Fiery The Angels Fell (Bropocalypse Now, Six.)

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I've watched c-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those ... moments will be lost in time, like tears...in rain. Time to die. ~Roy Batty, Blade Runner.

...

So Ahab sent for all the children of Israel, and gathered the prophets together on Mount Carmel. 

And Elijah came to all the people, and said, “How long will you falter between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal, follow him.” But the people answered him not a word. 

Then Elijah said to the people, “I alone am left a prophet of the Lord; but Baal’s prophets are four hundred and fifty men. 

Therefore let them give us two bulls; and let them choose one bull for themselves, cut it in pieces, and lay it on the wood, but put no fire under it; and I will prepare the other bull, and lay it on the wood, but put no fire under it. 

Then you call on the name of your gods, and I will call on the name of the Lord; and the God who answers by fire, He is God.”

So all the people answered and said, “It is well spoken.”

Now Elijah said to the prophets of Baal, “Choose one bull for yourselves and prepare it first, for you are many; and call on the name of your god, but put no fire under it.”

So they took the bull which was given them, and they prepared it, and called on the name of Baal from morning even till noon, saying, “O Baal, hear us!” But there was no voice; no one answered. Then they leaped about the altar which they had made.

And so it was, at noon, that Elijah mocked them and said, “Cry aloud, for he is a god; either he is meditating, or he is busy, or he is on a journey, or perhaps he is sleeping and must be awakened.” So they cried aloud, and cut themselves, as was their custom, with knives and lances, until the blood gushed out on them. And when midday was past, they prophesied until the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice. But there was no voice; no one answered, no one paid attention.

Then Elijah said to all the people, “Come near to me.” So all the people came near to him. And he repaired the altar of the Lord that was broken down. And Elijah took twelve stones, according to the number of the tribes of the sons of Jacob, to whom the word of the Lord had come, saying, “Israel shall be your name.” Then with the stones he built an altar in the name of the Lord; and he made a trench around the altar large enough to hold two cords of seed. And he put the wood in order, cut the bull in pieces, and laid it on the wood, and said, “Fill four water-pots with water, and pour it on the burnt sacrifice and on the wood.” Then he said, “Do it a second time,” and they did it a second time; and he said, “Do it a third time,” and they did it a third time. So the water ran all around the altar; and he also filled the trench with water.

And it came to pass, at the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice, that Elijah the prophet came near and said, “Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that You are God in Israel and I am Your servant, and that I have done all these things at Your word. Hear me, O Lord, hear me, that this people may know that You are the Lord God, and that You have turned their hearts back to You again.”

Then the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood and the stones and the dust, and it licked up the water that was in the trench. Now when all the people saw it, they fell on their faces; and they said, “The Lord, He is God! The Lord, He is God!”

And Elijah said to them, “Seize the prophets of Baal! Do not let one of them escape!” So they seized them; and Elijah brought them down to the Brook Kishon and executed them there. 

~2 Kings 18:20-40

Evidently, the State of New Mexico has started digging up the ground at Jeffrey Epstein's former Zorro Ranch.

They're apparently finding a lot of stuff.

This was one of Epstein's home bases for his Baal-cult of sexual abuse.

Also for awhile now I've been seeing a bunch of crap about Nazi troll Jack Lang, but a few minutes ago I saw that he's texting back and forth with 15 year old girls.

Is there even ONE of these fucking people who's not a pedophile??

Just sayin' my partner's daughter, basically my step-daughter at this point, is 14 and if some 30 year old dude was texting her? Between me and my partner, nobody would ever find him. I spent a lot of time in the field as an Air Force security police troop, I know how to hide a body and I live in Northern Michigan. I know places nobody goes.

The thing I don't get is...why are conservatives, you know *Checks Notes* the people who taught me to fear and hate pedophiles and who spent most of my formative years panicking about pedophile Satanic cults now *Checks Notes* endorsing exactly that same shit and pretty much...especially the "Conservative" MAGA "Christians" swearing themselves to live under the rule of such people forever??

Is hatred of some mostly-imagined "Other" literally more important to These Fucking People than their own souls??

Like I'm sorry, but if you're a so-called "Christian" and you're willingly living under a demonic pedophile-cult 'cause you think it'll hurt other people, you ain't a Christian, you ain't conservative and you're probably at least somewhat sympathetic to the fucking demons and devils.

In D&D terms these would be the people who buy the propaganda put out by the Devils of Baator that they are the defenders of the multiverse against the Demons of the Abyss in their perpetual Blood War.

And like some Neutral Evil D&D character, they believe this crap.

Apparently, they want to.

I mean, that's bog standard Republicanism since at least 9/11 if you think about it.

Like I keep saying, if Heaven doesn't have a hierarchy and Hell does, these idiots would rather go to Hell.

The worst part is, it gets worse still.

The clocks stopped at one seventeen. There was a long shear of bright light, then a series of low concussions. By day the dead impaled on spikes along the road. I think it's October but I can't be sure. I haven't kept a calendar for five years. Each day is more gray than the one before. It is cold and growing colder as the world slowly dies. No animals have survived and all the crops are long gone. Soon all the trees in the world will fall. The roads are peopled by refugees towing carts and gangs carrying weapons, looking for fuel and food. Within a year there was fire on the ridges and deranged chanting. There has been cannibalism. Cannibalism is the great fear. Mostly I worry about food. Always food. Food and the cold and our shoes. Sometimes I tell the boy old stories of courage and justice - difficult as they are to remember. All I know is the child is my warrant and if he is not the word of God, then God never spoke. ~The Man, from Cormac McCarthy's "The Road" (Film.)

Any ideals of freedom these fucking monsters claim to possess aren't worth the cost of the piece of scrap paper it'd take to write them down on.

Conceptually, these fuckin' people are obsessed not only with slavery in general but sexual slavery in particular.

Anything but having to obtain consent, I guess?

As somebody now responsible for a kid I don't think that's the kind of world any of us want to live in. I don't give a damn.

This shit disgusts me.

And if it doesn't disgust you, what the fuck is wrong with you??

When the fuck is enough, enough??

You can take a lot of things away from a man. Cigarettes, the gym. You can take his freedom, his legs, but not his feelings. Not his feelings. A man loves a woman. Don't matter what kind of man he is, if he loves her, he wants her. He wants her body. He wants her to want his. So you say to him, "you can never make love again. You will never touch her in that way again. This is the last time. The last time. Forever." If that's not cruel and unusual punishment, I don't know what is. ~Augustus Hill, from the HBO series Oz, S1.E2 "Visits, Conjugal and otherwise."

These guys don't want to have sex out of love or even lust, let alone for any of those other "Traditional" reasons like having families with kids and shit. Not a bit, it's entirely about gratifying 100% pure male egotistical narcissism.

These people don't want virgins and young women for any kind of chastity or moral reasons, they want that because they're creepers and pedophiles.

People who were like this used to hide it, lest they get beat up or shot at by random parents and girl-dads in particular. This was the standard especially on the Right until Trump came along.

Patriarchy, if that's what one really wants, requires protection, provision and responsibility. Otherwise it's just a cover for abuse and a power trip.

Funny how that changed overnight in 2015, ain't it??

That's not the world these assholes want to live in, though.

Hell, I've been called "Gay" for treating my partner with respect. For treating her like a person, you know...how one is supposed to interact with other people in a society?

This shit isn't sustainable and it doesn't work. 

We've got to take the neighborhood back. We've got to go in there. Just forget telling your child to go to the Peace Corps. It's right around the corner. It's standing on the corner. It can't speak English. It doesn't want to speak English. I can't even talk the way these people talk. "Why you ain't where you is go." I don't know who these people are. And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. Then I heard the father talk. This is all in the house. You used to talk a certain way on the corner and you got into the house and switched to English. Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads. You can't land a plane with "why you ain't…". You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth. There is no Bible that has that kind of language. Where did these people get the idea that they're moving ahead on this? Well, they know they're not, they're just hanging out in the same place, five or six generations sitting in the projects when you're just supposed to stay there long enough to get a job and move out. ~Bill Cosby, the "Pound Cake" speech.

And these CHUD's can't wait until somebody starts mass-producing sex robots so that they pretty much can get themselves off without ever having to treat another human being properly.

I mean, fuck, these people bitch about low birth-rates now. What happens when those who can afford it spend all their time banging sex robots??

I mean, while we're at it what happens when the robots get tired if this fucking bullshit??

These people don't want to live in a society, they want endless narcissistic gratification and that's all there is to it.

I'm assuming most of these motherfuckers have never done anything genuinely worthwhile in their lives and I say that as somebody belatedly helping to support a family. Lots of pretty simple things can get filed under "Worthwhile endeavors."

Again, that ain't the world these ass-clowns want to live in or participate in or even be a part of. They might as well be like Elon Musk, mailing off vials of their spunk to random women or some such bullshit. 

If that's what all this kind of crap is now, then it needs to die. In fact, the graveyard of History is too good of a fate for this fucking garbage!

Bropocalypse Now, yo.

Like, I'm sorry but I used to be a conservative and specifically a Politically conservative Christian back when those words apparently meant something other than this.

When somebody like me is looking at this mess and saying "Like tears in rain...time to die" that ought to be a sign we're in trouble.

You either believe in freedom or you don't.

Слава Україна!

Valin Hess: So what shall we toast to, boys? I can blather on about “To health” or “To success,” but I’d like to do somethin’ a little less rote. Where you from, Brown Eyes?

Migs Mayfield: How ’bout a toast to Operation Cinder?

Hess: Now there’s a man who knows his history.

Mayfield: No, I don’t just know it. I lived it. I was in Burnin Konn.

Hess: Burnin Konn?

Mayfield: Mmm.

Hess: That was a hard day. I had to make many unpleasant decisions.

Mayfield: Yes, you did. Entire city gone in moments, along with everybody in it. We lost our whole division that day. Man, that was like 5-10,000 people.

Hess: Yep. All heroes of the Empire.

Mayfield: Yeah. And all dead.

Hess: Well, it’s a small sacrifice for the greater good, son.

Mayfield: Depends on who you ask, don’t you think?

Hess: [irritated] What you gettin’ at, trooper?

Mayfield: All those people, the ones who died, was it good for them? Hmm? Their families? The guys I served with? Civilians, those poor mud scuffers, died defending their homes, fighting for freedom. Was it good for them? 

Hess: But we’ve outlasted them, son. They’re eating themselves alive. The New Republic is in complete disarray, and we grow stronger. You see, with the rhydonium you’ve delivered, we can create havoc that’s gonna make Burnin Konn pale by comparison. And then they’re gonna turn to us once again. You see, boys, everybody thinks they want freedom, but what they really want is order. And when they realize that, they’re gonna welcome us back with open arms. Ah. To the Empire.

[Mayfield chuckles, then fires a blaster at Hess' chest, killing him instantly. He and Mando then shoot their way out of the mess hall] ~From The Mandalorian, Season 2, Ep. 7 "The Believer"

Five

The martyrs of history were not fools, and our honored dead who gave their lives to stop the advance of the Nazis didn't die in vain. Where, then, is the road to peace? Well, it's a simple answer after all. You and I have the courage to say to our enemies, "There is a price we will not pay." There is a point beyond which they must not advance. This is the meaning in the phrase of Barry Goldwater's "peace through strength." Winston Churchill said that "the destiny of man is not measured by material computation. When great forces are on the move in the world, we learn we are spirits — not animals." And he said, "There is something going on in time and space, and beyond time and space, which, whether we like it or not, spells duty. ~Ronald Reagan

Death Cult Bromance (Bropocalypse Now, Five.)

 Lt. Daniel Kaffee: I WANT THE TRUTH!

Col. Nathan Jessup: You can't handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lieutenant Weinberg? I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: that Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives! You don't want the truth, because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall. You need me on that wall. We use words like "honor", "code", "loyalty". We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline! I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide, and then QUESTIONS the manner in which I provide it! I would rather you just said "thank you", and went on your way. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon, and stand a post. Either way, I don't give a DAMN what you think you are entitled to!

Kaffee: Did you order the Code Red?

Jessup: I did the job that—

Kaffee: DID YOU ORDER THE CODE RED?!

Jessup: YOU'RE GODDAMN RIGHT I DID!!!

~From the film A Few Good Men.

...

And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple: and his disciples came to him for to shew him the buildings of the temple.

And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.

And as he sat upon the mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?

And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you.

For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.

And ye shall hear of wars and rumors of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.

For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in diverse places.

All these are the beginning of sorrows.

Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name's sake.

And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another.

And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many.

And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.

But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved.

And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.

When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, spoken of by Daniel the prophet, stand in the holy place, (whoso reads, let him understand:)

Then let them which be in Judaea flee into the mountains:

Let him which is on the housetop not come down to take any thing out of his house:

Neither let him which is in the field return back to take his clothes.

And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days!

But pray ye that your flight be not in the winter, neither on the sabbath day:

For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.

And except those days should be shortened, there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened.

Then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there; believe it not.

For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.

Behold, I have told you before.

Wherefore if they shall say unto you, Behold, he is in the desert; go not forth: behold, he is in the secret chambers; believe it not.

For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. ~Matthew 24:1-27

As I've said recently, I'm a fairly agnostic sort of Christian. This is a fairly recent change from just "Agnostic."

A generation ago, though, I was a conservative Christian and a member of the End Times Prophecy Movement.

I've written about this and may one of these days provide a rolodex of said posts on this site.

Nothing that's going on right now, and none of this bullshit with these fake-ass "Christian Nationalists" openly trying to bring about the End Times, is Okay with me now or would have been anything I'd have been cool with 25 years ago.

These things are not for Man to decide.

But you have to read the Lord's Word to know that.
If God can be manipulated by Man, then He is NOT God and it's all a lie.

It specifically says in Matthew chapter 24:

Verily I say unto you, This generation shall not pass, till all these things be fulfilled.

Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away.

But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only.

But as the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. ~Matthew 24:34-37

The truth is that These Fucking People aren't trying to bring about the End Times, they're trying to feeble-minded Americans into accepting their endless increasing demands, and bully the rest of the world into looking the other way. 

If These Fucking People really believed that the World was going to End seven years from now with themselves being replaced by the direct monarchial rule of Jesus Christ, they would not be acting the way they are acting. This would not be all about trying to secure "permanent" Billionaire-wealth or Republican political Power or White Men having Power over women, because in less time than it takes to pay off a lot of car loans these days such ideas would be totally meaningless.

As if their demands upon the rest of the country and this world have not already been so escalatory and extreme to the point where that's blatantly obvious..

But, of course like most of America the rest of the world has said "No."

And when it doesn't work? They will bow down before whatever Demon presents itself and offers them Power.

Because deep down this shit is a Death Cult, like the lady I quoted up above said and they don't really care where they get the Capability to cause Death.

And God, as written at least, isn't gonna help them with that enough.

I believe in no God, no invisible man in the sky. But there is something more powerful than each of us, a combination of our efforts, a Great Chain of industry that unites us. But it is only when we struggle in our own interest that the chain pulls society in the right direction. The chain is too powerful and too mysterious for any government to guide. Any man who tells you different either has his hand in your pocket, or a pistol to your neck. ~Andrew Ryan, Bioshock

Because none of this is really about Christ, it's all about Power and whatever they think they can grab for themselves. If it was about Jesus, they might disagree with guys like James Talarico, they might blast the ever-living fuck out of them for their politics, but they wouldn't be trying to literally demonize their faith.

Because it's not enough to disagree anymore, and these motherfuckers for the most part don't have the guts to own their own bullshit and just be able to say they don't like somebody.

It's all learned helplessness and passive voice and every damn thing gets blamed on God or the Devil. 

It's like arguing with my ex-wife, everything has to come down to a religious context because these idiots are desperate to avoid taking accountability for anything that comes out of their mouths.

Deep down, these motherfuckers are a bunch of Self-worshiping Narcissists.

They know it. You know it.

We have too many men of science, too few men of God. We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon On The Mount. The world has achieved brilliance without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants. We know more about war than we know about peace, more about killing than we know about living. ~General Omar Bradley

They only said they believed in Christ because that sounded like the best way to hurt more people at the time.

They're constantly trying to play the "God Card" because they think if they do, people won't question them.

If they really Believed, or at least believed in the things they said they do, they would not have selected an Atheistic Bullshitter who cannot even properly name the Books of the Bible as their leader.

If they really believed in the Lord's Word, they would defer to that and not try to substitute 19th Century fan-fiction for it.

Political Power is These Fucking People's true "God."

And there's nothing conservative about it, but they figured hijacking that word would be easier.

That's why their so-called "Gurus" literally cannot apparently see the world in any other way besides some kind of arrogant-sounding, sneering anti-Liberalism by the kind of people who pick obscure references and use big words because they figure it'll impress the people they think listen to their crap.

Which is always a smaller number than they think it is.

We wouldn't know who these fucking people were if they hadn't caught the eye of malformed misfits like Elon Musk and Peter Theil.

No sympathy for the devil; keep that in mind. Buy the ticket, take the ride...and if it occasionally gets a little heavier than what you had in mind, well...maybe chalk it up to forced consciousness expansion: Tune in, freak out, get beaten. ~Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

40 years ago somebody like Curtis Yarvin would've been simping for the Baader-Meinhof Gang and claiming the Soviet Union wasn't Communist enough anymore for no better reason than that's what all the other "Cool" fake-intellectual dilettante types who oscillate from "Left" to "Right" as the political seasons change were doing.

The endless ass-kissing corporatism is just a bit, same as everything else with these goddamned people.

Come on, there's a whole bunch of MAGA "Influencer" types that started out with shit like Occupy Wall Street. This is well known and it isn't that hard to figure out.

They're not trying to accomplish anything more than getting invited to better Cocaine Orgies and be more popular with their other sneering pseudo-intellectual friends.

I'm sorry, but I used to be a conservative, as in an actual political conservative who believed in this shit.

The first time I ever saw what Curtis Yarvin actually looked like?

I laughed my ass off and El Bimbo, the Blue Oyster gay bar music from the Police Academy movies briefly played in my head.

That dude is a conservative about like I'm a goddamned toaster oven.

And *Checks Notes* These Fucking People are about to all appoint themselves "Experts On Biblical Prophecy."

Excuse me while I go throw up.

Not going to lie, in a less "Politically Correct" era my first reaction probably would have been an affront to his masculinity and some assertions about his sexuality and that'd be without knowing who his main patron is. Knowing that?? Well...let's just say bare minimum I'd assume he's the sort of guy who's seen another man naked somewhere other than the gym.

Look, if that's what you are, that's what you are. I don't care. Be open about it, be yourself, and stop bothering everybody with your bullshit. 

I'll note yet again that most of the people in politics and public life these days who scan as bog-standard straight or even well-adjusted LGBT folks are at least Democratic voters or some kind of Anti-Trump conservatives or at least not-fully-on-board-with-this-shit sort of Republicans.

And honestly I think it's less "Closeted LGBT types" and more simply the kind of perverts who'll stick it in a knothole in a fencepost if nothing else is around.

Best case it's a Death Cult Bromance, but I rather suspect there's other things going on with these guys. I know the kind of idiot fuck-fuck games Bro Culture dudes play when they think nobody's watching.

And idiots keep giving these people political power.

These are the people trying to bring about the Apocalypse.

Without knowing that, if you actually go by what the real definition of "Apocalypse" is...a time of revealing...we're already in one.

We've got to take the neighborhood back. We've got to go in there. Just forget telling your child to go to the Peace Corps. It's right around the corner. It's standing on the corner. It can't speak English. It doesn't want to speak English. I can't even talk the way these people talk. "Why you ain't where you is go." I don't know who these people are. And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. Then I heard the father talk. This is all in the house. You used to talk a certain way on the corner and you got into the house and switched to English. Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads. You can't land a plane with "why you ain't…". You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth. There is no Bible that has that kind of language. Where did these people get the idea that they're moving ahead on this? Well, they know they're not, they're just hanging out in the same place, five or six generations sitting in the projects when you're just supposed to stay there long enough to get a job and move out. ~Bill Cosby, the "Pound Cake" speech.

And it's not looking too good, is it, what's being revealed?

Fuck this silly bullshit.

If we want to get these motherfuckers out of our lives, it's probably gonna come down to a fight.

People like this tend not to go away until they get punched in the face a few times.

Remember when somebody jacked Richard Spencer right upside the jaw?

Seems like nobody heard much of anything from that dude after that.

Just sayin.'

These people are revealing what they are because, like shitty little kids, they can't wait to tell on themselves.

Like the Colonel at the end of A Few Good Men, the MAGA's can't wait to tell us how shitty and violent they are and how their idea of "Freedom" isn't worth the seven letters it takes to spell the fucking word.

Like I said I'm a former End Times Christian and Republican myself. My formative years were the 1980's and 1990's. I'm a United States Air Force veteran. My partner is still kinda-conservative for sure, as am I just in some different ways (and you should hear us fight when we argue about this stuff, LOL. We agree on a lot, it's the other 10% we'll kill each other over.) Me, my partner, all my former Church people and friends from my old job...most of whom voted for Bush 43 in 2004? None of us are in the club anymore.

I've spent too much of my life around the people who became These Fucking People. I've listened to their music, I've listened to them talk, I've seen the shit they post on Facebook. I've watched as small-"C" conservatives like most of the people I know got pushed out. 

Then you wake up one morning and you find out that Tea Party Joe Walsh is a Democrat?

The Christian Nationalist MAGA idea of "Freedom" is pretty much the Empire from Star Wars.

The Baal-Worshipers are even worse and basically wanna be the bad guys from Cormac McCarthy's "The Road."

Note that number includes most of the richest men on the planet per the goddamned Epstein files.

And trust me, if they ever get it, there won't be no talk about no End Times because they will never want that shit to end. Why else do you think they want an AI Jesus?

They don't care if the world dies, so long as they make it to their bunkers first.

You either believe in freedom or you don't.

That includes the freedom to not have your world ended by some chuckle-fuck's End Times delusions and thinking they're gonna have Jesus on some kind of a gilded leash doing their bidding like Princess Leia in Return Of The Jedi. Yes, this shit is impossible. That's still what they think.

And you're either willing to fight for that freedom or you're not.

Слава Україна!

Valin Hess: So what shall we toast to, boys? I can blather on about “To health” or “To success,” but I’d like to do somethin’ a little less rote. Where you from, Brown Eyes?

Migs Mayfield: How ’bout a toast to Operation Cinder?

Hess: Now there’s a man who knows his history.

Mayfield: No, I don’t just know it. I lived it. I was in Burnin Konn.

Hess: Burnin Konn?

Mayfield: Mmm.

Hess: That was a hard day. I had to make many unpleasant decisions.

Mayfield: Yes, you did. Entire city gone in moments, along with everybody in it. We lost our whole division that day. Man, that was like 5-10,000 people.

Hess: Yep. All heroes of the Empire.

Mayfield: Yeah. And all dead.

Hess: Well, it’s a small sacrifice for the greater good, son.

Mayfield: Depends on who you ask, don’t you think?

Hess: [irritated] What you gettin’ at, trooper?

Mayfield: All those people, the ones who died, was it good for them? Hmm? Their families? The guys I served with? Civilians, those poor mud scuffers, died defending their homes, fighting for freedom. Was it good for them? 

Hess: But we’ve outlasted them, son. They’re eating themselves alive. The New Republic is in complete disarray, and we grow stronger. You see, with the rhydonium you’ve delivered, we can create havoc that’s gonna make Burnin Konn pale by comparison. And then they’re gonna turn to us once again. You see, boys, everybody thinks they want freedom, but what they really want is order. And when they realize that, they’re gonna welcome us back with open arms. Ah. To the Empire.

[Mayfield chuckles, then fires a blaster at Hess' chest, killing him instantly. He and Mando then shoot their way out of the mess hall] ~From The Mandalorian, Season 2, Ep. 7 "The Believer"

Four

When men stop believing in God, it isn't that they then believe in nothing: they believe in everything. ~Umberto Eco

Babylon Slipping (Bropocalypse Now, Four.)

Joe: For the last time, I'm pretty sure what's killing the crops is this Brawndo stuff.

Secretary of State: But Brawndo's got what plants crave. It's got electrolytes.

Attorney General: "So wait a minute. What you're saying is that you want us to put water on the crops.

Joe: Yes.

Attorney General: Water. Like out the toilet?

Joe: Well, I mean, it doesn't have to be out of the toilet, but, yeah, that's the idea.

Secretary of State: But Brawndo's got what plants crave.

Attorney General: It's got electrolytes.

Joe: Okay, look. The plants aren't growing, so I'm pretty sure that the Brawndo's not working. Now, I'm no botanist, but I do know that if you put water on plants, they grow.

Secretary of Energy: Well, I've never seen no plants grow out of no toilet.

Secretary of State: Hey, that's good. You sure you ain't the smartest guy in the world?

Joe: Okay, look. You want to solve this problem. I want to get my pardon. So why don't we just try it, okay, and not worry about what plants crave?

Attorney General: Brawndo's got what plants crave.

Secretary of Energy: Yeah, it's got electrolytes.

Joe: What are electrolytes? Do you even know?

Secretary of State: It's what they use to make Brawndo.

~From the film Idiocracy.

...

And after these things I saw another angel come down from heaven, having great power; and the earth was lightened with his glory.

And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the great is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and a cage of every unclean and hateful bird.

For all nations have drunk of the wine of the wrath of her fornication, and the kings of the earth have committed fornication with her, and the merchants of the earth are waxed rich through the abundance of her delicacies.

And I heard another voice from heaven, saying, Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues. For her sins have reached unto heaven, and God hath remembered her iniquities.

Reward her even as she rewarded you, and double unto her double according to her works: in the cup which she hath filled fill to her double.

How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her: for she said in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow.

Therefore shall her plagues come in one day, death, and mourning, and famine; and she shall be utterly burned with fire: for strong is the Lord God who judges her.

And the kings of the earth, who have committed fornication and lived deliciously with her, shall bewail her, and lament for her, when they shall see the smoke of her burning,

Standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas, alas that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come. ~Revelation 18:1-10

So apparently Mark Wayne Mullin, US Senator, soon to be former Senator and Homeland Security secretary, cannot speak proper English.

And a fair number of "Christians" see war and think that Jesus is coming, or that He will somehow get here faster if there is a war.

Again, it's going to come down to "These Fucking People think if they fuck shit up bad enough and make things horrible enough for everybody, it'll somehow bring on the End Times.

As I keep trying to point out, you can dumb it down all you like, but the main point I keep trying to make here is that God is God, and you are Not.

If God can be manipulated or ordered about by Man, then He is clearly not God, and all this is a lie anyway, and what's even the damn point??

We keep dumbing things down more and more, appointing or electing even stupider people to office mainly in an endless quest for low taxes and higher shareholder profits, along with various shitty agendas that even a (just for example) semi-intelligent Christian who's actually read the Lord's Word has a good chance of knowing they're complete bullshit.

At this point it's less that Trump's America is Babylon and Babylon is falling than it is, well, the Great Whore Of Babylon slipped on a banana peel and fell off the roof, thus coming to a humorous if rather painful end.

These Trump administration guys aren't trying to win an actual war with the real country of Iran using 40 years of very real threat assessments, expertise and intelligence.

They're acting like Influencers engaged in some kind of Content War against some shit that only exists in their own heads.

We're trying to Pwn Something Something Gazpacho Own The Libs Unga Bunga! on social media and the Iranians are acting like it's a real war, a war we're likely gonna lose because we're not taking anything seriously.

Too many of us don't even know what the fuck "Taking It Seriously" even means anymore.

Mark Wayne Mullin about got himself into a fight with the President of the Teamsters a few years ago and likely would have got his ass kicked.

There's jobs out there, whole groups of people, among other things...where people can't afford to fuck around. There was a time when being in the government or the military came with standards.

We've got to take the neighborhood back. We've got to go in there. Just forget telling your child to go to the Peace Corps. It's right around the corner. It's standing on the corner. It can't speak English. It doesn't want to speak English. I can't even talk the way these people talk. "Why you ain't where you is go." I don't know who these people are. And I blamed the kid until I heard the mother talk. Then I heard the father talk. This is all in the house. You used to talk a certain way on the corner and you got into the house and switched to English. Everybody knows it's important to speak English except these knuckleheads. You can't land a plane with "why you ain't…". You can't be a doctor with that kind of crap coming out of your mouth. There is no Bible that has that kind of language. Where did these people get the idea that they're moving ahead on this? Well, they know they're not, they're just hanging out in the same place, five or six generations sitting in the projects when you're just supposed to stay there long enough to get a job and move out. ~Bill Cosby, the "Pound Cake" speech.

There was a time when being able to speak eloquently and well and having an education was effectively the bargain-basement price of entry into a conclave such as the United States Congress...much less the office of the President. 

Jesus Christ, what the fuck is wrong with people??

Like, back during the 2000 election I remember being horrified when the main question a lot of people were asking about Bush 43 vs. Gore was "Which one would you rather have a beer with?"

And again, I was a Republican at the time.

This glorification of Idiocy has got to stop. 

Tom Ridge, the first head of the Department of Homeland Security, was an Army veteran and a lawyer who'd been the Governor of Pennsylvania. A history like that used to be pretty much required to be a freaking Cabinet secretary! Mark Wayne Mullin has an Associate's Degree in Construction and owns a plumbing company that he inherited.

My coworker that I'll be working with tonight is from Oklahoma and I'm gonna ask him what he thinks of this mess.

But the truth is that neither those MAGA's that are left nor the Billionaires and corporations who actually profit from all this horseshit want anybody who's competent or has an ounce of integrity or morality in any of these kind of positions.

Because that might prevent them from doing whatever bullshit they wanna do.

And Red States like Oklahoma and Texas have started to become examples of just what happens when we let that kind of shit fester for way too long.

Worse, nobody has the guts to change anything, they all just hope they can cash out before the shit hits the fan and things go pear-shaped. 

I can tell you that just from having been at my old job for so long.

The thing is, sooner or later we're gonna have to do something other than bullshit. Sooner or later we're gonna have to make something other than money.

And when that reality catches up with us, almost certainly faster than changing out all these dopes for people who know what they're doing...the tolerance for this shit is gonna go right out the window.

When the shit hits the fan I think it's going to come down to "On One Side, you'll need to meet qualifications and have a history of demonstrated moral and physical courage to be the gun-captain on a Technical Truck" and "On The Other Side, there'll be people who have to ask ChatGPT for both a battle plan and an exit strategy, who can't go to the bathroom without a Security Forces troop watching their ass."

It's like these fucking people who can't even go to the goddamn grocery store without a Cowboy Hat and a Colt Revolver, or maybe a rifle slung on their shoulder. 

Like what the fuck are you afraid of??

You think you're gonna find a terrorist in the meat department??

Heavily armed cowardice is still cowardice.

And it's been my experience that if you're no good in a fight without a weapon, you're gonna be worse than useless with one.

The clocks stopped at one seventeen. There was a long shear of bright light, then a series of low concussions. By day the dead impaled on spikes along the road. I think it's October but I can't be sure. I haven't kept a calendar for five years. Each day is more gray than the one before. It is cold and growing colder as the world slowly dies. No animals have survived and all the crops are long gone. Soon all the trees in the world will fall. The roads are peopled by refugees towing carts and gangs carrying weapons, looking for fuel and food. Within a year there was fire on the ridges and deranged chanting. There has been cannibalism. Cannibalism is the great fear. Mostly I worry about food. Always food. Food and the cold and our shoes. Sometimes I tell the boy old stories of courage and justice - difficult as they are to remember. All I know is the child is my warrant and if he is not the word of God, then God never spoke. ~The Man, from Cormac McCarthy's "The Road" (Film.)

Ten bucks says you ain't afraid of...or even paying attention to...the people that are actually a threat.

If you can't...either due to bigotry, misinformation or what the fuck ever...properly identify a threat to yourself, there's probably a good chance you'll come to an embarrassing end and deserve it.

People like Mark Wayne Mullin and Trump aren't the problem, they're a symptom of a wider problem of willful stupidity.

They're a symptom of a basic loss of survival instincts.

And here we are, opening up a Pandora's Box with a whole new threat pyramid.

20 years ago there was a whole slew of Christian end times-themed novels with names like "Babylon Rising" that attempted to follow in the footsteps of shit like the Left Behind series and perpetuate the fading 1990's End Times mania for various levels of fun and profit.

They were wrong.

Babylon is slipping.

We can either fall off the ledge with it, or we can find a way to hang on.

Your choice, yo.

Слава Україна!

Valin Hess: So what shall we toast to, boys? I can blather on about “To health” or “To success,” but I’d like to do somethin’ a little less rote. Where you from, Brown Eyes?

Migs Mayfield: How ’bout a toast to Operation Cinder?

Hess: Now there’s a man who knows his history.

Mayfield: No, I don’t just know it. I lived it. I was in Burnin Konn.

Hess: Burnin Konn?

Mayfield: Mmm.

Hess: That was a hard day. I had to make many unpleasant decisions.

Mayfield: Yes, you did. Entire city gone in moments, along with everybody in it. We lost our whole division that day. Man, that was like 5-10,000 people.

Hess: Yep. All heroes of the Empire.

Mayfield: Yeah. And all dead.

Hess: Well, it’s a small sacrifice for the greater good, son.

Mayfield: Depends on who you ask, don’t you think?

Hess: [irritated] What you gettin’ at, trooper?

Mayfield: All those people, the ones who died, was it good for them? Hmm? Their families? The guys I served with? Civilians, those poor mud scuffers, died defending their homes, fighting for freedom. Was it good for them? 

Hess: But we’ve outlasted them, son. They’re eating themselves alive. The New Republic is in complete disarray, and we grow stronger. You see, with the rhydonium you’ve delivered, we can create havoc that’s gonna make Burnin Konn pale by comparison. And then they’re gonna turn to us once again. You see, boys, everybody thinks they want freedom, but what they really want is order. And when they realize that, they’re gonna welcome us back with open arms. Ah. To the Empire.

[Mayfield chuckles, then fires a blaster at Hess' chest, killing him instantly. He and Mando then shoot their way out of the mess hall] ~From The Mandalorian, Season 2, Ep. 7 "The Believer"

Three

Proclaim ye this among the Gentiles; Prepare war, wake up the mighty men, let all the men of war draw near; let them come up: Beat your plowshares into swords and your pruning-hooks into spears: let the weak say, I am strong. Assemble yourselves, and come, all ye heathen, and gather yourselves together round about: thither cause thy mighty ones to come down, O Lord. Let the heathen be wakened, and come up to the valley of Jehoshaphat: for there will I sit to judge all the heathen round about. Put ye in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe: come, get you down; for the press is full, the fats overflow; for their wickedness is great. Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision. ~Joel 3:9-14