GraniteGrok now has well over 44,000 posts in its archive – and I have written well over 16,000 of them and Steve is credited with an almost as large number as well. Why do I bring this up?

We’ve become self-referential. If there has been anything in politics that has poked its head up above ground, we’ve probably written about it. In fact, several times in one aspect or another. Thus, we are our own reference area that we can research to see what we wrote about in the past.

Sidenote: have to ask the webmistress if we can get a better search engine at some point.

Sometimes, stuff just comes up during that research and I go “well, isn’t that interesting?”  Wasn’t what I was looking for exactly, but it wouldn’t be a bad thing to bubble it from whence it came, would it?

This was one of them from 2017, especially as the Biden Administration, like all Socialists, are making another run to make Christian Charities a thing of the past under the beliefs that Government is the only place where good things happen and that “God is the opiate of the masses” and should be eliminated from being a competing “Power” in competition with Government (even as this country was founded on the idea of Religious Freedom; it is becoming it’s own State Religion, IMHO):

Christian leaders or Progressive / Statist activists

This piece in the Washington Post keeps on confirming my belief that The Church is continuing its march in becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of The State.  Once again, there is no charity in Government – the government money that is used for relief is not given voluntarily – it is taken by force (go ahead, try not paying your taxes and tell me I’m wrong) but Progressives DO conflate the two  and then use that to virtue-signal to the rest of us their moral superiority.  Like these two authors – I’ve taken a few snippets out for commenting.  First, they lead off with a sentence that is absolutely true – but it is setting a false stage for something that ISN’T tru:

The Bible is replete with references to caring for the poor in obedience to God. Jesus declares that loving our neighbor — wherever they live — is one of the greatest commandments, a corollary to loving God.
Yes, we are called to do this.  All one has to do is to read Jesus’s Sermon On The Mount – or the Good Samaritan to know of the values that He preached.  But note – he NEVER preached that message to a group of politicians or to the Roman government officials, but to individuals. He came to change a person’s heart, mind, and convictions – one by one by one.  An individual ministry and not a collective one – for only one person can pray for forgiveness of their personal sin and to accept His message of redemption and salvation.    But not here:

While the U.S. government doesn’t directly share this mandate, it plays a critical role in fulfilling the moral responsibility of all Americans to help those less fortunate. In fact, the U.S. government has always been a strong partner with American citizens in helping those in extreme poverty and crisis. Yet now, President Trump’s proposed budget threatens to severely cut that foreign aid.

No, no, no, NO!  People have a sense of morality (putting aside the phrase “the public morality” for the moment), individuals have an innate sense of right and wrong as well as kindness and empathy.  A GOVERNMENT cannot fulfill the moral responsibility that belongs solely to you and to me.  Each of us putting our hands into our pockets to give sacrificially, giving of our time to those in need, applying our talents in the stead of those who cannot – that is fulfilling that moral responsibility.

Again, and I cannot hammer this home often enough – there is no voluntary with Government.  There is no charity with Government. You are forced to participate which subsumes the individual to the collective (and faceless) actions of bureaucrats.  How CAN this be charitable?  One has to KNOW what is being done – go ahead, ask most Americans about this issue and I bet you’ll get deer in headlights for responses.

And NO, the phrase  “the U.S. government has always been a strong partner with American citizens” is absolutely wrong.  One of our early posts (by Doug), Not Your’s To Give, speaks to that directly.  But it seems that ever since the Progressive Era started, we’ve been losing that early and right way of thinking – that charity belongs solely to Civil Society and Individuals.  Instead, under Progressive demands and without regard to our founding philosophy of a limited government, they have pushed Government to be large and have both crowded out Civil Society from its former roles and forcibly pushed its own organizations into those spaces, and started the process of convincing Individuals that only Government can do the good and big things.

A complete reversal of the Founders intent.  Remember, it was Bernie Sanders that said he’d eliminate ALL private charities if he could.  And here they are advocating that government do something with other peoples’ money instead of doing the hard work themselves and convince more people to support their direct mission.

At less than 1 percent of the federal budget — an amount analogous to the “widow’s mite” — foreign assistance promotes our values, our own prosperity and our nation’s security, all while providing a lifeline to the most vulnerable in the world, those Jesus called “the least of these.”

Yeah, catch that bit of “Bible-wrapping”?  Me too.  How DARE they take the utter sacrifice of that poor widow and conflate that to taxes that are forcibly taken?  She gave all she had, her tithe, while in a time when the US Govt already owes $20 Trillion, these Christian leaders want to see others taxed to service their own purposes.

HOW IS THIS BEING CHRISTIAN???  This is yet another sign of church leaders becoming more worldly even as they wrap themselves in helping the poor.  I do remember these kinds of stories of the Pharisees and Saducees…

…Every year, generous Americans, churches and foundations support the life-saving work of organizations like World Vision and Catholic Relief Services to keep vulnerable children alive and enable communities to work toward standing on their own. They expect our government to mirror their generosity. The U.S. government and faith-based organizations are powerful partners in eradicating the most egregious forms of poverty hindering human potential.

Especially to them.  World Vision got $171,950,308 in US tax monies.  Catholic Charities has received $1.6 Billion since 2012.

And NO, to add a few more thoughts, I do NOT expect the Government to “mirror” anything I do in part for Charity. What I REALLY want out of my Federal Government is to ONLY do those things outlined in the Constitution. Period.  Leave the Charity to ME, to Individuals, or Civil Society. Stick to your own mending – we’ll take care of the important stuff. Remember, “LIMITED” is supposed to be part of your name and purpose.

You’ve become too big for our britches.

With poverty-focused international assistance at risk for deep cuts, more than 100 leaders in the Christian faith community expressed our support for foreign assistance in a letter to Congress. Evangelical, Roman Catholic, Orthodox, and mainline Protestant leaders, as well as leaders from a wide array of networks, seminaries, ministries and mission agencies — cumulatively representing tens of millions of American donors — have signed this letter.

Look, I am not saying they don’t do good work.  What I am saying is that they are repeating what I have seen locally – more and more becoming captured by Government and the lure of “free money”.  What gets my ire is that there IS NO FREE MONEY.  If you are given government money, be assured that money was first taken from someone else.  Yet this is what they want – from the brokest nation the world has ever seen.

Guess these two missed the lessons of Biblical stewardship.

So stop being lazy, Christian Church, and get to it. Stop doing the “well, SOMEBODY has to do something about this” – it’s lazy, it’s slothful, and it’s avoiding one of YOUR missions.

The federal budget cannot be balanced on the backs of the poor. By drastically cutting foreign assistance, we risk the extraordinary gains we have made against hunger, disease and extreme poverty. It is penny-wise and pound-foolish to forfeit funding that does so much good in the world.

Ha!  Due to the chuckleheads these two are trying to beseech additional funds from, I think that the US is INCAPABLE of balancing ANYTHING, much less its own budget. Trust me, it can’t be balanced on the back of the poor because it never balances.  Bad metaphor guys.

This is the “just a cuppa coffee” assault on our money by other means – EVERY charity that has enslaved itself by the Shiny Object that is the public Treasury has the same argument for yet other issues.

Bottom line?  They have all become LAZY; it is far easier to convince a few politicians or a handful of desk-bound bureaucrats to loosen the public purse strings than to be that individual changing yet another individual heart and mind to give.  Paperwork – far more easier to convince in getting a few signatures than the public at large.

They have turned from their first love.

Richard Stearns is president of World Vision U.S. and the author of “The Hole in Our Gospel.” Sean Callahan is president and CEO of Catholic Relief Services.

Oh yeah, Catholic Charities is a big deal in the refugee biz – bring them in at so much a head from the Federal Government, place them into a community that has no choice in the matter and do the work to put them on that community’s dole. Once again, forcing others to be “charitable”.  Yeah, right Christian charitable that is, eh?

These are the kind of folks that are turning “Christian Charity” into an oxymoron.

That’s what happens when you no longer rely on “passing the plate” and turn to the world.

The post Blast from the Past – Apropos Given What the Biden / Sanders “Build Back Better” Catastrophe wants to Do appeared first on Granite Grok.

President Trump’s big beautiful wall didn’t get finished not because it couldn’t. There are millions of dollars in materials, already paid for, sitting in the dust, rotting at the border.

Contracts already made and paid, materials purchased, sitting in the sun, rotting away because Democrats want the border open.

This guy went to the border to show you, so take a few minutes to watch and feel free to be suitably outraged.

The post Biden Admin Leaves Millions in “Border Wall” Materials to Rot in the Dust appeared first on Granite Grok.

Another way of describing “Public Choice” is how Government employees use their position within Government to get what they want instead of concentrating on serving those that pay their salaries.

When government is spoken of explicitly by the intelligentsia, it is often depicted as if it is simply an expression of a Rousseauian “general will,” rather than a collection of politicians, bureaucrats and judges, responding to the incentives and constraints confronting politicians, bureaucrats and judges. That there should be a separate specialty as “public choice” economics, in which government officials’ actions are analyzed in terms of the incentives and constraints of their circumstances, is a sign of how atypical such an approach is among intellectuals.

-Prof. Thomas Sowell (Intellectuals and Society)

That SIG in the title, and the best-known example of it, are the Teachers Unions who, in both large and small cities and towns, are often the largest and most active voter block in their locality.

They can often control elections, budgets, and the working conditions to fit THEM over the interests of those that employ them – us.

The Pandemic has made it startlingly clear how unions made it both far more difficult for a lot of working families and brought home to those families by Zoom, GoToMeeting, Google, MS Teams, and other conferencing software what is really going on in schools.

And until the MSM decided “oops, have to protect our Left flank” and stopped reporting on it, we saw Parents going after School Boards for putting THEIR concerns into the trash can.

“Schoolies” (teachers, school workers, their friends, and families) have shown themselves to be THE largest voting block to both bully everyone else and gain a financial standing that is often much larger than the median income of the families in their locales.

Self-interest, indeed.

(H/T: Cafe Hayek)

The post Notable Quote – This is ONE “Special Interest Group” Everyone Knows appeared first on Granite Grok.

There are times that try men’s souls and I think that this age would fit that oft used phrase. Mostly because, it seems, that Enlightenment and Reason decided to go on a cruise somewhere and left a lot of souls on the Left high and dry.

There can however be solace that some souls will self-reflect and return to some semblance of sanity.  From my weekly read at Weekend Pundit comes this hint of hopefulness: (emphasis mine):

A discussion with the Left-leaning daughter of a friend of mine gave me a glimmer of hope that the younger generation isn’t doomed. One of our topics of discussion was about the whole ‘woke’ movement.

At one point, I made a point that the woke appear to me to be people desperate for a cause, people who will latch on to any cause like a drowning man will latch on to a floating bit of debris to save oneself. So many have taken up causes on behalf of people who they believe should be offended about some small thing. That they aren’t offended about that small thing offends the woke, so they become offended on behalf of those people who aren’t offended, in many cases offending the very people on whose behalf they are being offended.

I also made a point that the woke also will seek trivial or non-existent causes, amplify them all out of proportion, and then be offended when anyone has the audacity to question their new cause, accusing the questioner of being a ‘whateverist’ because they don’t support the cause du jour.

She was about to reply, then her eyes opened wide when she realized what it is I had just said.

My thought was “Ah, light dawns over Marblehead!”

You do know, dear readers, that there are multiple places that are named Marblehead here in the US (the closest one to NH is in MA, but also Ohio, Illinois, Wisconsin). I haven’t asked but it could have been a reference to a person, based on the story, but I won’t take that any further other than to remark “a two-fer?”…

I could see she was thinking things over and she finally said something along the lines of “You know, I hadn’t thought about it that way before.”

After a few moments of cogitation, the course of our discussion changed paths a number of times as we we continued devouring our evening repast.

It will be interesting to pick that particular thread of discussion again sometime in the future.

Heh! I don’t believe that I’ve ever seen such a sentence with the word “offended” so often – but it does make a lot of sense: the woke are offended for those that don’t care.  Offended by proxy for the too lazy to be offended? Or misreading “the room” combined with the Biblical “mote” and “beam” admonition?

I think I’ll just file this under “those that have too much time on their hands” but hope that Marblehead has one more wokester that has now awakened from a bad dream.

The post Oh? Is one of the “Woke” truly becoming Awakened? appeared first on Granite Grok.

The US Department of Agriculture has asked both New Hampshire and Vermont to test White-Tailed Deer for COVID19, and before you laugh, Deer have been found carrying antibodies.

In its study, released in July, the inspection service tested 481 deer in Illinois, Michigan, New York and Pennsylvania and found COVID-19 antibodies in 33% of the samples.

“We do not know how the deer were exposed” to the virus, the study said. “It’s possible they were exposed through people, the environment, other deer, or another animal species.”

The “experts” don’t want anyone to panic, which would sort of be a first, but they don’t think deer can spread COVID to people. TO that, I say this. First, unless I misunderstand things, flu’s cannot be eradicated because they have animal reservoirs.

The study said that based on available information, the risk of deer and other animals spreading COVID-19 to people is low. It also said there were no reports of clinical illness in the deer populations surveyed, and that captive deer “experimentally infected” with the virus as part of a USDA Agricultural Research Service study didn’t show clinical signs of illness.

Second, for the sake of the deer, I hope it’s not them.

The FDA, CDC, and DoA might suggest we get them all inoculated, and the animal rights people will find themselves at cross purposes.

COVID Jabs kill people (of which they most likely approve) but might kill the deer (which they don’t).  Can you be pro-jab for some mammals and not others?

Perhaps they can distract from their guilt by complaining about how “White-Tailed Deer” sounds racist.

The post Two New England States Will Begin Testing the Deer for COVID19 appeared first on Granite Grok.

We posited the likelihood, early on, that Darrell Edward Brooks Jr. – who killed at least six and injured dozens more – was let off easy as a result of the “progressive” bail reform movement. It was.

The Milwaukee DA said his office recommended $1,000 bail for Brooks following his arrest on Nov. 5 on charges that he punched his girlfriend in the face and hit her with his vehicle in a gas station parking lot. The woman is identified only by her initials in court papers, which indicate they have a child together. Brooks was also charged with eluding police officers when they arrived to take him into custody.

A review of Wisconsin court records shows Brooks may have been a familiar figure to Chisholm, given that he was arrested and charged about half a dozen times in Milwaukee County during Chisholm’s tenure.

Chisholm is Milwaukee County district attorney John Chisholm, “a leading figure among “progressive prosecutors,” leftwing lawmen who favor diversionary programs and community-building to locking up criminal defendants.”

A program that is so focused on pretending to be compassionate that it has no sense of awareness about the risk it creates. And while federal bail reform is essential, this approach is indeed a miscarriage of justice for the six people who are dead, including an 8-year old who was walking in the parade.

Chisholm has blamed “false information” and “deliberately manipulated” scare stories about rising crime for the sense of unease that is powering opposition to progressive prosecutors. “The progressive message is very difficult to get through,” he has acknowledged, noting that he has repeatedly been the target of “conservative dark money” campaigns aimed at unseating him.

Outside money is how you got the job. As for campaigns to unseat you, the face of a dead 8-year old might be all it takes. That’s on you and your movement, and it’s getting dark outside. But hey, at least AOC is still with you.

The post “Bail Reform” Advocate Responsible For Christmas Killer’s Low Bail Prior to Act of Mass Murder appeared first on Granite Grok.

OK, it still the Thanksgiving “weekend” and life can’t be all serious and political.  Thus, the Palate Cleaner posts are a bit more numerous lately.  This one is long but rather well done and it shows what a good piece of engineering can do to upset the status quo – especially when the Queen of Dominos is brought in as a demonstration.

I’m not going to say anymore but for me, it was fun to watch.

Especially when 10,000 dominos are knocked down at once.

But where was the “pick’em up robot”?????

(H/T: Mark Rober, who was listed on the right of the “Hot Wheels Treetop Express” as a recommendation)

The post Palate Cleanser – The Domino Robot (300 dominos at a whack) appeared first on Granite Grok.

Below is a statement released five days ago by Renny Cushing blaming the surge in COVID cases in New Hampshire (which is seasonal because COVID is a virus) on “the unvaccinated.”

Is Cushing IGNORANT or DISHONEST? The CDC has admitted that the so-called “vaccines” do not prevent the “vaccinated” from getting infected with COVID and then transmitting COVID to others.

CDC director says vaccines can’t prevent transmission anymore, so why would any government, organization, or company mandate them? https://t.co/vaYbKzzV9Z

— Thomas Massie (@RepThomasMassie) August 20, 2021

Here is Cushing’s statement:

“It is disheartening to hear New Hampshire’s State Epidemiologist acknowledge that the Granite State is currently experiencing the highest levels of COVID since the inception of the pandemic. Plain and simple, Gov. Sununu is failing our vaccination effort in New Hampshire. New Hampshire has the lowest vaccination rate in New England and currently has the second highest per capita COVID cases in the United States … “

And here is a recent chart from the NY Times showing that this year’s seasonal surge mirrors last year’s surge:

AND … as you may recall … in November, 2020, Sununu instituted a mask-mandate, which shows masks are as inefficacious as the vaccines.

The post House Democrat Leader Renny Cushing … Ignorant or Dishonest? appeared first on Granite Grok.

Australia, New Zealand – what used to be thought of as Free and Democratic nations have been overrun and turned into Sununu “Public Health trumps EVERYTHING” nations by healthcare tyrants who forget that Life is more than just fear of disease.

Especially one that is survivable by 99% of the population below 70 years of age.

Those nations are locked up, shut down, and starting up “medical apartheid States” by removing freedoms.

Finally, the common folks (in Austria and the Netherlands as well) are starting to yell “NOT ON MY WATCH!” with a Cold Fury determination.  Just as I ask about the GOP (is the Party for the High Officials or the lowly people at the bottom), one can ask the same thing about nations – does a Nation “belong” to the highest Elected Representatives (or mere unaccountable bureaucrats and folks like Fauci) or to the people that voted to put them into those seats and hired others as their employees?

Methinks that for far too long now, those at the top have severely forgotten about what their true roles are to be in Society – especially when the People start to stand up and tell them “no more.”

America was founded by those that no longer wished to be ruled by the old European aristocracy – Freedom was their goal and on an individual level. We thrived because of people who refused to “accept their assigned roles in Society”; they no longer accepted the “social construct” of Societal caste systems. They were willing to die to be, as the US Marines used to say “The best you can be.”

Australia, on the other hand, was founded as a penal colony – ruffians, rapscallions, and dangerous men indeed. A far different starting point.

But both, eventually, worked to independence from the Crown and living in Freedom.

Which in many cases, has been taken away by those believing they have the right to make ALL decisions for others instead of letting us make them for ourselves.

And now we’re seeing a “return to our roots” in all four nations when people have had enough and the “leaders” can’t “read the room”.

Courage – the willingness and fortitude to stand up and fight for what is right even though one could lose everything. Not the absence of Fear but the controlling of it in fearful situations. This gentlemen fought it and fought for freedom despite it.  Now, seeing the need and hearing the call, returns to the fight again. Different, but the same.

So, what are YOU doing?

(H/T: Conservative Treehouse)

The post “Courage is Not the Absence of Fear” appeared first on Granite Grok.

Nothing says “global warming” like unexpectedly cold temperatures.  That’s why they rebranded is climate change and then climate chaos and then super random weather that’s your fault, no matter what. And it matters, especially to the freighters trapped in arctic sea ice that’s not supposed to be there.

At least 18 ships are stuck in Arctic sea ice off the coast of Russia after an unexpected early freeze took shipping companies by surprise. Some could be stranded for months as they wait for icebreakers to reach them.

Imagine Joe Biden’s embarrassment if all those container ships floating in the Pacific were not idling because his party’s policies had crippled our logistic infrastructure and undermined the ports and trucking industry.

If for some magical reason they were trapped out there due to climate change, chaos, super random weather, he could blame you.

The Russians are sending ice breakers to free their cargo ships.

What’s Joe Biden doing to ‘Free’ ours?

The post Early Freeze Traps 18 Ships in Arctic Sea Ice appeared first on Granite Grok.

One of my favorite “clean” comedians, Jim tells jokes you can share just about anywhere with anyone. Oh, and they’re funny more often than not. That helps.

This is a clip from his latest tour/special “Quality Time.”

It’s about spousal murder, actually, and it made me laugh. Here’s to hoping you agree (and no, I didn’t wake up late unless you consider 6 am late.)

The post Wake Up (Late) and Laugh – Jim Gaffigan appeared first on Granite Grok.

Over the past 21 months, not one single resident under the age of 20 in the state of New Hampshire has died from COVID. In the few months since vaccination began and was encouraged by politicians and bureaucrats, two “kids” have been killed, and one is permanently disabled.

Of which we know.

The cure is more dangerous than the pathogen, so what does the state do? It takes millions in strings-attached federal dollars to run a massive marketing campaign to vaccinate as many kids as possible.

Related: NH Governor Sununu: You Are Responsible if a Child is Injured or Dies!

I can see politicians’ disregard for public health, but what happened to physicians first doing no harm? These shots are, after all, being administered by state-certified or licensed practitioners.

Have they all been politicized? Hospitals are terminating frontline workers who, for whatever reason, do not want The Jab. This creates the crisis we were told the lockdowns were instituted to prevent.

A policy path has created a crisis that didn’t even exist – kids dying due to pandemic policy, not the alleged pathogen.

If Democrats were smart, faced with a potential wipe-out in 2022, they would do a 180 and reject vaccines, especially for kids, and pump that science into their media machine 24/7/65. Pretend to be the party of the people again acting to save the children.

Sununu might be swinging in the wind and easy pickings next November. But this is unlikely. Chris is carrying their water.

They can’t just tip the bucket. Our only chance for salvation is an actual Republican with name recognition, means, and motivation to challenge him on policy or for the office itself, but don’t hold your breath.

As I noted earlier this morning, most people in any position to raise a meaningful challenge are mired in the same tar pit as Gov. Sununu. Changing that will take a lot.

And is a growing pile of kids killed by the magic vaccine enough, or do we need something more?

The post NH Public Health Policy Has Officially Killed More “Kids” than COVID appeared first on Granite Grok.

Yet again, politicians are sensing the diminishing paranoia. As expected, they are now spreading fear about another ‘variant’ and using it to bring corona-fascism back to maximum levels. Again, they have shifted from counting deaths to counting ‘cases’ or other inflated ‘statistics’. 

The post Racist Biden Bans Travel From Africa, Blames Omicron Variant appeared first on The Liberty Block.

Credit where it’s due. The title is a direct quote from eugyppius on substack, and the piece is worth some time. Titled Ignorant and Afraid, it outlines the cloistered mindest of global elites and that connection to COVID policy, its failures, and their inability to admit it.

The problem with curated information isn’t just that it is slow, subject to inertia, and produced by insular out-of-touch functionaries. Because the information has political importance, there are incentives everywhere to manipulate and degrade its quality. Bureaucratic actors will lie about what is going on to curry favour, save face or evade blame. What is more, many advisers, analysts and modellers are only in the position of providing analysis in the first place, because we need more women in STEM, or because they tell the Faucis of the world what they want to hear, or because they have the right combination of sociopathy and narrow-mindedness necessary to ascend complex bureaucratic hierarchies.

One or more of these dopes is making policy in your town, county, or State. In ours, the lead out-of-touch functionary is Governor Chris Sununu. He is so clearly a victim of this and so convinced he is not, speaking out against members of his party and his voting base, arresting them at meetings, as he clings desperately to the COVID worldview surrounding him.

Sununu has become, in my opinion, incapable of seeing outside the narrative he has embraced, rejecting anything outside it as rubbish or conspiracy.

it is only official, curated information that is allowed to inform bureaucratic decisions. Products of the hive-mind are deliberately excluded, via gate-keeping mechanisms like peer review and credentialism. All of the terrified Angela Merkels of the world act within an environment of outdated, poor-quality information, all the time.

There are reams of scientific research by people far more qualified than those surrounding Sununu telling us that these vaccines are much more dangerous to children than COVID19 or any of its variants. Not one child in NH has been taken from us by this flu, but “kids” have already died from The Jab, and the State – in the person of Chris Sununu – is forging ahead with an aggressive campaign to convince parents this is what’s best for them.

As Ken noted yesterday in this link-loaded extravaganza, the dead children will be on Sununu’s head, perhaps even become his legacy. Not because he is evil or twisted or has some secret depopulation agenda, but because he has sequestered himself away from input outside the approved circles.

He is a Sununu, so I suppose that was inevitable, but how deep is the infection? Is Chris slip-sliding toward the “Republicanism” of VT Governor Phil Scott or MA Governor Charlie Baker, defacto Democrats operating under a false flag? Puppet princes pretending at ideological balance based solely on party registration but (increasingly) unidentifiable as such on actual policy?

He’s not there yet, not entirely, but he is on that path and appears so embedded in this cloistered mindset that he might be offended by the suggestion. I can guarantee his inner circle is offended. “Because …  Bureaucratic actors will lie about what is going on to curry favour, save face or evade blame.”

Like blaming the unvaccinated.

Or having pouty fits until you get the federal money with the strings attached to glorify a pharmaceutical regiment that, rather than returning us to normal, has become the new normal.

That new normal, these Corona policies, really are as stupid as they look. The cloistered elites have become incapable of seeing it, and like any addiction, you either need an intervention, or someone needs to hit rock bottom, and that someone won’t be them. It will be us.

The post (Why) “Corona Policies Really Are as Stupid as They Look.” appeared first on Granite Grok.

So, a little dated, but still noteworthy. Last Sunday, Sun-King Sununu went on CNN and was “interviewed” by Dana Bash. I will reproduce the relevant part of the transcript below, and then further discuss below that:

BASH: So, you are a prominent Republican governor, so I want to ask a couple of questions about your party.  Many in the GOP want to kick 13 House Republicans who voted for the bipartisan infrastructure bill off their committees. At the same time, you have Republican Congressman Gosar sharing a video showing him killing a Democratic congresswoman, and only two Republicans wanted to strip him of his committees.  What does that say to you about the GOP? Voting for a bipartisan bill is considered worse by many than encouraging violence.

SUNUNU: Look, I don’t think — I think politics in its entirety on both sides of the aisle in Washington is screwed up. I mean, it really is. They have got their priorities all wrong. They focus on the wrong things. They don’t talk about balancing budgets. They don’t talk about fixing health care, immigration reform. Social Security and Medicare are going to be broken in about 10 years. You better get around to fixing that, because I have elderly citizens that are counting on those types of programs. And, instead, we spend all of our time focusing on these nitpicky things. And I think, when a congressman says those things and puts that thing up, of course they have to be censured for that. Of course they have to be held to bear for that. When we talk about kicking people off of committees because they don’t like one vote or the other, again, I just think they have their priorities screwed up.

BASH: So, you’re talking — just to be clear…

SUNUNU: So, I don’t either party’s going to get 60 votes in — yes.

BASH: I know you’re talking about both parties, but, as a Republican, I’m asking you about Republicans. It sounds to me like you said that…

SUNUNU: Sure.

BASH: … Paul Gosar should have been censured and stripped of his committees and that…

SUNUNU: Yes.

BASH: And Republicans — and it’s OK for Republicans to support a bipartisan infrastructure bill?

SUNUNU: Of course. Look, I think it’s OK for Republicans to support anything that is bipartisan.

BASH: What does it say about your party that they’re being attacked the way they are?

SUNUNU: Again, I think it says that we have our priorities wrong. Republicans have had huge successes, with cutting taxes, limiting government, creating — creating opportunities in schools, supporting parents, making sure kids — those are our wins, and those are America’s wins, and those are wins from not — Republicans and independents and even some of the conservative Democrats.And that’s what we have to focus on as a party. 

BASH: Governor — Governor, I was in New Hampshire the day that you announced that you wouldn’t run for Senate. I was there covering Congresswoman Liz Cheney, who is facing an uncertain political future and intense criticism from her party over her position January 6.Do you think there’s room for Liz Cheney in the Republican Party, and, specifically — you’re in New Hampshire — in the 2024 primary process?

SUNUNU: Well, I think there’s room for everybody in the Republican Party. I really do. Whether you’re independent or Democrat, I think we got room for everybody to come on — come on board. And I think that’s what you’re going to see over the next year.

So … on both the question of the censure of Representative Paul Gosar and the Green New Deal (Bash and the Sun-King both inaccurately refer to it as “bipartisan infrastructure bill”), the SUN-KING SUPPORTS THE POSITION OF NANCY PELOSI.

As for the Green New Deal (“bipartisan infrastructure bill”), Sun-King Sununu obviously has NO IDEA what he is talking about. From Philip Klein at National Review:

This [the 13 GOP Reps who voted with the Democrats] is a substantively bad decision that is political malpractice … only a small portion of the bill focuses on traditional infrastructure such as fixing roads and bridges and the legislation (soon to be law) will add $256 billion to deficits. It will also help grease the wheels for the passage of the larger multi-trillion welfare bill that will expand Medicare and Obamacare, initiate a federal takeover of preschool and child care, and impose economically devastating tax increases on individuals and businesses. … Biden entered this week reeling from a devastating rebuke of his presidency by voters in areas of the country thought to be reliably Democratic. He headed into the 2022 election year a wounded animal, and Republicans stood to make major gains. Now, they tossed him a life raft and allowed him to put bipartisan gloss on his radical agenda. 

As for Gosar, he was censured and lost his committee assignments over a video he posted on social media that was an edit of the anime “Attack on Titan” series. The edited video portrayed Gosar slaying a “Titan”—a giant human-eating monster— that was edited to have Representative Sandy Ocasio-Cortez’s face. Here is part of what Gosar said in his own defense:

“The cartoon depicts the symbolic nature of a battle between lawful and unlawful policies and in no way intended to be a targeted attack against Representative Cortez or Mr. Biden,” Gosar said in a separate statement. “It is a symbolic cartoon. It is not real life. Congressman Gosar cannot fly. The hero of the cartoon goes after the monster, the policy monster of open borders.”

Apparently, Sun-King either believes that anime is real life, that AOC is a Titan and that Rep. Gosar can fly … or he knows better and is just telling Dana Bash what CNN wants to hear so he can get invited back on CNN and get another hit of dopamine. Either way, Sun-King is on the side of Pelosi and AOC and against every Republican except Kinzinger and Cheney, who are Republicans in name only.

As for the Sun-King’s embrace of the Trump-Deranged, warmonger Liz Cheney, just more proof that Sun-King was NEVER an America-First “Trump guy.” He has always been and remains a Koch-bitch.

The post Sun-King Sununu Goes on CNN … Attacks Rep. Paul Gosar … Supports Liz Cheney appeared first on Granite Grok.

I have always been a Matchbox / Lesney kind of guy. When my parents split, my Dad had weekend visitation and when we got a bit older, we started to go and race Slot Cars.

At the end of our time, at our favorite place (lots of tracks and all kinds of configurations) they had a Matchbox display, and each of us, my younger brother and I were allowed to pick one Matchbox car. When the weather was good, I played with them a lot – in the dirt. Never kept the boxes they came in.

When I learned of EBay.com, I took a look and saw that these decades-old vehicles were worth a lot more than the 25 cents each one cost back then. The price went through the floor during the Great Recession but just took a look and they are way up in price again as a collectible. Dang, I shoulda kept the boxes!

Anyways, I just ran across this Hot Wheels video – quite neat with two different views (P.O.V. and then watching the car).

It makes it VERY clear that the Hot Wheels were the ones to buy if all you were interested in was watching something that could go MUCH faster than the Matchbox cars. Now, the Grandson has a few sets of them and is finally old enough to start making his own routes. This one, however, covering an entire backyard and in and out of the trees, going rooftop high, is well beyond his means (er, and mine as well).

And no, he has not been introduced to my 60-year-old Matchbox collection (well over a 100 vehicle count – several Matchbox cases). That will come once he learns to handle (and play) with them so as to not damage them further).

Dang, he just came into my office and asked “What is THAT!”.  I foresee how a lot of time is going to be spent in the Spring…

(H/T: Gizmodo)

The post Palate Cleanser – Hot Wheels Treetop Express appeared first on Granite Grok.

Data from the UK shows conclusive evidence that vaccinated people under 60 are twice as likely to die as unvaccinated people. The tragic Irony, is, of course, that healthy people under 60 have nothing to fear from COVID19.

Alex Berenson shared the data so click through and show her some support.

The brown line represents weekly deaths from all causes of vaccinated people aged 10-59, per 100,000 people.

The blue line represents weekly deaths from all causes of unvaccinated people per 100,000 in the same age range.

The UK medical establishment, as we’ve noted before, is not as married to approved narratives as the US Medical-Media-Industrial Complex. That’s not to say they aren’t in on the scam, just that the initial reporting tends to be more open and accurate.

I have no idea why that is but it’s been very helpful in our quest to expose truths otherwise hidden on our side of the pond. And this is a big one. All-cause deaths among the vaccinated are higher.

Talk about letting the air out of the “Public Health Trumps Everything” Narrative ballon.

Source Data per Berenson is this XLS, table 4. The source file can be found here.

The post UK: Vaccinated People under 60 Are Twice as Likely to Die as Unvaccinated People appeared first on Granite Grok.

Dragon 6 had a post (“Friendsgiving” not “Thanksgiving” ?) that decried yet another Leftist attempt to neuter and obliterate one of our country’s favorite traditions.

It started at the Pilgrims’ feast at which time they thanked God for watching over them. Two quotes from that post, but in reverse order:

…The social justice and cancel culture crowd has made me suspect everything and this is no exception. If nothing else they are certainly devious. So from my foxhole what I see is the Left making new inroads to eliminate our most basic of American holidays by transitioning to a focus that is away from “Thanksgiving” and its historical, religious and family connotations, to a focus on a sanitized and secular view.

…I tried to find out how in hell we got to this point. Where did this concept come from? Well, it looks like according to Merriam Webster the word came to us through social media (what a shock) and is supposed to be a large meal among friends during the Thanksgiving season.  Notice the emphasis on friends not family.

These self-righteous bigots and twits just can’t leave things be, can they? And they refuse to leave the rest of us along!  They have to always seek to “untie the binds” that give us some sense of nationality.

Why?

Simple – to remake the rest of us into their own image (go ahead, Progressives, prove me wrong). They hate who we are, consider us guilty as sin (against their own relativistic morality, whatever it happens to be today (or yesterday’s and what it might be tomorrow). They are doing their damnedest to unmoor from our most valued traditions while all the while yelling at us “WHAT’S WRONG WITH YOU! It’s always been this way!”.

Sheer gaslighting to As Van Jones, a self-avowed Communist once said:

top-down, bottom-up, and inside out

THAT is how “they” will attempt to create chaos in and of our culture. After all, Lenin said that when there is chaos, there is opportunity. And that “opportunity” exists in order to take Power from others. In this case,  from We the People to themselves. From Traditional America to a Socialist Utopian one.

One displaced norm at a time.

The nuclear family is one of those norms that keep them from doing so. By shifting the emphasis, as Dragon 6 pointed out, it separates Parents from their children, grandkids from grandparents, and further disassembles extended (and sometimes far-flung) family members from each other. Families aren’t chosen but it is supposed to be the American bedrock. Unfortunately, Government policies since the 1960s, especially LBJ’s Great Society’s welfare programs, have been anti-family. They still are today and the Left is remaking our language to “1984” out of existence those other stumbling blocks in their way.

The other one is Religion. After all, Dragon points out a “sanitized and secular view.” Remove the meaning, the emotions surrounding, and the feelings arising from a given event, what is left? A day where a large meal is eaten. Move that meal from being one for thanking God, recognizing that there is a Deity/Power/Something Greater than oneself, and then it’s just a meal.

And meals are just meals when they aren’t imbued with meaning. And with a meal without meaning, it’s just another day.

After all, friends just come and go from our lives – nothing is certain.

And that is the ultimate aim of the Socialists – making your life void and uncertain. They know, however, that Man is driven to believe in something.  That they do not wish to change.

Instead, they want you, by deconstructing and destroying “your meaning”, that you will believe in them and the world they wish to foist upon you.

Celebrate, instead, that which is Thankful and “From Whom all blessings flow” and know that the “Whom” is not Government. Sure, be thankful for your friends, at all times. But know that Thanksgiving is more than friends.

The post Friendsgiving and not Thanksgiving? appeared first on Granite Grok.

Unlike Progressive-Socialists who believe that “charity” can only be carried out by Government and not by private entities (see Bernie Sanders, below), Conservatives believe that each ONE of us is PERSONALLY responsible for helping others out – not as a Collective.

Sure, we band together to do so but we do so as an act that is solely voluntary in nature – we don’t have to be FORCED to be charitable.

One of my traditions, for DECADES, was that every time I saw a Salvation Army red donation kettle, I’d stuff a few bucks into it. Going into a store and coming out of the store.

For the last three years, I’ve been training the Grandson in the same tradition and having him put the money into the kettle, starting the understanding that we, as Christians, are to help those that are in more desperate straits than ourselves.

Each time, I’m reinforcing the message about why I would give him money to put into the kettle, hoping one day for the lightbulb to turn on in this aspect of his life.

Yesterday, sadly, I walked past that kettle without stopping with the Grandson, hand in hand. Both going in and coming out. I won’t stop again.

No, I can’t help or save everyone. In fact, none of us can, especially those that refuse to help themselves. And now the Salvation Army, for quite some time to come, is in that situation itself.

As Browcoat’s post (“The Salvation Army’s New Mission – White People are Racists“) states:

“The subtle nature of racism is such that people who are not consciously racist easily function with the privileges, empowerment and benefits of the dominant ethnicity, thus unintentionally perpetuating injustice,”

So everyone other than themselves is guilty of a sin that they don’t know is one.

It is clear that they are now stereotyping others, ME!, according to this execrable Leftist Social Justice Warrior philosophy that, contrary to their former Christian philosophy, never grants grace and redemption to those it believes heathen and guilty. A true Christian ministry cannot hold both beliefs at the same time and be intellectually AND spiritually honest to itself.

Or to the rest of us.

I will find another true ministry (Samaritan’s Purse comes to mind quickly) in which to help the poor and downtrodden. The issue for me will be in how to “train up” the Grandson in making it real and personal while still teaching a rather abstract lesson for this young’un.  I cannot, and will not, “enable” the changed philosophy of the SA.

I predict, just like the Boy Scouts before them, this will come to no good end. We may well be seeing the end of the SA.

Why give a donation to an organization that hates you and accuses you of malfeasance for things you are not responsible for?  That is not Christian orthodoxy – that’s simply political rhetoric for a specific purpose and it isn’t for the purpose of Salvation for there isn’t any in the SJW worldview; you are forever guilty and there is no redemption.

They have just started, willingly, on the path to becoming just yet another secular “social organization” trapping itself on the Government teat of “free money” – an extension of Government tied up by “strings attached”. It will be that money that will drive it going forward.

**********************

Bernie Sanders:

• Bernie Sanders (former Socialist Mayor of Burlington, VT, Socialist Congressman and current Senator from Vermont, and current Democrat (Socialist) candidate for President:

SANDERS TO CHARITIES: DROP DEAD”

For the kickoff of the 40th annual Chittenden County United Way fund-raising drive in Burlington, Vt., the sponsors considered themselves fortunate to have as guests Mayor Bernard Sanders of Burlington and Gov. Richard Snelling of Vermont. . .”I don’t believe in charities,” said Mayor Sanders, bringing a shocked silence to a packed hotel banquet room. The Mayor, who is a Socialist, went on to question the ”fundamental concepts on which charities are based” and contended that government, rather than charity organizations, should take over responsibility for social programs.

And now, with his Build Back Better (and Biden thinks it’s HIS legislation) bill, Sanders IS crowding out real charities from Civil Society. What better way than to tie them to Government tax monies?

The post For the First Time in Years, I Simply Walked past the Salvation Army Kettle … appeared first on Granite Grok.

Missionaries from Wokeistan have been preaching it for years. You need to decolonize Thanksgiving. You know, apologize for being the indigenous relatives of those who conquered those indigenous people who came before them.

A process of genocide, slavery, and renewal that is as old as human habitation on this or any continent. Their faux-reflection of white guilt projected on others to advance a political agenda.

It’s something of an intellectual circle-jerk with “experts” recruiting ground troops to sell a flawed (or at least incomplete) progressive narrative about the past—one whose irony is lost on them.

Their mission today is itself, a cultural conquest with a body count. Just ask anyone who has died from The Jab, killed themself in forced isolation, overdosed on an opioid carried across the open southern border, or during a riot, or some other expression of Progress.

The Political Left is reimaging the American Constitutional Republic. It is rescinding the rights, property, and persons of its ancestors.

Denying the existence of borders or laws that interfere with their plan and taking from us the fruits of our labors. Robbing us through policy, denying basic resources by making them unaffordable, and introducing toxins through fear or force into our bodies.

Not flattering it is.

People born on these lands for generations are being labeled as second-class citizens, and some are dying. Their culture, erased.

The idea of the individual before the state is being beaten out of them or at least their children to create a new world in the new world that looks alarmingly like the one our ancestors left to come here and start over.

There is, of course, no new world left on this planet to which we might escape this recent tyranny. And I doubt they’ll pander to us by allowing autonomous reservations on which we might reside. Their cleansing is political and absolute and if allowed to continue will deny every one of every race or creed – except for a handful of elites – even the most basic rights.

If anything, we should decolonize that.

The post Did You Decolonize Your Thanksgiving? (How about Decolonizing THIS, Instead?) appeared first on Granite Grok.