No Greater Strength…

@VP: The Airmen of Minot Air Force Base & your fellow Americans serving across the globe have volunteered to defend our freedom & way of life.

@VP: There is no greater element of American strength – there is no greater force for peace in this world – than the U.S’ nuclear arsenal.

Oh, look who was a few hours away from me, Puppet Pence. He was waxing eloquent about the greatest force for peace in the world – nuclear weapons. Golly, and here I thought you were a godbotherer extraordinaire, Mr. Pence. Isn’t that psychopathic Jehovah supposed to be the greatest force for peace insanity, war, and slaughter? Oooh, I think Jehovah’s gonna getcha for that one.

Via Twitter.

The Hounds of Heaven.

Lance Wallnau is getting worse, in every respect. He’s now into becoming a parody of himself territory. Or perhaps he now considers himself a comedian for Jehovah or something, I don’t know.

Citing a prophecy from the book of 2 Kings that Jezebel would be devoured by dogs, Wallnau railed against “the Jezebel spirit” that is “working through the media to bring depravity and perversion” to America and prayed that “the hounds of heaven” would be let loose to destroy the “coup” being led against Trump by Robert Mueller.

With “Who Let The Dogs Out?” playing, Wallnau prophesied against the late night television hosts Bill Maher, John Oliver and Stephen Colbert, though he did not seem to actually know their names.

“We’re going to see a season of dismantling of Jezebel in media,” he proclaimed. “Bill Maher, coming down! Steve Oliver, coming down! Carvell, coming down! God is going to release his comedic armies against you and you are going to be absolutely confused because you are thin-skinned and incapable of taking it the way you dish it out.”

So, Jehovah has comedic armies now? If you’re the lead, Lance, you all leave a great deal to be desired. I wonder, does this answer for Jehovah’s notoriously bad aim when it comes to those big punishments?  There seems to have been a big backfire here, because it seems it is you, Lance, who is absolutely confused, and you lot are among the most thin-skinned of all. You can’t take it, and you can’t dish it out.

“The dogs are being loosed, heaven’s canines are coming out,” Wallnau declared, as he began to pray in tongues for Trump and his family. “We loose the dogs on Jezebel’s lies, on all the media lies; chase ’em down. May the favor of this president go up.”

Perhaps you should have gone with Shakespeare: “Cry ‘Havoc!’, and let slip the dogs of war”. (Julius Caesar). Would have added a slight touch of class to your clown show.

Via RWW, where there’s video, if you can cope with seeing Lance with his tongue hanging out.

In the “oh fuck” terrifying department, we have Robert Jeffress, who has the Tiny Tyrant’s ear, approving of nuclear war:

Robert Jeffress, a Texas megachurch pastor and a top evangelical ally to President Trump, responded to Trump’s threat to rain down “fire and fury” on North Korea yesterday by issuing a statement declaring that “God has given Trump authority to take out Kim Jong Un.”

These fucking idiots talk as though a nuclear missile would launch, land conveniently on their target, all nice and clean, no fallout. It’s been more than obvious, from the campaign days (those seem so long ago) that Donny has been itching to use nuclear weapons, and now he has “reason”. I grew up under the threat of nuclear war, and I hated it. That is a horrible sword to be hanging over heads, especially those of children. Tends to fuck up your viewpoint a lot. Now, in old age, I get to live with that clear and present threat once again. I really don’t want to die just yet. I really don’t want millions upon millions of other people to die just yet. Fuck, I hate this. If “god” wants to “take out” Kim Jong Un, fine, let him do it without the nukes.

RWW watch has the full story, and the rundown on Jeffress and his hold on the Tiny Tyrant.

‘America must be ready to nuke first’

Wikipedia.

Donald Trump’s nominee to be an assistant secretary for the Defense Department’s nuclear, chemical, and biological defense programs believes that the U.S. has the right to preemptively unleash nuclear weapons on other countries.

The New Republic‘s Emily Atkin wrote on Friday that Trump has nominated Guy B. Roberts to — according to the job description posted on the DoD website — “prevent, protect against, and respond to weapons of mass destruction threats” and advise Defense Sec. James Mattis on “matters concerning nuclear, chemical, and biological defense programs.”

Roberts, Atkin said, has a strong resume. He is a 25-year veteran of the Marine Corps and has worked in nuclear weapons policy for NATO.

However, he is a strong proponent of the controversial doctrine of “first-use nuclear policy,” the belief that the U.S. reserves the right to strike other countries with nuclear weapons at will.

Pres. Barack Obama considered joining a “no first-use” pact, which Roberts responded to in 2016 with an essay for The National Interest titled “America Must Be Ready to Nuke First.”

In the essay, Roberts argued that the U.S. must function as a bulwark against Russian military aggression.

Mr. Roberts seems to have missed the memo detailing how Russia is our best fucking friend forever these days. It’s bad enough being stressed to the limit by every single day the Tiny Tyrant remains in office. It’s bad enough that there are calls to beef up the military even more, because the Great American Empire™ is collapsing, and military dominance is the holy solution, you bet. Now we get an idiot with an itchy trigger finger. I am now more worried about nuclear war than I was back in the 1960s and 1970s, and I was fair worried back then.

Via Raw Story.

Relics of A Cold War Satellite Program.

Julie Anand and Damon Sauer, “Calibration Mark AD48 with Satellites,” from Ground Truth: Corona Landmarks (courtesy the artists).

Strange colossal shapes dot the Sonoran Desert in Arizona, x-shaped relics of a once top-secret Cold War spying project. Known as the Corona program, the surveillance initiative by the CIA and US Air Force involved using satellites to take aerial photographs of the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China. The cameras on these satellites were calibrated with concrete crosses 60 feet in diameter. Their exposed 70mm film was later jettisoned in space, the parachuting capsules caught in mid-air by plane. The calibration markers helped assure that the film was in focus, and that there was a landscape measure to accurately assess the size of pictured objects.

Approximately 256 of these markers were placed on a 16-square-mile grid in Arizona, spaced a mile apart. Long after Corona’s end and its declassification in 1995, around 100 remain. Phoenix-based artists Julie Anand and Damon Sauer have spent three years tracking them down for a project called Ground Truth: Corona Landmarks.

You can read all about this, and see more at Hyperallergic.

Oh Goody, Another War.

Tucker Viemeister.

Chris Murphy: Four direct engagements w Syria/Iran/Russia in 45 days. Trump is quietly starting a new war that Congress has not declared. Red alert.

News that no one needs to hear. Trump must be stopped. Now. I can’t help wondering if this is just the Tiny Tyrant wanting to play with his toys, or his attempt at a Reichstag fire.

Via Raw Story.

The Ghost of the Fortress.

The Ghost of the Fortress has become a permanent fixture at the Mark Rothko Art Center and Gallery. Per rq: a sort of monument to warhorses (who quickly became obsolete with the advent of more modern technologies), and thus is wrapped in gauze as a symbol of the uneasy life and death these horses (and, by extension, soldiers who served with them) experienced. As the sculpture concept declares (and I translate loosely from the article): “Usually what remains after war is not medals or grand victories, but crippled and ruined lives.” And for this reason they shied away from a heroic depiction of the warhorse (no bared teeth, flailing hooves, free manes flying in the wind). The authors of the piece drew inspiration from photographs of the wounded from WWI, and as it’s probably the last war that saw active-duty warhorses on the premises, they produced this restless ghost.

Via Delfi Kultura.

That Ol’ Time Christian Nationalism.

CREDIT: AP /Pablo Martinez Monsivais.

As per usual, when things are not going well for the Tiny Tyrant, he runs off to Fox or somewhere else where he knows he can get the warm fuzzies. This time, he ran away to Liberty College, that bastion of future hate machines.

President Donald Trump outlined a deeply religious vision of America while speaking to graduates of a conservative Christian college on Saturday, invoking his own version of Christian nationalism and touting policies friendly to right-wing faithful.

I have noted that most journalistic outlets are now using the title of president. I don’t agree with that move, and I refuse to use it, so when it’s in a quote, you can expect to see it struck out here. Trump may be many things, but a president he is not.

“America is a nation of true believers…When the pilgrims landed at Plymouth, they prayed,” he said. “It’s why we proudly proclaim that we are one nation, under God, every time we say the Pledge of Allegiance.”

Oh for fuck’s sake. No. I am not a “true believer”, whatever definition you apply to that one. Pilgrims? Nice, invoking genocidal assholes who just couldn’t wait to judge, torture and slaughter. We don’t proudly proclaim any of that utter shit. One nation my arse. A splintery collection of states, most all of whom hate all the others. As for the pledge of allegiance, oh, there’s that vaunted ignorance again. The phrase “under God” was incorporated into the Pledge of Allegiance on June 14, 1954. That little change is a few years older than I am.

“In America we don’t worship government, we worship God,” Trump proclaimed, to thunderous applause. He later added: “We all bleed the same blood of patriots, we all salute the same, great American flag, and we are all made by the same almighty God.”

Oh my. Yeah, you don’t want government worshiped, you want to be worshiped, don’t you, Donnie? As for we worship “god”? No, we don’t. And yes, if you prick me, I bleed,* but I don’t ooze patriotism. Can’t say I’m thrilled by the idea of you being so focused on people bleeding. I am sure as fuck not willing to bleed for you.

The address also appeared to connect religion to the president’s willingness to increase military action in the Middle East, such as dropping the MOAB bomb on Afghanistan. Falwell in particular praised Trump for “bomb[ing] those…who were persecuting Christians,” and the president noted during his speech that Americans will be “hearing a lot about [military actions] next week from our generals.”

* If you prick us, do we not bleed?
if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison
us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not
revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will
resemble you in that.

– The Merchant of Venice, W. Shakespeare. [Spoken by Shylock.]

Think Progress has the full story.

No Shit, Pope Sherlock.

Pope Francis addresses a joint meeting of Congress in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 24, 2015. Photo courtesy of REUTERS/Jim Bourg.

Pope Francis has issued a statement that nuclear war would be bad. I’m sure most of us just didn’t know that one already.

According to CNN, the pope was traveling from Egypt to Italy when he echoed earlier remarks about the danger of a “piecemeal third world war.”

“It’s piecemeal but the pieces are getting larger, and are concentrated in places which were already hot,” Pope Francis explained. “Today a wider war would destroy, I won’t say half of humanity, but a large part of humanity and culture. It would be terrible. I don’t think humanity today could bear it.”

Nuclear war will have wide ranging, catastrophic effects well past what and whoever is caught in the initial blast zones. That’s been common knowledge for many a decade now. That would be the faster option when it comes to killing ourselves. Right now, we’re going with the somewhat slower option of driving climate change.

“I think the United Nations has the duty to resume its leadership, because it has been watered down a bit,” the pope said, adding that a third-party nation like Norway could help mediate talks between North Korea and the United States.

How about you ask that impotent god of yours to get off its ass, and magically enlighten the fucking idiot parading as the U.S. president? He’s not terribly keen on that whole united nations stuff, and boy, does he love havin’ himself some nukes. As for Norway, pardon? Anyone ask the Norwegian people what they think about that idea?

Via Raw Story.

“An armada, very powerful,”

It seems the Keystone Regime has finally gotten its Keystone ‘armada’ headed in the oh-so-wrong direction. I just know someone had mentioned the word ‘armada’, and had to explain to the Tiny Tyrant what that meant, because Mr. Yella Fella’s vocabulary is on the bigly sad side.

BEIJING — It was supposed to be steaming toward North Korea more than a week ago, an “armada” signaling American resolve. Then it wasn’t.

Now, it seems the USS Carl Vinson may finally be heading north.

“Our deployment has been extended 30 days to provide a persistent presence in the waters off the Korean Peninsula,” Rear Adm. Jim Kilby, commander of Carrier Strike Group One, said in a message posted on the Carl Vinson’s Facebook page and addressed to “families and loved ones” of the personnel on board.

The Carl Vinson, accompanied by a carrier air wing, two guided-missile destroyers and a cruiser, was reported to have been ordered to sail north after leaving Singapore on April 8. But a week later, the Navy published photos showing it was actually sailing in the opposite direction through the Sunda Strait between the Indonesian islands of Sumatra and Java, more than 3,000 miles southwest of the Korean Peninsula — and more than 500 miles southeast of Singapore.

It appears the confusion over its whereabouts stemmed from a U.S. Pacific Command announcement that “could have been worded a little more clearly,” in the words of a defense official speaking on the condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the record.

[…]

Days later, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told reporters that the Carl Vinson was “on her way up there.” In an interview that aired April 12, President Trump said the United States was sending ships. “An armada, very powerful,” he said.

They were not exactly wrong, Navy officials now say. It’s just that the change of course toward the Korean Peninsula had not happened yet.

“Not exactly wrong”, a corollary to “alternative facts”. I had been relieved over the fuck up, thinking “oh, never been so grateful for incompetence!” Unfortunately, it seem the Tiny Tyrant is hellbent on poking where he should not, playing the “my missile is bigger than yours” game, with nukes. Trump is so unstable when it comes to weapon use that he makes Kim Jong Un look like the most stable of individuals. Trump desperately wants to play war, and he doesn’t care if his toys are nuclear in nature. He needs to be removed from office, stat, before we are all crispy crittered, or becoming nuclear winter mutants before death. As came up on the previous post about nuclear war, this is the only true story (h/t to Chigau) about nukes flying. There won’t be hero survivors, nuclear war will not result in a nifty “hey, we can do it over and get it right this time!”. There will just be death.

The Washington Post has the full story.

In the meantime, South Korean news is busy mocking Trump’s stupidity and ignorance. Vijay Prashad has a good column up about the terroristic history of the U.S. on North Korea.

China, Russia Chasing U.S. Carrier.

USS Carl Vinson. (Jo Jung-ho/Yonhap via AP, File).

China and Russia aren’t too happy with the Tiny Tyrant’s tough toddler obsession with nuclear weapons, nor his increasing instability without a first thought, let alone a second. They have dispatched intelligence gathering ships to dog the U.S. Carrier. I’m grateful for their intervention, such as it is at this time. I have not been this scared of nuclear war since I was a child. As nuclear tensions de-escalated through much of my lifetime, I had hoped to make it through the rest of life without having to worry about being crispy crittered or dying a slow death in nuclear winter. Now we have a maniac in the white house who is nursing a 30 year obsession with nuclear weapons with an itchy trigger finger.

China and Russia have dispatched intelligence-gathering vessels from their navies to chase the USS Carl Vinson nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, which is heading toward waters near the Korean Peninsula, multiple sources of the Japanese government revealed to The Yomiuri Shimbun.

It appears that both countries aim to probe the movements of the United States, which is showing a stance of not excluding military action against North Korea. The Self-Defense Forces are strengthening warning and surveillance activities in the waters and airspace around the area, according to the sources.

The aircraft carrier strike group, composed of the Carl Vinson at its core with guided-missile destroyers and other vessels, is understood to be around the East China Sea and heading north toward waters near the Korean Peninsula.

China and Russia, which prioritize stability in the Korean Peninsula, showed concern over the tough U.S. stance, with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov saying the issue should be resolved peacefully through political and diplomatic efforts.

The dispatch of the intelligence-gathering vessels appears to be partly aimed at sending a warning signal to the United States.

Full story here.

Sunday Facepalm: Beastly!

Kevin Swanson is being rather beastly over Beauty and the Beast, and for a different reason than the standard Christian zealot reason of “gay character”. Swanson is concerned with the promotion of inter-species breeding. Yep. Obviously, Mr. Swanson’s knowledge of how that whole breeding business works is deficient, but let’s take a look at La Belle et la Bête by Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve, published in 1740. The original work was more in line with a novella than a brief tale, and it was for adults, not children.

Villeneuve’s work is more novella than simple tale with its elaborate prose and numerous details, including stories told within stories. Her narrative is far from complete upon the Beast’s transformation into a man. Then we meet his mother and learn his backstory as well as Beauty’s own hidden history, for she is not the true daughter of a merchant, but a princess in disguise herself. All of this combines into an elaborate literary creation, not a traditionally truncated folktale. Villeneuve imagined new material, uniquely her own, while incorporating traditional folklore elements, many of which exist in the version we are most familiar with today. She writes about romantic love and marriage while exploring themes like women’s marital rights, although those themes are somewhat hidden in most English translations of the tale.

Two different English translations of Villeneuve’s tale are presented in this collection. The first one, by Ernest Dowson, was first published in 1908. It is one of the most accurate translations of Villeneuve’s content into English, including elements often changed or omitted in other translations. However, Dowson’s language is less ornate than Villeneuve’s and doesn’t capture the same essence as another favored translation, one by J. R. Planché, first published in 1858.

Planché’s translation includes footnotes by the present editor to show where he modified the text, changes he briefly touches upon in his comments to his Victorian audience. The changes, although small, are far from minor for they change an essential element of the tale. Instead of asking Beauty to marry him each night—a familiar refrain in modern versions of the story—the Beast asks Beauty, “May I sleep with you tonight?”

The question, while risqué, is not merely suggestive or erotic. It implies control and choice for Beauty over her own body and sexuality, something that was not legally hers or that of any woman who was handed over as property in marriage to a husband in centuries past. The Beast is no true beast since he never forces his physical desires upon her despite any rights implied by her presence in his home in what today may be considered a common law marriage, although the construct didn’t exist in Villeneuve’s time.

Another important change is in the Beast’s transformation scene. Beauty finally agrees to sleep with the Beast and marry him in the original Villeneuve. The Beast then sleeps beside her during the night, although no other activities beyond Beauty’s mysterious dreams are described. When she awakens the next morning, a man—one whom she has come to love in her dreams—is sleeping beside her instead of the Beast.

That, and more is from SurLaLune Fairytales. All of the above elevates the tale considerably from the versions which are familiar today, and it’s easy enough to figure out why Disney certainly wouldn’t touch upon such complexities. The Disney version is a simplified tale of love, with the requisite lesson about how appearances are not what matters, don’t judge a book by its cover, and so on. For Mr. Swanson, that’s quite bad enough, as somehow or another, along with the horrible effort to ‘homosexualize’ whole generations, claims the movie promotes ‘Inter-Species Breeding’, oh, the horror!

Swanson said that the movie was an “insidious” effort to “homosexualize the next generation of eight and ten-year-old kids” and ensure that they are “indoctrinated into the homosexual lifestyle.”

“This is how revolutions take place,” he said. “You are in the middle of a cultural revolution in the United States of America. No, this is not the cultural revolution that Mao Tse-tung brought to China; this is a different kind of cultural revolution, but I’m going to say it’s just about as dangerous … though a bit more insidious.”

Oooh, look at that nicely done twist into communism. You can’t have the gay without the commie in the christian version of the gay agenda. From what I understand, a minor character in the movie has a crush on his mean boss. This is hardly a gay version of Beauty and the Beast. (As the commonly known tale has little to do with the original these days, that would be a fun movie!) It’s not as though the current flick has become mandatory, and all people must have their eyelids taped open and have no choice but to watch it.

Even worse, Swanson said, the film is promoting inter-species breeding, which he said Hollywood has been pushing since the days of Star Trek.

“Christians, I don’t believe, can allow for this,” Swanson stated. “Humans are made in the image of God. Humans are assigned a spouse which happens to be a member of the opposite sex. Friends, God’s law forbids it … Christians should not allow for this, man. We cannot allow for humans to interbreed with other species. It’s just wrong, wrong, wrong. It’s confusion, it’s unnatural.”

“We are in some of the most radical, most anti-biblical, the most immoral, the most unethical, the most wicked sexual environment that the world has ever known, right now,” he warned.

Star Trek? Oh my. Does the not very thoughtful Mr. Swanson not know that we don’t have a federation, starships, or zillions of extraterrestials around to get sexy with? Yes, I had one hell of a crush on Mr. Spock when I was 9 years old, it was those ears. Unfortunately for me, there weren’t any neato trips to Vulcan happening. Given the limitations of television back then, and the lack of imagination now, most all the aliens pictured were suitably humanoid, barely distinguishable from the bog standard human. Even so, there’s no inter-species breeding going on in the Star Trek sense.

Humans are assigned a spouse? So all that dating stuff is not necessary? You had better let people know where the ticket center is, so they can grab their god ticket and see who has been all lined up for them. I think the only confusion going on here is in the mind of Mr. Swanson, a steamy mess of muddle. After all, there really isn’t a beast in Beauty and the Beast, he’s a prince in disguise, remember? A human type prince. Everyone gets all human prior to the happily married business.

Via RWW.

And we have a bonus facepalm today, in the form of Rick Wiles, who is now officially unhappy with the Tiny Tyrant over the Syria bombing. Mr. Wiles has now decided that the evil is in the form of Ms. Kushner and her husband:

Wiles went on to compare Ivanka with the daughter of Herod who, in Matthew 14, convinced her father to behead John the Baptist.

“That’s who I think Ivanka Trump is,” Wiles said. “She’s a Kabbala practicing, evil woman whispering evil things in the ear of her father. She’s going to the grave site of an old dead Kabbala practitioner and getting spirits telling her what to do … We have to pray against witchcraft in high places, witchcraft that plans to kill millions of people. … [Ivanka and Jared] are cleaning out the White House to surround President Trump with their Kabbala practitioners, and the only advice he is going to get will be from people who are evil. And the church is letting this happen.”

Oh my, now it’s a Jewish witch in the white house! I think it’s wars and bombs which are killing people, and it’s the Tiny Tyrant’s notion that it’s his military and his toys that are the actual problem.

Via RWW.

America The Ugly. Ugly, Ugly, Ugly.

Credit: Screenshot, Fox News.

In a disgusting, repellent display, even for those purveyors of disgusting, Fox News thought it would be appropriate to show the Moab bombing of Afghanistan, overlaid with treacly jingoism in the form of country music. As much as I love words, I don’t have enough for this perversion, my gorge is rising. I’ll include one of the videos here, if you can cope with it. I suggest not playing, I did, and it made me want to vomit.

That didn’t stop Fox News, however. President Trump’s favorite television program — Fox and Friends — celebrated the bombing, with a soundtrack to boot.

“The video is black and white. But that is what freedom looks like, that’s the red white and blue,” host Ainsley Earhardt said after the program showed the video of the bomb dropping in Afghanistan.

“One of my favorite things in 16 years at Fox News is watching bombs drop on bad guys,” Geraldo Rivera says.

Oh. In that case, I look forward to someone dropping a bomb on Fox News.

The video was shown overlaid with country star Toby Keith singing the chorus of “Courtesy of the Red, White, and Blue,” which celebrates the military with jingoistic fervor:

“Hey Uncle Sam, put your name at the top of his list
And the Statue of Liberty started shakin’ her fist
And the eagle will fly man, it’s gonna be hell
When you hear mother freedom start ringin’ her bell
And it feels like the whole wide world is raining down on you
Brought to you courtesy of the red white and blue.”

Later in the program, Fox and Friends showed the video again, again overlaying it with uber-patriotic country music.

“We’ll play a little music, demonstrate the moment of impact there in Afghanistan on the MOAB in Nangarhar province,” host Pete Hegseth says, as the video plays under Kid Rock singing “born free.”

[…]

Fox News, which was the most-watched cable network of 2016 and is a primary source of news for millions of Americans (including, it seems, the President), isn’t overly concerned about those deaths, however.

“I think it is very, very important we kill bad guys but there is no denying that the issue of friendly fire is really egregious,” Rivera said, only to be immediately rebutted by host Pete Hegseth.

“Why go there first, Geraldo?” said Hegseth. “Civilian casualties happen. We’re going against an enemy that cuts off our heads.”

Oh right, seems yours hasn’t been cut off, has it, you fucking moron? Have there been waves of the Mother Of All Swords landing here in the good ol’ U.S. of Amerikka, resulting in thousands of heads rolling? I haven’t noticed anything like that at all. Not that I’d be entirely against certain heads rolling, and I’m looking at Fox News. I’d most likely favour a guillotine though. More efficient. Goddamn disgusting asshole apes, chattering away, ever so excited over dead people. Celebrating. Yeah, why ever go there, ’cause you know, people die, who gives a shit, lookit that bomb go! Of course, when other people fight back against that sort of thing, they are the bad ones. And, they are the bad ones when they become radicalized because bombs keep being dropped on them, killing people. Those people that don’t matter, because hot damn, lookit at that thing go! Fucking barbaric animals.

:Spits:

Think Progress has the story.