In The Shadow Of Mt Hollywood

As many know, one of my hobbies is model trains, and every now and then, I'm amused when the hobby world intersects with real life. Real life, of course, always wins, but hobby types, being hobbyists, are usually surprised and disappointed when this happens. It's a little sad when people in the hobby supply business come out on the losing end as well, but this is almost always because they seem to forget that business involves real life, not a hobby. As the New York Times put it hehind a paywall this week, "Want to Escape the Financial News? Don't Try a Hobby." Somewhat belatedly, the model railroad industry has woken up to the fact that they outsourced the vast majority of their production to a small number of factories in China. Very little is actually known about these factories -- including how many there actually are and who's behind them. I suspect that they operate on much the same basis as larger enterprises that make products like cell phones....

A week ago Monday, I noted that Owen McIntire of Kansas City, MO had been arrested on charges of firebombing a Tesla dealership. This was in the context of the remarkably high proportion of Tesla arsonists who are trans males, and I wondered, as did others on social media, whether, given his feminine appearance in photos, he was trans as well, although legacy reports carefully avoided any reference. This morning, it was confirmed : The college student accused of firebombing a Tesla dealership has been released from federal custody to continue gender affirming medical care, according to a report. . . . The University of Massachusetts physics student was granted release by US Magistrate Judge Jessica Hedges due to “serious and ongoing” medical needs — which include gender-affirming medical care that requires daily medication as well as mental health support, according to KMBC. Fox News Kansas City quoted McIntire's defense attorney : “What the courts d...

Two weeks ago, Jeff Bezos stepped into one of the biggest PR disasters you could imagine. Aaron Cohen, a PR and brand executive. wrote : Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin may have made history on Monday for sending an all-woman crew into sub-orbit on its New Shepard rocket ship for all the wrong reasons. From a pure PR perspective, this was a Jupiter-sized faceplant. . . . It reeks of poorly performed virtue signaling. Showing extremely privileged women taking a magical vacation into space as passengers while leaving common folk grinding away at their hamster wheel does not a good deed make. . . . It is difficult to imagine any PR team approving this launch without waving flaming red flags. But just yesterday, Amazon and Bezos stepped in it yet again : Punchbowl News reported on Tuesday that, according to a source familiar with the matter, the e-commerce giant will start showing the figure added to the value because of the duties right alongside a product’s total pric...

Trump has bveen asking this question in various contexts lately, most recently over Taylor Swift . Of the Philadelphia Eagles' Super Bowl win, he observed at the White House yesterday, “It was incredible. A little surprising,” the president said of the blowout win. “I was there along with Taylor Swift,” Trump added before asking rhetorically: “How did that one work out?” The “You Belong With Me” singer, who is in a high-profile relationship with star Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce, was loudly booed — to her apparent surprise — when she was shown on the big screen during the game. Moments earlier, Trump was greeted with applause and cheers when he was shown during the pregame performance of “The Star-Spangled Banner.” I've been wondering when Trump will address this question to J B Pritzker : Illinois’s Democratic governor, JB Pritzker, scorched Donald Trump’s administration on Sunday night, calling for “mass protests” and declaring that Republicans “cannot kn...

The @nytimes story on the January DC plane crash hides its takeaway until the last sentences: the lady helicopter pilot ignored multiple warnings from her right seat about altitude (and his directly telling her to turn away) and flew straight into a passenger jet. The end. Ugh. pic.twitter.com/7emtYkZTwQ — Alex Berenson (@AlexBerenson) April 27, 2025 There's a new fuss over what seems to be a previously unreported excerpt from the cockpit recording of the Black Hawk helicopter that crashed into an American Airlines jet at Reagan National Airport on January 29. Three months on, new details published by The New York Times revealed that the pilot made more than one mistake leading to one of the worst catastrophes in aviation history. Not only was Lobach flying her Black Hawk too high, but in the final moments before the impact, she failed to take advice and instruction from her co-pilot to switch course. . . . Just 15 seconds before colliding with the commercial airpl...

An Atlantic piece, Trump’s Cosplay Cabinet , was linked on Real Clear Politics this morning. Its complaint: In Donald Trump’s administration, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem rotates through various costumes—firefighting gear for drills with the United States Coast Guard, a cowboy hat and horse for a jaunt with Border Patrol agents in Texas, a bulletproof ICE vest for a dawn raid in New York City. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth posts photos of himself doing snowy push-ups with U.S. troops in Poland and deadlifting with them in predawn Germany. And FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino spars with agents on the wrestling mats of Quantico. Kristi Noem is a particular target: Noem, who has earned herself several dismissive, Mattel-inspired nicknames—“Border Control Barbie,” “ICE Barbie”—is perhaps the most conspicuous offender. She has been photographed behind the controls of both a Coast Guard boat and a Coast Guard plane, donned a helmet and Border Patrol fa...

Alt media so far haan't been happy with either Attorney General Bondi or FBI Director Patel, accusing both of grandstanding on Fox News without making real progress on the Trump agenda. At the moment, Bondi’s position is much more politically precarious with the right, which might explain her omnipresence on Fox News and Fox Business programming, where she’s repeatedly turned to safely articulate her explanation for the Epstein files mishap — “Everything’s going to come out to the public,” she assured host Sean Hannity — and return to her preferred message of cleaning up the Biden era Justice Department and prosecuting violent crime. The same story suggests Trump is nevertheless happy with her: By all indications, Bondi’s position remains secure with President Donald Trump, who called her “fantastic” on Thursday and gave her a glowing review during a visit to the Justice Department Friday. The longer-term question is how much more patience and grace Trump’s b...