Eliza Dushku reminds you . . .

. . . that she's still around. And oh by the way, she's coming back to a television show near you:

A bunch of bikini pics . . . always a good way to get the folks attention. I mentioned this before, but Eliza will be joining the cast of Banshee this season as an FBI agent (I think).

I'm reminded of a gal I know, who used to hang around the Playboy mansion a lot back in the day. And she said she could always tell when some female celeb or model had something coming up because she'd just start showing up at the mansion and hang around trying to get her picture taken or get involved with anything that was going on there. Guess that's what Twitter is for now.

I had hoped it would finally be a bridge too far

Alas, I was wrong. Again.

A few days ago, Presidential candidate Donald Trump made the outlandish, at least I thought it was outlandish, statement that America should stop allowing Muslims to enter this country, whether they are already citizens or not.

I had thought that finally this self-aggrandizing ass-clown had finally put his foot so far down his own throat that Republican voters would wake up and see this fool for what he is. Nope. As I toured the web in the days after, I saw one respected blog or writer after another saying that Trump was spot on. I could not believe my eyes.

The normally common-sensed Michelle Malkin was totally cool with the idea of profiling anyone wanting to enter this country via a religious test or simply based on where they were coming from. An unusual stance from someone of Filipino origins who has for years documented the ethnic slurs she has endured from liberals. Plenty of Muslims in the Philipines last I heard. I wonder how Michelle would feel if she traveled abroad and found out she could not return simply because of how ethnic she looks.

There have been a few writers and pundits of note pushing back against Trump and his ridiculous stances on . . . pretty much everything. Charles C. Cooke over at the National Review has consistently showed Trump for who and what he is. His recent column is wonderful and I recommend it highly. One quote says it much better than I could hope to:

Whatever else he might be, the idea of Trump as a paladin of civil liberties should make one howl with terrible laughter. Since he announced his candidacy, Trump has threatened to ignore those who are carping about free speech and shut down parts of the Internet; he has promised to summarily deport those who are suspected of being illegal immigrants, without due process of law; he has endorsed extensive campaign-finance regulations that fly directly in the face of the First Amendment; he has vowed to restrict the Second Amendment rights of those on the terror watch list, again without due process; he has praised Franklin Roosevelt’s internment of American citizens, suggested that natural-born Americans can be deported against their will, and proposed that American Muslims be barred from reentering the country; he has described as "wonderful" a Supreme Court ruling that obliterated the "public use" limitations on the invocation of eminent domain; and he has refused to rule out registering Americans on the basis of their faith. Worse still, he has responded to the criticism that these positions have generated by channeling his inner Nancy Pelosi: "Are you serious?"

And for those ardent Trump supporters, shoving your fist in the air and yelling "F*ck yeah!" at every inanity utter by this vulgar cretin, let me try this on you -- so you're okay with the creation of a militarized entity to go around this country, kicking in doors and dragging suspected illegal immigrants out of their homes, packing them in buses, trucks whatever, and then driving them to the US/Mexico border and marching them across at the point of a rifle? Yes? This is what Trump is proposing. He has said this again and again.

So if Hillary or Bernie or Fauxchahontas gets in, you'd be okay with the following -- the creation of a militarized force going house to house throughout the country, kicking down doors, and searching the home for legally purchased firearms that the [fill in the blank] administration has decreed by executive order would now be illegal and confiscating them. 'Cause it's sauce for the goose, bro. If you're going to be all in for one party's fascist policies, don't go cryin' when the other party uses them.

We, as conservatives, have fought hard over the last seven years, to get our representatives in Washington to remember we have a Constitution in this country. We expect our government to follow that document. And we've been pushing the flaccid spineless members of the party out the door to get some true conservatives in the House and Senate. And now you want this f*cking bozo to run for President?!

Trump would never win a general election. We're supposed to be electing a champion for our beliefs, but also someone who can win over the undecided and centrist/right leaning Democrat voters. Trump is alienating everyone but the 30% of the poll voters who've got their heads up their asses about the big picture.

And plenty of bloggers are giving up already too. Stacy McCain, who I generally like, did a post the other day and basically threw in the towel for 2016:

Honestly, I’ve got a Zen-like serenity about the Trump phenomenon. The prospect of Trump going thermonuclear and running as an independent is the worst-case scenario, and so what?

Not my problem.

Yeah. Not your problem, Stacy. I'll remind you of that when Hillary's President and the country's going to socialist hell in a handbasket. We went through this stupidity in 2008 when bloggers like the execrable Allahpundit were saying an Obama presidency would be better than a Huckabee presidency. As I've said for 7 years now -- how's that Obama presidency going for ya dumbass? And now these guys are doing it again.

Like four years ago . . . we had such a moment that was ripe for serious discussion of policy and a new direction for the country, and we got the clown car circular firing squad of Republican candidates that allowed the worst President in the last century to get re-elected. Now with the door wide open, we get f*cking Donald Trump and his reality show campaign f*cking up everything.

I've got no idea what I'm going to do if this dolt gets the nod as our candidate. I cannot bring myself to vote for anyone this fake or dangerous and voting for whoever the Dems put up there isn't going to happen.

I'm lost. Truly.

Stacey Dash suspended for two weeks . . . still a FOX

pun intended  :-)

After this weekend's You, the public are so unintelligent and uninsightful, you can't appreciate my awesomeness . . . I'm so disappointed in you speech by President Obama on the tragedy in San Bernadino, oops, I mean gun control, a couple of FOX News contributors lost their composure on live television.

The always over-caffeinated Col. Ralph Peters called the President a "pussy" . . . something only allowed on MSNBC when speaking of any Republican Commander-In-Chief. And Stacey Dash said that the President "didn't give a shit" about . . . something. Honestly, I didn't get that far in the article. Imagining Stacey's breathy-sex voice swearing has me feeling like Gomez when Morticia speaks French . . .

Thankfully, Col. Peters never appeared in Playboy. Equally thankfully, the lovely Stacey has:

you're welcome

Rita Ora did not have a moment

Rita Ora showed up at a recent X Factor taping in a daring and dangerously low cut dress:

But unlike Lizzie Cundy, it would seem Rita Ora planned for the inevitable by covering her girlie bits with pasties:

Takes the fun out of celeb watching, but props to Rita for knowing what was likely to happen when you dress like that.

So who is Obama going to blame on television tonight?

I hear we're getting a prime time address from the President tonight to speak on the events in San Bernadino and the larger situation of ISIS and terrorist attacks. Is there anyone who doesn't know where this is headed?

I posted earlier that the administration was working to draft an executive action on gun control. So we're going to hear that the Second Amendment and its supporters are to blame for the San Bernadino tragedy. And we're just going to need more laws that only affect the law-abiding and don't deter the criminal one bit.

We'll hear how our own supposed intolerance -- "they were mocking his beard" and bigotry is bring the wrath of these terrorists down upon us. Why if we would only close Guantanamo, there wouldn't be any way to recruit or radicalize these new ISIS fighters.

Supposed hateful rhetoric from Republican Presidential candidates will be blamed. As well as FOX News and any conservative commentator who criticizes our lightworker from another dimension President.

And I'm sure the catch-all bogeyman of the left, George Bush, will be blamed in some way for all this. You know -- all the problems I inherited from the previous administration . . .their war . . . etc.

I don't know if I have the stomach to sit through anything this guy has to say, but I might tough it out just to see how he blames everyone but the terrorists for what's going on in the world today.

Update:

Well . . . I managed not to throw up. So there's a plus.

But it was a pretty unfulfilling speech, set at about 13-14 minutes.

Basically, the Prez isn't going to change anything he's doing now. Says he gets daily updates, but then why prior to the Paris attack, did he think ISIS was contained? And he's pushing for a cease-fire in the Syrian war.

The gun control stuff was just red meat for the lefties. The nonsense about the no-fly list -- first off, neither of the two terrorists in San Bernadino was on that list, so what would that accomplish? In fact, how many of these foiled attacks have had suspects who were on the no-fly list buying firearms? It's a symbolic move, nothing else.

And how much harder does he want to make it to buy an AR-styled rifle? And what does he want to do? Extend the waiting period? A more thorough background check? What? None of those things would have stopped or slowed this attack and they won't stop future attacks as the radical Islamic terrorists don't mind laying in wait for months to stage an attack.

It was just the usual pandering to his left-wing base. Nothing that would help stop a future attack on innocent Americans.

There was of course the usual straw man arguments about a non-existent backlash against Muslims in this country. You hear people talking about death threats and discrimination, but no one actually can point to it actually occurring. Kind of like the poop swastika that everyone knew about, but no one actually saw or took a picture of.

Like I said, I didn't throw up. And I'm glad I didn't sign up for one of those drinking games, because he did surprise me with the restraint in not attacking conservatives or Republican Presidential candidates. And with only 14 minutes of air time, the Prez wasn't going to be late for his big soiree with all the Hollywood deep pocket types he had lined up for later in the evening.

Basically, business as usual in the Obama White House.

Rule 5 Sunday -- Margaret Nolan

I'm not sure which cable channel it is, but one of them is running a James Bond sort-of marathon right now. Watching the wonderful Goldfinger the other night, I was reminded of the busty and beautiful Margaret Nolan (a 20 year old at the time), who appears briefly as Dink, Bond's masseuse.

Nolan was quite the "it" girl for many years, appearing in an impressive amount of movies and television shows in Great Britain. Still alive and kicking, Nolan does graphic art, taking old images of herself and creating Dali-esque visuals with them. Nice to see a gal not shying away from her saucy past in the cinema.

*click on the thumbnails for full-sized images*

Rule 5 Sunday suggested by this.

Hat tips:
Jake Finnegan
The Daley Gator
The Classic Liberal
Say Anything Blog
Proof Positive
American Power
Reaganite Republican
Goodstuff's Cyber World

Here's a story you won't read at HotAir...

...or Townhall or from any of the cut-and-paste journalists at the various conservative online outlets.

The USPS announced a $1.2 billion operating profit for fiscal year 2015 that ended in Sept of this year. This makes three consecutive years with an operating profit and the second straight where that profit exceed $1 billion.

This despite our so-called obsolete business model. It is projected that the USPS will have delivered 15.5 billion pieces of mail in FY 2015, of which 600 million pieces will be parcels -- a 10.5% increase over last year's volume.

Once again, it is important to point out here that the USPS's financial problems stemmed almost entirely from the 2006 Congressional decision to force the USPS by law to fund future retiree health benefits 75 years into the future. Something no other public or private business in the country is required to do. As I have said in countless comments sections -- hang that $5.5 billion pre-pay on FedEx or UPS and let's see how skippy they are.

There are a couple of factors driving the upturn in profits at the Post Office. One is that upper management has mistakenly assumed that the decline in letter volume is a straight line and would not plateau. This is a bit ignorant and as any reasonable person would conclude, there would be a point where it would level off. The assumption that letter volume would decline to an eventual zero is simply ridiculous. So those projections were bound to not come true.

Also, as correctly projected by yours truly (and roundly ignored as I usually find myself) there has been an increase in catalog mailings as online stores vie for your business. With the proliferation of ad-blocking software, the only sure way to get news of your business into a consumer's hands is to send them a catalog. They can't block that. And if you create an eye-catching mailing, you can get some business. As I pointed out repeatedly -- people may buy from Victoria's Secret online, but they shop those catalogs. Studies have shown that direct mail advertising is still the best value in the industry. And businesses are taking advantage of that this year in a big way. My mailbox at home is packed every day. Isn't yours?

And finally, despite the totally inaccurate statements to the contrary, the PO has been downsizing and reducing the number of full-time employees. CCA's and PSC's take the place of the PTF's of old and work for a fraction of the pay rate that PTF's earned in the old days. It's a bit harsh and the CCA's quit in droves, but it makes good business sense. So there ya go.

So we're keeping Saturday delivery. We're doing Amazon parcels on Sunday because UPS can't afford to. We still do door-to-door delivery (unlike Canada, which may be changing its mind on that), and we're making money.

What's so obsolete about that?

---

Speaking of business models . . . I've never quite understood how models like Nikki Sims and Jordan Carver stay in business. After a few years of the big tease, paying customers should be realizing they're never going to get to see these gals in all their unexpurgated glory. But they keep on keepin' on. Case in point:

That's about the closest I've seen from Nikki. Guess it's a point of principle or something. She can always answer with a straight face "No, I never did nudity" when years from now someone asks about her internet modeling days.