Thursday, January 28, 2016

Rita Ora is topless, may be fake

Rita Ora covers the recent issue of Lui Magazine a magazine that's known for doing nudes of actresses and other female celebs. This cover image appeared online today:

rita ora topless lui magazine

Technically, the cover of the 'zine had little stars over Ora's girly bits. So this may either be a good photoshop, or someone got ahold of the photog's original picture and reconstituted the cover with it.

I'm sure we'll get the full details at some point, but for now . . . it is what it is (and I hate that effin' saying!).

Update:
Case solved! Apparently the cover pic is legit, just not the one that appeared on the newsstand for obvious reasons. But the shoot was conducted by 'ole pervy himself, Terry Richardson, so you can be sure there are probably some really bizarre shots of Ora in a number of compromising positions hiding in his hard drive.

But here's a few more from the issue -- clearly modesty isn't Rita's main concern here:

rita ora topless lui magazine
rita ora topless lui magazinerita ora topless lui magazine
rita ora topless lui magazinerita ora topless lui magazine

Wednesday, January 27, 2016

Donald Trump = basically a pussy?

So, in case you were away from any sort of media device or newspaper -- Donald Trump has backed out of the final televised debate prior to the Iowa caucuses. Ostensibly because he can't handle this:

donald trump afraid of megyn kelly

Through video and interviews, Trump claimed Kelly is a meany-mean pants who won't suck up to him like the rest of the FOX prime time anchors.

blah, blah, blah

What I actually think is happening is this -- Trump and Cruz are neck and neck in Iowa, both with around 30% support. Don't believe those snapshot polls that have him near 40% -- complete outliers. Trump is notoriously bad in policy debates, despite what Rudy Giuliani said on Kelly's show last night. His lack of policy background hurts him with everyone but his rabid 30% fan base.

Trump can lose Iowa very easily. Especially if he has a bad debate. He may lose the Iowa anyway, if caucus goers end up being offended by his skipping of the debate. And my point here is that, frankly, Trump doesn't care.

Iowa is not a required win for those who aspire to be President, I think it was Bush being the only one to win Iowa then go on to become President. Trump knows this. And he's playing the long game. He'll sacrifice Iowa in order to burnish his brand as some hard-ass who won't play the media's game, even those that's exactly what he does all the time.

He may end up winning Iowa anyway (my prediction is that he won't), and if so, he can claim he's re-inventing politics, etc.

But this tempest in a teapot is just another example of him sucking the media air out of the room and away from the other candidates. I still think he's afraid to take the chance Kelly makes him look like a fool. So still basically a pussy. But maybe a pussy like a fox?

Oy! Me and those metaphors, lolz!



btw, if you're interested in how Trump's notoriously decorous fans responded on Twitter to Megyn's account over His Yugeness dropping out of the race, check out this analytical analysis of the invective hurled her way:

Donald trump's vulgar fan base

Monday, January 25, 2016

Another unintended consequence?

I mentioned in the post below, wondering whether National Review was crazy like a fox, in that the issue was giving their editors and content providers more airtime to espouse their thoughts on front-runner Donald Trump.

But something else may be springing up -- a closer look at the relationship between FOX news host/personalities and Trump. John Daly (no, not the golfer . . . at least I don't think so, lolz!) wrote a piece for BernardGoldberg.com wherein he speaks to points that Bernie himself had brought up previously, and I've been ranting about for a while. Which is to say that many of the hosts are so blatantly in the tank for Trump that they've lost their credibility.
The "Against Trump" issue presents essays from 22 top conservative commentators, including Glenn Beck, Thomas Sowell, Erick Erickson, Dana Loesch, Brent Bozell, and Cal Thomas. Each of them makes their case for why Donald Trump should not be the GOP nominee. Most of the essays are thoughtful and measured. Others take a sharper tone, but all should strike an objective reader as having legitimacy.

Regular columnists for National Review (including Jonah Goldberg, Charles Cooke, and Kevin Williamson), and several of those who participated in the issue, were active on Twitter at the time of the Thursday-night unveiling (and the hours that followed). They were clearly armed not only to promote the issue, but also take on the anticipated surge of Internet fury directed at them by die-hard Trump supporters who have demonstrated that they don’t take criticism of their guy lightly.

Again, Thursday night’s backlash was expected. What wasn’t expected (at least I didn’t see it coming) was the treatment that the mere concept of the issue received from many the next day on the Fox News channel, where conservative thought has long been granted not only a respectful platform, but has also contributed greatly to the network’s runaway success.

Daly went on to single out Jeanne Pirro, Harris Faulkner, Andrea Tantaros, Jesse Watters and others. Importantly to me, he also went after Eric Bolling and Sean Hannity, but inexplicably left out head cheerleader Greta van Susterin.

Watter's suggestion that principles in a candidate didn't matter, only the fact that Trump could draw 40,000 to a stadium event mattered drew this response from Daly:
Aside from the obvious point that the principles-don’t-matter attitude is precisely why National Review felt compelled to make its voice heard, it is a fallacy to suggest that Trump has demonstrated himself to be the most electable candidate in a general election match-up. National polls reveal a far different story, in fact. Beyond that, the notion that offering a conservative-based criticism of Trump is “putting pure conservatism over the country” is ridiculous on its face.

Daly goes on to point out the hypocrisy in folks like Bolling and Hannity claiming NR wants some sort of purity test for Trump, when that is exactly what Bolling and Hannity have been screaming about for the last 8 years as the party tried to purge tenured members of Congress over their lack of action on a variety of issues.

He also quotes Dana Loesch on the backlash she suffered from Trump's supporters on Twitter:
"Trump supporters have called me a whore, slut, told me I should die, said I had abortions, and attacked my marriage. I win the Internet!"

And no, Loesch was not exaggerating. I witnessed it. Others involved in the project dealt with anti-Semitic and homophobic insults.

I've read some of those comments as well. The anti-Semetic/homophobe insults were aimed at (at least) Charles C. Cooke, who did a marvelous job of deflecting everything, staying on point, and allowing those mouth breathers to expose themselves for the hateful, bumper sticker mentality fanatics they are.

Daly closes with the proper money quote on the whole thing:
What I find particularly striking is that I’ve heard very little criticism at all of the actual content of the essays. I’m not even convinced their most passionate critics have even read what’s in them. The uproar seems to be confined to the fact that the issue was published and could potentially (but not likely) do damage to the current GOP front-runner.

Make no mistake about it. There was a clear sense of betrayal that led to conservative thought being bastardized on Friday, on a supposedly conservative news network. I suspect that if the target of National Review’s criticism were a so-called establishment Republican, or really any Republican politician other than Donald Trump, we wouldn’t have seen nearly that level acrimony (if any at all).



And speaking of staying on point, Charles C. Cooke dressed down the afore mentioned head cheerleader on Twitter as she jumped in to defend her girl-crush:

@greta  National Review says subliminally "we are irrelevant" - the polls show most Republicans want @realDonaldTrump

@charlescwcooke  @greta Are you under the impression that NR exists to parrot the transient folly of pluralities?

@greta  knowing Buckley's writings,I would think you would be more worried about a socialist / Sanders

@charlescwcooke  Because I’m able to hold more than one thought simultaneously, I can oppose both charlatans and socialists.

@charlescwcooke  Funny that nobody told me I had to blindly listen to the people when Barack Obama was re-elected with a second popular vote majority.

Accompanying this tweet with a graphic of a mesmerizing spiral, Cooke tweeted:
"We don’t think Trump should be the nominee."
"But he’s winning."
"That’s why we published."
"But he’s winning."

In response to a tweet showing Bernie Sanders leading Hillary Clinton in the polls, Cooke shot back:
@charlescwcooke  Sanders must be right. I support him fully now. To oppose him would be elitist and anti-the-People. #Sanders16

Pretty good stuff. I hope he keeps it up.

Rita Ora models the Christian Grey collection

Rita Ora was at Versace's Spring Summer fashion show the other day and went apparently commando in this intriguing outfit:

rita ora sexy
rita ora sexy

It's actually a sexy little dress, but all those long ropes hanging off of it are giving me a funny vibe -- like an all-in-one little bondage outfit. After watching that horrible movie, I can just see Grey forcing Ana to wear her bondage gear in public at some point.

Surprised they didn't put that in the movie. Maybe it'll be in the sequel . . . if it's ever made.

HotAir columnist missed the point, again

Over at HotAir there's a post by Jazz Shaw, whom I like as a rule, about the following statement made by Donald Trump as he spoke at a Christian college in northwest Iowa the other day:
"I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters, OK? It’s like, incredible."

Shaw focused on the outrageous outrage that followed such an absurd statement, mocking those who assumed Trump was actually speaking about gunning down some innocent person. Of course he wasn't. But Shaw missed the 800lb elephant implied in that statement (again, too much mixed metaphors? sorry)

One -- Trump is speaking to the blind devotion, almost religious fervor of his supporters. They are immune to facts to the contrary about their newfound god. They are incapable of having intelligent debate about Trump's stances on various topics, his lack of practical experience, his constantly conflicting views or statements, and the withering impossibility of many of his proposed policies. Trump's statement encapsulates that ardent faith perfectly.

Two -- is the more sublime implication. Trump knows his supporters blindly support him no matter what he says, or proposes (as in increased ethanol subsidies the day after Ms. anti-crony-capitalism endorses him), or does. He is truly the Teflon Don in that regard. And that's scary. Because it shows that Trump knows he has carte blanche with his voters. He knows he can count on rabid support among 30% of Republican voters no matter what happens. And if by some chance he's not looking like the eventual candidate, he may get a chance to play Kingmaker, by pledging that rabid fan base to a candidate that needs it towards the end of the campaign.

Imagine what may come from Mr. art-of-the-deal if that scenario comes to pass.

That's the real point here Jazz.



And for emphasis, check out this vid put out by a Republican strategist -- Trump in his own words basically:

Sunday, January 24, 2016

So, National Review . . . crazy like a fox?

Ever since the National Review came out with it's Against Trump issue, it's been sort of amazing watching the sturm und drang in the media, both left and right. But I wonder -- was this envisioned by the editors of NR when they came out with this issue?

The collaborators in the issue run across a spectrum of conservative and libertarian thinkers. So it wasn't just the usual guys/gals at NR putting this out. And since the issue hit the stands, I've seen more folks from NR on television than I've ever seen before. And the upshot of this is that they get to repeat their stance on Trump before an even wider audience than before.

The pro-Trump forces at FOX are in full attack mode -- Greta was on Friday saying she thought the attack on him would backfire, giving him ammunition because she "...just think[s] he's so clever." She said this beaming like a high school freshman cooing about the varsity quarterback.

ugh   Get a room, why don't you?

But for all the talk about how this is going to backfire and end up helping Trump, I doubt that will happen. The 30% of Republican voters who are simply blinded by their fealty to Trump won't change their views. And believe me, I've gotten a close look at that in the comments sections at various websites where I dared speak against His Hairness. But as more undecideds look at Trump's candidacy and see it for the empty shell it is, they may gravitate to other candidates.

And with out-of-touch dinosaurs like Bob Dole coming out against Ted Cruz, and others in the Washington insider world bashing Cruz, he may end up picking up some support.

So I'm thinking -- did the editors assume this was going to happen . . . a firestorm of publicity that pushes their view on Trump into every conversation? Or was it an unintended consequence of them simply doing what an opinion magazine is supposed to do -- put forth an opinion?

I guess we'll see.



And a word about these comment sections . . .

Wow! And I thought the Paulians were brutal!

I went to Conservatives4Palin an independent website set up after the 2008 election to promote Sarah Palin and support her, initially on the thought she would make a run for office at some point. I used to comment there pretty frequently back in the day. But as she has slipped more and more into celebrity mode, I rarely go back there. But after her endorsement of Trump, I posted a comment about how Trump was running on a plate of empty rhetoric, just as Obama had, and I thought Palin had backed the wrong horse this time. That was it. Holy cow, you'd of thought I had personally attacked her. I was called a liar (?!), one guy challenged me on the empty rhetoric point by saying Trump had a plethora of policy statements on his website. I was tempted to respond that, as my college comp teacher told me once -- don't use a $10 word when a 50¢ will do just as well, you end up looking like a fool. Which is to say I don't think that word means what you think it means.

There was also a posting after the National Review article came out by Steve Fleisher wherein he claimed the editors were just money grubbers hoping to sell a few more issues. Nice. I'm sure Dana Loesch and Thomas Sowell and Glenn Beck and Dana Pavlich are pleased to be disparaged like that simply for having an opinion of their own.

I'm also impressed by how many commenters comment at NR and seem to hate the magazine, the writers, and everything they write. I don't usually troll the comments sections, but looking at the stuff in these articles, it's about 90% against and 10% for. I'm in the minority. Again. sigh

But do these guys simply go there to bitch and whine? Honestly, what a miserable life they must have. And the complaints are so juvenile. Kevin Williamson wrote today that the rise of Trump is due to fact that people simply don't read, that their attention span has been reduced to sound bites and one or two word slogans -- hope and change, make America great etc. The backlash was brutal -- elitist, intellectual superior, don't tell us what to think, etc. Ridiculous.

Williamson made a great point -- you don't ask a surgeon to do your taxes. The guy might be smart, but he's not an accountant. Asking a businessman to run the most powerful country in the world with no background in politics, world affairs, or domestic policy is not wise. Why is asking someone to question their motives for backing Trump so bad? And when the opposition response devolves into name-calling, I wonder if those doing the name-calling are not as secure in their beliefs as they claim to be.

Whatever happens over the next months, it certainly isn't going to be boring. That's for sure.

About this whole #oscarssowhite nonsense

I've been watching the foolishness over the claims of racism against the Oscars (the nomination committee is run by a black woman, btw), and trying to find the right way to respond.

I ran across this at WWTD and thought his snark made the point perfectly (language warning):
Charlotte Rampling made movies back in the good old days when everybody had an indecipherable European accent and the girls were always naked in lakes. Rampling declared in a radio interview that it’s the black actors and directors boycotting the Oscars who are the racists against the whites. Kind of abrupt, but she has a point. Either you believe that the greatest socially and politically progressive industry in our nation is blatantly racist, or you don’t. And if you do, then what the fuck do you do? These fuckers are already wringing their hands and adopting Somalian babies in response to the epidemic of White Privilege in their own homes. You might see a mass suicide. Or they might start driving combustible engine cars again and waiting for the earth to swallow them up. Even that won’t end their guilt.

Will and Jada Smith are protesting a business where they’ve made $300 million and been allowed to raise a weird crystal praying indulgent family on a mega estate without much trouble. Because Will didn’t get nominated for a movie where he struggles with an accent and Roger Goodell tries to run people off the road to cover up the fact that playing football is dangerous? Smith got a crazy fucking expensive crappy movie made just so his son could star. He’s been nominated for an Oscar twice, and lost, to other black actors. To be fair, he’s probably crazy scared of his wife because of those Medina bottom pictures.

Straight Out of Compton had tits and drugs and swearing. That shit never wins an Oscar, even if filled to the brim with Whitey. Spike Lee has been honored time and time again by the film industry who keeps letting him make movies with his very low winning percentage. This is the first year he didn’t get squat. Now it’s racist. White people in Hollywood are easy to pick on because they’re so inexorably worried about being white people. By the time you get to the letter ‘R’ in the word racist they’ve already donated to the United Negro College Fund and ordered their daughter to blow a black boy at her Bat Mizvah reception. Mazel tov, Jody. Take a selfie with George Clooney, hashtag StopWhitePrivelege


I missed on the wardrobe assessment with my Duffster post below, but I'll go out on a limb this time and say these gals are definitely braless and see through:

image
model gabe
image
image
model gabe
image

Friday, January 22, 2016

Hilary Duff is see through, may be braless

hilary duff nipples see-thru

Since my Duffster broke up with her husband, she's been doing a lot of silly newly single type stuff like trolling for dates on Tinder ostensibly as fodder for a reality tv show [eyeroll]. She turned up recently in the oddest looking top for something and set the internet on fire with what looked like a partially exposed nipple.

Well I guess it was warm enough in California today for her to put a gauzy top on and get photographed braless. This is trend I can get behind:

hilary duff nipples see-thru
hilary duff nipples see-thru
hilary duff nipples see-thru
hilary duff nipples see-thru
hilary duff nipples see-thru

Now if we can just get her to go clothes shopping with Bai Ling, we could start having some real fun:

bai ling ripped jeans
bai ling ripped jeans

Update:
Case solved:

Hilary duff not braless

So she's wearing a bra after all. Which would be a bummer except for the fact that it must be really see-thru on its own . . . which is really hot since she paired a see-thru bra with a see-thru shirt.

Saucy flirt :-)

Kate Hudson's bare ass = you're welcome

kate Hudson's bare ass in a bathtub

36 year old Kate Hudson has always had one of the best white girl booties in the business. She Instagrams that butt with a relentlessness that rivals Anastasia Ashley. Well, she upped the game a bit here.

No complaints from me  :-)

Micaela Shafer not nude = still enjoyable

micaela shafer lingerie

German model and attention junky Micaela Shafer has, for the last couple of years, basically appeared everywhere and at everything naked. It's been an amazing demonstration of total body confidence and shameless self-promotion. That seems to have worked. Because now she's getting serious modeling jobs. And she is cleverly not just doing full-on nude shoots:

micaela shafer lingerie
micaela shafer lingerie
micaela shafer lingerie
micaela shafer lingerie

For the record, I prefer the blonde hair on her to her more natural black. It softens her look a bit. Also, that 3/4 profile is the money shot for her, she looks stunning in those images.

Also a wardrobe bit -- these girls with the fake, gravity defying boobs have an opportunity to wear some really great lingerie. They don't actually need the underwire chinet plate with beading mega-bras that other overly enhanced models do. So get some sexier stuff, girls/photogs. Now if I had the opportunity . . .

And if you're missing Micaela's nakedness a bit, here's a little bit of tease that came out recently as well:

micaela shafer naked

Well, it's on now

national review against trump cover

In case you missed it, the editors at National Review put out an issue/on-line articles stating the conservative case against Donald Trump as the Republican nominee.

They brought in a pretty impressive array of conservative writers, many like Glenn Beck and Dana Loesch, Trumpians/Palinbots will have a hard time claiming are part of the "establishment" -- something Trump is already backing away from saying in speeches that you have to be establishment to get anything done.

I'm still waiting for the official Trump response which typically has run one of two ways -- he'll either call them all stupid/liars or he'll say they're all really great people who've done great things but they're simply wrong about him. And his lemming-like followers will beat their hands together like the trained seals they've become (too much metaphor mixing? sorry).

The RNC has already signaled their stupidity by dropping the National Review from the February debate. Yep, that'll show 'em. So, we're like the Dems now, Reince? It's free speech only if we stick to the party narrative? F*ck you!

And the execrable Allahpundit has declared it stupid that NR even put the article out. I suppose in his spineless world the proper thing to do is walk around with one's head down moaning like Eeyore about how inevitable Trump is and we should just accept his destruction of conservatism and the Republican party and post that "Game over, man!" video clip that became his calling card in 2008. F*ck you too, pussy!

Here's a few snippets from the headline article in the Review, I encourage everyone to go read it. And also the comments from the Trumpians. If you need any more evidence of Trump employing the cult-of-personality tactic that put Obama in the White House, I'm not sure where to point you.

Emphasis mine:
Trump is a philosophically unmoored political opportunist who would trash the broad conservative ideological consensus within the GOP in favor of a free-floating populism with strong-man overtones.

Indeed, Trump’s politics are those of an averagely well-informed businessman: Washington is full of problems; I am a problem-solver; let me at them. But if you have no familiarity with the relevant details and the levers of power, and no clear principles to guide you, you will, like most tenderfeet, get rolled. Especially if you are, at least by all outward indications, the most poll-obsessed politician in all of American history. Trump has shown no interest in limiting government, in reforming entitlements, or in the Constitution.

His obsession is with "winning," regardless of the means — a spirit that is anathema to the ordered liberty that conservatives hold dear and that depends for its preservation on limits on government power. The Tea Party represented a revival of an understanding of American greatness in these terms, an understanding to which Trump is tone-deaf at best and implicitly hostile at worst. He appears to believe that the administrative state merely needs a new master, rather than a new dispensation that cuts it down to size and curtails its power.

If Trump were to become the president, the Republican nominee, or even a failed candidate with strong conservative support, what would that say about conservatives? The movement that ground down the Soviet Union and took the shine, at least temporarily, off socialism would have fallen in behind a huckster. The movement concerned with such "permanent things" as constitutional government, marriage, and the right to life would have become a claque for a Twitter feed.

Some conservatives have made it their business to make excuses for Trump and duly get pats on the head from him. Count us out. Donald Trump is a menace to American conservatism who would take the work of generations and trample it underfoot in behalf of a populism as heedless and crude as the Donald himself.

As they mentioned, Trump is incredibly poll-driven and his supporters are too. At least when the polls are in their favor. Problem is, Trump loses to Hillary in every poll head-to-head. He's got the lowest net favorability with independents and democrats (-27 with independents and -70 with dems) of any of the candidates. Only Rubio wins against anyone the Dems throw out there. Polling has Cruz beating Hillary but losing to Sanders in the general election. Also of interest is that Trump's favorability among Republicans is lower than everyone but Kasich and Bush. Which calls into question the polling that has him sitting with such comfortable leads in every state.

Open your eyes, voters. Donald Trump is not a conservative. He's not genuine. He's playing a game, and you're all falling for it. Don't bring the country down with your willful ignorance about this guy.

Update:
So it's door #1 apparently -- Trump spoke at a fundraiser or meeting of some sort and called the National Review sad and a dying paper than no one reads. He also invoked the late William F. Buckley (founder of NR) saying he would have been ashamed of the cover story. Interestingly, Buckley wrote an article prior to his death wherein he called Trump a demagogue and a narcissist. Sounds like Bill knew him pretty well to me.

For it's part, NR has cleverly fallen on it's sword saying that being disinvited from future debates is a small price to pay for telling the truth about Trump.

Tuesday, January 19, 2016

As usual, Charles Cooke puts it better than I can

sarah palin spits on true conservatism

Over at the National Review my boy Charles C. Cooke puts into words much more elegantly what I said in the post below.
Last year, long before Trump made his ambitions clear, I submitted that if one "wanted to find a figure to which Palin can be reasonably compared . . . it’s not Ronald Reagan. . . . It’s Donald Trump." And so it has come to pass. Like Palin, Trump has mastered the art of the interminable ramble, the purpose of which is not to convey meaning or to advance a useful argument but to stun the audience into dumb submission. Like Palin, Trump has embraced his ignorance and wielded it as a sign of strength and normality against the ever-protean "elite." And, like Palin, Trump has betrayed his desire to fix the political system not by mastering or replacing it, but by becoming it. This isn’t an insurgency, it’s a shakedown. And the conmen are moving in packs.

He's a bit harsh there on Sarah, I've never considered her ignorant. In fact, her political knowledge as a sitting governor is vastly superior to Trump. And a lot of her policy statements and predictions have been quite accurate and prescient. Still . . .
What, we might ask, has become of Palin’s beloved Tea Party? What, too, of her purported admiration for limited government, and of her ostensible hatred of heretics and fakers? The prospect of a mass movement that was earnestly committed to libertarianism was always a little too good to be true, but even I didn’t imagine it ending like this. All that talk of the Constitution and the Declaration; all that energy expended against the cronies and the rent-seekers; all those purifying voter drives — and for what? So that Sarah Palin could add a few zeroes to her bank balance and Donald Trump could go from the purchaser to the bought? Today was the day that Rick Santelli’s famous yelp finally melted into populism and avarice. Today, at about ten minutes past six, P. T. Barnum beat out Hayek for the soul of the insurgent Right. Today, the rebels became the charlatans they had set out to depose. What comes next will be anybody’s guess.

He's 100% right in this last bit, as I said below . . . Sarah has sold out the Tea Party and Constitutional conservatives who have stood by her for 8 years now.

Good luck on the money train, babe. I'm sure you'll get a lot of speaking engagements at Trump's casinos in the future.

Over at the NY Daily News conservative columnist S.E. Cupp chimes in:
If his world-view weren’t enough to make Palin cringe, Trump's inauthenticity as an anti-establishment candidate should be. Palin admirably took on what she called the "good old boy network" to become Alaska’s first female governor. Now, she leaps to support a guy who helped create that network and who thrives in it. In what bizarre world is a billionaire real estate mogul who donates money to Rep. Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Harry Reid "anti-establishment"?

The Sarah Palin I knew in 2008 — the one who campaigned tirelessly and many times thanklessly for John McCain, a war veteran Trump has openly mocked — would have seen through Trump’s charlatan candidacy. The Sarah Palin I knew in 2008, a devout Christian whose faith was constantly scrutinized by the secular left, would have no affection for a man who is constantly scrutinizing the devout Christian faiths of other conservative candidates.

The Sarah Palin I knew in 2008, who was a passionate and fearless voice for hockey moms, mama grizzlies and women everywhere, all while enduring patently sexist attacks from the left, wouldn’t have supported a man who calls other women bimbos and slobs, thinks women who breast-feed and go to the bathroom are "disgusting," and criticizes another candidate for her looks.

That Sarah Palin is gone. Maybe one day, over a beer, she’ll tell me why.

And finally Glenn Beck has an appropriate last word about this endorsement on his Facebook page:
Sarah Palin
Small Government, lower taxes, fewer regulations and the constitution?
Not any more.
Big government, bailouts, executive orders, not just abortion but partial birth abortion, nationalizing of banks, stimulus, pathway to citizenship.
All of these views were held by Donald Trump during this administration. Pathway to citizenship in 2013. Some as recently as last year.
What was the massive pivot point to make him change so fundamentally?
When Sarah and the tea party won a hard fought election and were under attack in 2010, DJT was giving money to Pelosi, Reid and Rahm.
I couldn’t disagree with her more but she has played the game now for years. Perhaps she knows more than those of us still on the outside.
Maybe the press was right about her but for all of the wrong reasons.

Sarah Palin is dead to me

sarah palin stabs real conservatives in the back

Well, they've been hinting at it and now apparently it is true -- Palin has endorsed a self-aggrandizing, vulgar, cretinous ass clown for President of the United States, i.e. Donald Trump.

Turning her back on actual conservatives she helped put in office like Ted Cruz and Nikki Haley, Palin has instead opted to back a famewhore candidate that is everything she claimed Barack Obama was back in 2007.

I've stuck up for Sarah for years, defended her against the slurs and misinformation spread about her . . . I predicted way back in the 2008 Primaries that McCain would select her as his running mate and that it would give his campaign a boost of energy.

I was right about a great many things about Sarah Palin, but I was wrong about this. She's not interested in returning this country to a Constitutional republic. She's not in favor of smaller, more responsible government and lower taxes. She wants a dictator . . . one that campaigns with a R after his name. disappointing

This endorsement may tip the scales in Trump's favor. And I may find myself faced with a quandary on election day this year. Because I won't vote for this fool. And I won't vote for whatever socialist idiot the Dems put out there.

Maybe I'll write my own name in.

And add Sarah's name to the list of (supposedly) conservative commentators I've lost respect for this cycle.

Political cartoon

branco cartoon

Amazing similarities


The Washington Post has an article in it's online issue about Donald Trump's disastrous machinations with the Taj Mahal in Atlantic City back in the 1990's.

It's an amazing bit of research and reporting. And if you've been paying attention to the primaries build up and the campaigning, the similarities between how Trump bulldozed his way into that debacle and his current Presidential run are plain.

His "just trust me" "I'll get it done" "I'm Donald Trump, I can do things others can't" rhetoric, the outright lies and grandiose overstatements about his abilities and promises of wealth to be delivered have all been echoed over and over on the campaign trail and in the televised debates.

Along with his penchant for lashing out at any who dare to stand up to him. Such as Marvin Roffman a senior analyst at Janney Montgomery Scott who forecast that Trump's absurdly ambitious plans for the Taj wouldn't work. Trump demanded Roffman be fired then denied he ever did so, despite the evidence of his written demands for Roffman's dismissal.

Roffman sued both his former employer and Trump and got financial settlement's in each case. But as I've said repeatedly as Trump-bots have pushed this clown to the top of the polls -- trade one thin-skinned petulant dictator for another? WTF are you people thinking?!

As an aside, there's a rumor that Sarah Palin may come out with an endorsement of Trump today. If that's so, I'll be very disappointed. And along with Glenn Beck, I'll be wondering exactly what happened to the Tea Party grassroots that sprung up all those years ago.

Trump as Republican nominee = Hillary as President, as Trump loses against Hillary in every poll. And if you're thinking Hillary will go down with this server thing, remember, I've said all along that she's a stalking horse for Elizabeth Warren. You see quiet chatter about this all the time in background stories. Warren's got the lib bonifides to take the reigns and run with it. And Bernie would happily support a Warren presidency, so the left would be united and Trump's hateful rhetoric would turn off independents and swing voters. It would be a landslide victory for socialist Democrats.

I would encourage anyone to read that article. And if you're seriously considering Trump as your nominee, I wish you'd think this through. You're making a mistake and dooming this country to an even more leftward lurch than we've seen in the last eight years.

Saturday, January 16, 2016

Glenn Beck still falling on deaf ears at FOX

As I mentioned previously, I don't watch The O'Reilly Factor very often. On Friday though, I noticed in the tease for that night's episode that both Marco Rubio and Glenn Beck would be on. So I did my little back and forth trying to catch just those segments and avoid the usual grandiose bloviating that O'Reilly is famous for.

Much to his dismay, when O'Reilly asked Beck who had won Thursday's debate, Beck replied Rubio and Cruz. Beck pointed out once again that Trump is noticeably weak on policy questions. As O'Reilly pushed Beck to anoint Trump the presumptive nominee, Beck pushed back as he had with Hannity previously.

Beck pointed out that Trump simply isn't a conservative and never has been. He went further, calling Trump a "progressive" something O'Reilly dismissed out of hand. Beck countered by pointing out that progressives believe government is the answer to everything and the answers to big problems are even bigger government. He said that Trump agreed with that, noting that Trump's answers to the country's problems aren't the dysfunctional over-reaching government but rather the wrong people are running the government.

O'Reilly was beside himself, finally pointing out that Bernie Sanders was, in fact, a progressive. Beck stammered into the camera, agreeing, and then waited for the implications of what he just said to dawn on O'Reilly. Naturally it did not happen. Nothing's going to get through that arrogant self-assuredness.

Beck pointed out how he's been right about so many things that O'Reilly has dismissed him on, from the caliphate to Obama, etc. Naturally O'Reilly wasn't going to admit Beck was right even though any open-minded person should be able to see Trump for what he is.

As I've said before, a number of FOX's on-air talent are totally in the tank for Trump -- Greta, Eric Bolling, Hannity . . . they all fete Trump for their own reasons. I believe O'Reilly wants Trump to be the eventual candidate for a simple reason -- ratings.

He's admitted as much, talking about how Trump is ratings gold to hosts and O'Reilly is all about the ratings. He doesn't care who runs the country and what they do with it. He's insulated by his wealth. Whatever pitfalls and tragedies strike you and me, O'Reilly will have his millions and his comfy lifestyle and his place on television to tell us how smart he is. He spews this bullsh*t about how he's all about protecting the people, but he really doesn't care. If the causes that bring him notoriety also help folks, that's wonderful, even more good press. But at the end of the day, he only cares about himself.

I've said repeatedly that informed voters must take things with a grain of salt, understand who's telling you stuff and wonder about their motivations. Conservative pundits, bloggers, and tv hosts are no different. There's plenty of resources out there, check things out for yourself, don't trust any of them.

[aside] I had hoped Beck's website would have a clip of his appearance on The Factor Friday, but it doesn't at the moment. If he puts one on there, I'll embed it here.

Update:
Okay, here it is. It's not the entire segment, but you can get an idea of what Beck was saying and how O'Reilly was trying to stick up for Trump throughout:



Also, Beck had to back pedal about his claim that Trump had voted for Obama in that segment. He did so, but also offered a bit of illuminating background on why he believes Trump did, in fact, vote for Obama (from his Facebook posting):
"1. He was a registered democrat when he cast the vote. Trump had been a registered democrat for 7 years by the time the 2008 election came around.
2. This doesn’t guarantee that Trump voted for Obama of course. However, registered democrats in New York voted for Obama by a 91% to 8% margin. So, if Trump was in that 8%, he was quite the outlier.
3. He remained in the democratic party for almost another year after casting the vote.
4. In the decade leading up to the vote, he was a dedicated Democrat, with the only exception being his flirtation with the Independence (Reform) Party in 1999-2000. Incidentally, in this period, large parts of his platform were considerably to the left of Hillary Clinton, or Barack Obama. In fact, I don’t believe even Bernie Sanders has ever proposed a wealth tax on what is in your bank account.
5. In the year leading up to the vote, he spoke favorably about Hillary Clinton, telling Wolf Blitzer “I think Hillary would do a good job." Obviously, it is theoretically possible for someone that thinks Hillary would be a good president to vote against Obama. But to paraphrase Donald: “Not a lot of Republican votes come out of blue state democrats that support Hillary Clinton.”
6. He was among the fiercest critics of the Bush administration. Yes, now it’s hard to believe that he would have voted for Obama, but in 2008 he had spent several years speaking just as negatively about Bush. He called him “a terrible president, perhaps the worst president in the history of this country.”
7. It’s not just that he called Bush a “disaster” many times. It’s why he called him a disaster: Iraq. He called the invasion of Iraq “one of the worst decisions ever made” saying it would have been a “wonderful thing” if he had been impeached because of the war. In fact, he was arguing for the war related impeachment of Bush just two weeks before he cast his presidential vote.
8. Given his opinion on Iraq, consider Trump’s available choices as he looked back: one candidate on record opposing the war, one candidate on record passionately supporting “one of the worst decisions ever made.” Why wouldn’t he vote for Obama?
9. Similarly, given his opinion on Iraq, consider Trump’s available choices as he looked forward: one candidate on record saying he would end the war, the other on record saying he would escalate it. Why wouldn’t he vote for Obama?
10. He continued to praise Obama after the election telling Larry King “Here's a man that not only got elected, I think he's doing a really good job.”
11. He gushed about Obama in his 2009 book: “His comments have led me to believe that he understands how the economy works on a comprehensive level. He has also surrounded himself with very competent people, and that’s the mark of a strong leader.”
12. He supported Obama’s first main policy push, the stimulus, saying it was “what we need” while praising Obama’s for “building infrastructure, building great projects, putting people to work in that sense.”
13. He supported Obama’s efforts to fix the banks including to potentially “nationalize” them. “I do agree with what they're doing with the banks. Whether they fund them or nationalize them, it doesn't matter.”
14. Looking back at this period, he described himself as Obama’s "biggest cheerleader."
15. Trump’s argument is that he raised money for McCain, so obviously he supported him. Is this really a standard Donald feels comfortable with? Does that mean he also supported John Kerry, Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, Ted Kennedy, Anthony Weiner and Eliot Spitzer?
16. Immediately following the passage of Obamacare, while even moderate republicans coalesced around its repeal, Donald Trump made a maximum donation to the campaign of Harry Reid. Reid was one of the few vulnerable democrats able to hold on to power in the Tea Party wave election of 2010.
17. Speaking of the Tea Party wave, put yourself in that moment again. Hope for constitutional preferences was renewed. Hundreds of thousands of people were gathering all across the country and in Washington DC for Restoring Honor. Conservatives celebrated the biggest wave in a century. One month after that election, Donald Trump gave $50,000 to Barack Obama’s Chief of Staff, Rahm Emanuel.

Do I believe Donald Trump voted for Barack Obama in 2008? Yes. Yes, I do."

Friday Flashback -- Linda Blair


linda blair topless oui magazine

Yes, I know it's Saturday . . . I'm having some issues here, cut me a bit of slack please.

Anyways, Linda Blair as we all know, burst onto the scene in what is perhaps the scariest movie of all time -- The Exorcist. Not only was the movie shocking and frightening, it created a firestorm of publicity in 1973 by having the then 13 year old Blair using some pretty foul language and playing out some pretty foul scenes before the camera.

Like a lot of actors who become associated with an iconic performance, Blair never broke free of the Exorcist albatross around her neck. In 1983, in an attempt to be "grown up" she posed for Oui Magazine which had positioned itself as the poor man's Playboy back then and got sorta stars like Blair and a young Demi Moore to pose nude for them.

I ran across some decent scans from that issue recently and share them with those who may never have seen Blair in the baby-fat goodness of her early 20's:

linda blair topless oui magazine
linda blair topless oui magazine
linda blair topless oui magazine
linda blair topless oui magazine
linda blair topless oui magazine
linda blair topless oui magazine

I don't think that term means what you think it means

During President Obama's in-kind political donation, oops, I mean town hall on gun confiscation, oops, I mean common sense gun control, the Prez repeatedly brought up the dreaded "conspiracy theories" about his wanting to confiscate law-abiding citizen's firearms and essentially deconstruct the 2nd Amendment to the Constitution.

Mirriam Webster defines conspiracy theory as:

"A theory that explains an event or set of circumstances as the result of a secret plot by usually powerful conspirators."

In the case of our President, and by default, his enablers in the leftwing/mainstream press, the term is used as a pejorative, an insult implying an irrational fear of the uneducated about something beyond their comprehension. To wit: Obama claims he's not out to take our (the law-abiding citizens) guns . . . that's a fallacy, crazy talk, a conspiracy theory, etc., he just wants to ensure that no more mass killings (naturally he refuses to invoke the terrorist attacks that have escalated during his impotent term in office). Even though nothing in his proposals would have prevented any of the terrorist attacks or mass killings he sheds crocodile tears over on television.

btw, they used to say Bill Clinton was the first black President, apparently Obama is the first woman President -- can't get what he wants? He turns on the water works. pathetic

Over and over again, he repeats this statement "I'm not out to take your guns."

Hmmm . . .

On the first day of the 2016 legislative session, Democrat lawmakers Mary Margaret Oliver, Carolyn Hugley, Pat Gardiner, Stacey Abrams, Dar’shun Kendrick and Dee Dawkins-Haigler of Georgia introduced HB 731, a bill that outlawed certain types of firearms (over 50 brands and models) in the state of Georgia, along with high-capacity magazines (anything that holds more than 10 rounds). The bill goes on to state that beyond banning weapons certain weapons would be required to be seized by the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

Ya got that? Seized. That's the same as confiscation, okay Mr. President?

Oh, and the penalty for owning a dreaded high-capacity magazine after Jan 1, 2017? Yeah, it's a felony. A felony!

The list of firearms banned is pretty expansive, and concurrently non necessary as fully automatic and select-fire weapons are already illegal to own without a Class 3 dealers permit (at least that's what it used to be called). And some of the weapons, like the Barrett .50cal sniper rifle cost nearly $15,000.00! Who the heck can afford one of those? Let alone the ammo?

But he's not coming for you guns, folks. That's a myth. A conspiracy theory.

It's not paranoia if they're really out to get you.

And it's not some crackpot theory when you're actually introducing bills that do what you claim you're not trying to do.

Thursday, January 7, 2016

Bernie Goldberg agrees with me

"Dogs and cats, living together . . . mass hysteria!

I mentioned before that I don't watch Bill O'Reilly's show. I find him to be a buffoon and a bully and nowhere near as informed or intelligent as he thinks he is. But I happened to be watching tonight and caught his segment with Bernie Goldberg on FOX's handling of the 2016 campaign.

Goldberg pointed to several things he found problematic with FOX's coverage. One -- Trump gets too much air time, more in fact, according to Bernie, than many FOX anchors. Second -- and more to my point, Trump is often interviewed by certain hosts like he was their friend. Which is to say, the hosts show favoritism towards Trump.

Bernie was careful not to name names, but I will. Greta van Susterin, Sean Hannity and Eric Boling are the ringleaders of Team Trump at FOX News. Greta leads with Trump, as she did tonight, or has him on more than anyone else. He's practically a regular feature on her show. And as a former prosecutor, she knows how to lead him with questions to protect him.

Greta: "Now I know you really didn't mean [whatever stupid thing he just said], right? I mean, you were simply trying to point out [this more innocent thing], right?"

Trump: "Of course, I would never say such a thing as that, Greta. It's just as you say, I was just trying to make this other point." blah, blah, blah.

It's disgusting.

Boling was subbing for O'Reilly after Trump's childish comments about Hillary during the last Democratic debate. Boling loved every minute of it. And when his guests in one segment tried to point out how un-Presidential and undignified he was behaving, Boling just shut them down saying he thought it was great someone was dishing it out to Hillary and more power to him, etc.

I quit watching Hannity after Glenn Beck showed him for the dim-bulb hypocrite he really is. Hannity's the low hanging fruit of conservative talkers, a poor interviewer and a one-thought host. And he's a huge Trump fan. Apparently completely okay with a dictator Trump while being totally against a dictator Obama.

So bully for Bernie for having the stones to take these hosts to task even if he didn't have the full set to name names. O'Reilly for his part told Bernie he didn't know what he was talking about. Claimed CNN has Trump on more than FOX, which I don't know but I'll bet is not true. And claimed that Trump is ratings gold so hosts are going to have him on because he's entertaining.

Hmmm...

I thought they were supposed to be a "news" channel. Focusing on the issues in electing the next President. Which is it, Bill? I think you may have made Bernie's point for him.

Tuesday, January 5, 2016

Anna Camp in a bikini = too modest

anna camp bikini

Pitch Perfect is a guilty pleasure of mine. A silly little picture that captured my imagination with solid acting, a good story and some decent musical performances. Of course, I'm not the only one as the original spawned a sequel that came out last summer.

Anna Camp played the head of The Bellas, a harsh taskmaster for the girl's group that literally drove herself sick with her desperate drive for perfection. I thought she was attractive when I saw her in the movie, the first time I've seen her in anything, I think, so when I saw she had some bikini pics out there, I was intrigued.

meh

You can see she's got a pretty rockin' body, and I'm not advocating wardrobe exposures at every turn -- but the granny-panties bikini just isn't doing it for me. She still looks great and all, something a bit more saucy might have been fun.

just sayin'

anna camp bikini
anna camp bikini

Friday, January 1, 2016

And a story of class, or lack thereof

Social media + holidays . . . the combination has given birth to its own cottage industry it seems. Every celeb or wanna-be tries to come out with the perfect encapsulation, via image or 120 characters, of any given holiday or celebration.

New Year's Eve = party. We all know that. So let's look at two women who gave a peek at both ends of the spectrum in commenting on the biggest party night of the year.

First, my girl Maitland Ward brings me to the brink of shortness of breath by going nearly full monty in this poorly lit Instagram image:

maitland ward nipple new years eve

That's a party I would have liked to have been at.

At the other end of the spectrum is the tiresome Lena Dunham, letting us know what a night out in NY is like with her:

lena dunham fat drunken pig

That's a party I'm glad I missed.

Not going to read too much into these images. But I find it interesting that Dunham's view of New Year's is passed out drunk on the floor with her pants around her ankles. This coming from a gal who falsely accused a guy of rape after she got falling down drunk and druggy at a party.

Update:
To be fair, in looking at Dunham's Facebook or Twitter or whatever post, it seems the picture she posted is supposed to represent a woman who was scared to death, literally, by a confetti cannon. Not sure why she had to have her ass hanging out of her clothes other than Dunham's desperate attempts to shove her lardy, out-of-shape body down the throats of everyone at every opportunity.

A story of change to start the new year

So let's start this year off with a story about a change of heart, shall we?

I found this story over at Prof. Jacobsen's site. In 2012, a Brazilian woman named Sara Fernanda Giromin created Femen Brazil under the name Sara Winter. Openly bi-sexual, she went on to do a number of protests against the church over gay rights and was openly pro-abortion, having aborted her own child.

sara winter becomes pro-life
sara winter becomes pro-life

But in 2015 all that changed. Did she find God? Well, not exactly. What happened was that she got pregnant again. And this time, she gave birth to the child and everything in her life changed. I mentioned in a previous post, and I repeat it often in these discussions -- I defy anyone to hold a newborn baby, especially their own child, and deny the existence of God.

While Giromin doesn't actually speak of a newfound life in God, she does regret not only her actions against the church, but also killing her first unborn child:
"I have repented of having had an abortion and today I ask for forgiveness," writes Giromin. "Yesterday marked one month after the birth of my baby and my life has taken on a new meaning. I’m writing this while he sleeps serenely on my lap. It is the greatest sensation in the world.

Please, women who are desperate to abort, think carefully about it. I was very sorry I did it. I don’t want the same for you."

Giromin goes on to apologize to the church for various protests against them, including an iconic photoshoot of her kissing another half-naked girl in front of the Church of Our Lady of Candelária in Rio to emphasize the gay community's contempt for Christianity:
"Asking for forgiveness is certainly not an easy thing to do . . . we went way too far and ended up offending many religious and non-religious people."

She has now also repudiated the feminist movement at large, calling it a "sect" that actually persecutes women, promotes lesbianism, covers up pedophilia within its ranks, and inflames hatred of men, Christianity, natural female beauty and the equilibrium of families. She writes in her book "Bitch, no! Seven times I was betrayed by Feminism" that she was pressured to become bi-sexual to gain more acceptance within the feminist community. She also found herself sexually molested by other feminists, forced to do drugs, and encouraged to have sex with total strangers.

Stacy McCain has spent the last year or so detailing the craziness within the radical feminist movement and you can read plenty of pushback from outsiders who try to discount what he brings to light. But here is a major player within the movement saying all these things are actually occurring within the borders of the feminist movement.

Whatever happens now, Sara Giromin is a happy parent whose eyes have been opened. Here's hoping she and her child have a wonderful life together.

And for the rest of us . . . realize that anyone can come back from the brink.

Mysterious ways, indeed.