Still coronavirus-free in central Virginia. Since I am non-essentially languishing at home I am living my best life. 1. Gym workouts every morning. Gym is open but restricted to ten people in the building. Not a huge problem at 0600, and...no waiting on equipment. 2. CGSC coursework online. Plugging through class segments like #CCPVirus through Italy. Papers a little slower going. 3. Planting flowers. Nearly 100 new plantings, plus some landscaping work. This weekend I will clear a new forest trail. 4. Playing with dog. 5. Photography of previously planted flowers, and dog. 6. Painting basement stairwell. Well stocked supplies of meat, propane, and alcohol. I hope this goes on for another three weeks.

TomR: This is funny. That error in the movie was the source of discussion among my cronies and me in junior high, and then later in hisgh school. Over time we have concluded that it was not in fact an error in the production of the movie, but simply Rat screwing up Damon's instructions. It's nice that you are turning your son on to a peek into a better, less stupid and fragile era.

Happy Birthday Porch! Sat down and tried to watch The Andromeda Strain last night. Fell asleep. This is roughly equivalent to my reaction to Kung Flu.

Oh and happy birthday Jane.

Disappointment! Frustration! Despair! CHAOS! Central Virginia feeling the Bern muthafcukas! Milwaukee gonna party like it's Nineteen Sixty-Eight (do do, doo do do). (I secretly am nervous that the great karmic wheel is going to roll over my foot in November, but whatever...)

Disappointment! Frustration! Despair! CHAOS! Central Virginia feeling the Bern muthafcukas! Milwaukee gonna party like it's Nineteen Sixty-Eight (do do, doo do do). (I secretly am nervous that the great karmic wheel is going to roll over my foot in November, but whatever...)

Hmmm. Double posting. Damned n00bs.

Narciso: Stately Soylent Manor is terrif. Cleared all of last year's storm damage, converted most into logs that will subsequently be converted to firewood. The rest will be converted to chips to improve my one existing, and one soon to be cut, forest paths. Did some major drainage work last fall, so now I am looking for landscapers to come unfcuk everything, and studying gardening books to figure out what to plant. Wife's side garden is going to have to wait until the front of the house doesn't look like a construction site. Shop is coming along. Tomorrow will be for building a spiffy new miter saw table, on which to place my spiffy new miter saw. When I get all of my projects done, I will retire, grow my beard out, make furniture, throw my computer off the mountain, and never look at another newspaper again. It will be glorious.

Narciso: Stately Soylent Manor is terrif. Cleared all of last year's storm damage, converted most into logs that will subsequently be converted to firewood. The rest will be converted to chips to improve my one existing, and one soon to be cut, forest paths. Did some major drainage work last fall, so now I am looking for landscapers to come unfcuk everything, and studying gardening books to figure out what to plant. Wife's side garden is going to have to wait until the front of the house doesn't look like a construction site. Shop is coming along. Tomorrow will be for building a spiffy new miter saw table, on which to place my spiffy new miter saw. When I get all of my projects done, I will retire, grow my beard out, make furniture, throw my computer off the mountain, and never look at another newspaper again. It will be glorious.

Mueller was looking for scalps more than true justice. Stone was and us basically a harmless goof ball. On the other hand, he is guilty of the crimes for which he was charged. Just had this convo with my wife... Imagine if Stone had been a Democrat, or any other favored denizen of the political petri dish. Would the recommended sentence have been more or less in that case? Would the jury have been stacked with people out to get him? Stone is guilty, probably. But he is being treated the way he is because of his political affiliation, not the facts of his guilt. He should get something like 18-24 months, tops, with a lot of that suspended, folding sheets in some minimum security country club. Dear wife just informed that she would not be voting for Trump. I told her I would never, while I have all my faculties, vote for a Democrat of any stripe. So I guess we cancel each other out.

Mueller was looking for scalps more than true justice. Stone was and us basically a harmless goof ball. On the other hand, he is guilty of the crimes for which he was charged. Just had this convo with my wife... Imagine if Stone had been a Democrat, or any other favored denizen of the political petri dish. Would the recommended sentence have been more or less in that case? Would the jury have been stacked with people out to get him? Stone is guilty, probably. But he is being treated the way he is because of his political affiliation, not the facts of his guilt. He should get something like 18-24 months, tops, with a lot of that suspended, folding sheets in some minimum security country club. Dear wife just informed that she would not be voting for Trump. I told her I would never, while I have all my faculties, vote for a Democrat of any stripe. So I guess we cancel each other out.

Soylent, just think if Mayor Pete won! It would be faaaaaaaaabulous!. O.M.G. its raining men! SQUEEEEEE! I don't think most of America will buy his kind of liberalism, especially from a Son of Gramsci. This is fundamentally it. He's a pinko. His gayness is, frankly, the most uninteresting part of an all-around uninteresing guy. But Trump, when he gets around to Hall Monitor Pete, needs to paint him up as a cut rate Bernie Sanders without the integrity to admit his socialism.

That's a great way to get people to not vote for you, Pete. This is probably true. I am guessing that many of the heterosexual men who might normally vote for a gay Democrat man, would only do so if they could avoid the mental picture of what would inevitably go on in the White House. Reminding them of it doesn't seem like a winning strategy. And before anyone blows me up: I have no issue with teh gheys. I am simply pointing out that many heterosexual men do not like to think about the necessary behaviors to qualify a person to be a gay man. The prospect of being confronted with those thoughts for four years may prove to be a difficult thing to overcome.

JiB, TomR: First of all, Buttjudge was a Navy Reservist, not Army. I am an Army Reservist (although I have volunteered almost my whole career to be mobilized to the active component) so I can tell you how the Army does it, but Navy might have some differences. JiB is correct. Direct commissions for the active component of the Army are pretty much reserved for doctors and lawyers (don't know about indian chiefs). In the Reserves you can go from civilian to commissioned officer in one of two ways. I was a 09S accession, which means I went to basic training, then directly to federal OCS, then to my basic officer courses. Just about six months to the ay from shipping out of MEPS to graduation at Ft. Huachuca. Buttjudge was a direct commission, which means he submitted a packet with his resume and photograph, took a PT test, and was boarded by 3-6 O6's to make sure he wasn't an oddball. Board recommends selection, bing bang boom in a month or two you get your commission, and orders to report to a direct commission finishing school, that teaches you how to march and salute and other things you would get in phase 1 of basic training. Five weeks later (or so) you are a shiny new butterbar O1 (in Buttjudge's case, an Ensign, like Wesley Crusher). He may have come in as an O2 (LTJG), or less likely an O3 (LT), but he most likely came in as an O1. Again, I do not disparage his service. I know several direct commissions who are good Army officers, largely because they came in a little older and wiser than the average ROTC or West Point grad. Buttjudge clearly is no dummy, and his civilian work probably helped him a lot in his job at KAF, so I suppose Yay Navy. I can't speak to his leadership ability. I can only guess based on his willingness to allow people to think he was in actual combat (big difference between that and being a "combat veteran"). JohnH: Re: ISAF - mostly that's true, although some of our Czech and Slavic allies dearly loved to mix it up with bad guys. Some of our Five Eye parters would go looking for fights too. French and Dutch - not so much. RSE: I'm no "hard man" and I would never claim to be. I joined and stay in because I don't like war, but I would rather subject myself to it than leave it to others with more to lose. Or my grandchildren, God forbid.

Hi all: Chiming in waaaaay late but I have been following the whole "Buttigieg is a fraud" line on Twitter, and now I see it has popped up here. I have pretty close to first-hand knowledge on this particular subject. Some points: 1. Buttjudge went to AFG in the 2013 timeframe as a Navy Reserve Individual Augmentee (IMA). He, by his own description, worked an intelligence job studying "threat finance." This is very likely since other pictures show him clearly wearing the Afghanistan Threat Finance Group patch. There was a threat finance group that worked at a seperate compound on Kandahar Airfield (KAF)where he claims he was stationed. It did network analysis on Taliban sources of money, and corrupt local and district government officials. I know this because I was almost assigned to this place in 2010. 2. Buttjudge very likely only went "outside the wire" to participate in Key Leader Engagements (KLEs) out in the province. He may have gone as far as the PAK border at Spin Boldak, but a lot of the KLEs took place at a little Afghan National Army base right off KAF (that counts as "outside the wire", I guess), or in Kandahar City, or at one of several district centers. He was transported to these things as cargo in armed convoys, surrounded by real pipehitters. Aside from the possibility of an IED (which mostly didn't occur on the main roads he would have traveled) he was never in any real danger. Just the general unease that comes with being out and about in a place where everyone hates you. 3. Patches. The Navy is/was weird about patches. The two things that every Sailor I ever ran into was required to wear was the US flag and the NATO ISAF (International Security Assistance Force)patch. Most Sailors also wore a subdued Navy Jack flag, right below the US flag. Buttjudge is clearly seen in at least one picture with the Threat Finance patch, which was possibly made for his office by the local embroidery shop as a distinctive patch. The Navy, to my knowledge doesn't wear "combat" patches, which is the patch of the unit you deployed with. Even in DC, most Sailors don't wear any kind of unit patch on their utilities. 4. The picture MM2 linked to with the sanitized uniform is not evidence he is a fraud, or was a CIA operative. It is probably mostly evidence that uniform rules were lax for Navy Reservists at KAF. It's entirely possible he took the patches off as an OPSEC thing because he wanted to post the picture to social media. It is, I'm pretty sure, taken at the rug shop in the KAF bazaar (NOT outside the wire, BTW). As I type this, my chair is sitting on a rug from that shop. He probably went down there on an off-duty day/half-day and had a picture taken while he was haggling for the overpriced "authentic handwoven rugs" straight from an industrial loom in Pakistan (yeah, I got burned there too). 5. Take a look at the condition of the uniforms in the pictures that are out there. In Afghanistan, real killers have very worn looking uniforms. This comes from getting them filthy, then either you or some hajji washing them in 10,000 degree water. The get faded and soft very quickly. His look new and stiff. This is not evidence of anything other than he did not spend a lot of time out in the field. 6. Take a look at the photo of him in his body armor. Real action heroes strip that rig down to bare essentials (no neck protection, side plates, groin dangly thing). Most actually wear a vest called a plate carrier (which is NOT what he is wearing), because regular body armor is heavy AF and makes it hard to do the "move" part of "shoot, move, and communicate". That and a combat load of ammo is about it. Maybe a camelback. Just remember: in any military picture, more armor means less mobility, which nobody who fights for a living wants. 6. This gets to my main point: I don't disparage his service, I disparage that he tries to come off like some kind of war hero. The tooth-to-tail ratio (in the Army anyway) is something like 20-1 support staff to every shooter. I predict it is probably similar across all the services. So that means lots and lots of people served in Iraq and Afghanistan who never ever saw anything close to real action. In one long tour, and two field trips, I only really felt like I was in danger on a couple of occasions, and never once fired my weapon in anger. Lots of people like that, who went, did a necessary job, and came home to mostly not talk about it. Buttjudge did an important job, but he was never in any kind of real hostilities there. His experience was closer to MASH than to a John Wayne movie, but he lets uninformed civilians THINK he was in a John Wayne movie, because that's what a lot of people think it's like for everyone. For most people it's a year of boredom, with some occasional excitement. Sorry to rant. As irritating as Buttjudge is, for real reasons, there is no reason to weave conspiracy theories about him. He was just another REMF.

I didn't get a chance to log in yesterday, so a belated Happy and Prosperous New Year to all my JOM friends. Hope you all set good goals and achieve them this year.

Happy Day After Thanksgiving JOMers. HOpe your food was delicious, your weight stayed stable, your teams won, and you dominated your family at board games. Making bone broth and culminating Hate Io_a Week today in my mountain redoubt with some afternoon football watching and beverages. Anyone have any good turkey leftover recipes to share?

Which account about RBG is correct--chest pains of emergency surgery? Dafuq is "routine" emergency surgery anyway? I don't wish bad things on little old ladies, but man it wouldn't it suck all the oxygen out of Schiff's little circus?

Harsh TK, but not far from where I see it too. I don't always agree with Threadkiller, but when he's right, he's right: Political violence in this country will largely come about as a result of Uncle Sugar failing to provide the FSA with the fruits of everyone else's labor. And the cops will stand around and watch it happen because no one wants a 20-year career destroyed by a PC virtual lynch mob.

this thing we have Cosa nostra alright. They're all fucking gangsters.

Howdy folks... Hey I just changed over to the Ice Dragon browser and I'm trying to get everything back in trim again. Where do I/How do I get the little first/last comment thingy back? I forgot where that came from.