Friday, December 30, 2022

Have no fear, the January ish is here!

An ish is pub. Pub, pub. An ish is pub. Pub, pub. An ish is pub. Pub, pub. An ish is pub. Pub, pub. An ish is pub. A doggone ish is pub!

The January edition of The Last Word has now materialized, and it chugs along as ever. This ish talks about censorship of auditing videos, my successful effort to remove a noisy plate from a city street, handing in school reports full of gibberish and funny sayings, people peeing on the toilet seat at a Senate office building, and more!

So scoot on over here...

https://www.scribd.com/document/616966064/The-Last-Word-1-2023

If that doesn't work, fly on over here...

http://bunkerblast.info/lastword/lw2301.pdf

Wednesday, December 21, 2022

Lawyer barred from Rockettes show after being caught by facial recognition tech

This is fascism.

I don't care what anybody says. It's fascism, end of story.

A woman was barred from a Rockettes show at Radio City Music Hall in New York because facial recognition technology in the lobby discovered that she happens to be a lawyer who works at a firm that filed a personal injury suit against a restaurant owned by the venue's parent company.

After being detected by this technology, guards approached her and ejected her instantly. She was with a Girl Scouts troop with her daughter. The rest of the group was allowed in.

A spokesperson for MSG Entertainment, which owns the venue, said the company's policy is to ban attorneys from firms involved in litigation against the company from attending events.

This policy is now resulting in a challenge to MSG's liquor license - because the license bars the venue from arbitrarily banning patrons.

What a mess America has become. What a mess.

Friday, December 16, 2022

It was a long bubbling season, Charlie Brown!

Today at Kroger, some woman was in such a Krogery mood that she bubbled.

Friday, December 9, 2022

Another Beshear screw-up

Kentucky has had a system of unemployment insurance that has served workers well since 1938 – offering 26 weeks of insurance.

But starting next month, unemployment insurance in Kentucky is being slashed so it will last only 12 to 24 weeks – depending on the recent unemployment rate. With unemployment as bad as it is lately, you might think that it will be 24 weeks when this change takes place. But who are we kidding? It's 12 weeks. Of course.

Much like how our rulers deliberately used a botched model for COVID deaths as an excuse for stay-at-home orders and other police state measures, they've been using made-up employment figures for years – almost always vastly undercounting the unemployment rate. Their penchant for disinformation isn't limited to science and law, but also economics.

The Beshear administration is making this change to appease the governor's friends at the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce – much as how some of Beshear's COVID measures also pleased this elite secret society.

Andy Beshear's legacy will be not just a botched COVID response but also gutting a successful worker insurance system that has lasted 84 years.

A person bubbled at Target too!

Today at Target in Newport, some woman bubbled.

Monday, December 5, 2022

A person bubbled at Kroger

Today at Kroger, some woman bubbled a green bub.

Thursday, December 1, 2022

Disabled man threatened with guns by Delta

Here's another story that's been mostly ignored by the pop-up media.

Recently, a travel blogger flew from Santiago to Atlanta using Delta Airlines – and was threatened with guns by the airline. The man uses a wheelchair because of spinal muscular atrophy. The Air Carrier Access Act gave him the legal right to stay on the flight when it landed until he was given access to his own wheelchair.

Delta disrespected this right – and threatened the man. A video caught a flight attendant telling the man that the TSA would make him "get off the aircraft with all their guns and stuff."

The Air Carrier Access Act is based on a sound premise. One of the things it was designed to do is fight actions such as airlines abandoning disabled passengers for hours.

Cue the laptop bullies who will inevitably defend the airline.

Wednesday, November 30, 2022

Have no fear, the December ish is here!

It's another December to dismember at The Last Word, as our December issue is now pub!

This ish talks about more bad Domino Rally reviews, people throwing pizza on the floor during high school outings, the battle of the bubble gum dyes, a student buying pot at school (which used shredded Ranger Rick magazines for cut), med school students getting expelled for abusing cadavers, and more!

So read it now before it reads you...

https://www.scribd.com/document/610883864/The-Last-Word-12-2022

If that doesn't work, bip on over here...

http://bunkerblast.info/lastword/lw2212.pdf

Tuesday, November 29, 2022

New York City to lock up "mentally ill" without trial

Since 2020, the bigger the city, the more of a fascist stronghold it is.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams – already on record as supporting child abuse, getting a city worker fired for speaking out against it, and running an administration that lied in court in a related case – is at it again. Adams has now announced the city will involuntarily commit the so-called "mentally ill" without any sort of trial or hearing, even if they pose no threat to anyone.

Why? Because Eric Adams is a hateful, hateful man, that's why. In a city with a long string of incompetent mayors, that shouldn't be too surprising, but Adams's totalitarianism has few rivals.

Today's Democratic "leaders" hate America, and they hate freedom. It shows every time their traps flip open.

New York's latest directive would unambiguously violate the Supreme Court's 1975 O'Connor v. Donaldson ruling. This unanimous landmark decision says people may not be indefinitely committed against their will.

Wait! There's more! The city is also urging passage of a state law to bolster the city's stance.

The Coalition for Homeless rightly blasted the city's new directive, but the city is sure to dig in.

In the 2000s and 2010s, America's cities were the home of modern pioneers and innovators. Now our cities are the home of gentrified goosesteppers.

Monday, November 21, 2022

Colleges should pay to have student debt canceled

One of the issues Occupy took up was student debt. Occupy Cincinnati once had a march about this issue, and we were actually attacked during it.

These days, I don't expect anything productive to be done on this or any other matter, given the sorry state of our political system. To give you an idea of how bad things are, in one recent local election, the supposedly most progressive of the 3 candidates wanted to bring back the draft. Today's so-called progressives have become the war hawks that real progressives have long fought against.

I've long supported canceling student debt, but not long ago, some folks actually raised a good argument against it. While debt would be canceled for people who went to college, what about those who never had the chance to go to college? What do they get from canceling student debt?

That's a fair point, but it doesn't make college debt any less burdensome. Another drawback of canceling student debt is that all of us taxpayers would be on the hook for it. So here's my solution: Make colleges pay for it. This would apply to public and private colleges alike, so not all of it would be shouldered by taxpayers.

Think of this as a warranty. For decades, I've said that schools should be subject to warranties that guarantee the quality of the education they offer. If a school doesn't provide an education that allows one to make enough money to pay off their debt, whose fault is that? Is it my fault we have such shitty schools?

Many of our schools are run by some bad, bad people, and there's new evidence emerging all the time they'd rather teach hatred of the Bill of Rights than useful academic material. Our colleges bash the principles America is supposed to be run on, and they ought to pay a price just for that. I hope that with the decline of our colleges just in this decade, society can lift the violent taboo against not attending college.

Tuesday, November 15, 2022

Republicans win U.S. House

Oh no!

Anyway...

Thursday, November 10, 2022

Rural areas moving to the left of urban areas?

There's no law that says urban areas have to be to the political left of rural areas. In fact, the United States since 2000 has been the exception, not the rule. But now, some election results show that rural counties may be trending leftward, while large metropolitan areas are stagnating by moving to the right.

This is now true to an extent in Kentucky. As the dreadful and extreme Amendment 2 was defeated, the county breakdown shows that it won Boone County while losing Carroll County. It won Daviess and McCracken counties but lost Henry and Nicholas counties.

This indicates that fighting against COVID bio-juche isn't the only issue where rural areas have improved over the cities. Urban areas are becoming more authoritarian on issues in general – while rural areas may be becoming less so, even on issues such as abortion rights.

The voting patterns seen in this cycle for referendums and nonpartisan elections doesn't seem to bear any correlation with partisan results. America's party system is undergoing a realignment as significant as what took place during the Civil War and the New Deal.

America may be approaching an era in which rural areas are actually more liberal than urban areas. It's like it's 1990 again. Yes, you too can live in Eminence or Glendive!

COVID maximalism loses at the polls

Days after the election, we still don't know what party will control either the House or the Senate, but one thing is clear. COVID maximalism has lost in the court of public opinion.

One of few major candidates in the entire country to run against COVID totalitarianism was – oddly enough – Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican. He ended up winning in one of the most significant landslides anywhere. Some governors who were some of the most diehard lockdownists in America survived because their challengers failed to attack them for their COVID maximalism.

Dr. Mehmet Oz, the Republican nominee for Senate in Pennsylvania, lost largely because he was one of the first well-known Americans to endorse lockdowns. Oz had praised the Chinese Communist Party for its embrace of "zero COVID" authoritarianism.

Whatever the weather, people all over America and around the world are tired of the bio-juche police state and the lies spread to prop it up.

Sunday, November 6, 2022

Celebrity look-alike cruise

You may have heard of a celebrity cruise. But what about a celebrity look-alike cruise?

I just received an important e-mail about a recent cruise in which numerous celebrity look-alikes were seen. They included Elvis Presley, Brian Dennehy, Boris Yeltsin, and Marjorie Taylor Greene. The Elvis look-alike was so hilarious that one day when he was at the pool, another feller began yelling, "Elvis is in the house!"

In addition, a man wearing a Brigham Young University shirt audibly passed gas while strolling through an elevator lobby. Also, some woman bubbled.

Saturday, October 29, 2022

Have no fear, the November ish is here!

November wouldn't be November if you couldn't pop open a toilet or three and relax with the November ish of The Last Word!

In October, Zinecinnati came to town, and we saw it all! Also, this ish talks about CNBC's idiotic airport stores, another McDonald's tantrum, lost 'Sesame Street' episodes, photocopying bubble gum, airlines destroying luggage, records getting ruined by sewage, and more!

Once again, Scribd is blocking this ish until they can get their spam filters in order, but you can find the latest edition of The Last Word here...

http://bunkerblast.info/lastword/lw2211.pdf

Monday, October 24, 2022

201 photos and videos (so far) from my trip out west!

In the month of ba-de-ya, I went on a fact-finding mission out west. I picked up 2 new states, and the trip was so action-packed that it is expected that I will amass a total of 459 photos and videos of Roads Scholaring interest.

This caused me to split the trip into 2 massive photo shoots, which splits the trip down the middle. The first grand batch consists of 9 parts and 201 items. And you're gonna peep 'em until you can blow a bubble with 'em...

http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/ilwa22a.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/ilwa22b.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/ilwa22c.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/ilwa22d.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/ilwa22e.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/ilwa22f.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/ilwa22g.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/ilwa22h.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/ilwa22i.html

Wednesday, October 12, 2022

Amendment 2: another assault on bodily autonomy

"My body, my choice" means what it says.

I've fought against the media as they relentlessly dig in on their support of mask mandates. Bodily integrity should be an unassailable value in a free society. But this also applies to reproductive freedom.

There's been a big misconception that those who support extreme abortion bans are not the same people who support mask mandates. But if that was true, why do we have both? Some folks have noted that in the past few years, right-wing war hawks and authoritarians have merged with the "liberal" intelligentsia. That's why we see right-wing extremists like Bill Kristol joining the Democratic Party.

On November 8, Kentuckians will have the chance to reject Amendment 2 – a referendumb that would amend the Kentucky Constitution to enact one of the most restrictive abortion bans in the country. If this miserable amendment passes, the Kentucky Constitution would be hamstrung against protecting reproductive liberty. A trigger law would go into effect that would outlaw abortion even in cases of rape or incest, and Amendment 2 would snuff out any challenges to this trigger law.

Although this amendment was introduced by Republicans, the Democrats haven't lifted a finger to fight it. Sadly, this is not a surprise, given the Democrats' painful takeover by factions that seem singularly dedicated to expanding government overreach. And government overreach is what Amendment 2 is. There is strong sentiment out there against government intrusion into personal behavior. Limits on reproductive rights are as troublesome as the ever-expanding prison state and the unending COVID maximalism that has been cheered by the media.

When I said I stand for limited government, I meant it.

Thursday, September 29, 2022

Occupy Democrats gave to McConnell as allegations of pocketing donations swirl

Here's yet another bombshell that the media is going to sweep under the rug.

Remember the popular Occupy movement of a decade ago that the media hated so? There's still little shards of debris out there exploiting the Occupy banner, and one of them is Occupy Democrats. They claim to be a group of Occupy supporters within the Democratic Party - but all they do is spew venom. They don't contribute a damn thing that's positive. Nothing they post is recognizably Occupy.

Now it's been found that just before the 2020 election, the Occupy Democrats Election Fund donated $40,000 to the McConnell Senate Committee – as the Senate Republican leader cruised to reelection. Even after the Democrats completely abandoned the bedrock values of their historic supporters, Mr. Elbow Care remained one of the worst Republicans out there.

Just as shocking, it took 2 years for anyone else to find it. We never would have found it, because we never would have thought to look for it, and we don't have enough staffers to look for it. A larger operation has no excuse not to find it more quickly.

Wikipedia says Occupy Democrats "publishes false information, hyperpartisan content, and clickbait." Yet somehow, the group's posts "are among the most widely shared political content on Facebook." The University of Iowa library said Occupy Democrats "has been known to show misleading, fake, or exaggerated partisan content." The Valencia College library placed Occupy Democrats on a list of sources that "cannot usually be accepted at face value and need further verification from other sources to determine if information is credible." Even the Atlantic said Occupy Democrats is "studded with straightforwardly fake news", and BuzzFeed said Occupy Democrats once published a satirical story as fact. Yet Joe Biden's 2020 campaign worked directly with Occupy Democrats for its messaging.

But wait! There's more! A devastating new article in the Raw Story says founders of Occupy Democrats are being accused of pocketing donations to the group. According to these allegations, the founders funneled money they raised through their PAC into their own businesses and donated precisely zero to Democratic campaigns. Hundreds of thousands of dollars went to "fundraising consultants." Yes, they fundraised to pay for "fundraising consultants."

One of the founders claimed that Occupy Democrats is a superPAC, so it can only spend donations on consultants and messaging, because it is not allowed to donate to candidates. So why did it donate to McConnell? One reporter said that's because it's actually not a superPAC but a hybrid PAC. This means Occupy Democrats is too dumb to even know how its own PAC works.

A commenter on the Raw Story piece asked if Occupy Democrats was a Republican front all along designed to scam Democrats into donating. Another said there is a history of the rich hijacking movements for financial gain. I think the only difference between Occupy Democrats and other groups is that Occupy Democrats got caught. I know MoveOn and Drinking Liberally are scams. I don't think MoveOn always was a scam, but it has been since at least 2020.

What about all the "progressive" blogs that all suddenly shifted to COVID maximalism and began supporting lockdowns at the exact same moment? Who was paying them off? It doesn't seem likely that these blogs would abandon their principles unless they were being paid off.

The Occupy Democrats scandal ought to raise suspicion about other shitlib organizations and blogs. But it probably won't, because the media won't cover it.

Have no fear, the October ish is here!

It's gonna be an October to ploptober, as the October ish of The Last Word is now pub!

This ish talks about another road trip out west, struggles with buying a new computer, hotel pools usually being closed, people playing frisbee with a John Denver record, a person spitting food on Monopoly money, a person getting bubble gum stuck in their sock, and more!

So point your pooper here...

https://www.scribd.com/document/597091033/The-Last-Word-10-2022

If that doesn't work, slink on over here...

http://bunkerblast.info/lastword/lw2210.pdf

Sunday, September 25, 2022

Chaka Khan look-alike sighted

I just spent a half-hour trying in vain to fit "I Feel For You" into a title about celebrity look-alikes. Oh well. Anyway, I received an important e-mail saying a Chaka Khan look-alike was sighted a few days ago.

Also, as the proliferation of green bubble gum continues, this e-mail said a person was seen bubbling a big, green bub in a car. It was also reported that someone pooped all over the back of a toilet at an NFL game in Cleveland.

Friday, September 23, 2022

School-to-prison pipeline widens in Cincinnati

I and many other Americans spent the 2010s fighting against the school-to-prison pipeline. The fascism of the 2020s has set our hard work back by generations.

At a meeting last week, Cincinnati school board members voted 6 to 1 to keep armed police in schools – even though studies showed that placing armed cops in schools is not useful. This also came after school police fell under scrutiny for racist practices.

Like so many other things, the school-to-prison pipeline has only gotten worse over the years. Some folks insist things were just as bad in the 1970s, but they forget that I was alive then and I'm old enough to remember that America was much freer then. The University of Connecticut Center for Education Policy Analysis says that in 1975, only 1% of American schools reported having police on site, but that number had ballooned to 58% by 2018. In fact, Cincinnati was one of the first school districts to fall to these pressures.

School police have also come under fire for arresting youths for acts that are not even criminal.

America has become a totalitarian police state where every move is controlled, and no institution exemplifies it more than our broken schools. We are at war with the monsters who run our schools, and we must step up our efforts against these child abusers. Shame on the unseemly goblins who run our schools.

If anyone needs to be armed, it's the students.

Celebrity look-alike boldly goes where no man has gone before

Today at Kroger, I saw a William Shatner look-alike.

Also, some woman driving down Carothers Road bubbled.

Sunday, September 18, 2022

People plopped stuff at Ploptoberfest (imagine that!)

You're slipping!

Last night, I went to Oktoberfest in Cincinnati – or, as I call it, Ploptoberfest. It wasn't as illustrious as last year, when I threw up across from the Enquirer building and people drank beer on the streetcar, but it existed nonetheless.

Ploppings aren't as creative as they were a decade ago. However, I did notice that someone put a plastic Kroger bag and a beverage bottle in the toilet. As a bonus, someone smashed a packet of ketchup on the wall in a portable restroom.

Also – predictably – a person was in such a festive mood that they bubbled.

Thursday, September 15, 2022

Surprise! Splat!

Today, I got home from a road trip all the way across the country. I even went to Washington and Oregon, so now I've been to every state in the contiguous 48 states and D.C. This fact-finding mission is known as the September Surprise!

Celebrity look-alikes abounded. They included Clint Eastwood, Jeff Bezos, David Canary, and Dick Cheney. But I plan to elaborate on them more in the next ish of The Last Word.

Also, after I got home, I received an important e-mail declaring that a Pink look-alike was sighted at Meijer.

Sunday, September 4, 2022

Kazooing is cool

Earlier, I went to Rip-off-fest, as I warned I might do.

My proud smuggling tradition continued. I smuggled in Dr Pepper and a kazoo in defiance of the fest's rules against bringing in beverages and musical instruments. Just to make sure I was violating their dumb rules, I briefly played the kazoo, but it was just the first few notes of "Smoke On The Water."

Also, a person was in such a festive mood that they bubbled.

Saturday, September 3, 2022

Georgetown! Maysville! Ripley! Game day bucket go boom!

Back in July, I goed on a little automotive Roads Scholaring just east of Cincinnati. This event yielded 45 photos, and peepage is in order. This also means I'm finally caught up on recent Scholaring photos. So glide on over here...

http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/geomay22a.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/geomay22b.html

Friday, September 2, 2022

Where's my kazoo?

Every year, the list of items prohibited at Rip-off-fest gets longer and longer – if they have the event at all.

Rip-off-fest is my name for Riverfest – a so-called festival in Cincinnati. I usually attend the fireworks display each year and smuggle in a soft drink – as beverages are prohibited. I've never been caught, but I once saw a young woman harassed for trying to bring in a soda from Frisch's Big Boy.

This year, the list of banned items includes some bans I've never noticed before. For example, musical instruments are banned. Maybe I'll look for my kazoo later. Balloons and beach balls are banned too. Whistles and tools are also banned.

After I smuggled in Pepsi, last year's Rip-off-fest was a fun little diversion, and we had fine weather. Everyone smiled widely, and a column of mucus even dangled from the nose of a youngster who was approximately 10 years old. It looks like this year we might not be so lucky with the weather. But the weather might not be what keeps people away, as turning the event into a police state might instead be the culprit.

Thursday, September 1, 2022

Wednesday, August 31, 2022

Have no fear, the September ish is here!

Guess what? Ba-de-ya! That's what!

The September ish of The Last Word is now pub, and it will make your navel spontaneously combust!

This ish talks about the decline of local community colleges, the gentrification leaf blower, a psychiatrist discussing flatulence, a kid cussing at a store, YouTube hiding downvotes, a person chewing 40-year-old 'Dallas' gum, a zine convention humiliating itself, and more!

So point your pooper here...

https://www.scribd.com/document/590357029/The-Last-Word-9-2022

If Scribd blocks this ish, you can find it here...

http://bunkerblast.info/lastword/lw2209.pdf

Wednesday, August 24, 2022

Newsom to the right of Campbell County Fiscal Court

Campbell County, Kentucky! My home county! It's also the home of notoriously right-wing public and private schools, ridiculous campaigns against adult entertainment venues, an official cover-up of school officials' harassment campaign against an 11-year-old, burgeoning gentrification, and other reactionary policies.

But at least Campbell County Fiscal Court (the county's governing body) approved a syringe access program several years ago that was surprisingly ahead of its time.

This actually places Campbell County to the left of California Gov. Gavin Newsom. You knew the man was a shitlib, because you regularly read this blog, as most cool people do. On Monday, Newsom actually vetoed a bill approved by legislators that would have allowed some cities to open supervised drug injection sites in an effort to put a dent in the increase of fatal overdoses. The growth of substance abuse over the past 2 years was in turn largely caused by Newsom's failed lockdowns.

Naturally, Newsom is being held up as a possible future presidential candidate by the media.

Oh boy! Gavin Newsom versus Nikki Haley! What a stinker that'll be! I think I'll retire to Sweden or Nicaragua.

At least I was never assaulted for not wearing a mask at a picnic in Campbell County – which happened to people in California under Newsom.

Monday, August 22, 2022

Val Demings attacks Marco Rubio from the right

The Democrats have gone full-on fascist.

Rep. Val Demings is likely to be the Democratic nominee to challenge Marco Rubio for Senate. Rubio was first elected as a Tea Party favorite. So I never thought I'd see a major Democrat attack Rubio from the right. Yet Demings has managed to do exactly that.

Recently, Demings charged that an associate of Rubio has ties to Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro – who Demings called a "socialist dictator."

Uh, Maduro was democratically elected.

This is Joe McCarthy-level stuff. In my day, liberal Democratic leaders were strongly opposed to communist dictatorships, but generally did not use red-baiting to attack Republicans from the right. This nonsense about a "socialist dictator" sounds like it's straight out of the pages of the Tea Party or the Reagan regime.

Demings has other extremist positions. She was one of the most avid lockdownists of the COVID pandemic, praising draconian lockdowns in other states and repeatedly urging lockdowns and other extreme measures in Florida. If you told me 30 years ago that in 2022 there would be a major Senate candidate who red-baits an opponent and demands that a whole state be placed on house arrest over a coronavirus, I would have thought, "Man, the Republicans sure have gotten extreme!" Except this time it's not the Republicans.

Florida's Democratic Party is in shambles – just as the party is in the rest of the country. America has a broken party system that is now ready for the trash heap of history.

Another celebrity look-alike at Kroger

Today at Kroger, I saw some woman who strongly resembled singer Carlene Carter.

Thursday, August 18, 2022

Joe Fischer got skeeped at

Hey! Did you know there's a nonpartisan race for Kentucky Supreme Court on the November ballot?

Incumbent Justice Michelle Keller is facing a challenge from State Rep. Joe Fischer. You may know that Fischer – a Fort Thomas Republican – is an extreme conservative. And when I say he's right-wing, man, do I mean right-wing! Fischer isn't just conservative. He's on a completely different plane of existence!

I know that these days, Fischer occasionally sounds almost reasonable compared to the lockdown totalitarians. Fischer isn't really a lockdown right-winger like Mike DeWine and Rodrigo Duterte are. And make no mistake, when I first voted in 1991, lockdowns would have been considered a right-wing authoritarian policy. Lockdownists don't get to practice wokewashing to hide their tyranny.

Now Fischer has been chided by the Kentucky Judicial Campaign Conduct Committee because in his campaign materials he talks about being a conservative Republican. In other words, he's running a partisan race – which violates the Kentucky Constitution's provisions that judicial races must be nonpartisan. The committee sent a letter that observes, "When judicial candidates emphasize their affiliation with a political party, they erode long-held American principles of judicial independence and fairness." The letter says legal disputes should "be decided by an impartial tribunal that is not influenced by political affiliations."

In addition, look how badly partisanship has ruined the other branches of government lately. On an increasing basis, the parties have built their entire identities around truly vile, repulsive policies.

Hopefully, Fischer's rightist poologgery will be soundly rejected by voters in November.

Saturday, August 13, 2022

School grants itself the right to read students' text messages

You can usually count on the individuals who run our schools to be good little goose-steppers.

I heard via one of the people on Twitter who I follow that an unspecified school – apparently in the Bay Area – has a new policy regarding cellphones. It says school officials are now allowed to read any text messages between students – even if these messages were sent outside of school hours or away from school property.

Back in my day, there was a TV show called 'That's Incredible!' If there was a show today about America's schools, it could be called 'That's Unconstitutional!' Just about everything schools do displays their hostility to constitutional liberties that were rarely even in doubt only a generation ago.

California schools have been especially Nazi lately. They seem to burn a lot of books there.

Friday, August 12, 2022

The government lies a lot

Yesterday, the CDC ostensibly loosened official guidance regarding COVID, but all this does is highlight how much the government has been lying to us since the pandemic started.

If I go into more detail about what I think, I'll be censored. Now that it's come out that the Biden administration pressured social networking sites into censoring users for having the "wrong" opinions, that point is especially relevant. It's also way past time to start the prosecution phase for the atrocities that have been committed since 2020. Neither major party is innocent.

Yesterday's guidance brings to mind how we've been lied to about masks. When COVID vaccines were introduced, we were told that vaccination was the ticket out of restrictions. At minimum, we were led to believe that anyone who got vaccinated would be completely exempt from all mask mandates. That was a lie. They lied to us with a straight face. Many public and private agencies continued to dig in long after that – and some have continued to do so today. Yes, today – even after yesterday's new guidelines. This is almost 2 years after a vaccine came out.

I got vaccinated the very moment I was permitted to, and got both doses. This took place in early 2021. I feel that if a safe and effective vaccine is out there, people should use it, unless they're medically ineligible. Vaccination has long been considered a great tool to protect not just the person getting vaccinated but all of society. But what are we supposed to think when mask mandates aren't lifted even after all eligible people have had a chance to be vaccinated?

We were also told that once we reach herd immunity, COVID would no longer be considered a pandemic disease, so all restrictions would be dropped. The upper estimate for herd immunity was placed at 70%. We were promised that if 70% of people had immunity resulting from either infection or vaccination, it was over. That was another lie. The CDC itself said just yesterday that a whopping 95% of Americans now have immunity. Yet the stupid continues.

We are out of patience – and I do mean we, not just I. I have consulted with others, who have very strong credentials, and they have absolutely no patience left whatsoever. Personally, I shall continue to do everything within my power to avoid places that have a mask mandate – as I have done for over 2 years. I made exceptions for places like supermarkets and convenience stores that seemed unlikely to enforce the rules that ostensibly existed, and there wasn't a chance in a million I was going to comply outdoors. I have valid medical reasons for avoiding maskage. When I was in 4th grade, a teacher tied me to a chair and stuffed a rag in my mouth, and maskage mimics this assault. Early in the pandemic, I conducted an experiment with maskage. I kept swallowing uncontrollably, I had trouble breathing, my heart started racing, and I got a headache after a very short time. The media does not get to gaslight us by saying "everyone" is able to wear a mask. Yet they have said it many times. The more proof you provide that this is false, the more they double down.

Digging in after being proven wrong is known as the smart idiot effect. They've been doing this since long before COVID – especially on matters related to the economy. Bush did it after his lies that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction were debunked.

The media does not get to be the arbiter of what people are medically able to do. I shouldn't have to explain this. This is common sense. Three years ago, I didn't have groveling for the right to breathe without obstruction on my bingo card for this decade.

The government has lied to us so much about COVID that nobody pays any attention to the virus anymore except to try to avoid the lingering restrictions. Nobody trusts our overlords.

Wednesday, August 10, 2022

Pelosi praises China

There ya have it, folks.

In an interview with 'Today' – yes, I know 'Today' isn't exactly a bastion of populism – Nancy Pelosi praised the government of mainland China. Pelosi said, "China is one of the freest societies in the world. Don't take it from me. That's from Freedom House. It's a strong democracy."

I did check Freedom House, and it ranks China as one of the least free countries in the world. And that's a source that actually overestimates how much freedom most countries have. So bust goes that bubble.

American media companies have major interests in China. Gavin Newsom spoke at the annual gala for Sing Tao, a newspaper with ties to the Chinese Communist Party. American politicians of both major parties have supported Sing Tao. The CCP is gobbling up real estate all over America, stockpiling it, and jacking up housing costs.

America has become a wholly owned subsidiary of the CCP.

Tuesday, August 9, 2022

Bucs stadium violated ADA (a blast from the past)

This is yet another story yielded by the Big Cleaning. I've found lots of little tidbits, such as Rod Blagojevich trying to ban milk in Illinois schools, but many of them never seemed to become actual policy.

Unfortunately, many stories reported on actual events, not mere proposals. In 2005, the Tampa Sports Authority discriminated against disabled Tampa Bay Buccaneers fans who attended games at Raymond James Stadium. The agency sent a form letter to fans who used wheelchairs saying that sealed wheelchair cushions were no longer allowed at games. The letter said cushions must now have an opening so they can be opened up and inspected when fans entered the stadium.

This subjected disabled fans to more intensive scrutiny than other spectators – thus violating the Americans with Disabilities Act. But why was anyone subjected to major scrutiny at all? It was because this was when the NFL was instituting its new pat-down searches of fans.

One of the nobodies with the sports authority said they were "bending over backwards to accommodate" disabled fans. That's a load of roo gas - reminiscent of the news report where wealthy agribusiness owners complained that farm workers got too many rights. The agency suggested a "remedy" in which bomb-sniffing dogs would inspect the cushion. Seriously, they said that.

Because the ACLU actually cared about civil liberties back then – unlike today – the group had a lawsuit against the NFL's invasive pat-downs.

In the years since, the NFL has gotten more and more abusive. Like the rest of North America's big league sports industry, the NFL was ear-deep in the COVID-inspired fascism of a year or two ago. I think it's time for Congress to revoke the antitrust exemptions of the NFL, Major League Baseball, and other sports leagues.

When they tried to force cable systems to carry religious channels (a blast from the past)

Let's take a trip back to the bubble gum bustin' year 2005!

This is when self-described "moralists" – yes, they used that term to describe themselves – wanted to pass a law requiring cable TV systems to carry religious channels. Several members of Congress inserted such language into a bill dealing with the switch from analog TV to the much-despised digital format.

Supporters of this plan said cable companies were deliberately shoving religious broadcasting aside – even though many companies offered several religious channels. Several years earlier, one cable provider even struck a deal with congressional "leaders" to drop a local channel that covered liberal rallies and replace it with full-time fundamentalist preaching.

How about fair coverage for all minority groups? If cable companies had to carry religious channels, they should have also had to open up access to any other group. Public access channels were required to allow such access, but no group got a whole channel. In fact, most public access channels were just filled with a rotating series of messages consisting of text on a computer screen. There was nothing preventing religious groups from making public access programs – like everyone else had to do.

The proposed law also blasted a gaping cavern through the claims – which persist today – that the FCC can't bring back the fairness doctrine and impose it on cable channels, or that the FCC can't place ownership caps on how many channels a large corporation may own. It also rips to shreds any claims that the FCC can't encourage stations to show quality children's programming.

Those who endorse government censorship based on content are usually the same weenieistic hypocrites who oppose regulation for the purpose of public interest – such as ownership caps.

If a pound of doublethink is worth a million dollars, I want mining rights to our rulers' heads.

Our rulers always did love dictatorships (a blast from the past)

In addition to letting me sort my old records and cassettes, the Big Cleaning continues to unearth old stories we stockpiled. Quite frankly, I'd rather cover old stories than new stories, even though our overlords have become more extreme and reactionary over the years. These days, they just do all their stupidity in unison, so it's not very interesting. In past decades, they at least put some variety into their idiocy.

But there's one thing that's stayed the same for years. They hate America. They just hate, hate, hate it. They like foreign dictatorships better, and they can't hide it. Nowadays, just like 15 years ago, and just like 30 years ago, they can't shut up about how horrible they think America is because too many Americans have the nerve to demand freedom.

One of the stories deals with topics that were slated to be taken up by Kentucky lawmakers in 2006. There were the usual gripes by Republicans demanding that the school funding formula be changed so that funds were transferred upwards to richer school districts. But there was also a plan to again lengthen the school year. One of the nobodies in the administration of Republican Gov. Ernie "Hey Bert" Fletcher suggested it should be lengthened because China's school year was longer.

And??? Why should America take cues from overseas dictatorships for its domestic policy?

If you like other countries better, move there. The world has about 200 countries. If you don't like America, there's lots of other choices.

This isn't the only issue where American elites supported authoritarian foreign governments. They also praised overseas dictatorships as having a better business climate and being tougher on crime, for example. But some of their claims didn't always line up with the facts.

These caterwauling troglodytes portray America as being full of cowboys and hippies who behave recklessly and care only about their "freedumb." But civil liberties, peace, and economic equality are universal values – which are aspired to by people worldwide.

Our rulers display doublethink. Those who demanded a longer school year because a few other countries were doing it are usually the same people who recently supported closing schools for 2 years. You can't have both – yet they supported these contradictory ideas. This is doublethink just like how they call opponents both "liberals" and "right-wing Trumpers." Everything George Orwell warned us about is taking place now.

Sunday, August 7, 2022

Bunker blasts and celebrity look-alikes in the Northwest

Today, I received an important e-mail about a trip that was taken in the northwestern U.S.

Only 2 celebrity look-alikes were seen: Denver Pyle and Liz Cheney.

But yesterday, Pioneer Square in Seattle was full of nifty poo. Live music was played, and the airy vapors of cannabis graced the air. A man sitting on a bench released a bunker blast that was said to have briefly lifted him a foot in the air.

Friday, August 5, 2022

Have no fear, the August ish is here!

The August edition of The Last Word has been pub for days now, and you're gonna read it until your face flies off in public!

This ish talks about censorship of 'Sesame Street' and other media, computer programming misadventures, not being allowed to go to the bathroom at school, a person getting bubble gum on the floor at a gym, the greatest episodes of various TV series, and more!

Scribd is blocking access to this issue. This is ironic, because the first article in this issue is about censorship.

But you can still find this ish by gliding over here...

http://bunkerblast.info/lastword/lw2208.pdf

Saturday, July 30, 2022

More bunker blasts and celebrity look-alikes!

I just received a very important e-mail about flatulence and celebrity look-alikes being detected in public!

According to this vital communiqué, a Rick Astley look-alike was seen on a flight from Cincinnati to Seattle. A Pete Rose look-alike was observed boarding a flight from Cincinnati to Austin. This was especially amusing because he was wearing a red baseball cap and chewing bubble gum, as ol' Pete often did.

In addition, 2 silent-but-deadly bunker blasts were detected on the plane.

Monday, July 18, 2022

Real ID fascism continues in Kentucky

Kentucky Democrats' apologia for the thug George W. Bush continues as the party is ushering in another towering wave of Real ID fascism – and using it as an excuse to cut the public's access to their local motor vehicle department.

Kentucky Transportation Cabinet Secretary Jim Gray has fired off an op-ed boasting about how the state has "crossed a significant milestone" by gutting its licensing system. Gray writes that we're less than a year away from Real ID taking full effect. If the Democrats cared at all about the public, they would have fought this like it's going out of style. Instead – on an increasing basis – they've not only let this Republican program take effect but have acted like it's the greatest thing ever.

There are now only 31 regional motor vehicle departments throughout the state – as opposed to the old, more convenient way of each of the 120 counties having at least one. Many of these 31 offices are not near central cities that have the most residents. Gray says that new options will "reduce the number of trips to a regional office", but it doesn't eliminate them entirely, and most people will have to travel much further when they do have to visit a regional office.

Real ID is fascist. That point is incontrovertible. It infringes on personal liberty and on the states' autonomy. It is a domestic passport – a "papers please" program. What Kentucky should have done is either sue over it or simply ignore it except to say that facilities must continue to accept the old ID's.

Just don't expect the Democrats to do it. If there's one thing I've learned over the past couple years, it's this: Fascist is as fascist does.

Disabled Missouri man loses caregivers

Not far from St. Louis, a 32-year-old man who is said to be incapacitated and developmentally disabled has lost his caregivers, after an agency responsible for his care suddenly walked away from him.

This has left his adoptive mother and various officials scrambling to find him proper care. This situation isn't even unique in Missouri – or probably other places. Much of this crisis lately has been caused by lockdown-induced staffing issues.

It turns out that when the man was a young boy back in 2000, he was severely abused at a state-run mental health facility. Everyone in 2000 insisted this sort of physical abuse didn't take place anymore – even as it seemed like it kept getting worse, as society was turning more aggressive and uncaring. This facility slammed patients against floors, forced them to fight each other, hit them with books, and forced them into cold showers. This abuse resulted in a monetary settlement, plus prison time for some of the abusers.

In a society where our rulers enjoy abusing the most vulnerable, abuse like this is sadly no longer surprising.

Friday, July 15, 2022

Happy now, Dems?

Something just happened in Kentucky that has never before happened. Just a few years ago, it would have been considered unthinkable. It was considered a Holy Grail by some, but to most folks it seemed like there was no realistic chance it would ever happen.

Can you guess what it is?

Republicans have just overtaken Democrats among registered voters in Kentucky.

Tough titmouse, Dems (as an intelligent person would say). You earned it. If not for the Democrats' utter corruption, elitism, and totalitarianism that has ballooned in the past 2 years, this wouldn't have happened. This is 100% the Democrats' own stupid fault. It might actually be more obvious in Kentucky than in some other states, as many of the state boards have become packed with patronage appointees.

Forty years ago, the Democrats had a registration advantage of well over 2-to-1. They blew it by becoming so right-wing. And right-wing they are. Under a traditional definition, they would be considered a right-wing authoritarian party now – yes, even more so than the Republicans now. They're to the right of Republicans on many issues now, including war, Big Tech censorship, and Real ID.

The Democrats' loss in membership isn't limited to Kentucky. It's nationwide. Recent surveys show that – for the first time in the modern era - Republicans now outnumber Democrats nationally among the nation's voters. This is especially striking considering the national trends only 15 years ago.

What is the Democrats' base of support now? It seems like they're down to just a few propellerheads and incels.

Metro Tim

A project 34 years in the making shall now be deemed complete to my satisfaction!

Many years ago, when looking at standard reference books for high school assignments, I thought of what it would be like if official definitions of metropolitan areas covered every county in the 50 states and D.C. - not just those closest to the central cities.

Perhaps the biggest driver of this interest was radio, since rating services like Arbitron used government definitions as a basis for their own metropolitan areas, with some modifications. From time to time, I came up with some rather rough definitions of my own to cover every county, but none of them seemed very accurate.

Now I think we can finally settle on a real set of definitions. I used FreeBASIC to process databases of county-to-county commuting data and other factors to create something consistent and believable. This is not specifically for radio but rather more for general purposes. However, this is not a list I intend to keep modifying, so I use data from the 2000 census and the resulting roster of official metropolitan areas as the reference point. (This is despite the fact that I was skipped by that census.) My new list is retconned to have applied in the 1970s and shall be deemed to apply today.

So read it and peep...

http://bunkerblast.info/newmetros.html

Tuesday, July 12, 2022

Cut a fart at Kroger

Today at Kroger, I heard someone crack an LAP when I was in the frozen foods section.

Monday, July 11, 2022

A person went to prison for hurting Simon Leis's feelings (a blast from the past)

Something something decency bluh bluh bluh!

The Big Cleaning has yielded this ridiculous story from 2002. The story touches on broader issues that are still relevant today.

Throughout greater Cincinnati and into northern Kentucky, it's long been true that if you go against the established narrative, you will be blacklisted. Over the past couple years, the Democrats have been more guilty of this than the Republicans, but the Republicans were far worse for many years before. Even then, the Democrats weren't completely innocent, nor are the Republicans entirely blameless now.

We don't like some of the things we've been hearing about lately in northern Kentucky. More specifically, a few Republican politicians are using their ill-gotten power to scare everybody. I'm not saying that even all Republicans are guilty here, but we're once again being led down a very dangerous road.

This sort of intimidation loomed large throughout greater Cincinnati in 2002, especially under ultraconservative Hamilton County Sheriff Simon Leis. Back then, a woman got in trouble for "pandering obscenity" for selling homemade porn tapes. This material was distributed only to adults, and was constitutionally protected. She was using the domain name simonleis.com – a political statement about the Republican sheriff's "decency" crusades.

A judge actually sentenced the woman to a year in prison for making fun of the embattled lawman on a porn site. The judge told the woman, "You decided to use the First Amendment as a sword and not as a shield." So she wasn't supposed to use the First Amendment at all? Is the First Amendment supposed to be just a husk that sits there unused?

That came a few years after all those computer bulletin board systems were illegally shut down – which was never remedied.

Schools endorsed Bush (a blast from the past)

You know all these school officials who are calling everyone "right-wing Trump supporters" now because they disagree with them? Let's go back to the bubble gum bustin' year 2004 to see what they were up to back then.

Just before the 2004 "election", they openly endorsed George W. Bush for President. A student at a public high school in Virginia Beach said their school had this announcement over the intercom: "In tomorrow's election, you can vote for a rock or a pancake. The rock is President Bush. You know where he stands and he is solid. The pancake is Sen. Kerry. He is flat and spreads out easily and often flip-flops to prevent from getting burned."

Somebody replied that this couldn't possibly be true, because no public school would ever allow Republicans to be praised. Oh, trust me, they did. I went to public schools where that was all they ever did. Private schools were of course even worse, and I remember some pretty right-wing stuff being said in the morning announcements.

Some of the biggest right-wingers I've ever met were school people. Now they're the ones calling everybody else "right-wing Trump supporters."

Less than meets the eye (a blast from the past)

It's indisputable that this decade has so far been worse than any others in modern times, but our descent into fascism is not new. Each decade of my lifetime has been worse than the one before it – with the exception of the 2010s.

It was already so bad by 2008 that it was almost impossible to engage in air travel in the U.S. without being manhandled extensively. The Big Cleaning has yielded a 2008 piece that says a G.I. Joe toy created a stir at Los Angeles International Airport. Security staff considered the toy a dangerous weapon, because G.I. Joe carried a 2-inch plastic rifle. A passenger was not allowed to board with this toy.

It wasn't just the good ol' U.S. and A. In London, a man was stopped by airport security for wearing a Transformers t-shirt showing a cartoon robot. He couldn't board unless he changed his shirt.

These incidents were apparently because of "temporary" measures put in place after 9/11. Yet these "temporary" measures were still in place 7 years after the attacks. In fact, they're still in place now – 21 years after 9/11. This is proof that when the government enacts a "temporary" measure, it could very well become permanent. Hence, 2 weeks to "flatten the curve" has become permanent masking.

This wasn't even entirely new with 9/11. An online commenter said that back before 9/11, their children had a pencil sharpener permanently confiscated because it was a miniature replica of a cannon. They missed their flight because security crews wasted so much time inspecting the pencil sharpener.

Thursday, July 7, 2022

Ukrainian forces kill 10-year-old girl

A 10-year-old girl was killed after Ukrainian forces struck a civilian part of the city of Donetsk.

To the best of my knowledge, the Western media has not covered this attack – at all.

This is where American taxpayers' money is going. There's never enough for Social Security or education, but there's always enough to give to foreign militaries for deadly assaults like this.

Monday, July 4, 2022

Say yes to Michigan!

Some of you may know that back in May, I went on a little fact-finding mission to Michigan! We also bipped into Indiana to peep Indiana Dunes National Park!

That trip yielded 77 photos of at least marginal Scholaring interest, and they'll knock your socks off in public...

http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/mi22a.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/mi22b.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/mi22c.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/mi22d.html

Friday, July 1, 2022

New York law would require gun owners to turn over social media accounts

When a state either relaxes or toughens its gun laws, I usually just glance at the article and move on with life – unless something completely nutty happens. And boy howdy, did it ever!

Lawmakers in New York state just approved a new bill – which is expected to be signed into law – that would require anyone applying for a handgun license to turn over a list of their social media accounts so their "character and conduct" could be verified.

Let that sink in for a moment.

This is completely unprecedented. I'm not a big gun guy, but anyone with even a rudimentary understanding of civics can see this is impermissible. Under this bill, the state of New York would deny gun licenses on the basis of social media content.

If you still have your anti-Newt Gingrich zines from 25 years ago posted, or if you recently upvoted a Reddit post referring to Barbara Ferrer as "the Cryptkeeper", either one is likely to be fodder for the "character and conduct" police. And it's a slippery slope. Today it might affect gun licenses, but tomorrow it could be driver's licenses or any professional certification.

Those who made fun of me over that "America is fast becoming a police state" line are looking mighty silly right now.

How to lose an election

This is a perfect illustration of why I'm never voting Democratic again.

The Democrats aren't even bothering to run a candidate for numerous legislative seats in northern Kentucky – largely because of backroom deals with the Republicans. The candidates they do have are terrible.

I stumbled upon the Facebook page for one of them. About every third photo she posts is a map of the current COVID community levels for Kentucky – which nobody cares about anymore. In another post, she talks about the fact that she caught COVID and blames it on someone in Minneapolis not wearing a mask. She wrote an article for the venomous Forward Kentucky that includes misinformation about COVID. One of her Facebook pictures is just text in which she tries to absolve the Biden administration of blame for high gas prices – even though Biden has done zero to rein it in.

Such is the state of the Democratic Party in 2022. The party is full of economic and medical misinformation, finger pointing, totalitarian policy initiatives, and nonsense.

The modern Democratic Party is a death cult. They're "uptown Republicans."

Have no fear, the July ish is here!

Celebrate the Fourth on the first with a fifth by poppin' open a keg or three and relaxing with the July issue of The Last Word!

This ish talks about a trip to Chicago full of Greyhound troubles and filthy restrooms, a yuppie who got mad at a bicycle, a ruined punk rock concert, a psychiatrist who forgot to wear his shoes to the airport, books falling apart, and more!

So point your pooper here...

https://www.scribd.com/document/580619181/The-Last-Word-7-2022

If that doesn't work, glide on over here...

http://bunkerblast.info/lastword/lw2207.pdf

Thursday, June 30, 2022

Executive order time!

Last Friday's overturning of Roe v. Wade and the failure of Congress and the Biden regime to rectify Friday's decision is further proof that neither the Democrats nor the Republicans can be trusted. More and more evidence of this has been piling up regarding other issues lately. For example, President Biden recently appointed an advocate of cutting and privatizing Social Security to the Social Security Advisory Board. But it seemed like a goal of protecting Roe v. Wade was the only thing the Democrats still had going for them – and now they've blown that too.

The Democratic-led Congress recently had a chance to codify Roe v. Wade by passing a new federal statute. Yet somehow they failed to pass this bill.

Roe v. Wade was a landmark decision, and – like it or not - the legal basis for the 1973 ruling is pretty solid. Roe v. Wade is predicated on the Constitution's right to privacy – a right that should be unassailable. Not everyone liked Roe v. Wade, but the legal reasoning for the ruling is ironclad.

Because Congress has failed to do its job and has not codified Roe v. Wade, can the President do anything? You bet! Odds are that he won't, but he surely can.

In the early 1960s, civil rights activists rightly urged President John F. Kennedy to issue an executive order to ensure that public accommodations could not discriminate on the basis of race. They said such an order would simply enforce protections that already appeared in the Constitution. In fact, Kennedy did issue Executive Order 10925, which said government contractors could not engage in racial discrimination.

An executive order to uphold Roe v. Wade would simply enforce constitutional protections that are supposed to already exist. For as long as anyone can remember, overturning Roe v. Wade was a goal of many abortion rights foes, so I'm sure abortion rights supporters had already drafted what an executive order might say in case it was overturned.

So why hasn't Biden issued an executive order? If I was President, I would have had one ready by the end of last Friday.

Over the past couple years, we've seen that unelected agencies – including some that are part of the Biden administration - think they can issue orders to enforce laws that do not even exist. So why won't an elected President issue an order to uphold the Constitution's right to privacy, which actually does exist?

Now it's clear that the Democrats are going to fight as hard to protect Roe v. Wade as they have for civil liberties in general, education, peace, a living wage, and single payer healthcare. In other words, they won't fight for it at all. An online comment said the Democrats' electoral strategy is to let bad things happen, campaign on fear of worse things happening, let worse things happen, campaign on fear of even worse things happening, let even worse things happen, and so on. Lately, the Democrats have directly instituted some of the worst things themselves. The main point is that the Democrats are already raising money off of Roe v. Wade being overturned. They let it happen and not be rectified, and now they're fundraising off of it. They failed, yet they want to be rewarded for it.

The reason the Democrats haven't codified Roe v. Wade is that they'd no longer have anything to run on.

More people are now seeing this for the con that it is, but the major parties are such cults that it has taken much too long for most folks to realize what a grift they are.

Meanwhile, Biden has now made a deal with Republicans to appoint a right-wing lawyer who defended a highly questionable Kentucky anti-abortion law to a federal judgeship.

Monday, June 27, 2022

Putting the wind in the Windy City!

Some of you may know that I went to the Chicago roadmeet over the weekend.

Some of you may also know that bunker blasts are uproarious beyond all description.

To the surprise of nobody, several air biscuits were detected throughout my trip. But I also plan on putting out the next ish of The Last Word soon, and perhaps it shall include more detail of these hilarious trouser sneezes!

Needless to say, Greyhound bungled things as it always does, but what's a mere mortal to do? Stink?

Dear Supreme Court

Not your call.

The end.

Thursday, June 23, 2022

Heroes or zeros: you decide!

I'd like to introduce you to a character we call the outlaw hero.

Some popular culture in my day prominently featured outlaw heroes. Some of the things they did might have been slightly outside what the law would permit, but they at least had a strong sense of what was ethically right or wrong. They often fought against a corrupt official regime. In that universe, the outlaw heroes were the good guys, and the public officials they fought were the bad guys.

People sometimes do things that at first appear to be bad, but some say we just don't know the whole story. On April 7, 2020 – when we were deep in the throes of pandemic martial law – I saw a woman and teenage girl shoplift orange juice from Circle K. I wrote a little vignette about the event for The Last Word, and I put out a short text blast making light of this episode. But I received several replies on Facebook saying the shoplifters may have actually been not villains, but heroes. What if this was a family down on their luck – with their livelihoods destroyed - and they needed nourishment for themselves or a very ill family member? I know losses from shoplifting add up, but what if the teenager – who would have died without proper nutrition - someday becomes a great doctor who finds a cure for cancer?

I know there's a lot of "what ifs" about a lot of events. What if I grew up just a few miles away from where I did, placing me in a better school district? What if I never accidentally discovered WCLU? What if Ronald Reagan never got elected?

On the other hand, even if the shoplifters were suffering hard financial times, was Circle K really the right target? That's like if your boss doesn't pay you, so you go out and rob a bank. The wrong party is being punished.

Or is it? Are we thinking of Circle K as a person or a large corporation? Since it's the latter, is it part of the same system that has subjected the public to economic ruin? Is Circle K powerful enough that it could have helped prevent the collapse of our economy? In 2020, I was unaware that Circle K had been the defendant in at least 2 wage theft suits over the previous few years, but corporations in general commandeer much of our political and economic system.

Many Americans admired the gangsters of the 1930s, thinking they were just fighting the forces that caused the Great Depression. Actually, most of these gangsters were dangerous criminals who would gun down anyone who got in their way. But real outlaw heroes are not violent gangsters. They have standards that reflect solid ethical values.

Do small-time shoplifters and their ilk possess a sly, mischievous charm that makes them true freedom fighters who challenge the system's impenetrable corruption? Or are they just plain old criminals who are worthy of being shunned? You be the judge!

Wednesday, June 15, 2022

Oscar appeared on 'Hee Haw' ('Sesame Street' Wednesday)

You probably thought 'Sesame Street' was 'Sesame Street' and 'Hee Haw' was 'Hee Haw'. In other words, the 'Sesame Street' universe was completely independent of the 'Hee Haw' universe.

But did you know that back in 1981, Oscar the Grouch appeared on 'Hee Haw'?



"Hey folks! It's Oscar the Grouch from 'Sesame Street'!" As if there's an Oscar the Grouch from '60 Minutes'?

The ol' Osk is cool!

Sunday, June 12, 2022

Insurance racket discriminates against renters (a blast from the past)

This is a story we've had backlogged since 2016, but do you think things have gotten any better since then? Spoiler: they haven't.

A report by the Consumer Federation of America revealed that people who rent their home pay up to 47% more for car insurance than homeowners. The study covered 10 American cities.

This analysis used a persona to obtain insurance quotes from several major car insurers. It discovered that renters paid an average of 6% more for basic liability coverage than homeowners. And that includes data from Oakland, which was governed by a California law that was supposed to ban insurers from using homeownership as a factor in determining the cost of auto insurance. In the 9 cities besides Oakland, Liberty Mutual charged an average of 19% more to renters. Allstate increased rates 19% for renters in Tampa. And in Louisville, Farmers increased rates by a staggering 47%.

This is of course a form of classism. I don't even need to tell you that part. And there's no evidence that any state has done a damn thing to rein it in since then. You can bet your bizcream that – if anything – states have actually dug in on enforcing insurance mandates, especially against the working class. I damn sure haven't seen any sign that they've done anything to stop renters from being charged higher rates.

In fact, I think it's classism for the sake of classism. Insurers discriminate just because they feel like it – not because they actually believe that any data justifies it.

Inequitable transportation can kill

It's mind-blowing not only how much America's passenger transportation system has declined but also how little you hear about it.

In just the past few months, I've learned more and more about how deep the conspiracy runs, and how much our schools, legal establishment, and others have connived to worsen the inequity that plagues not just schools but also transportation. In most of America, there used to be better access to local and intercity mass transit. But while this access has declined, the financial and other investments needed for personal vehicles has soared. It's not just the skyrocketing gas prices (which the government won't do shit about) but other factors too.

With personal cars out of reach for more and more, our rulers should at least do more to serve people who use mass transit. And it should be done so in a way that is equitable.

This is underscored by a story from suburban Buffalo some years back. A Buffalo area mall did not allow buses from predominantly Black neighborhoods to drop off passengers there. Because of this, a woman who worked at the mall couldn't take a bus, and ended up being struck and killed by a dump truck on her way to work. This resulted in a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against the mall – and the mall rightly lost. The woman's 4-year-old son received that money.

Believe it or not, the accident occurred not in the Jim Crow era, but in 1995. And access to transportation has declined even more since then.

We knew before then that America's overlords are experienced at classism and credentialism. But this story proved they're guilty of racism as well. Next time someone accuses you of being a "class reductionist" who doesn't care about racism, sexism, or any form of discrimination other than classism, notice how little they've done to fight racism. In 1995, I tried hard to alert readers to stories of injustice of all forms, and it got me expelled from college and later arrested. What were shitlibs doing in 1995?

Teacher throws hockey stick at student

I've written about abuse like this for decades, and everyone just denies it. Frankly, I'm sick of this shit. But this time, it was caught on video.

In Princeton, Minnesota, back in March, a teacher threw a hockey stick at a 2nd grade student. The hockey stick hit the boy in the face and knocked out a tooth.

The assault has now come to light as the school district has been trying to get the community to rally around the teacher. The teacher was apparently forced into retirement, but the district posted a congratulatory message on Facebook. Furthermore, the school failed to make a police report, and there has been no criminal investigation.

Abuse by a school employee...check. School district trying to rally support for the offending teacher...check. Lack of police investigation...check. The only thing that's changed in 40 years is that now it's caught on video. And that still didn't change the outcome.

Saturday, June 11, 2022

Big South Forkyyyyy...

Although rain tried to destruct my April trip to the Big South Fork region in Tennessee and Kentucky, the event still yielded 61 photos of a Roads Scholaring or closely related interest!

So read 'em and peep...

http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/bsf22a.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/bsf22b.html
http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/bsf22c.html

Thursday, June 2, 2022

Want an arts grant? Better toe the party line!

There's a scandal brewing in the arts world, and the media is of course sweeping it under the rug.

It has been revealed that agencies that dole out grants for the arts have been discriminating against venues and works that do not act as a pipeline for official propaganda. Many venues need grants just to survive, and they've become captive to the party line.

Some of the funding received by art museums and performance halls is contingent upon them hosting events that support the official narrative and imposing COVID restrictions on patrons.

Furthermore, independent music recording acts have been denied grants because their songs openly oppose war and the hated "new normal." The thought police has shut out whole new kinds of music, while established broadcasters get handouts and are allowed to buy up more and more stations.

Meanwhile, Broadway theater – already awash in dough - received tens of millions of dollars in bailout money from American taxpayers as compensation for its refusal to reopen as normal after the pandemic. Broadway's choice to not reopen normally prevented or discouraged attendance. Each play that was affected could apply for up to $10 million. In other words, Broadway got free money from the taxpayers for its pro-war stance and support of lockdown culture – while dissenting works were denied funding.

Predictably, the media hasn't covered this sorry episode at all.

Monday, May 30, 2022

Here comes bubble gum!

Isn't it neat how most of the readership of this blog is sent into helpless fits of guffawing at the very mention of bubble gum? Not just the sight, smell, or taste, but the mere mention.

You would have had a blast at our local Memorial Day parade this morning! As people marching in the parade were tossing out Dubble Bubble to spectators, some woman yelled, "Here comes bubble gum!"

In addition, I saw 4 – count 'em, 4 – people who were in such a festive mood that they bubbled.

Saturday, May 28, 2022

Baste of Cincinnati is back! (Circus Vargas, Circus Vargas!)

After being canceled 2 years in a row, the Taste of Cincinnati food festival – or as I call it, Baste of Cincinnati – is back! It's a miracle it survived being canceled 2 years in a row, and there was no excuse for canceling it the second time, but now it's back 100% normal!

I got in a confrontation with a pedestrian on the way home, but that's fodder for the July ish.

Taste of Cincinnati is not particularly exciting. At all. It never really was. It's better than being cooped up at home all day, but what's a mere mortal to do? Stink?

I only saw one celebrity look-alike today – namely an Eric Clapton look-alike. However, I did see some woman who was in a festive enough mood that she kept bubbling green bubs.

Friday, May 27, 2022

Have no fear, the June ish is here!

June wouldn't be June if The Last Word didn't put out its June issue!

This ish talks about a hilarious soda spill on a Michigan trip, hiding beer under school bleachers, the Governor of New York ruining books, people getting expelled from school, fights at a carnival, and more!

So point your pooper here...

https://www.scribd.com/document/575881380/The-Last-Word-6-2022

If that doesn't work, glide on over here...

http://bunkerblast.info/lastword/lw2206.pdf

Thursday, May 26, 2022

Shitlibs, 2000 style

A common shitlib gimmick is to bark about how they were Republicans until the party nominated Donald Trump. It isn't true of all of them, of course, because the Democrats were plagued by the DLC for decades before. But what this shows is that many were Republicans long after that party drove most of its moderate members away.

I found an editorial from the now-defunct Cincinnati Post from 2000 that represents the right-wing Republicanism of many of those who became shitlibs. I used to hear the Post described as "Cincinnati's liberal paper", which shows just how right-wing the Enquirer is. Today, the Enquirer is part of the elitist, totalitarian media consensus that is mostly right-wing except for its patronizing wokewashing that lets them pretend to care about a few issues. But the Post was far from liberal.

The 2000 editorial from the Post was titled "Clinton's hate-mongering." The right-wing vitriol of this piece was overpowering. It attacked President Bill Clinton for advancing a bill against hate crimes and acted as if congressional Republicans were poor, innocent victims of liberal bullying.

The media thought Clinton was one cool cat when he pushed right-wing ideas like school uniforms, welfare "reform", and the late '90s war games with Iraq. But every time he came to his senses and supported something to make the country better, he was portrayed as some dangerous leftist radical.

The Post accused Clinton of "beating up on the Republican congressional leadership" and said the GOP "should beat up on Clinton for advancing such a misguided proposal" like hate crime laws. The Post's arguments against hate crime laws were laughably weak. The editorial said these laws "criminalize motivation", as if hate crimes do not include any actual bad behavior. It said hate crime laws were the same as double jeopardy – which means to try the same crime twice – even though the media had been silent over other criminal cases being tried twice just because prosecutors didn't get the result they wanted the first time.

The article then had the nerve to accuse Clinton of being "unnecessarily nasty" to Republicans. If you don't understand why that's ridiculous, you must not have been around in 2000. GOP spite never started to let up until many of the worst offenders joined the shitlibs who now fill Democratic ranks. In fact, most of the editorial is a textbook illustration of this malevolence.

The right-wing Republicans of 2000 are the Democratic shitlibs of 2022. I mean that literally. Many of them are the exact same people. Many of those who attacked opponents as "liberals" back then assail these same dissenters as "right-wing Trump supporters" now. If they call you the latter, remember that nasty editorial they wrote back in 2000.

Wednesday, May 25, 2022

Favorite shitlib insults

Go!

A shitlib is sort of like today's equivalent of the DLC. Shitlibs tar the name of a political faction while not even supporting the values that said faction is supposed to stand for. The term is often used by real progressives to denote establishment "liberals" who toe the party line of sources like MSNBC (which is now full of right-wing Republicans from the Bush era).

But what are some of the favorite insults lobbed by shitlibs?

One of the most common is "anti-vaxxer", which they apply to people who aren't actually anti-vaxxers. Make no mistake, there are real anti-vaxxers out there. But shitlibs call people "anti-vaxxers" even when they write something that explicitly supports vaccinations. Shitlibs are the real anti-vaxxers. They deny natural immunity even exists – while vaccines are based on some of the same ideas as natural immunity.

Another shitlib insult is "dirtbag leftist." Though they intend this phrase as an insult, it's been turned around by those on the receiving end of it to be a compliment.

My favorite shitlib insult lately is "class reductionist." Shitlibs deny that classism and credentialism are even real. They think it's just a hoax. So anybody who points out a real instance of classism or expresses class consciousness is attacked as a "class reductionist."

Another favorite of mine is their tendency to call opponents "right-wing Trump supporters" – even though shitlibs were often Republicans until very recently.

What's your favorite shitlib insult?

Tuesday, May 24, 2022

George Carlin look-alike sighted

I just got back from a little road trip centered on northwestern Michigan, and I saw a George Carlin look-alike at a Speedway station in Findlay, Ohio.

Friday, May 20, 2022

Puerto Rico statehood drive would gut territory option

As corruption and authoritarianism grow in the once-great Democratic Party, it's also expanding in Puerto Rico, and that's why the Democrats are pushing harder than ever to make the island territory the 51st state. In fairness, existing states are plagued by tyranny and corruption too, but that doesn't make this effort any better.

The truth is, however, that Puerto Rico had a worse COVID-19 response than almost every existing state. A bad COVID response has practically become an article of faith for Democratic "leaders." COVID totalitarianism is a cult that the Democrats follow. I'm not using that term figuratively, for it has all the characteristics of a cult.

Now a group of Democratic members of Congress are introducing a bill that would authorize a referendum next year in Puerto Rico that would give the territory's voters 3 options: statehood, free association, or complete independence. One of the problems with this referendum is that it does not allow Puerto Rico to continue its current territorial status.

Trying to force Puerto Rico to change its status has angered the territory's leading opposition party.

Removing the island's existing status as an option isn't the only problem with this bill. There is currently no major effort to enact laws in Puerto Rico or nationwide against the government abuses we saw during the pandemic – and which we still see. Last year, Pennsylvania enacted a pair of measures to fight abuses of emergency powers. That would be a good model for the rest of the country.

We will not support the Puerto Rico statehood bill unless both these things happen: The referendum there must allow an option to continue the territory's current status. And there must be a law to limit emergency powers.

From now on, there must be a law against abuse of emergency powers before we can support any new states. It can be a federal law or a law enacted by the new state – just as long as there is such a law.

I say this as a former member of the local Young Democrats: The Democrats are now mired so deeply in COVID cultism that it composes much of their identity. It's a second skin to them. If they're able to do so, they will admit or reject new states on the basis of COVID policy alone.

If new states are admitted as a reward for having a tyrannical COVID response, we have a right to expect new states to also be admitted for having a good response.

WKU censored online criticism (a blast from the past)

Much of academia these days is made up of dumb losers who cannot tolerate or comprehend dissent. America's universities are in bad hands. But students have suffered through universities' intolerance for years now.

This includes the poologgery that occurred at Western Kentucky University back in 2012. Even in a state whose public universities have a history of political intolerance (as I know firsthand), this was worse than usual.

The college persuaded Twitter to close down a parody account that criticized the school. A student also said her schoolmates had been skeeped at by school officials over Twitter posts.

WKU's president went on Facebook to reprimand students over their posts, but getting Twitter to close an account is what truly crossed the line into censorship. The critical posts weren't even made using a school account or school computers.

WKU officials claimed they were trying to protect the school's brand. But actually the effort was aimed at silencing criticism of WKU.

By that time, much of our education system had already become a tainted brand. There wasn't much left to protect in 2012, and it's far worse now.

Thursday, May 19, 2022

Kentucky Democrats endorse Andy Barr

The elitist bullies who make up the shitlib Democratic vanguard are always bumping their gums about how we must "vote blue no matter who." But a few weeks ago, they rejected the Democratic candidate for Senate in Utah and instead endorsed right-wing independent Evan McMullin. Now Kentucky Democrats have done something like this too. They're endorsing a right-wing Republican even though the Democrats have a candidate.

Kentucky's 6th congressional district has long been "represented" by right-wing Republican Andy Barr. Barr is seeking another term, and is being challenged by Geoff Young, who won Tuesday's Democratic primary.

Although Young was the choice of Democratic voters in a contested primary, the state's Democratic "leaders" are endorsing Barr instead. The Kentucky Democratic Party even released a statement saying they would not back Young. Failed Gov. Andy Beshear has been particularly nasty and vitriolic.

If Democratic Party bosses wanted somebody more to their liking than Geoff Young is, they should have put up a more well-known candidate – instead of throwing a fit about the results of the primary.

The reaction by Democratic "leaders" to Young's candidacy also typifies the burgeoning war by elites against rural America. Young actually won every county in the district except Lexington's Fayette County. Why should the gentrificationists who have ruined our cities have more of a voice in our electoral process than rural counties do?

Up here in northern Kentucky, most local elections are just as bad, for the Democrats – not for the first time - made backroom deals with the Republicans to not field candidates in most races.

There is nothing shitlibs enjoy more than calling Americans idiots. Yet they're mystified that we don't give a shit what they think anymore.

Monday, May 9, 2022

Celebrity look-alike embellishes Wasatch Range

I just received an important e-mail declaring that an Ellen DeGeneres look-alike was seen working at the Salt Lake City airport.

Sunday, May 8, 2022

Getting your fill of Phil

Today at Kroger, I saw a Phil Donahue look-alike.

Saturday, May 7, 2022

Vermont town wanted to burn house to force out residents (a blast from the past)

Here's another slice of fairly recent history that shows just how heartless our overlords are.

A few years ago, officials in the town of Arlington, Vermont, planned to ask the fire department to burn down a historic town-owned house to drive out a family that had lived there for years. The family included 6 people, including an elderly widow and a visually impaired man. Three of the 6 were deaf. Two of the 6 were small children.

But the town called the family "squatters." As we all know, that's one of those words that gets thrown around so much that it's lost all meaning.

It turned out that the town wanted to demolish the house just so the property could be turned over to a well-connected developer. The town practically admitted as much, as officials said clearing the property would be a good way to attract buyers.

When I was about 4, I used to think the purpose of a fire department was to burn down houses – not put out fires. But that was before I ever heard of gentrification.

Monday, May 2, 2022

Airline bee incidents could sting

For reasons that are completely unknown, the spread of killer bees was long laughed off as something we'd just have to live with – even though it could have been prevented. But a 2006 article said killer bees had reached Florida after "decades of hype" – posing a threat to "basically everyone who ventures outdoors." These "decades of hype" provided plenty of time to prevent it, but not a damn thing was done about it. Killer bees had already appeared in the southwestern U.S. in the 1990s. At least 14 people in the U.S. had been killed by them.

In Florida, killer bees killed animals and menaced utility workers, firefighters, reporters, and even police. People were trapped in their homes by swarms of the dangerous insects. The decades-long inaction on killer bees forced residents to bee-proof their homes.

Now there's been another incident involving bees. They might not be killer bees, but this episode underscores the dangers that may be present.

Last month, a shipment of 5 million honeybees heading from Sacramento to Anchorage was rerouted all the way to Atlanta by Delta Airlines. The bees were being shipped to over 300 beekeepers in Alaska. Most of the bees died when they were stranded on the hot tarmac in Atlanta. The crates were also placed so the bees could not access their food.

It's bad enough that this shipment was destroyed in a way that was completely avoidable. But here's a terrifying question we can't find an answer for: Are bees shipped on the same flights as passengers? Maybe the reason nobody can find an answer is that they might not like the answer.

The prospect of crates containing millions of bees being on passenger flights is a disaster in the making. If you don't understand why this is dangerous, ask an adult. Can you imagine 5 million bees swarming a passenger flight? No people should be anywhere near these bees unless they have special training and perhaps a beekeeping suit.

Even last month's incident could have threatened many people. When the bees first got to Atlanta, they were kept in a cooler. But many of the bees escaped from the cooler – right there inside the airport, no less.

At the end of the day, we need to make sure that bees are considered hazardous cargo that may not be transported on passenger flights. If this isn't a rule or law already, it ought to be.

Saturday, April 30, 2022

Have no fear, the May ish is here!

May wouldn't be May if the May edition of The Last Word wasn't pub!

This ish talks about my waterlogged sleeping bag on a camping trip, 4th grade troubles, Kentucky Horse Park tickets getting ruined by ketchup, luxury cruises getting spoiled in ridiculous ways, and more! It's not sold in any store!

So beep your bipper here...

https://www.scribd.com/document/572219772/The-Last-Word-5-2022


If you can't read it on Scribd, float on over here...

http://bunkerblast.info/lastword/lw2205.pdf

Friday, April 29, 2022

Another Kroger bubbling (imagine that!)

Today at Kroger, some woman bubbled.

Wednesday, April 27, 2022

Comic Book Guy goes Krogering

Earlier, I received an e-mail declaring that a person who resembled Comic Book Guy from 'The Simpsons' was seen at a Kroger. He was even wearing a 'Star Wars' hoodie!

The e-mail also said Casey Kasem mentioned 'Sesame Street' in a rebroadcast of an 'American Top 40' from 1973. He made reference to "a Muppet called Ernie."

In addition, the e-mail said a person bubbled conspicuously and with extreme dispatch at a local park.

Monday, April 25, 2022

A person got mad because Elon Musk doesn't have a master's degree

Using literacy tests to disqualify voters was an ugly chapter in American history. But the mindset that drove this requirement lives on in the credentialism that defines America's elites today.

Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter is an improvement over the previous disastrous state of affairs, but if we just go by raw measures, it would be a wash. Musk is a billionaire, but he has no master's degree. I only oppose the billionaire part – not the part about not having a master's degree.

Some nobody posted on Twitter that Musk "doesn't even have a Master's degree. Is that who we are going to trust with the future of our democracy?" Guess what? I don't have a master's degree either.

The elites say it's just fine for billionaires to buy up entire venues – as long as they have a master's degree. Maybe people with higher education levels should be disqualified from positions of power – because they didn't exactly handle the pandemic very well.

People are right to be wary of a billionaire owning Twitter. But who do you think owned it before Elon Musk did? The Last Word?

Sunday, April 24, 2022

More "vote blue no matter who" hypocrisy

Democratic blogs have long urged folks to "vote blue no matter who." That's their bag, I guess, and I could tolerate it before these blogs sold out their principles in the name of fighting the pandemic. Appeasing wealthy donors who acted in bad faith and supported a bio-juche dictatorship was more important than principles to them.

But recent developments have shown that these blogs don't even abide by their own "vote blue" maxim.

Visit any shitlib blog of the "vote blue no matter who" strain lately, and you'll see they spend more time attacking Democrats than fascist Republicans like Mitt Romney. One of their biggest targets lately is Tulsi Gabbard, who is the topic of endless red-baiting. If the next presidential election is Romney versus Gabbard, you know damn well they'll support Romney. Another Democratic target over the past couple years is Virginia State Sen. Chap Petersen – thanks to his rather consistent opposition to the COVID police state. The shitlib blogosphere has actually tried to recruit a challenger to Petersen.

I wanted to see what Daily Kos said about Utah Democrats supporting Evan McMullin for Senate. Naturally, the Kos Kids are praising the move.

In other words, perhaps the biggest "vote blue no matter who" blog out there has rejected Democrats like Gabbard and Petersen - but embraced a right-winger like McMullin over an actual Democrat.

Do they even realize how ridiculous they sound?

Illinois school district punished students over MySpace posts (a blast from the past)

How out of control were the autocratic ghouls who run our school systems back in the 2000s? Almost as out of control as they are now.

My Big Cleaning yielded a story about the fascism practiced by schools in Libertyville, Illinois, in 2006. The school system declared that students would be punished if they used MySpace or other websites to depict under-age drinking or other "illegal or inappropriate behavior" – even if these posts were not made from school or using school resources, and even if the content was completely unconnected to school. Even if they made these posts from their own home, they would be disciplined.

Students were required to sign a pledge agreeing that such content would be grounds for punishment. The school district vowed to follow up on tips alerting them to these posts.

School officials sound like big Democrats to me. I bet they wrote letters demanding lockdowns.

More Tommy Thompson right-wing extremism (a blast from the past)

Tommy Thompson is one of these fascists from 20 years ago who now seems to be among the Democrats' favorite Republicans – ever since the propellerheads switched parties and traded their Wall Street business suits for Silicon Valley underpants.

Thompson is the right-wing 4-term former Governor of Wisconsin and Secretary of Health and Human Services in the George W. Bush thugocracy. He ran for President in 2008 but was forced out of the running after making a series of anti-Semitic remarks. Most recently, Thompson humiliated himself through his actions as interim president of the University of Wisconsin System.

As my Big Cleaning gets under way, I found a folder full of news stories on my computer dating back over 20 years that I never got to cover – because our rulers would always outdo themselves by doing something even stupider. In 2002, Thompson – while he was part of the Bush regime – announced that the government would oppose labeling of genetically engineered frankenfoods. "Mandatory labeling will only frighten consumers," he told a biotech gathering. Boo! He went on to say, "Labeling implies that biotechnology products are unsafe.'' Uh. Aren't they?

That was after 19 countries already required labeling.

This was also when Bush planned to move 300 workers from HHS to the Department of Homeland Security – a department that to this day has accomplished nothing positive.

As HHS head, Thompson succeeded Donna Shalala, who helped to nearly ruin the Democrats' electoral chances in 2020 with her vanity congressional campaign. Shalala brang her own extremism to the fore, which ultimately wasn't much different from Thompson's recent travails. Republican hero worship of big corporations 20 years ago was borne of the same bad intentions as Democratic support for corporations today.

Because frankenfoods were not labeled, American consumers remained in the dark for years thereafter. It wasn't until 2016 that Congress passed a law to try to give people more information on what they put into their bodies. The labels did not appear until this year, and some confusion still reigns. To add insult to injury, an NPR story about the labels repeated a false claim that there's no evidence that genetically engineered crops are harmful to humans.

Why should the media be trusted on any issue if they amplify outright lies like that in plain sight?

Bubbling season has sprung

Today, a person walking up the street bubbled a humongous bub.

Saturday, April 23, 2022

Utah Democrats back Evan McMullin for Senate

The Democratic Party as we once knew it has essentially ceased to exist.

Utah Democrats had a candidate to challenge Republican Sen. Mike Lee in November. It's not as if Democrats in Utah are better than anywhere else, as they hopelessly botched the COVID response in the Salt Lake City area – but then again, Republicans botched it to an extent in the rest of the state. But now Utah Democrats have voted at their convention to ditch the Democratic candidate for Senate and instead support independent Evan McMullin.

McMullin ran for President in 2016, painting himself as a "respectable" conservative, in contrast to Donald Trump. By all accounts, McMullin is no progressive, and he probably wouldn't have been a major Democratic candidate 30 years ago. The Democrats back then were enough of a big tent party that they might have nominated candidates of differing policy stances – but not someone who flat-out wasn't a Democrat.

Any Utah voter who is legitimately a Democrat or outside the conservative fold is now finding themselves with no candidate to vote for. Of course, with the Democratic Party being the twisted mess it is now, this isn't unique to Utah, as Democratic candidates have inched more and more into what would have been considered right-wing authoritarianism just a few years ago. I'm also accustomed to local races where there is often no Democratic candidate, because corrupt Democratic party bosses often make backroom deals with the Republicans to let the GOP run unopposed. This story also reminds me of that congressional race in Hawaii some years ago where right-wing Democrats fielded their own candidate to split the Democratic vote and "prove" that more liberal candidates couldn't win. But at least these events aren't such an obvious concession as what happened in Utah where the Democrats actually backed a separate conservative candidacy of someone who isn't even a Democrat.

Democratic "leaders" don't give a damn about anyone except themselves and their corporate allies.

South Fairmount! Park Hills! Newport! Game day bucket go boom!

Roads Scholaring continues to loom large in the world of the Great Royal Tim. The magic continued in February, when I pept the brand bippus bustin' new Lick Run Greenway. The greenway has a poo connection, as it was part of a sewer project...

http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/cinwest22.html

If that fails to enchant you, there's a few photos from March that focus mainly on the area around the new detention basin in Park Hills, a project that decimated the old Amsterdam Road setup...

http://bunkerblast.info/roadpics/covph22.html


It's free like pee!

Friday, April 22, 2022

My, my, my Bologna...

China's ruling regime has long been a darling of the American media, which possesses a deep-seated love of authoritarian governments and policies. In the past few years, China has become known for what's called a social credit system – which is a bit like the hated practice of credit scores, but instead of focusing on economic activity, it punishes people if their behavior is not considered virtuous. It involves widespread mass surveillance.

Now the Italian city of Bologna is becoming the first place in the Western world to introduce a social credit system for its citizenry. It has been speculated that it may soon be the rule throughout all of Italy.

Bologna officials call it a "smart citizen wallet" that awards "digital points" based on a person's conduct, especially if the person "does not receive sanctions from the municipal authority."

Think it won't happen in America? Remember, the system of credit scores that we have – which effectively confers titles of nobility - only dates to the late 1980s. Americans in the 1970s probably never thought that oppressive system could happen.