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So, we rise from the rubble...
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Monday, August 25, 2025
Free Download: Anne Rice, "Memnoch the Devil"
"'Memnoch the Devil' is a novel by Anne Rice in which the concepts of good and evil are questioned. Through Memnoch's interactions with God and Lestat, all of the characters question their motives, and they search their souls to try to determine whether they are truly good people or not.
Lestat is a vampire who is tracking a victim that he has taken a special interest in, a drug lord, murderer and art smuggler named Roger. During his hunt he has become aware of another presence following him as well and has become frightened of what may be tracking him. For some reason he believes that this may be the Devil that is tracking him and he calls upon his close friend and fledgling, David, for comfort and advice. David advises that perhaps the events taking place may have something to do with the victim of choice, or with the victim's daughter, Dora, a religious leader. David actually feels more as though Lestat may be losing his mind.
When Lestat takes his victim, something unusual occurs that shakes Lestat. The victim first talks to Lestat, which is something that no other victim has been able to do. Also, Roger comes back to Lestat to tell him his life's story, make corrections to the gaps that Lestat has been made aware of and to ask that Lestat watch over his daughter. Lestat accepts the responsibility, but must also deal with his own personal feelings for Dora, as well as the past. Lestat 's past with women causes him trouble in this area in keeping his promise. Lestat's stalker turns out to confront him in the middle of his living up to this new responsibility and he must attempt to fulfill his promise to Roger and take on the challenge that has been placed at his feet.
Memnoch, the Devil has come to ask for Lestat's assistance as his first lieutenant. Lestat must now decide if he will accept the Devil's proposal and keep his soul. Furthermore, Lestat has to reconcile his religious ideas with the true history of the beginning of the world and the parts that both God and the Devil play in the world that exists and the afterlife. He is given the opportunity to find out the answer to the very question that has plagued mankind since the beginning, but once he does have the answers, will he be able to choose a side, and if so, will it be the right one? Lestat is taken to Heaven and to Hell, as well as to the beginning of time and even to the crucifixion of Christ to witness the events as they truly happened and make his decision based on what he witnesses."
Download "Memnoch The Devil", by Anne Rice, here:
An astonishing, can't-put-it-down book...
"Few Really Ask..."
“Very few beings really seek knowledge in this world – few really ask. On the contrary, they try to wring from the unknown the answers they have already shaped in their own minds – justifications, confirmations, forms of consolation without which they can’t go on. To really ask is to open the door to a whirlwind. The answer may annihilate the question and the questioner.”
- Anne Rice, “The Vampire Lestat”
"Has He Gone Completely Insane? Zelensky Announces That There Is Not Going To Be Peace"
"Has He Gone Completely Insane?
Zelensky Announces That There Is Not Going To Be Peace"
by Michael Snyder
"If you listen long enough, people will eventually tell you exactly what they truly believe. Unfortunately, we have just learned what Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky truly believes about the war with Russia, and it is not good news at all. Apparently Zelensky is convinced that there will not be a permanent state of peace until all of Donetsk, all of Luhansk and all of Crimea belong to his government. Needless to say, the Russians will never hand all of Donetsk, all of Luhansk and all of Crimea over to Ukraine willingly, and so they will need to be taken by force. Since the Ukrainians cannot do this alone, they will be seeking to enlist the help of others, and that is what should deeply alarm all of us.
The mainstream media’s fawning coverage of Zelensky’s Independence Day speech makes him sounds like some sort of a great peacemaker. Here is just one example…"President Volodymyr Zelensky said Ukraine would continue to fight for its freedom “while its calls for peace are not heard,” in a defiant address to the nation on its independence day. “We need a just peace, a peace where our future will be decided only by us,” he said, adding that Ukraine was “not a victim, it is a fighter”. He continued: “Ukraine has not yet won, but it has certainly not lost.”
That makes him sound so incredibly reasonable. But the mainstream media did not report on any of the troubling parts of Zelensky’s speech. I went and found a transcript of the speech, and it reveals Zelensky’s real goals…"And now, in a full-scale war for independence, it is here, on Maidan, that one can find such important symbols. Symbols of how we fight, what we fight for, and how we are overcoming this war.
These symbols are all around us. In this Independence Monument. Inside, it has a reinforced concrete frame and can literally withstand a hurricane. In the same way, our Ukraine has withstood the great calamity that Russia brought to our land. In this “Zero Kilometer” point. It is the starting point where distances to Ukrainian cities are written: to our Donetsk, our Luhansk, our Crimea. Today, these markers have a completely different meaning. They are no longer just about kilometers. They remind us that all of this is Ukraine. And there are our people, and no distance between us can change that, and no temporary occupation can change that. One day, the distance between Ukrainians will disappear, and we will be together again as one family, as one country. It is only a matter of time. And Ukraine believes it can achieve this - achieve peace, peace across all its land. Ukraine is capable of it."
This is what started the war in the first place. Western leaders gave Zelensky a green light to break the Minsk agreements, and so he gathered a 70,000 soldier invasion force along the borders of the DPR and the LPR. The Ukrainians were shelling the living daylights out of the most heavily populated cities in the DPR and the LPR and were preparing to move in when the Russians intervened. Zelensky’s obsession with conquering Donetsk and Luhansk precipitated this entire crisis, and now 1.7 million Ukrainians are dead.
But instead of being willing to accept the compromise deal that the Russians are now offering, in his speech Zelensky defiantly proclaimed that Ukraine will never accept any “compromise” that comes from the Russians…"This is Ukraine now. And this Ukraine will never again in history be forced into the shame that the “Russians” call a “compromise.”
Yes, Zelensky is calling for a temporary ceasefire along the current line of contact, because Ukraine has been steadily losing more territory. But in Zelensky’s mind the purpose of such a ceasefire would be to regroup and rearm in preparation for taking all of Donetsk, all of Luhansk and all of Crimea. That is why Ukraine’s plan is to bring as many western troops into Ukraine once a temporary ceasefire has been established. Once they are there, it will be far easier to drag western nations into the war.
The Ukrainians aren’t stupid. They have already lost 1.7 million soldiers and they know that the only way that they can militarily defeat Russia is with NATO’s help. And so that is why Ukraine has been attempting to provoke Russia into doing something really dramatic over and over again. The goal is to get the Russians to escalate matters so much that NATO will feel forced to come riding to Ukraine’s aid.
For instance, the Ukrainians just attacked a nuclear power plant deep inside Russian territory…"A fire has been put out at a nuclear power plant in Russia’s western Kursk region and air defences have shot down a Ukrainian drone, Russian officials have said. The drone detonated when it fell and damaged a transformer, but radiation levels were normal and there were no casualties, a post from the plant’s account on messaging app Telegram said. The United Nations’ International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has repeatedly called on both Russia and Ukraine to show maximum restraint around nuclear facilities in the war."
Why would the Ukrainians do such a thing? The answer is obvious. They want the Russians to strike back so hard that western leaders will finally feel compelled to join the conflict. At one point the stunts that the Ukrainians have been pulling almost worked. There were plans to strike decision making centers in Kyiv with Oreshnik missiles, but Russian President Vladimir Putin wisely vetoed those plans…"Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko on Friday told reporters in an anecdote given to a press conference that Russian authorities had plans to directly attack Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s office in Kiev, but that President Putin rejected the proposed action. What’s more, Lukashenko said, is that it would have happened with the new Oreshnik missiles, which are medium-range hypersonics that Russian officials have touted as having the same destructive power as a low-yield nuclear strike."
But it is just a matter of time before the Ukrainians successfully push the Russians too far. When that time arrives, we could find ourselves directly fighting a nation that has more nukes than we do…Moscow continues to hold nearly 4,400 nuclear warheads, over 1,500 of which are “strategically deployed” while the U.S. possesses more than 3,700 warheads in its stockpiles with 1,400 deployed, according to the Arms Control Association. And as I have extensively documented, Russian missiles are far superior to what we possess, and Russian anti-missile systems are far superior to what we possess as well. We must not get into an apocalyptic conflict with the Russians. But if the Ukrainians get their way, that is precisely what is going to happen.
Meanwhile, it appears that there will be no peace in the Middle East either. On Sunday, the IDF conducted an enormous bombing campaign in the capital of Yemen…"Israel bombed Houthi rebel targets in Yemen’s capital on Sunday, including a military site near the presidential palace. The attacks by the IDF, which also included strikes on the Asar and Hizaz power plants, came after the Houthis fired a “multi-headed” warhead at Israel for the first time on Friday. The use of the munition presents a new challenge for the Israeli defence system, which up until now has successfully repelled most of the Houthis’ attacks. Sunday’s attacks sent huge fireballs into the sky over Sanaa, the Yemeni capital, as the IDF said it had struck a “significant electricity supply facility for military activities” for the Houthis."
And it is being reported that a “defining battle” between Israeli troops and Hamas is imminent…"On Saturday, Israeli tanks and troops began maneuvering ever closer to Gaza City’s outskirts in preparation for a full-scale offensive. Eyewitness accounts reported intensified shelling as Israel is moving toward what could be the defining battle of its war against Hamas terrorists: the capture of Gaza City.
Israel’s security cabinet approved the operation, known as Gideon’s Chariots B, and has deployed up to five IDF divisions toward the city’s outskirts - a highly significant mobilization. Thousands of reservists - some 60,000 - have been called up. John Spencer, chair of urban warfare studies at the Madison Policy Forum and executive director of the Urban Warfare Institute, told Fox News Digital the scale of this operation is unprecedented. “This will be a bigger challenge than anything the IDF has faced, arguably ever. It is the densest location in Gaza, the heart of Hamas’s stronghold. And you don’t really know what the tunnels are until you get into them.”
If Hamas would have just released all of the hostages, so much bloodshed could have been avoided. But that never was going to happen, was it? Unfortunately, just about everyone seems to have come down with a really bad case of “war fever”. Leaders all over the planet want to fight, and so that is what they will get."
"That One Chance..."
“You get that one chance; and damn it, you’ve got to take it! If there’s one lesson I know I will take with me for eternity, its that there are those things that might happen only once, those chances that come walking down the street, strolling out of a café; if you don’t let go and take them, they really could get away! We can get so washed out with a mindset of entitlement – the universe will do everything for us to ensure our happiness – that we forget why we came here! We came here to grab, to take, to give, to have! Not to wait! Nobody came here to wait! So, what makes anyone think that destiny will keep on knocking over and over again? It could, but what if it doesn’t? You go and you take the chance that you get; even if it makes you look stupid, insane, or whorish! Because it just might not come back again. You could wait a lifetime to see if it will… but I don’t think you should.”
- C. JoyBell C.
"You Can’t Touch This: The Importance Of The Battle Of Tours"
"You Can’t Touch This:
The Importance Of The Battle Of Tours"
by John Wilder
"Europe in the early 700s was a patchwork of squabbling kingdoms still picking up the pieces from Rome’s grand collapse. When the Empire fell and the Legions retired and moved to Florida, Europe was a hammered mess. Barbarians had even turned Rome into a tourist trap for Vandals and Goths where you could get great bargains: half off togas, and all the gold you could eat.
A new wave of chaos crashed in from the south: The Umayyad (U-Mad) Caliphate was fresh off conquering Spain during a short decade of conquest. After that, they began eyeing the rest of the continent like Whoopi Goldberg eyes a dozen chocolate éclairs after a hard day of being wrong. It occurred to the U-Mads: why stop with Spain when they could go on to France (then Francia for some reason) for cigarettes and baguettes and brunettes and marmosets and intangible assets?
Enter Charles, the Frankish warlord who was the illegitimate son of that hobbit®, Pepin. Being a bastard (like me Charles was born one, and didn’t have to work at it like most people) Charles wasn’t in the line of succession for all that Frankish Hobbit® power. Scared of him, Pepin’s wife had Charles tossed in the clink so Charles wouldn’t become the boss when Pepin died.
Well, prisons were made for breaking out of, and Charles did exactly that. A lot of others decided they were king instead when Pepin died, so Charles had to defeat the humorously named Chilperic II, Raganfrid, and Radbod. Okay, Radbod would probably be a good professional wrestling name, so Radbod get a pass but the rest of them are just bad D&D® names from a drunk DM. The Funny Name Gang fought with Charles at Cologne, and Charles lost.
Charles didn’t give up, and instead regrouped and trained in a movie montage in the hills, and then attacked his silly-named foes at Malmedy, and they scurried like schoolchildren and Charles got all their stuff, plus the reputation of a guy who could win battles against people who were utterly unprepared for it, them being asleep on siesta and all. One battle doesn’t win a kingdom, though.
Charles waited a year and trained his army in yet another movie montage for the sequel, Charles II, complete with 1980s theme music, something telling him he was the best or something. Regardless, Charles invaded Chilperic’s place in Northern France, and won. And he kept winning. Charles essentially spent the next fifteen years fighting battles and winning ever single one of them in his bid to secure power. After that, he selected the title he wanted. It was mayor. So, after all of that, it was time for peace, right?
No. Charles had just beaten the other French. But as I mentioned, he was being invaded from the south. That brings us to 732 AD and the town of Tours.
Let’s frame it this way: Charles’ victory at the Battle of Tours in 732 AD stands as one of those rare moments where the West dodged a civilization-ending bullet. Think Thermopylae, where a handful of Spartans bought time against Persian hordes; the Battle of Vienna in 1683, halting the Ottoman tide at Europe’s gates; or the sack of Carthage in 146 BC, when Rome finally crushed its African rival and secured Mediterranean dominance, or John Wilder’s Divorce of 1995.
Tours fits right in – a pivotal civilizational clash that crushed a major threat to the struggling West like it was a telemarketer. Let us set the scene properly, because context is king (or mayor as in Charles’ case).
By the 8th century, Islam had exploded out of Arabia, swallowing Persia, North Africa, and Spain in under a century. The U-mads crossed the Pyrenees in 720, gobbling up Septimania (southern France) and launching raids deeper into the Frankish lands. Their leader, Abdul Rahman Al Ghafiqi, governor of Al-Andalus (moslim Spain), was no slouch. He had spent years in active command of an army taking over Spain. His army, perhaps 20,000 to 80,000 strong (historians bicker like barroom philosophers on numbers), consisted mostly of Berber and Arab cavalry, light and fast, perfect for hit-and-run plunder.
They had sacked Bordeaux and were loaded with loot, but this was no mere smash-and-grab; the Arabs smelled yet more conquest, and were testing the waters for a full push into Frankish heartlands. They outnumbered the Frankish armies.
On the other side? Charles, the Mayor of the Palace the real boss of the Franks. Why Charles? No one else stood ready to protect Europe; the Byzantines were busy fending off Arabs in the east, the Lombards in Italy were too fragmented and hadn’t even invented spaghetti yet, and the Anglo-Saxons across the Channel were still figuring out the magic secret of bathing that disappeared when the Romans left. If Charles failed, the road to Paris, and beyond to the Rhine, lay open. Stakes? Imagine a Europe where minarets dot the Seine instead of cathedrals.
Oh, wait...Now, the battle itself: October 10, 732, near Tours. Charles, with about 15,000 to 30,000 infantry-heavy Franks, chose high ground in a wooded area, forming a tight phalanx of armored foot soldiers, a tactic used successfully by everyone from Sumerians to Greeks to Romans to Vikings. This was a human wall of axes and swords and shields and pikes, disciplined like Roman legions but with beards that could hide small animals. They set up on top of a lightly-forested hill, and waited. And waited. Abdul Rahman wanted Charles to attack. Charles wanted Abdul to attack.
As the Arabs didn’t have warm clothes suitable for the winter, they finally blinked, and attacked. Abdul Rahman’s cavalry charged uphill at this mass of men, lumber and steel, repeatedly, expecting to shatter the line like they had against the Visigoths they had defeated in Spain. But Charles’ men held, their heavy infantry absorbing the impacts like Rocky Balboa in, well, like every Rocky movie. And with good reason: Charles had seen this battle coming and had the largest standing army, well trained and ready to go, fierce and with faith in their nearly undefeated leader.
As the day wore on, the Muslims tired. Their horses foaming, their riders frustrated. It was now hammer time. Charles’ scouts raided the enemy camp, sparking rumors that Abdul Rahman was dead and the loot vulnerable. Panic spread among the U-mads. The governor himself charged into the fray to rally his troops and got cut down, probably by a Frankish axe to the skull, because why not go out dramatically? Night fell, and the invaders melted away, leaving tents, treasure, and thousands of dead.
Casualties? Franks lost maybe a thousand; Muslims, up to 12,000, including their leader. It was not pretty, with bodies piled like cordwood, blood soaking the fields and Charles standing tall. Charles got his nickname at this point. In old Frankish, it’s “Martel” but it translates to “The Hammer”.
Aftermath hit like a hangover after a wild raid. The U-mads retreated south of the Pyrenees, their momentum broken. Internal revolts soon toppled their dynasty, replaced by the Abbasids who shifted focus eastward.
In Spain, Christian kingdoms in the north took heart. This sparked the Reconquista, a 700-year grind where indigenous Iberians overthrew their colonial Muslim overlords. No “noble savage” myth here; it was gritty reprisal, castle by castle, until 1492 when Ferdinand and Isabella booted the last emir from Granada and started Spain’s golden age. Tours proved resistance worked, and turned the tide from defense to offense.
Yet Charles Martel remains poorly remembered today, a footnote in textbooks while his grandson, Charlemagne, gets the statues. Why? Charles never crowned himself king, deeming the title too puny for a man who ruled de facto over Franks, Aquitainians, and more. “Mayor of the Palace” suited him. It was understated power, like a mob boss who wears sweats instead of Armani®. Martel laid the foundations for post-Roman Europe: professional armies funded by land grants, essentially the birth of the feudal system. Martel also left a unified Frankish state, and was the salvation of Christianity.
After the victory at Tours, Charles granted large portions of Church land to his followers, on the condition they help him militarily. The Church wasn’t happy, but the Pope later begged Charles’ aid against Lombards, dubbing him a “defender of the faith.” Irony? Delicious, especially with fava beans and a nice Chianti.
Most crucially, Martel set the stage for his grandson, Charlemagne. Martel’s son, Pepin the Short, finally ditched the Merovingians and became king with papal blessing. Charlemagne then forged the Carolingian Empire, crowning himself Holy Roman Emperor in 800 A.D., defining medieval Europe with laws, learning, and conquests from Saxony to Italy. Without the Hammer’s stand at Tours, there is no Charlemagne and perhaps no unified West to change the world.
Martel reminds us that history turns on hammers, not hashtags. He was no saint. He was ruthless, pragmatic, a bit of a land-thief, but he saved the West from a fate it might not have survived. Next time you think that we can’t win, tip your hat to the Hammer, who showed us the way because he was too illegit to quit.
"How Truly Insane It Really Can Be"
"A duct-taped banana, created by conceptual artist Mauricio Cattelan and titled "Comedian", sold for $6.2 million at a Sotheby's auction in November 2019, a price that included auction house fees. The buyer was crypto entrepreneur Justin Sun. The artwork consists of a banana duct-taped to a wall, and its sale has been a subject of much commentary regarding the nature of art."
Then...
Ya know, you just couldn't make this stuff up...
"800,000 Layoffs and Nobody Saw This Coming!"
Snyder Reports, 8/25/25
"800,000 Layoffs and Nobody Saw This Coming!"
Comments here:
Dan, I Allegedly, "Central Bank Digital Currency Ban - Good News!"
Full screen recommended.
Dan, I Allegedly, AM 8/25/25
"Central Bank Digital Currency Ban - Good News!"
"Big news today! In this video, I’m diving into the latest defense bill (HR 3838) and its groundbreaking stance on banning Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs). This could be a huge win for preserving your privacy and protecting small businesses from unnecessary surveillance. We’ll also touch on the economy, challenges with remittances, grants for small businesses, and even real estate trends you should know about. Plus, I’ve got some insights into alternative financing and new opportunities for entrepreneurs - Square’s $10,000 grant could be a game-changer for your small business!
Let’s not forget the latest developments in the used car market (Hertz teaming up with Amazon!) and housing dynamics in hotspots like Florida, Texas, and beyond. And of course, I couldn’t leave out the hilarious story about CBS News' financial woes or the shocking case of a corrupt bank manager stealing from home equity lines. There’s so much to unpack here!"
Comments here:
Adventures With Danno, "Shocking Prices at Meijer"
Full screen recommended.
Adventures With Danno, AM 8/25/25
"Shocking Prices at Meijer"
Comments here:
Jim Kunstler, "Ghislaine 'Splainin'"
"Ghislaine 'Splainin'"
by Jim Kunstler
"Well, I mean, I'm talking about the - the - I had had, there was a..."
- Ghislaine Maxwell
"Did you happen to bother reading the transcript of Ghislaine Maxwell’s interview? It’s tough sledding at times - both Ms. Maxwell and Deputy AG Todd Blanche tend to speak in choppy, incomplete sentences (as does, you might have noticed, President Trump) - but altogether the confab reveals that just about everything you think you know about the scandal might not be so, and her story is full of shocking surprises, assuming you can believe her.
For instance, Ms. Maxwell had exactly one night of actual sex with Jeffrey Epstein back in the 1990s, a few months after they met, and that was it. He had problems with straight-up sex, she says. At first, he claimed to have a heart condition. She says he had erectile difficulty “... which meant that he didn't have intercourse a lot, which suited me fine, because I actually do have a medical condition, which precludes me having a lot of intercourse,” she added. (We never learn what that condition was, exactly.) Anyway, she never had sex with him again.
Huh ? There goes one pillar of the public perception of the scandal: that Ghislaine Maxwell was a sort of nymphomaniac consort of Mr. Epstein, while supposedly acting as chief procurer of his masseuse “victims” and that the whole decades-long saga was a cavalcade of threesomes and orgies. She even claims at one point of being “a prude.”
So, what was her role in JE’s complicated life? Basically, a property manager, she says. You know, all those houses and compounds: the mansion on East 71st Street, the Palm Beach place, the ranch in New Mexico, Little St. James Island, a flat in Paris. It was a lot to manage. She had to hire architects, construction crews, interior decorators, servants. There were horses to care for at the ranch. It was a lot. She didn’t even have a key to JE’s New York City townhouse and was there only twice, she told Mr. Blanche.
During that time, JE had other girlfriends while in the early 2000s, Ms. Maxwell hooked up with the billionaire founder of Gateway Computers, Ted Waitt. He bought a big boat for them to start-up an oceanic research venture. The relationship foundered when, she says, a sketchy lawyer named Scott Rothstein, working for a crooked Florida law firm that was under a RICO investigation at the time, attempted to extract $10-million from Waitt to keep Ms. Maxwell’s name out of lawsuits brought by women claiming to be “victims” of Epstein’s massage shenanigans. Ms. Maxwell claims that Epstein’s masseuses, underage or otherwise, were recruited by the original masseuses, not by her (Ms. Maxwell).
Ms. Maxwell was out of Epstein’s life after 2009, when he got out of jail on state of Florida charges of soliciting prostitution and procuring a minor for prostitution. This was preceded by a sketchy federal case brought in the Southern District of Florida that ended with a peculiar non-prosecution agreement - when US Attorney Alexander Acosta was told to lay off on account of Epstein being an “intel asset.” Ms. Maxwell states in the new deposition that JE was not associated with any intel agency, claiming it would have been in his nature to brag about it. It would help if FBI chief Kash Patel or CIA head John Ratcliffe could clarify that. They would surely know, one way or the other.
Of course, the heart of all the salacious chatter about Epstein is the claim that he worked for Israel’s Mossad intel agency, and that many eminent global persons were recorded having sex with underage masseuses in order to blackmail them (and, supposedly, allow nefarious hidden parties to control world political affairs.)
Ms. Maxwell maintains that this is not so. She says there were no hidden cameras in bedrooms or elsewhere in the many Epstein properties or airplanes, and that she would know because she hired the electricians who installed everything else in them. There were only the usual security cameras on front entrances and gates... except for the Palm Beach house where local police installed a camera in JE’s office to catch a thief who was stealing cash stashed there. (Turned out to be JE’s butler, who was fired.)
Another thread at the center of the Epstein rumor mill is the notorious Epstein client list - supposedly of notables alleged to have cavorted with Epstein’s masseuses. Ms. Maxwell claims there was no such list, that a fake list was concocted by attorney Brad Edwards who represented women claiming to be Epstein “victims” in the lawsuit connected with the $10-million Ted Waitt blackmail caper. The list was composed from notes supposedly made off a computer by that same Epstein butler, one Alfredo Rodriguez. When interviewed in 2007, Rodriguez failed to produce the so-called “black book.” In 2009, he offered to sell it to attorney Brad Edwards (representing various “victims”) for $50,000. In 2010, Rodriguez was convicted of obstruction of justice and sentenced to 18 months in prison. He died in 2015.
A lot of monkey business in all this, wouldn’t you say? Perhaps the most astounding point is Ms. Maxwell’s assertion that no government attorney (or any other official, including from the FBI) ever interviewed her, or even called her on the telephone, during all the years of legal wrangling that went on. Say, what... ? How could that possibly be? Well, apparently it is so.
One has to wonder exactly how the case against Ghislaine Maxwell for “trafficking” girls back in the 1990s was finally brought in the notoriously corrupt Southern District of New York (federal court) on December 29, 2021. The lead prosecutor was Maurene Comey, daughter of you-know-who. Anything janky in this prosecution? You have seen enough jankiness in the New York courts, federal, state, and local, the past several years to destroy your confidence that they are in any way on-the-level. Just sayin’...
You are correct to observe that this hairball is a very complex, sometimes mystifying skein of stories, episodes, rumors, and, certainly, motives. The big takeaway, of course, is Ms. Maxwell’s repeated statements that Donald Trump was not involved in any salacious activity around Jeffrey Epstein, his properties, his airplanes, or anywhere else... and that he “acted like a gentleman” at all times. She even states that she “admires” the president for winning back the White House. Ghislaine Maxwell is rumored to be seeking a pardon from the president. We’ll have to stand by on that. But you also might consider the possibility that, as Mr. Trump has said, in this whole fantastic alleged scandal there is a whole lot less there there than many of us have been led to believe. Except that GM does not believe that JE took his own life. Neither does Mr. Trump. I guess we’ll have to stand by on that, too. In the meantime, read the goshdarn thing yourself. It’s riveting."
"Economic Market Snapshot 8/25/25"
"Economic Market Snapshot 8/25/25"
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Down the rabbit hole of psychopathic greed and insanity...
Only the consequences are real - to you!
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"It's a Big Club, and you ain't in it.
You and I are not in the Big Club."
- George Carlin
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Market Data Center, Live Updates:
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Financial Stress Index
"The OFR Financial Stress Index (OFR FSI) is a daily market-based snapshot of stress in global financial markets. It is constructed from 33 financial market variables, such as yield spreads, valuation measures, and interest rates. The OFR FSI is positive when stress levels are above average, and negative when stress levels are below average. The OFR FSI incorporates five categories of indicators: credit, equity valuation, funding, safe assets and volatility. The FSI shows stress contributions by three regions: United States, other advanced economies, and emerging markets."
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Job cuts and much more.
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Commentary, highly recommended:
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"The more I see of the monied classes,
the better I understand the guillotine."
- George Bernard Shaw
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Oh yeah... beyond words. Any I know anyway...
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And now... The End Game...
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Sunday, August 24, 2025
An Incredibly Beautiful Musical Interlude: "Nights in White Satin", Mario Frangoulis and Justin Hayward
"Nights in White Satin", Mario Frangoulis and Justin Hayward
"Nights in White Satin" in an Italian version "Notte di luce", from a special
performance in 2002 at Thessaloniki with Justin Hayward of The Moody Blues.
"Lavrov Speaks"
"Lavrov Speaks"
by Larry C. Johnson
"I am fascinated by Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov agreeing to do an interview with NBC. The bimbo doing the interview was following a script and not listening to what Lavrov was actually saying. Mr. Lavrov, despite gotcha questions from Kristen Welker, who conducted the interrogation, remained calm and cool and precise. He even extended an invitation for her to come to Moscow and do the next one in person.
Now that the hype surrounding the Alaska Summit and Trump’s subsequent Monday meeting in Washington with Ukraine’s Zelensky and this seven-pimp masters from Europe, has died down, their is growing realization in the West that there is no peace deal imminent. Lavrov explains in meticulous detail Russia’s position, which I have published on this blog ad nauseum.
While I understand President Putin’s desire to have a normal relationship with President Trump, I worry that Mr. Putin does not comprehend the depth of hatred within the Deep State for the Russian government. There is nothing short of destroying Ukraine militarily that will compel the West to reach a diplomatic solution to the war in Ukraine.
I don’t know if Vladimir Putin is a student or fan of game theory, but I think recent Russian actions suggests that Putin is applying the principles. So what is the best strategy, according to game theory, when Russia is trying to negotiate with the United States, who is intent on seeking Russia’s subjugation to Washington? Whether through deceit, economic sanctions or military force, I believe the US is intent on destroying Russia. The Washington bureaucracy will not allow Donald Trump to create a normal economic and diplomatic relationship with Russia. So what should Russia do according to game theory?
Game theory suggests that the best strategy when negotiating with a party that wishes to harm you involves a careful balance of deterrence, credible threats, and restraint. Key insights include:
• Credible commitment: You must make threats or promises that your adversary believes you will carry out; credibility often requires some form of constraint on your own actions to build trust in your declared strategy. Without credibility, threats will be ignored and negotiations will break down.
• Tit-for-tat or reciprocity: A common deterrent approach is to respond in kind to your opponent’s actions (e.g., cooperating when they cooperate, retaliating when they harm). This encourages cooperation by showing that aggressive behavior will be met with retaliation, making harm costly.
• Communication and reputation: Successful deterrence hinges on clear communication of intentions and maintaining a reputation for both resolve and restraint. This strategic signaling helps avoid unintended escalation while demonstrating you will defend your interests.
• Future consequences and repeated interactions: Viewing negotiations as part of a longer-term sequence encourages cooperative behavior since both sides anticipate future repercussions if they defect or harm one another.
I think that Russia’s attack this past week on a US-owned factory in western Ukraine, which was producing key components for drones, was an example of tit-for-tat retaliation. In summary, game theory advises Putin to balance firmness and restraint and to make credible threats of retaliation to deter harm, while keeping channels for cooperation open to avoid unnecessary conflict. Above is the Lavrov interview. I strongly recommend you take the time to watch it."
"A Damning Indictment..."
"This video, if true, is a damning indictment of Donald Trump and his ostensible commitment to America First. Nope. Trump is putting America Second. US Army Sergeant Jonathan Estridge, a 20-year military veteran, says he is under investigation for sharing anti-Israel posts on social media. He says he was told he is being investigated as a “national security threat.” Sgt. Estridge is correct when he says he swore an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution. There is nothing in the oath that US military personnel are required to swear an oath to protect Israel."
o
George Galloway, 8/24/25
"Scott Ritter: Israel's Very Existence Is A War Crime"
"What Gaza is doing is driving a stake through the heart of the United Nations, says
Scott Ritter. And Ukraine war will come to an end only on terms dictated by Russia."
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"Alert! WW3 Nuclear Command In Arctic! Trump Sends ERAM To Ukraine! Nuke Bomb Planted!"
Full screen recommended.
Prepper News, 8/24/25
"Alert! WW3 Nuclear Command In Arctic!
Trump Sends ERAM To Ukraine! Nuke Bomb Planted!"
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"The Collapse Of Everyday Life In America Is Spiralling Out Of Control"
Full screen recommended.
Jeremiah Babe, 8/24/25
"The Collapse Of Everyday Life In America
Is Spiralling Out Of Control"
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Adventures With Danno, "Grocery Items That Are Skyrocketing In Price"
Adventures With Danno, 8/24/25
"Grocery Items That Are Skyrocketing In Price"
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"People Will Be Insane When Food Prices Double Or Triple From Current Levels"
Full screen recommended.
Epic Economist, 8/24/25
"People Will Be Insane When Food Prices
Double Or Triple From Current Levels"
"Well, that was quite a surprise. We just got confirmation that inflation is picking up steam once again. That's concerning news, because the cost of living has already been putting pressure on people nationwide. In fact, one recent survey found that 86 percent of Americans are stressed about grocery prices. But it's not just food costs that are climbing. We're getting hit with double-digit price increases across the board, and that's having serious consequences. Our standard of living is taking a hit month after month, and the middle class continues to shrink.
On Thursday, we learned that the producer price index, which measures final demand goods and services prices, jumped 0.9% for the month, compared with the Dow Jones estimate for a 0.2% gain. It was the biggest monthly increase since June 2022. Excluding food and energy prices, core PPI rose 0.9% against the forecast for 0.3%. Excluding food, energy and trade services, the index was up 0.6%, the biggest gain since March 2022. Such a large change in one month was pretty unexpected.
Right now, electricity prices are climbing from coast to coast. For example, New Jersey residents just got hit with price hikes of between 17 and 20 percent... Air conditioning is rapidly becoming a luxury item. Not everyone will be able to afford it anymore.
Beef has also become a luxury, and it's being reported that last month the price of beef hit yet another new all-time high... I'm a meat and potatoes kind of guy, and so this really bothers me. When I see the prices that supermarkets are charging us now, it's pretty shocking.
Health insurance premiums are already way out of control. And now they want to hit us with double-digit increases again? This is the reality of the economy that we live in now. In this environment, even sending your kids to summer camp can put you deep into debt...
Today, most of the country is living paycheck to paycheck. And now that economic conditions are slowing down, we're seeing foreclosures start to spike just like we did in 2008 and 2009. Sometimes it feels like we're all playing a very challenging game of musical chairs. Every time the music stops, more seats are being removed and more people fall out of the middle class. If you still have your seat in the middle class, hold on to it tightly, because tougher times may be ahead.
I've been warning for years about the damage that was being done to the middle class. And let's be honest about what's happening in the job market. When college graduates with technical degrees are applying to 900+ jobs and still can't find work, something is seriously wrong with the economic picture we're painting.
The foreclosure uptick in places like Las Vegas should be a warning sign. We've seen this movie before, and it didn't end well. When people start losing their homes because they can't keep up with payments, that's usually a sign that broader economic troubles are brewing."
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God help us...
Musical Interlude: Moby, "Love Of Strings"
Full screen recommended.
Moby, "Love Of Strings"
Life, precious Life...
"A Look to the Heavens"
“The constellation of Orion holds much more than three stars in a row. A deep exposure shows everything from dark nebula to star clusters, all embedded in an extended patch of gaseous wisps in the greater Orion Molecular Cloud Complex. The brightest three stars on the far left are indeed the famous three stars that make up the belt of Orion. Just below Alnitak, the lowest of the three belt stars, is the Flame Nebula, glowing with excited hydrogen gas and immersed in filaments of dark brown dust.
Below the frame center and just to the right of Alnitak lies the Horsehead Nebula, a dark indentation of dense dust that has perhaps the most recognized nebular shapes on the sky. On the upper right lies M42, the Orion Nebula, an energetic caldron of tumultuous gas, visible to the unaided eye, that is giving birth to a new open cluster of stars. Immediately to the left of M42 is a prominent bluish reflection nebula sometimes called the Running Man that houses many bright blue stars. The above image, a digitally stitched composite taken over several nights, covers an area with objects that are roughly 1,500 light years away and spans about 75 light years.”
- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap120212.html
Chet Raymo, “Half Sick Of Shadows”
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“Half Sick Of Shadows”
by Chet Raymo
“Who is this woman? Her name is on the prow of her boat: The Lady of Shalott. Yes, it’s Tennyson’s “Lady of Shalott,” from the poem of 1842, here illustrated by John William Waterhouse in 1888. By some unspecified curse this lovely maiden was confined to a tower…
“Willows whiten, aspens quiver,
Little breezes dusk and shiver
Through the wave that runs for ever
By the island in the river”
near Camelot, where, forbidden to look out the window, she observed the world in a mirror and wove what she saw into a tapestry. So what is she doing in the boat, with her hand-stitched creation? One day, Sir Lancelot rode by her tower alone. She saw him in the mirror and – “half sick of shadows” – couldn’t resist turning to see him unreflected.
“His broad clear brow in sunlight glow’d;
On burnish’d hooves his war-horse trode;
From underneath his helmet flow’d
His coal-black curls as on he rode…”
The mirror cracked. She left her loom, descended from the tower, found a boat, inscribed her name on the prow, and…
“Lying, robed in snowy white
That loosely flew to left and right -
The leaves upon her falling light -
Thro’ the noises of the night”
cast off to drift downstream to Camelot – and to Lancelot. But curses are not to be foiled.
“For ere she reach’d upon the tide
The first house by the water-side,
Singing in her song she died,
The Lady of Shalott.”
We are all of us in a way the Lady of Shalott, all of us who seek to create an image of the world, artists, poets, scientists. We perceive the world through the filter of our limited senses, our biologically evolved brains, our nurtured preconceptions. We weave our tapestries, knowing that our creations are a reflection removed from reality. Our “curse” is to be in love with the real, yet never able to embrace it except in the cold glass of conceptualization. Our legacy? To be found in a boat lodged among the reeds, our tapestry draped across the thwart, with Camelot yet somewhere further down the stream, glistening, beckoning, inescapably out of reach. But, ah, there’s that gorgeous tapestry.
There is another curse, self made, and that is to mistake the mirrorworld for the world outside the window, to fail to recognize the contingency of our conceptualizations, to forego an honest seeking for the falsely found, and – most ominously – to want to impose our own mirrorworld on others.”
"Arizona 50-80% Housing Market Crash 2025, Top 10 Cities Becoming Ghost Towns"
Full screen recommended.
Discover The Nation, 8/24/25
"Arizona 50-80% Housing Market Crash 2025,
Top 10 Cities Becoming Ghost Towns"
"Arizona’s housing dream is collapsing in 2025. Once-booming cities that thrived on endless migration, speculative construction, and surging prices are now facing unsellable homes, oversupply, and vanishing buyers. From the sprawling suburbs of Surprise and Mesa to the high-cost enclaves of Scottsdale and Phoenix, entire markets are freezing, values are tumbling, and affordability has disintegrated. Developers are slashing tens of thousands off new builds, foreclosure filings are climbing, and once “safe” cities are now on the brink of becoming America’s next ghost towns. In this video, Discover the Nation counts down the Top 10 Arizona Cities Becoming Ghost Towns in 2025. Backed by data from Zillow and Redfin, we expose the inventory surges, price cuts, and population declines that are reshaping the Grand Canyon State."
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"They're Going To Shut Your Water Off"
Michael Bordenaro, 8/24/25
"They're Going To Shut Your Water Off"
"Homeowners all across the country are seeing major increases in their water bills with seemingly no end insight. And homeownership has become so expensive with all of the ancillary expenses that raising the water bills could just be the final nail in the coffin for people who are barely hanging on."
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"They Don't Know..."
They don't know because they don't want to know...
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'One can fight evil but against stupidity one is helpless.'
- Henry Miller
- Henry Miller
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