Explaining This 'Pegasus' Scandal

 Back around ten years ago, this spy software came up on the market, and was supposed to be used on 'bad' guys.  It was developed by an Israeli company (NSO Group).  

Somewhere in the process of things....the software (loadable on tabs, smart-phones, etc)....catches key-strokes and phone-numbers.  

So the user list went past just plain bad guys, and started to include journalists, businessmen, and human rights type folks.

The odds that politicians have been monitored?  No one talks much over that but if you look at the various 'users'....it wouldn't take much to monitor all 100 US Senators.  Monitoring of Secret Service personnel?  Same story.  Watching bankers and investment folks.....for trends?  Same story.  

Over the next six months, I expect hundreds of folks to discover their chats were intercepted, and this becomes a big deal.  

My Seven Problems With CNN

 1.  About fifty percent of the news coverage now seems more like a lecture, than an actual news report.  

2.  The CNN will take a fairly routine story with five simple facts....which ought to take 3 minutes to lay out.....but they turn this into a 9 minute report.  Then they bring two 'experts', who spend another six to eight minutes on the same five facts.  Finally, the grand guru steps in and spends five minutes drilling down into the same five facts.  

3.  CNN is incapable of telling you a balanced report.....most of the news analysts are going to a one-sided story.

4.  About a quarter of all of the journalists you see on CNN....aren't that bright, and I could probably perform at their level or better myself.

5.  For 2020, the bulk of all CNN coverage was Trump and Covid.  No kidding.

6.  Some of these 'experts' who appear....marginally know anything about their expert topic.  This makes you wonder how CNN found them or the amount of review in the process.

7.  If anything negative comes up about the Democratic Party....it's probably better than 80-percent chance that the negativity will never be mentioned by CNN.  

Observations

 1.  So when these Texas legislative democrats packed up and 'ran' off from the state....on a private plane....to DC, I noted that they wanted an image of themselves on the plane.  The photo?  It's about fifteen of them, unmasked and waving (while on the plane).  Breaking Covid rules?  Well....YEAH.

So word comes out last night that 3 of the folks (sitting in DC) now have Covid.  No one is saying they are in dire Covid, or mild Covid...just that they tested positive.  The odds that the majority will be tested by tomorrow and show the virus?  I'd take a wild guess that it's better than 50-percent.  The photo image now?  It really hurts their cause a good bit.

2.  Gunfire at the MLB game in DC?  Somewhere in the 6th inning....folks could hear 3 shots fire, and immediately people took cover.  Current info is that 3 folks were wounded.  

Having been to the stadium in the past, I'll just note that they built it on the far SE end of DC, in a questionable area.  

3.  Biden is basically unable to explain why he has two separate and unequal asylum/migrant policies (regular Latinos - OK, Cubans and Haitians - NOT OK).  

It's almost like a racist agenda.  

Vote Story

 If you go by what's being said in Phoenix....the odds of 3,387,326 people voted in November of 2020....is now nearing a question mark.  

The 2016 election results.....just for reference, in AZ?  2,604,657 people voted.  So it's a 700k extra vote occurring?  Yes.

Some folks are suggesting to recall the electors, and stage a new election.....to which there is nothing in the state or national constitution to really handle this type of mess.

Sending people off to prison?  It doesn't appear that you can point to any single person to identify them for one extra vote, or ten extra votes, or even a hundred-thousand extra votes.

My humble guess?  The state legislature as a minimum, will zeroized the outcome, with the 3.3-million votes thrown out.  How the news people handle this?  Unknown.

The problem here....this 'update' will trigger at least two additional states to review the same issues, and probably come to the same outcome....zeroing their vote outcome as well.  You may very well wake up by December...finding that the total vote zeroed out is around nine-million-plus votes.  

If you wanted to collapse trust in the system that exists....it's a pretty dynamic way of accomplishing that.  

'Reichstag Moment' Chatter

 I had to sit and read through a piece concerning comments of an idiot four-star Army general (head of the Joint Chiefs)....who commented that the 6th of January event...was a 'Reichstag-moment'.  

So to explain the Reichstag situation....around early November 1932...another German election occurred.  This was the 3rd in two years.  It's safe to say that the German political landscape was falling apart.

The 'winner' of this election?  The Nazi Party, but with only 33-percent of vote (remember, they do a number of parties in German politics).  So Hitler went to an attempt to form a government (partnering with some other parties).  He had to reach a compromise situation....agreeable to partners.  

From the 6th of November until the third week of January 1933....this back-and-forth business went on.  Then the coalition was settled. 

Around four weeks after this coalition settlement....on a Monday night (27 Feb 1933)....a fire started up at the Reichstag (capital building)...around 9 PM.

To best sum up the fire....there was a fair amount of wood work in the structure, and it burned pretty easily.  Somewhere within the structure....as the fire was downsized, police came upon this one Dutch guy.  The guy would be identified as a communist party supporter.

This guy (Marinus van der Lubbe) has an interesting history.  As a teen, he ended up as a apprentice bricklayer.  Around 1926, at a job....he got lime in his eyes and became mostly blind.  There in the Netherlands, he went on unemployment comp.  He ends up as a organizer for a Lenin group.  For a four-year period, he ends up as a central figure in strikes. The government has various charges up against him, but never seems able to put him into prison (begs questions).

Somehow, without a lot of explanation....he ends up down in Berlin....caught in the Reichstag.  The general talk is that he wanted the fire to energize anti-Nazi feelings.  

The police would end up putting this Dutch guy, along with the head of the German Communist Party and three Bulgarian Communists into a court session. 

The court wrapped up the mess...convicting the Dutch guy....acquitting the four others, and executing the Dutch guy 10 January 1934.  Age at the time?  25.

So here's the chief problem....historians all argue about the fire, and there's a lot of speculation over what actually happened.

Did the Dutch guy do it by himself?  Was there a broader conspiracy tied to this?  Could the Nazi apparatus have arranged for Dutch guy to get drawn into this and 'arranged' for him to have set the fire?  These are all still on the table today, with no clear conclusion.

About the only fact that you can glean is that the Dutch guy was in the interior of the building and was likely the person who set the fire. Beyond that....it's a question-mark.

So here is the curious thing that occurred the day after the fire....a decree went out.  The text?

"Articles 114, 115, 117, 118, 123, 124 and 153 of the Constitution of the German Reich are suspended until further notice. It is therefore permissible to restrict the rights of personal freedom [habeas corpus], freedom of (opinion) expression, including the freedom of the press, the freedom to organize and assemble, the privacy of postal, telegraphic and telephonic communications. Warrants for House searches, orders for confiscations as well as restrictions on property, are also permissible beyond the legal limits otherwise prescribed."

Before the smoke had even cleared....suspension of basic civil rights were terminated.  The speed from which this was done?  Kinda shocking.

From that point on....the downfall of Germany was set.

The chief question?  You kinda wonder if this was scripted out to bring this blind Dutch guy into Berlin, and arrange for him to think he was doing some 'good' deed, and he was simply the fall-guy.

So when this Pentagon general is uttering 'Reichstag moment'....without thinking much about it....he is suggesting a broad conspiracy might exist.  If so....who is the Dutch guy in this situation, and who arranged for him to be in the Capital building?

Just something to think about. 

Governor Ivey and 'No' to Vaccine Incentives

 From my home state of Alabama....Governor Ivey came out yesterday and said in a blunt way....'NO' to any incentives to Alabamians to get the Covid-19 vaccination.  We are of course around number fifty in the states, on the getting the vaccination rate done.  Some Alabamians would argue that there are more dogs in the state vaccinated....than people. 

For several weeks...journalists and pro-vaccinate folks were pushing that the state needed some kind of 'bonus-deal' or incentive....never being clear what it'd be....to get folks fixed up.

I paused over this and put my mind to the list of things that might have convinced Alabamians to cross the line and get the two-shot deal:

1.  A slip signed by the Baptist Association guarantying you entry into Heaven....even if you did frequent saloons/bars/strip-joints.  

2.  A 40-pound bag of dry dog food.

3.  A free ticket to a University of Alabama football game (it might be over a period of ten years though).

4.  A lottery chance of winning one of three-hundred shotguns.

5.  A dinner-date with Governor Ivey.

6.  A free chainsaw for one of twenty new vaccinated folks.

7.  A signed photo by former President Trump.

8.  A free bus-ticket from your town to the state capital.

9.  Free banjo lessons.

10.  One seat for the newly vaccinated folks to ride the lead car at the next Talladega race.   

Who or What was Jim Crow in Actuality?

 Around the late 1820s....this young guy....Thomas Dartmouth "Daddy" Rice (he was around age 19) started up with a tour group of entertainers....traveling through the US.

Rice would be what you'd call a traveling comedian today.  Rice had this character that he developed....which would eventually be given the title name 'Jim Crow'.

I should note....that originally as a teenage apprentice, he was signed up as a wood carver, and this didn't really interest him much....so he fell back onto being a comedian.

He'd apply blackface, and go through a song-dance routine, and then perform some comedy routines....as a black slave lowly-intelligent guy.

Around 1832 (age 24), his routine hit the big-time.  Wherever he went....the theater was sold out.  It was a magnificent lifestyle and character that he'd developed.

For about a dozen years.....the 'Jim Crow' character was the basis of his act, and turned a fair amount of profit.

At some point in 1840....he started to have health issues (differing views, but it would appear like some type of drug/alcohol mix).  His speech ability started to lessen and he had physical movement issues.  Personally, I think he had a stroke of some type.

Like most guys from the era....he likely drank to an excessive amount, and that probably led to his health issues.

He died in 1860 at age 52.  His last ten years.....probably spiraling down each single year.

So this Jim Crow character....starting up in 1832 and ending in the 1840s....is the starting point of this whole discussion?  Yeah.  Lots of people watched the act there in the east coast, along with renditions done in England as well.  They remember the black-faced character and the act.  

If you asked most politicians today...I'd guess 99.9-percent have no idea where it really started from.  

I should state for the record....Rice grew up in Manhattan, NY.