From Pine View Farm

A Picture Is Worth 0

Chef labeled

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0

Yet another “responsible gun owner exposes a toddler to his portable phallus.

River Willis, who had been sent upstairs with a cellphone to take a nap, came downstairs and said the phone had died. He asked his father to lie with him until he fell asleep, according to the arrest warrant.

Willis said he told him to go to the master bedroom and wait for him — but a few minutes later, he heard the gunshot. He said he ran upstairs to find his son had taken the pistol out of the fanny pack and shot himself in the face.

One more time, “responsible gun owner” is an oxymoron.

And I won’t even get started on what I think sending a two year old off to nap with a cellphone says about our society’s devolution . . . .

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American Stasi 0

UNC law professor Gene Nichol tells the story of another victim of the Trump maladministration’s war on brown people.

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Artificial? Yes. Intelligent? Not So Much. 0

Input for the intolerant? Follow the paper trail.

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QOTD 0

Pauline Kael:

Regrettably, one of the surest signs of the Philistine is his reverence for the superior tastes of those who put him down.

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A Tune for the Times 0

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Devolution 0

Michael in Norfolk mourns the political party to which he once belonged and for which he once even chaired a local committee. A snippet:

That political party is dead and gone and what now exists is party headed by the equivalent of a crime boss, racism is once again overt, bigotry. hate and division are the stock in trade of the GOP when it’s not pursuing its reverse Robin Hood agenda, and accountability for those in power is gone.

Follow the link to find out just which party he once championed.

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Establishmentarians and the Rule of Lawless 0

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The Rule of Lawless 0

The Department of Justice admitted in a recent court filing that it had violated over 50 court orders in immigration cases — and that stunning figure was just since Dec. 5 and only included cases in New Jersey.

More at the link.

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0

The hunt for politeness continues.

Musical NotesGuns and stupid, guns and stupid.
They go together like love and Cupid.
Let me tell you brother,
You can’t have one without the other.

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Suffer the Children 0

Thanks to the Trump maladministration’s ICE, we are again reminded that that’s not scripture. That’s a Republican family value.

And, speaking of ICE, methinks Atrios is onto something.

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She’s in a Pickle 0

Florida woman.

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QOTD 0

Rebecca West:

God forbid that any book should be banned. The practice is as indefensible as infanticide.

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A Tune for the Times 0

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Grokking the Disinformation Superhighway 0

At the Psychology Today website, Richard Restak warns that, “(t)hanks to the technology of the Internet and AI, misinformation is vastly increasing.” He points out that, not only can AI distort the present, it can distort the past:

Nor is the difficulty in distinguishing the real from the fake limited to the present. AI can provide a phony version of the past by altering photos or introducing characters who never existed into a specific historical context. George Orwell presciently anticipated this in 1984, a Comrade Ogilvy “who had recently died in battle under heroic circumstances.” But although no such person as Comrade Ogilvy ever existed, “a few lines of print and a couple of faked photographs would soon bring him into existence.”

Read the whole thing and remind yourself that, even if you see it on a computer screen (perhaps especially if you see it on a computer screen from “social” media), it ain’t necessarily so.

Afterthought:

I wonder how long it will be before the Trump maladministration starts to deploy AI in our national par–oh, never mind.

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American Stasi 0

Farron runs the numbers.

In related news, Thom talks with Mike Wriston about ways to fight back against Trump’s concentration campe.

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Still Rising Again after All These Years 0

Bird labeled

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“An Armed Society Is a Polite Society” 0

Another “responsible gun owner” allows a child access to a portable phallus . . .

A 6-year-old boy died Tuesday following an accidental shooting at a Montgomery County residence, according to police.

. . . and another news report fails to twig to the difference between “accidental” and “negligent.”.

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“History Does Not Repeat Itself, but It Often Rhymes”* 0

At the Washington Monthly, Robert J. Shapiro reads the writings of Hannah Arendt and hears a rhyme. A snippet:

MAGA is not the first mass movement to endorse violence in the service of its leader’s aspirations. If history is a valuable guide to understanding this moment, the most penetrating historical analysis is, famously, Hannah Arendt’s The Origins of Totalitarianism, which has been widely discussed since Trump rose to power.

(snip)

Her 1951 analysis of the movements that propelled the rise of the Nazi and Stalinist regimes begins with the insight that their followers were not a typical interest group seeking benefits or rights. Instead, they’re individuals who feel that recent disruptive societal changes cost them their status and are brought together by a charismatic leader who exploits their shared sense of injury.

The leader of these movements offers lies to explain why his followers lost their place, claims he can restore it given enough power, and, equally important, manipulates his followers’ anger to support violence committed at his behest.

I commend the entire article to your attention.

____________________-

*Mark Twain.

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The Rule of Lawless 0

At Above the Law, Joe Patrice reports on the Trump maladministration decision to dumb down the Judge Advocate General by excluding graduates from law schools that refuse to bow down to Donald Trump.

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