The First Rule of Dunning-Kruger Club...

ZCQOTD: "This man has built an impregnable stone house with lovely west-facing balconies on the summit of Mount Stupid."

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That’s a helluva dunk!

The Indiana governor’s office is about to be vacated vis term limits and the junior Hoosier senator is campaigning for it on a platform of being an “outsider”, because that’s a buzzword that plays well with the low-info GOP voter.

Bobbi is not impressed…

[S]top tryin' to buffalo me, buster -- if a Senator is on the outside, there's no inside left.

She’s got him dead to rights on that bit of goofery.

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QotD: Misanthropy Edition

From a web discussion elsewhere:

”Morons are nature’s original renewable resource.”

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QotD: Politics Is Showbiz For Ugly People Edition...

"In the age of social media, one need only be right for a moment—for one pithy putdown or quick comeback. That kind of superficial politics inevitably leads to figures such as Santos." -Kevin D. Williamson

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QotD: Skilled Trades Edition...

"The society that scorns excellence in plumbing because plumbing is a humble activity and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy. Neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water." -John Gardner

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QotD: Filters Edition...

From Ben Dreyfuss's Substack, "Calm Down Ben" (which is paywalled but has a free seven-day trial):

"If you have a thought that you would share in person at a party to casual acquaintances, and you have the time and cell reception, you should share it online. Don’t worry about it. Just go. Chase it down a hole. Riff in public and evolve in public. Do not worry about the fact that some of these thoughts will be stupid because everyone has stupid thoughts.

(If you have evil thoughts—like, say Osama bin Laden is good—you probably shouldn’t share them for your own career, but I think the world is better if you share them. At least we know! People who have strong filters and only share what they think “the room wants” could be thinking anything! They could be cannibals. They could be witches. Hate me or love me, but I have no thoughts that I think are Too Hot For Twitter. My worst thoughts are out there.)"

I tend to agree. I do prefer it when unsavory jackholes and complete lunatics skyline themselves right up front, rather than keeping their whackitude under a lid and only let it leak out at an uncomfortable moment.

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QotD: Attention Economy Edition...

"Whether something is true—or, again, even plausible—is an afterthought. What matters is what will boost engagement, traffic, eyeballs. It’s the Ka-Ching theory of Truth.

Because truth and falsehood look equal in two-dimensional space, the incentive structure is all screwed up. Repeating boring truths doesn’t pay. Spewing transgressive, shocking, attention-grabbing falsehoods that get people riled up and confirm their angriest or darkest passions is where it’s at." -Jonah Goldberg

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QotD: Pot Of Message Edition...

From an article by George Packer at The Atlantic:

"Art that tries to give political satisfaction is unlikely to be very good as either politics or art."

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QotD: The Hottest Of Takes Edition...

Alas, it's behind a paywall, but this bit from Nick Catoggio is too good to not pass along:

"In many cultures, holidays are celebrated in tandem, on consecutive days. Halloween is followed by the Day of the Dead; Christmas is followed by Boxing Day; Thanksgiving is followed by Black Friday; New Year’s Eve is followed by, uh, New Year’s Day.

There’s a special pairing for pundits: Election Day is followed by The Feast of Hot Takes.

On The Feast of Hot Takes, you gather piecemeal results spread across different regions from the previous evening and arrange them to form a mosaic that perfectly matches your priors."

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QotD: Poly-Ticks Edition...

Bobbi watched most of the GOP debate last night. I'm getting the vibe she's not feeling the Vivekmentum...

"I watched some of the Republican runners-up debate last night, the Island of Misfit Toys, and even in that group, Vivek Ramaswamy stands out as a jerk. Yes, in a profession of largely jerks, in a party that has embraced boorish jerkness, amid a collection of alpha jerks, he was still an outstanding jerk."

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QotD: Unforgiving Edition...

In a post about a Texas man injuring his grandson with a homemade .45 Colt blank, Claude Werner writes:

Firearms are relentlessly unforgiving of the slightest lapse in attention or competence. The shooter has probably been ‘shooting for years.’ Unfortunately, as is sometimes said of the law enforcement profession: “Some people have 20 years of experience and some people have one year of experience 20 times.”

Go and RTWT.
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QotD: Rules For Reading Edition...

Thanks to Greg Ellifritz for pointing me to this excellent set of rules for reading.

–Read widely and from people you disagree with. The Stoics believed that we should actively engage with anyone who can be a source of wisdom to us, regardless of their origin. If there is wisdom out there to be had, we’d be wise to avail ourselves of it.

-Pretentiousness is bullshit. Epictetus once heard a student talking proudly about having made their way through the dense works of Chryssipus. You know, Epictetus told him, if Chryssipus had been a better writer, you’d have less to brag about.

Go and RTWT...

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QotD: Ivory Tower Revolutionaries Edition...

"Institutions that once espoused a deep respect for the American federal republic, like the Claremont Institute and Hillsdale College have become havens for authoritarian nutters as bad -- and as willing to inspire bloodshed -- as any Mercedes-driving Ivy-League Marxist.

Not a one of them knows how to get bloodstains out of tweed or would be willing to do the work if you showed them how, either." -RobertaX

Rod Dreher is fixin' to lead the rugged Christian masculine resistance against the decadence and degeneracy of GloboHomo...just as soon as he finishes these simply divine oysters.

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QotD: War On Whatever Edition...

Over at Bobbi's blog, she mused:

"We've been sold a war on poverty, a war on drugs, a war on the border and a war on the sources of terrorism, but in every case, the conditions for victory are unclear, the price is higher than advertised and the sincerity of the pitchman is questionable."

The whole "War on [Fill In The Blank]" is problematic as a mental construct. The concept of "war" promotes binary thinking, zero sum outlooks, and a willingness to transcend niceties and violate rights in pursuit of victory. 

If you gotta put some maybe-innocent people in camps, censor some newspapers, suspend some habeus corpus...well, can't make an omelet without breaking a few eggs. Whose side are you on, anyway? Ours or the enemy's?

I'm reminded of P.J. O'Rourke's thoughts from All the Trouble in the World (maybe his last truly laugh-out-loud, snot-bubble-blowing hilarious book, BTW; Peej at the acme of his powers.):

"Politicians are always searching for some grave alarm which will cause individuals to abandon their separate concerns and prerogatives and act in concert so that politicians can wield the baton. Calls to mortal combat are forever being sounded (though only metaphorically– politicians don’t like real wars, too much merit is involved). The idea is that people will drop everything for a WWIII. Remember the War on Poverty? And how Jimmy Carter asked Americans to respond to a mere rise in the price of crude oil with “the moral equivalent of war”? (What were we supposed to do, shame the gas station attendant to death?) Now we’re “fighting pollution,” “battling AIDS,” “conquering racism,” et cetera."

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QotD: Mixed(Up) Media Edition...

"Media is off focus, out of proportion, increasingly ephemeral and wrong headed. In defense of the profession where I spent a half century laboring, there are places of excellence and too there are many reasons for the demise we witness.

So much of broadcast news, print journalism and on-line is a waste of time and even silly. This is what happens when newspapers are killed by financial vultures, when reporting and editing staffs are thinned to ludicrous levels so profits are boosted, when broadcast and print are forced into the blender of social media, a world of platforms that do not operate by the old journalism codes of conduct, ethics or canons. The public's "right to know" is now an afterthought, if even that, and it has become part of the broil that is ratings, revenue, investment portfolios, news deserts and a who cares attitude."

From Tom Cochrun's "Light Breezes" blog.

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QotD: Nuance Is A 4-Letter Word Edition...

"Complexity, it turns out, is a niche market." -Prof. Yamane

Ouch but true. People want pat answers and easy fixes, preferably ones which agree with their assumptions.

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QotD: Rueful Heh Edition...

"Buckle up. It's going to get a lot weirder before it gets any better. If it ever does." -RX

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QotD: Rubber Gun Edition...

Claude dispenses wisdom:

"Anyone who considers themselves a serious student of the Art should have an inert pistol of some sort. You can use it to practice things you can’t safely do with a real pistol. A SIRT gun is an ideal tool for this but not everyone is willing to spring that kind of cash. For less than the cost of a box of ammo, you can get a training aid that can be used in many different ways."

I agree wholeheartedly.

I would go further and suggest an inert duplicate of your actual carry gun that allows you to use your carry holster is a sound investment.

QotD: Tactical Talisman Edition

Gorillafritz dropping clue bombs regarding a classic bit of derpy gun counter lore:

Does that mean you should choose a shotgun for home defense because it has a built in potential deterrent mechanism? No. I don’t think that’s the right answer. A criminal who flees at the sound of a racking shotgun will also likely flee when you yell out to him that you’ve called the police. He would likely flee at the sight of ANY gun being pointed at him as well. There’s nothing magical about the shotgun.

You should RTWT.

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QotD: State Of Social Media Edition...

Mike Johnston, telling it like it is:

"Sigh. I would love to have that many viewers. Unfortunately, to accomplish that, I'd have to be making videos, writing only about products, and relentlessly structuring my my content as clickbait—not only in the title, but in the body of the content."

Mysterious 'bot storms will occasionally cause the spike he noted. It's such a weird internet artifact.

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