In The Shadow Of Mt Hollywood

There are no UFOs. The whole planet has cell phones the last ten years and all these supposed sightings disappeared. — Tim Dalton (@thor988835) April 29, 2026 So Trump has confirmed that UFO files are soon to be released, while a guy named Tim Dalton posts trenchant remarks saying no such thing as UFOs. A more extended version of Dalton's reasoning appeared in The New Yorker a couple of years ago: In February, 2023, photographs of a Chinese spy balloon over Billings, Montana, prompted speculation about aliens. The Air Force eventually shot it down, but first the pilot of an American U-2 spy plane flew past and took a selfie that showed the balloon out the window. “You can see it in exquisite detail,” [University of Rochester astrophysicist Adam] Frank told me. “Where are all those pictures? Every U.F.O. picture is a fuzzy blob. Everybody carries a high-resolution camera in their pocket now, and it’s always fuzzy blobs.” I've noted here in the past that since the age o...

Once I began to read reactions to Comey's new indictment for posting his "8647" shot, it occurred to me once again that everyone's missing the point -- the same point they missed after Charlie Kirk's assassination. I said here at that time, regarding the people who were fired for indecorous remarks celebrating that incident: Merriam-Webster defines "decoerum" as "agreement with accepted standards of conduct". In light of the remarkable rash of suspensions and terminations being visited on people who publicly celebrate Charlie Kirk's assassination, some people like intellectual welterweight Glenn Reynolds are saying, "I mave doubts about these firings. . . . The courts can sort it out later, just like they did (sometimes) when so many people on the right were being cancelled." He concludes maybe the courts will sort it out -- well, he's a law professor. But this isn't really a legal issue. What's happening i...

STOP IT!!!🤣🤣🤣 pic.twitter.com/XbW9BYbIKJ — il Donaldo Trumpo (@PapiTrumpo) April 27, 2026 Here's what The Mew York Times thinks important about the King's visit : One meeting that appears to be absent from King Charles III’s carefully planned schedule in the United States this week is any reunion with Prince Harry. On a four-day state visit intended in part to repair bruised U.S.-British relations, Charles’s itinerary currently includes no plans to see Harry, his 41-year-old son, who lives in California with his wife, Meghan, and their two children. Buckingham Palace officials declined to comment when asked whether the king and his younger son would meet. Charles and Queen Camilla are scheduled to be in Washington on Tuesday and New York on Wednesday before departing on Thursday. Fox News sees things more clearly : Trump has expressed frustration with Britain’s refusal to fully join the U.S. campaign against Iran, and has urged U.S. allies to get involved...

I'm intrigued about what's coming out on the "Hinckley Hilton" shooter, Cole Tomas Allen, and the Butler, PA shoter, Thomas Crooks. Both seem to have been quiet and unassuming, both were good students, but their families had been worried about them and their apparent relationship with firearms. Nevertheless, that both would wind up attempted presidential assassins came as a surprise to friends and employers. Regarding Crooks, according to Wikipedia , One investigation only found a "lunch detention in middle school for chewing gum" as bad behavior growing up. He joined the National Technical Honor Society in 2021 while a junior in high school. In 2022, he graduated Bethel Park High School with high honors and won a $500 "star award" from the National Math and Science Initiative. Crooks earned a score of 1530 out of 1600 on the SAT, as well as perfect grades on three Advanced Placement exams. Classmates and school officials characterized h...

Here's what Rowan Williams said about the "grooming gangs," in a recent piece for The Guardian. You'll note, first of all, that he put the phrase in scare quotes, because, of course, he doesn't really believe there actually are organised groups of Muslim men deliberately… https://t.co/6CXZhMfa4K pic.twitter.com/W8h9O03Q1A — RAW EGG NATIONALIST (@Babygravy9) April 17, 2026 Now and then, most recently here and here , I've reviewed the late 19th century idea that the best strategy to counter the threat of world proletarian revolution was to temporize with working-class demands, but nevertheless gradually capitulate to them. This was a product almost exclusively of the UK bourgeoisie. According to Wikipedia , As one of the founding organisations of the Labour Representation Committee in 1900, and as an important influence upon the Labour Party which grew from it, the Fabian Society has strongly influenced British politics. A few figures closely a...

Spielberg's 1981 film Raiders of the Lost Ark poses what amounts to a thought experiment that's at its basis not too much different from the one Rabbi Pesach Wolicki poses in the YouTube presentation I've discusssed over the past two days: it boils down to the question of what we would do if the Old Testament history and prophecies turned out to be more than just a collection of comfortable fairy tales; instead, they have some bearing on current events. Wolicki argues that the Old Testament contains numerous prophecies that the nation of Israel will be restored. Chrome AI Mode gives this summnary: Deuteronomy 30:3–5 Return from scattering to the ancestral land; Isaiah 11:11–12 Global regathering from the four corners of the earth; Jeremiah 31:31–34 Establishment of a New Covenant and spiritual renewal; Ezekiel 37:1–14 National resurrection (Valley of Dry Bones); and Amos 9:14–15 Permanent restoration and rebuilding of ruined cities. The issue Wolicki raises is simple:...

I'm continuing to discuss Rabbi Wolicki's arguments against the traddy (mostly) Catholic anti-Zionists, which I started yesterday. I've embedded the same video above, but I'll be talking about the second half of it, which begins at 6:51. I used to teach rhetoric over 50 years ago, and his argument here is one of the best pieces I've ever seen. I admire it simply as an astonishingly good argument, separate from its subject matter, which I also find compelling. It's reminiscent of Aquinas, in that it spends a great deal of time considering opposing arguments, but it doesn't follow Aquinas's formal stucture. Beginning at 6:51, he summarizes the position he's taken in the first half of his argument, in which he agrees with the contemporary position of the Catholic Church, "that the Jews are participants in God's salvation is theologically unquestionable. How can that be possible? . . . How that can be possible remains an unfathomable divine ...

Lately I've been following US-born Israeli Orthodox Rabbi Pesach Wolicki, because he puts me onto new trains of thought that take off from issues that have been sitting at the back of my head for a while. In the video embedded above, he offers some insights into traddy Catholics that I'd been wondering about myself -- now, he has no opinion on the Latin mass; he's into Hebrew. He doesn't care if you receive the sacrament kneeling or standing, in the hand or on the tongue; the sacraments aren't his thing. But he brings up a strain of opinion that he attributes not to Catholic leadership, but more exclusively to traditionalist Catholics: What you're hearing more and more are claims that the Jews of today aren't really the Jews, that the state of Israel has no significance, and of course, from those same circles and in the same conversations, attacks on Christian Zionism and calling it a kind of heresy. And this is a very serious issue, and it points ...

I've been saying for the past few days that the US-born Israeli Orthodox rabbi Pesach Wolicki has some of the best insights into the issues surrounding the Iran war. Here's what he had to say yesterday about the off-again on-again negotiations in Pakistan: At 19:50: They're trying to create uncertainty, to slow down the US decisionmaking. . . . Donald Trump is driving them nuts because of how fast he moves. He gives an ultimatum, and it's just like 48 hours or a couple days, or, you know, a short ceasefire, two weeks, negotiate, come to the table, you don't come to the table, boom. Open the Straits of hormuz. Oh, you didn't open them? Boom, blockade. . . . It completely counteracts their usual strategy, Westerners are usually so easy for them to deal with. They just drag things out, and they have another summit meeting and another negotiation in a different European city, and the American diplomats love that, getting on planes and being negotiators. And...

From Alan Dershowitz in yesterday's Wall Street Journal : I am a lifelong Democrat. I started campaigning for the party’s local candidates as a teenager in Brooklyn, N.Y., have been a registered Democrat for 67 years, made speeches for John F. Kennedy as a college student, and can count on one hand the number of Republicans I’ve ever supported for any office. I still disagree strongly with the GOP on abortion, the separation of church and state, immigration, healthcare and taxes, among other things. Yet I’ve decided to bite the bullet and register as a Republican. . . . I intend to work hard to prevent the Democrats from gaining control of the House and Senate, and I urge those who share my concerns about the increasing influence of radicalism in the Democratic Party to vote, campaign and contribute for continued Republican control of Congress. I will contribute money to Republican candidates, campaign for them, make speeches at Republican events, and urge pro-Israel A...

Via the New York Post (which also carried the diagram above): The deaths or disappearances of 11 top US scientists and researchers is a matter of urgent national importance, a member of the House Oversight Committee insisted Friday. Rep. Eric Burlison (R-Mo.) said his office had already been eyeing some of the “too coincidental” disappearances a year before President Trump told reporters Thursday that he had ordered an investigation. The lawmaker argued the fate of the scientists is almost “certainly” linked to the access some had to classified aerospace, defense and UFO information — and may involve bad actors from China, Russia or Iran. Why stop there? I'd be looking at the Men in Black. According to Chrome AI Mode: The Men in Black urban myth has existed for nearly 80 years, tracing its roots back to the "Summer of the Saucers" in 1947. The legend evolved through several key stages: First Appearance (1947): The myth began with the Maury Island incident ...

There really hasn't been much insightful commentary on the current state of play in Iran, at least in the US, since Vice President Vance walked out of the negotiations a week ago. On the other hand, some foreign observers seem to have a better handle on what's really going on, in particular the US-born Israeli commentator Pesach Wolicki. He talks like the Northeastern suburban Jews I grew up with, whch may be one reason I like him, but his discussion also reflects the respect the Israelis have for his negotiation skills, which US observers generally lack. At about 7:15 in the video embedded above [it may have since been made private], he begins: I'll remind you that a week into the war, we saw this: "Trump demands 'unconditional surrender' from Iran", OK? and he put out a Truh Social post, "There will be no deal with Iran except unconditional surrender. After that, and tbe selection of an acceptable leader, we'll make wonderful and bra...