“A thing called the Atlantic Ocean.”

President Trump on hurricane response challenges in Puerto Rico: “This is a thing called the Atlantic Ocean. This is tough stuff.”

Donald Trump blamed the Atlantic Ocean for the federal government’s failed response to Hurricane Maria’s devastation of the American territory of Puerto Rico.

“This is a thing called the Atlantic Ocean. This is tough stuff,” President Trump stated in a Rose Garden press conference with Prime Minister of Spain Mariano Rajoy.

The press conference marked the second time Tuesday that Trump blamed the ocean for the humanitarian crisis. Earlier, Trump stated, “it’s an island, sitting in the middle of an ocean.

No shit, Sherlock. Did someone just tell you that? Most of us know the basics of Puerto Rico, including the fact it’s in the Caribbean Sea, another really tough one, you bet. That does not excuse your ignorant, boneheaded mutterings and complete failure of proper response. Really, who the hell knew oceans are tough stuff? Perhaps the Tiny Tyrant should be tossed off a yacht for a while. After all, he’s the great businessman winner winner winner, so naturally, he could tame the ocean, or make a deal with it. It’s worth experimenting.

You can see some of the responses here.

Demons. It’s Always Demons.

Furfur, Earl of Hell, Commander of 29 legions of demons. Furfur causes love between a man and a woman, creates storms, tempests, thunder, lightning, and blasts, and teaches on secret and divine things. [Oooh, scary.]

Lance Wallnau is at it again, with new ‘understandings’ of current events, and now he gets it. Naturally, it’s demons. What else?

“The whole thing about the issue of taking the knee in sports,” he said, “understand what really is the warfare there is a spirit of globalism which is saying that no nation is worth bowing for, no nation is worth respecting, no flag is worth dying for. Satan wants to eradicate the nation state so that he can create a union of nations—that’s what the immigration thing is all about; by the way, I just realized, that’s what the climate accord is all about. I always thought there was something demonic and suspicious about these things. Now I get it.”

I guess I’m all over glad you “get it” Lance, but no thinking person is going to get whatever it is you’re rambling about. The protests aren’t saying anything of the kind; they are pointing out the hypocritical jingoism which is prevalent in uStates; people who happily wrap themselves up in a flag and pile of rotten peaches, claiming their right to be often murderous racists. No one should respect that. If a foundation is rotten, it’s pointless to plaster your eyes on the roof and extol its virtues.

The ‘immigration thing’. Mmmm, well, immigration is about people, first and foremost, Lance, not things. Immigration has been going on since…always. If you live in uStates, and you are not an Indigenous person, then you really, really need to shut the fuck up about immigration.

And now the climate accord is demonic. Some of us, Lance, not being idiots, would rather have a somewhat stable future in front of us, especially those with children, who are looking many generations ahead of them, and rightly worried about whether or not they will even be able to survive on our world. I won’t be around to see the worst, but what we’re seeing right now is bad enough. Most countries are fortunate enough to be populated with citizenry who are not embracers of regressive ignorance. They realize their very future is at stake. Here in uStates, however, it won’t be until great swathes of the country are rendered uninhabitable and food is in short supply that people like you will get the fucking message, and even then, you’ll holler the oh so convenient “Satan!” You and those like you are committing crimes against humanity. It’s a pity you can’t be tried.

Wallnau said that the left’s goal is to create a new world Antichrist system in which all nations are dissolved, which is why they are at war with President Trump, who is “a nation-state patriot.”

I’m not the least bit interested in your fictional antichrist, dude, nor does anyone want all nations dissolved, even if they do want them all to behave a bit better. The Tiny Tyrant is an unashamed white nationalist, white supremacist, bigot extraordinaire piece of rancid shit. That would be one reason I’m happily anti-regime and anti-Pinchpork. The full list of reasons would take up quite a bit of space.

The left, he warned, dreams of seeing the world turned into “one gigantic bureaucratic machine, assimilated by the United Nations, run by European bureaucrats, controlled by a one-world economy and eventually isolating Christians out of that community and making you the Jews in national socialist Germany.”

Oh for fuck’s sake. What do you idiots take to come up with this nonsense? I’m hoping you take something, because an unaltered brain shouldn’t be manufacturing this crap. Don’t be dragging Germany into this, Lance. Stick with your own fucked up country, where Nazis and fascists are running loose all over the place. If they got their way, Lance, you wouldn’t be persecuted. You’d be dressed up in a nifty uniform, and be put in charge of persecuting others, something I expect you fantasize about.

There’s video at RWW.

Tacoma.

Tacoma is a science fiction drama of survival experienced as a video game. Playing as a contractor named Amy who is recovering the artificial intelligence (AI) from a space station in 2088, you encounter the specters of its vanished crew through fuzzy recordings of their colorful silhouettes. Some of these voyeuristic scenes, retrieved from a fragmented augmented reality technology on the station, are from months ago, others are just hours, and each adds to a heightened sense of dread about their fate.

The recently released game was created by Fullbright, the studio behind the popular 2013 Gone Home. Where Gone Home had players navigating an empty house in the Pacific Northwest, piecing together the narrative of its absent family, Tacoma is set in a more isolated home. You can dig through the crew members’ belongings in their air-locked rooms and messy gym lockers, read their private messages, and eavesdrop on their interactions with the AI, called ODIN. There are key codes to find and doors to unlock that can add to your understanding of how the six-member crew dealt with the station’s sudden lack of oxygen.

You can read and see more at Hyperallergic.

Social Foretelling.

IV. – Development of Wireless Telegraphy. Scene in Hyde Park. [These two figures are not communicating with one another. The lady is receiving an amatory message, and the gentleman some racing results.]

This is from Punch magazine, in 1906. They didn’t quite get to cellphones, but they weren’t completely off the mark, either. The Punch Almanack, in 1879, also speculated on the possibility of a telephonoscope:

(Every evening, before going to bed, Pater and Materfamilias set up an electric camera obscura over their bedroom mantel-piece, and gladden their eyes with the sight of their Children at the Antipodes, and converse gaily with them through the wire.)
Paterfamilias (in Willow Place): “Beatrice, come closer, I want to whisper.”
Beatrice (from Ceylon): “Yes, Papa dear.”
Paterfamilias: Who is that charming young lady playing on Charlie’s side!
Beatrix: “She’s just come over from England, Papa. I’ll introduce you as soon as the game’s over!”

A version of Skype was foretold, too, by a number of people. You can see more here.

All The Witch Hunts…

It’s seems that whole clumps of bitter techbros are fleeing to the MGTOW life (that’s Men Going Their Own Way, if you didn’t know), and advocating a life of male separatism. Just a thought, but if you avoid women at all costs, it might not be a surprise that your viewpoints are more suited to a cave than a nice high tech office somewhere. Naturally, this is an evil witch hunt, with the intent to subjugate men (and make them do what? Scrub out the toilet?) and other nefarious things. As always, the irony of men screeching “witch hunt!” escapes them entirely.

One of those who said there had been a change is James Altizer, an engineer at the chip maker Nvidia. Mr. Altizer, 52, said he had realized a few years ago that feminists in Silicon Valley had formed a cabal whose goal was to subjugate men. At the time, he said, he was one of the few with that view.
Continue reading the main story

Now Mr. Altizer said he was less alone. “There’s quite a few people going through that in Silicon Valley right now,” he said. “It’s exploding. It’s mostly young men, younger than me.”

Mr. Altizer said that a gathering he hosts in person and online to discuss men’s issues had grown by a few dozen members this year to more than 200, that the private Facebook pages he frequents on men’s rights were gaining new members and that a radical subculture calling for total male separatism was emerging.

“It’s a witch hunt,” he said in a phone interview, contending men are being fired by “dangerous” human resources departments. “I’m sitting in a soundproof booth right now because I’m afraid someone will hear me. When you’re discussing gender issues, it’s almost religious, the response. It’s almost zealotry.”

Unsurprisingly, Mr. Altizer, when you decide to pontificate about how women should not be in a workplace, and they should be quiet about slaps on the ass, if they don’t want to deal, they should stay home and do what they were ‘made’ for and all that, it will elicit a response. Women have been responding to misogynistic attitudes for thousands of years now. If we, from time to time, snap or yell, well, I’m sure you’ll understand the frustration of having one generation after another having to repeat themselves.

I do love the touch of the soundproof booth, though. For unknown reasons, the NYT has decided to give these sad separatists a full work up, because life is so gosh darn hard for men, especially those of the white variety. I’ll wish them fun in their cones of silence, and continue to pay attention to those men who have happily figured out that yes, women are human beings too.

Full story here.

Sorta Doomsday, Right Around the Corner.

Well, the crank who predicted we’d all die a horrible and fiery death on the 23rd this month has re-evaluated. Doomsday is just around the corner, starting on October 15th, but it won’t be a horrible and fiery death, no. The rapture will happen, natch, but then it’s just going to herald in the tribulation, so really, nothing will change. We won’t even be able to say bye to all the christians.

Writing on his website, Meade clarified his belief that the 23rd is the date of a “historical event” in the skies that would signal the oncoming rapture. Doomsday itself, he says, will begin on October 15.

That date marks the beginning of a seven-year period of tribulation. “That’s when the action starts. Hold on and watch—wait until the middle of October and I don’t believe you’ll be disappointed,” he writes.

Some things to watch out for are the loss of electrical power across the world, leading to war, famine and other perilous events.

Hmmm, lots of places in the world are dealing with loss of electrical power because hurricanes. Nowadays, wars are a bit difficult to conduct without power. Anyroad, we’re awash in wars, power losses, famines, and other perilous events, read a fucking newspaper, Mr. Meade. Historically speaking, these things have been going on forever.

To be clear, Meade says, “Nothing is expected to happen in September.”

Oh, there’s a whole lot happening. Just not what you want, right?

Meade points to the total eclipse on August 21 as a significant event which he believes acts as a precursor to the beginning of the rapture. He says the date marks a 40-day countdown to the beginning of October. “October is the month to watch.”

Mmm. The rapture is not going to happen. It’s never going to happen. Get the fuck over it, please.

Meade subscribes to the conspiracy that a 10th planet, Planet X or Nibiru, will either cross or collide with Earth, leading to a seven-year period of tribulation, or rapture. This will be followed by a millennium of peace.

The rapture and the tribulation are two distinct events, dude. If you’re going to twist the mess of christian theology around, get it right. So, seven years of awful stuff, then the legendary thousand years of peace. Right. We’ve managed thousands upon thousands of years of tribulation. We haven’t managed peace yet. I won’t be holding my breath for your magical planet or your magical god to set things right.

So, doomsday, business as usual.

Via Raw Story.

A Medieval Porpoise.

Here is the video of an interesting archaeological discovery on the island of Chapelle Dom Hue near Guernsey. Earlier this week Phil de Jersey, working for Guernsey Archaeology, posted news of finding the skull of a juvenile porpoise in the graveyard of a small monastic site.

The porpoise is believed to date from the fourteenth-century, and de Jersey adds that it looks to have been buried deliberately, based on the way the grave was cut.

He tells the Guernsey Press, “That is what puzzles me. If they had eaten it or killed it for the blubber, why take the trouble to bury it?”

In another interview with The Guardian, he suggests one possibility deals with religious observation: “The dolphin has a strong significance in Christianity but I’ve not come across anything like this before. It’s the slightly wacky kind of thing that you might get in the iron age but not in medieval times.”

Via Medievalists.