and sold has met a crushing reality in Ukraine.”
Even though there may only be 20 test vehicles available, there is an expectation they will make appearance in the battle. A British ministry defense statement said, and I quote, any T-14 deployment is likely to be a high-risk decision for Russia. 11 years in development, the program has been dogged with delays reduction in planned Fleet size and reports of manufacturing problems. If Russia deploys a T-14 it will likely primarily be for propaganda purposes. Production is probably only in the low tens, while commanders are unlikely to
trust the vehicle in combat.
So even a balanced, objective analysis of the T-14 Armata isn’t particularly optimistic about its chances in combat.
Californians continue to flee the no-longer golden state, and many of them end up in Texas. ABC7 News in the bay area interviewed eight who fled as to why California dreaming has become a nightmare.
Some takeaways:
“In the span of two years, California’s population has dropped by more than a half million people.”
“I was assaulted twice on the BART.”
“I’ve never had a house this large in my life.”
“It is definitely a lower cost of living in Texas.”
“The home that I once remembered and knew back in the 1980s and the 1990s, a lot of that’s gone now.”
“Home prices are lower [in Texas], and there’s plenty of job opportunities.”
The former mayor of Ventura, CA moved to Texas in 2014. “One of the things I greatly fear about Venture and elsewhere in coastal California is that it’s not a place for everybody anymore, and especially not a place for young families. It’s a place basically where older, affluent people now live. And I think something has really been lost there.”
“Home prices in Texas cost less than half of homes in California. U.S. Census Bureau numbers show that the middle and lower classes are leaving California at a higher rate than the wealthy.”
“Many who have left in recent years say they simply couldn’t afford to stay.”
A mother with six kids says it’s simply impossible to afford a house large enough in California. “I feel like the California Dream was the American Dream in my grandparents’ and parents’ era. That’s just not possible for our generation to live that American Dream in that state anymore. It’s so expensive that you’re struggling every month just to get by and pay your rent and your mortgage and put food on the table.”
Food truck owner: “The reason why I left California, honestly, is just the cost. The cost of living, the cost of running a business, regulations.”
Mention of the Move to Texas Facebook group for Californians looking to get the hell out of their failing state.
“Some people are moving to Texas because of their conservative values.”
” It seems that the environment, politically in California, has just been a one-party rule. Republicans have done absolutely nothing to change anything in any way, it seems to me. They’ve been cowardly about it.”
“It’s very sad in Contra Costa County. You can’t even be conservative. You kinda have to hide if you’re conservative almost.”
Man whose family moved to California from South Korea in the 1970s: “Unfortunately my parent’s grocery stores were burned down in the L.A. riots, two of them, near Koreatown. And so that was, you know, quite a traumatic experience for my family.”
“I definitely think [California] is mismanaged. We moved primarily because of the crime. And, for me, it was not only the crime but also, you know, the amount of homelessness, needles. I was assaulted twice on the BART. Those particular assaults I really do think it had to do with the same kind of violence that I saw in the Bay Area towards Asian Americans.”
“I miss the ocean but not enough to move back.”
What would it take to move back to California? “Number one, the whole state would have to clean up. Get some of those rotten politicians. Be tough on crime again, like you should. People’s attitudes would just have to change. But for the most part, I really am happy here.”
“My commute is seven minutes to work.”
“Yeah, we definitely have not even contemplated moving back. We are just really happy out here.”
One party Democratic rule has hollowed out the state of California, and the people Democrats used to claim to represent (the working poor and the middle class) are the ones most harmed by the graft, corruption, incompetence, and radical social justice-engendered spiraling crime rates.
Until that changes, expect people to continue to flee California.
To be a black, Hispanic female, social justice warrior professor is to sit pretty close to the top of the victimhood pyramid. (She just needs be a disabled lesbian to hit for the cycle.) Given those exalted victimhood credentials, you have to wonder: How bad would her transgression have to be to get her fired?
The manic Manhattan college professor who threatened a Post reporter with a machete has been fired, the school said Tuesday — as it emerged she is suing the NYPD for allegedly abusing her during the 2020 George Floyd protests.
Shellyne Rodriguez was sacked by Hunter College just hours after the adjunct professor was caught on camera holding the blade to the veteran reporter’s neck while threatening to “chop” him up outside her Bronx apartment.
“Hunter College strongly condemns the unacceptable actions of Shellyne Rodriguez and has taken immediate action,” school spokesman Vince Dimiceli told The Post.
“Rodriguez has been relieved of her duties at Hunter College effective immediately, and will not be returning to teach at the school.”
The unhinged art professor wielded the machete and spewed the menacing remarks after the veteran Postie approached her regarding a viral video that showed her flipping out on pro-life students at Hunter College earlier this month.
So evidently the line is holding a bladed weapon at someone’s throat.
This is some curious news. Evidently members of anti-Putin Russia militias the Russian Volunteers Corps or the Freedom for Russia Legion has evidently invaded the border town of Kazinka in Belgorod, Russia, with forces that evidently included at least one tank:
The governor of Russia’s Belgorod region said on Monday that a Ukrainian army ‘sabotage group’ had entered Russian territory in the Graivoron district, which borders Ukraine.
In a statement on Telegram, Vyacheslav Gladkov said that the Russian army and security forces were taking measures to repel the incursion.
Earlier, the Telegram channel Baza, which is linked to Russia’s security services, had published footage apparently showing a Ukrainian tank attacking a Russian border post.
It’s a curious story that probably deserves considerable caution in drawing conclusions. False flag operation? Ukraine-backed distraction designed to force Russia to draw troops away from other regions in advance of Ukraine’s anticipated counteroffensive? Who knows? It seems a bit of a sideshow at this point.
The one thing I wouldn’t expect is for this to be part of a broader anti-Putin uprising by Russians tired of the madness of his disasterous war. That would be too convenient, and we would be far more likely to see evidence of that in Chechnya or Moscow than along the Ukraine border.
That makes me feel that it’s more likely this is a false flag operation to give Putin the excuse to use tactical nukes on the pretext that Ukraine had captured some. But I’m a cynical sort…
Remember the U.S. Army’s Next Generation Squad Weapon, AKA the XM-5, AKA the XM-7, AKA 6.8 x 51mm? Brandon Herrera has managed to get Sig Saur to send him the prototype of the new weapon (the Sig Spear) to test, and…he has some reservations.
The caveat here is that this is not an actual 6.8 x 51mm XM-7, it’s chambered in 308 Winchester/7.62 x 51mm (two calibers that are extremely close but not exactly the same), so the ballistics and operation are likely to be slightly different. (To make matters worse, the civilian version of the round is being marketed as 277 Fury. As far as I can tell from looking at Gunbroker, 277 Fury ammunition is available now, but models of the Sig Sauer MCX Spear chambered for the round aren’t yet on the civilian market.)
Pros:
Short stroke piston doesn’t need a buffer tube, meaning that the gun can have a folding stock. “Actually pretty cool.”
Decent trigger.
“This little right side bolt release here. Kind of a fan. Feels a little flimsy, but I like the placement.”
Left side fold-out charging handle is good.
“Hand guard here offers a lot of space to mount whatever shit you want.”
Two gas settings.
Silencer works (even if not hearing-safe quality).
Likes the flat dark earth (FDE) finish. “In my opinion, it’s a pretty sweet looking gun.”
“Gun recoil impulse not bad.”
“Running it suppressed it’s not that gassy.”
Very reliable, at least over the initial 200 rounds.
The cons:
“It’s fucking heavy, dude!…Unloaded it comes in at 8.9 pounds. For reference that is one full pound, or 13% heavier, than a full-size SCAR 17, which is also a semi-automatic 308 with a 20 round magazine.”
Folding aside, the stock isn’t great and wants to slip.
“This charging handle in the back is borderline fucking unusable. It feels, really flimsy, like I feel like I’m gonna fucking break it. And it’s stiff. It is so
fucking stiff! ‘How stiff is it, Brandon?’ Joe Biden in a room full of school kids.”
Potentially the biggest combat problem: Overinsertion of the magazine. “If you put too much force on the magazine when you’re inserting it, you will actually run up past the magazine release and get the weapon jammed.” Yeah, that sounds like a huge problem, and Sig needs to get that fixed ASAP.
The spring is a bit hard to get back in.
Super expensive right now.
From the comments on the video: “The fact that he’s actually able to unironically hold up a Scar 17 as a lighter, more affordable option is just batshit insane.”
Yeah, looks like Sig needs some more work here before it’s ready to field…
