In The Shadow Of Mt Hollywood

Former U.S. President Trump: First come the tanks, then come the nukes. Get this crazy war ended, now. So easy to do! pic.twitter.com/JLOg166tKF — Clash Report (@clashreport) January 26, 2023 It looks as though Trump is going to side consistently with the US right in opposing increased aid to Ukraine, and to some extent, I can't disagree with his basic point. As this report at Breitbart summarizes the problem: President Joe Biden announced Wednesday that the U.S. would be sending 31 Abrams tanks to Ukraine, but did not explain to the American public what the purpose of the tanks would be, or the broader U.S. goal in the war. White House communications chief John Kirby later tried to assure reporters (and Russia) that the tanks would not be used for an “offensive” purpose, but clearly the hope is to retake territory by attacking Russian forces. The story throughout the past year has been incrementalism. Zelensky campaigns for new weapons one step beyond what the West is wil...

Here's another intriguing data point: in the midst of a current news story that's presumably unrelated to the classified document issue, the emergence of Jeff Zients as Ron Klain's replascement as White House Chief of Staff, we find this: With his expected return to the highest echelon of the White House as chief of staff, Zients is now taking fire from all ideological directions for his meetings with Hunter Biden, scapegoating of people who resist COVID vaccination and history with healthcare companies accused of billing fraud. . . . Zients met with the younger Biden at least three times in the first half of 2016 as his father prepared to leave the vice presidency, according to emails from Hunter Biden's abandoned laptop verified by Fox News. The first two meetings took place at the vice presidential residence and included the elder Biden. The meetings also variously included former lobbyist and current White House counselor Steve Richetti; then-Office of Sci...

I've been tempted to post on the rental form in which Hunter, in 2018, claimed to have spent $49,910 in monthly rent, but I've held off several times on a hunch that more information would come out. This was a background security request for a rental in a luxury Los Angeles apartment building. The fact checkers were quick to dismiss this as a conspiracy theory : Days after it was reported that classified documents were found in President Joe Biden’s office at a Washington, D.C., think tank and at his Delaware home, conservative commentators launched new allegations about him and his son, Hunter Biden. "Hunter Biden paid his dad $50,000 a MONTH in rent for the home that housed classified documents… During the same time, Joe Biden only claimed less than $20,000 in rent payments PER YEAR!!!" read a Jan 17 Instagram post by Newsmax host Carl Higbie. . . . These posts are inaccurate and were flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinforma...

I found a typo in Sunday's post with the problematic image of a hotdogging W Mark Felt, and even though it had been flagged as sensitive, I decided to fix the typo for the record. When I went in to edit it, I found a new button saying REQUEST REVIEW, although in my research I'd found no reference to any ability to appeal such decisions, and there was wording in the guidelines that suggested this couldn't be done. I figured I had nothing to lose, so I clicked on REQUEST REVIEW, and when I visited my account this morning, the flag and message for that post had been removed, though I've received no other message. This confirms my view that Blogger's algorithm had somehow been triggered by the image of a G-Man doing his thing, when at least for now, bien pensant opinion actually favors the FBI, which protects us by raiding Area 51 bloggers and former presidents. But just to be on the safe side, I'm going to stick with non-controversial titles and cute pet phot...

Yesterday's post got flagged by Blogger for "sensitive content", and visitors got the following notice if they tried to view it (click on the image for a larger copy): I also got a notification that "This post was put behind a warning for readers because it contains sensitive content as outlined in Blogger’s Community Guidelines." I've been blogging on one thing or another for almost 20 years, often on sensitive topics, but this is the first such notice I've received. I'm assuming the problem was the photo of W Mark Felt posing as an FBI hotdogger in the act of drawing his firearm, and the algorithm deemed it potentially triggering, so to speak. I'm assuming for now that this was a one-off, and I'm going to proceed as usual. I may try using photos of kittens and ducklings as a header for a while to make it clear to the algorithm that I have no intention of triggering anyone, at least no more than I have in the past, although back in the...

The image above is W Mark Felt, the Watergate Deep Throat, from his glory days as FBI Director wannabe. As I said yesterday, it sounds like we have a new Deep Throat, apparently just as highly placed, who's beginning to leak about Biden's classified documents. So far, nobody seems to be getting the point. The news yesterday evening was that another half-dozen classified documents had been run down in a new search of the Wilmington home, this one conducted by people from the Justice Department, not Biden's personal attorneys, after those attorneys had insisted everything had been found. Biden’s lawyers immediately tried to get out in front of the revelation, releasing a statement claiming cooperation with the DOJ. But while the administration continues to talk about transparency, one bombshell detail from the search has left the president’s lies fully exposed. Namely, the fact that documents were found that were taken during Biden’s years in the Senate. I just don...

A lot has come out over the Biden classified docs over the past few days, but nobody seems to be making much sense of it. I think the key is here : White House officials are reportedly suspicious about how President Joe Biden’s classified document scandal was leaked to the press after only a select group of White House and Justice Department officials knew about the violation. The plot to hide the scandal, initially designed by eight of Biden’s closest confidants with apparent approval from the Justice Department, was suddenly leaked to CBS News 68 days after Biden’s personal attorney unearthed the classified documents at the Penn Biden Center. It is unclear why or what Biden’s personal attorneys were originally seeking at the center funded in part by anonymous Chinese donations. There's the whole thing in a nutshell, at least so far. The discovery of the classified docs was a byproduct of some other project that we don't know much about, except that well before an...