April 10, 2025

MY FRIEND DAVE FREER HAS A NEW BOOK COMING OUT:  STORM-DRAGON UP FOR PRE-ORDER.

And for those who read only on paper, yes there are paper editions coming out on the 11th. Amazon just doesn’t allow small presses to put that on pre-order.

Posted at 1:20 am by Sarah Hoyt 4

April 9, 2025

#JOURNALISM:

Posted at 10:24 pm by Glenn Reynolds 82

OPEN THREAD: Hump Day.

Posted at 9:30 pm by Glenn Reynolds 1283

ED MORRISSEY: Chris Matthews: Isn’t It Good, Canadian Wood?

I once had a point, or should I say, it once had me …

One could come up with a number of good arguments against tariffs. Chris Matthews did not choose well among them. Earlier today, the MSNBC commentator complained that American construction companies would lose access to … Canadian wood? Indeed, Matthews chose this particular import to highlight his opposition to Donald Trump’s tariffs, asking, “What is our plan now? We’re going to create more wood — is that it?”

Who wants to tell him?

Great point! It’s not as if lumber grows on trees! [Reads urgent bulletin from home office] Er, wait, I have a correction to make here…

Meanwhile, in other forestry-related news:

Posted at 9:14 pm by Ed Driscoll 163

I CAN’T BELIEVE THIS LOSER WAS THE DEMOCRATS’ DESIGNATED “NORMAL GUY:”

Posted at 9:11 pm by Glenn Reynolds 60

JUST NBC THE GASLIGHTING! Chuck Todd Says Legacy Media Downplayed Biden’s Issues Due To ‘Fear’ Of Perception Of ‘Helping Trump.’

Former NBC News chief political analyst Chuck Todd said Wednesday that legacy media was “subtle” with its coverage of former President Joe Biden’s age-related issues to avoid the perception of boosting President Donald Trump.

Corporate media spent years downplaying voters’ and Republicans’ concerns regarding Biden’s mental acuity until his disastrous June 2024 debate against Trump. Todd, on “Piers Morgan Uncensored,” said that legacy media members made an error by not focusing on Biden’s problems.

“I sit here, and I’ll defend a little bit of this in that I would argue the reason people were able to come to their own conclusion on Joe Biden is because of the media coverage,” Todd said. “Look, we were subtle. ‘He’s using the back staircase. He’s not using the front staircase.’ ‘Hey, he’s not doing any interviews.’ So there was this reluctance to draw the conclusion, to say, ‘Is he not doing this?’ And that I agree with. That was held back — held back a lot.”

Yes, NBC was certainly subtle when they reported on Biden’s decline:

The story revolved around Biden and other world leaders being greeted by a skydiving demonstration last Thursday at the Group of Seven meeting in Italy. Video shows Biden walking away from the leaders and toward a group of parachutists who had just landed, giving them two thumbs-up.

But conservative media outlets and the Republican National Committee posted videos shot from angles that cut out the parachutists. Some of their posts said incorrectly that Biden “wandered off.” Without the skydivers Biden was addressing included in those videos, viewers could be left with the impression that he was walking absentmindedly.

The misleading videos were an example of so-called cheap fakes, in which low-tech editing or other minor changes to videos, along with incorrect context, can amplify false but convincing messages.

The episode illustrated the dynamics of the new information ecosystem, in which tech platforms are hesitant to emphasize vetted, factual information during an election year for fear of appearing partisan — even as partisan operatives take advantage of the platforms’ attempts at neutrality.

—“The deceptive Biden G7 video was quickly debunked, but it kept going viral anyway,” NBC News, June 19th, 2024.

From March of last year, MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough was definitely being subtle when he discussed Biden’s decline,  which by then was obvious to everyone who wasn’t a Democratic Party operative with a Chyron:

“I’ve said it for years now: he’s cogent,” said Scarborough on Wednesday. “But I undersold him when I said he was cogent. He’s far beyond cogent. In fact, I think he’s better than he’s ever been, intellectually, analytically, because he’s been around for 50 years. And, you know — I don’t know if people know this or not — Biden used to be a hothead. Sometimes that Irishman would getting in front of the reasoning. Sometimes he would say things he didn’t want to say.”

“Start your tape right now,” he continued, “because I’m about to tell you the truth. And eff you if you can’t handle the truth. This version of Biden, intellectually, analytically, is the best Biden ever. Not a close second, and I’ve known him for years. The Brzezinskis have known him for 50 years. If it weren’t the truth, I wouldn’t say it.”

And Todd himself was ultra-subtle when reporting on the excesses of the Biden family: NBC’s Chuck Todd Worries GOP Will Accuse Biden With or Without Evidence. “This is the same Todd who had no problem allowing Russia collusion hoaxer Adam Schiff to accuse then-President Donald Trump of working with the Russians to steal the 2016 presidential election. Even though at the time, every honest person with common sense knew that was a fringe conspiracy theory.”

And to April of 2022: MSNBC’S Chuck Todd Snaps at Guest Over Criticism of Hunter Biden Media Coverage: ‘That’s the Laziest Attack.’

As Ace of Spades wrote on Monday: Now It Can Be Told: “Reporters” Writing About Biden’s Mental Decline Now Admit That Everyone In DC Knew He Had “Lost a Step” In 2020, But For Some Reason Never Reported It Until Biden Had Retired from Politics.

Basically, when a lie is no longer useful, because the public knows it’s a lie and is now punishing politicians and “journalists” for repeating it, Democrats and “journalists,” but I repeat myself, execute a Nixonian Modified Limited Hang-Out lie in which they say they have finally nailed down the “reporting” on facts that everyone in the world had the facts about five years ago.

Their claim is that everyone who knew this five years ago were biased, partisan, and acting, as Jake Tapper’s snarky chyrons say of Republicans, “WITHOUT EVIDENCE.” You see, we were all “Prematurely Right,” whereas the relentlessly-factual media has only recently finished sifting through the sands of evidence to Tell the Public What the Truth is just now.

You may think you were right and they were wrong. They insist, no, you were just partisan in guessing at what the facts were, whereas the Truth Scientists of the media actually conducted the necessary Journalistic Chemical Tests with their beakers and Bunsen burners and change-color strips and proven the truth just now.

It’s like the communists of the 30s supporting Hitler because they supported Stalin and Stalin had reached a deal with Hitler to divide Europe between us, and attacking anyone who prematurely opposed Hitler before he proved he was a Bad Egg after all by invading Russia.

You think you knew the truth before the media. You’re wrong, Stupid Bigots. The media just discovered the truth this past couple of months. Before that, it was unknowable.

I mean, except to the extent the media denied the truth previously.

Which was just about everybody covering the White House from 2021 to July of 2024.

Posted at 8:56 pm by Ed Driscoll 101

LEFTIES THINK TRUMP PROCEEDS BY IMPULSE INSTEAD OF BY PLAN:

Related:

Posted at 6:55 pm by Glenn Reynolds 460

MAKING AMERICA GREAT AGAIN:

Flashback: Low-Flow Showerheads Actually Use More Water Than High Pressure Ones.

Intrepid researchers at the University of Surrey had placed sensors in 290 showers around campus, recording data for 39 weeks from 86,421 individual shower sessions. “Water consumption,” the study found, sensationally, “was reduced by up to 56% with high water pressure.”

The researchers, seeming puzzled by the results, recommended more study. But they also offered a theory along these lines: When a showerhead delivers a good, fizzing spray, people pop in and briskly get their business done, unlike when faced with a drizzle that prompts them to wonder if the Head & Shoulders will ever be adequately washed off their head and shoulders.

But then, making your life worse is the actual goal. Everything else is just marketing. Related:

Posted at 6:47 pm by Glenn Reynolds 102

GOOD LORD:

Posted at 5:41 pm by Stephen Green 268

CHRISTIAN TOTO: John Lithgow Trashes Trump, Mum on Cancel Culture, Blacklist 2.0. “Google ‘John Lithgow Cancel Culture’ and nothing comes up, at least on the first few pages of said search. Why wasn’t Lithgow using his considerable clout to demand artists be able to tell their stories their way?”

Posted at 4:52 pm by Stephen Green 105

THIS COULD BE YUGE, ASSUMING HE CAN GET THEM TO COMPLY:

Without deregulation and tax cuts at home, tariffs are just a way to conserve inefficiencies. It’s good to see Trump working both sides of the equation.

Posted at 4:36 pm by Stephen Green 100

ADVENTURES IN 1/1 SCALE MODEL RAILROAD KITS: How Japan Built a 3D-Printed Train Station in 6 Hours.

In the six hours between the departure of the night’s last train and the arrival of the morning’s first one, workers in rural Japan built an entirely new train station. It will replace a significantly bigger wooden structure that has served commuters in this remote community for over 75 years.

The new station’s components were 3D-printed elsewhere and assembled on site last month, in what the railway’s operators say is a world first. It may look more like a shelter than a station, but building one the traditional way would have taken more than two months and cost twice as much, according to the West Japan Railway Company.

As Japan’s population ages and its work force shrinks, the maintenance of railway infrastructure, including outdated station buildings, is a growing issue for railway operators. Rural stations with dwindling numbers of users have posed a particular challenge.

* * * * * * * *

Serendix, the construction firm that worked with West Japan Railway the project, said printing the parts and reinforcing them with concrete took seven days.

The printing was done at a factory in Kumamoto Prefecture on the southwestern island of Kyushu. The parts left the factory on the morning of March 24 to be transported about 500 miles northeast by road to Hatsushima Station.

“Normally, construction takes place over several months while the trains are not running every night,” said Kunihiro Handa, a co-founder of Serendix. Construction work near commercial lines is subject to strict restrictions and is usually carried out overnight so as not to disrupt timetables.

Adam Carolla notes that had the station been printed and installed in California, even more records would be broken!

Posted at 4:14 pm by Ed Driscoll 35