Tag: opinion

TBT^2: Climate Hysteria Robs Us of Joy

The Portly PoliticoLeave a comment

Talk about a forgotten post:  I wrote this post way back in 2019, then reblogged it in 2020, and haven’t thought about it since.

When you’ve written and/or edited blog posts for going on 1430 consecutive days, it’s easy to forget some of the pieces you’ve written.  It’s one reason why it’s so foolish to crucify public intellectuals and other personalities for misguided tweets or ancient blog posts.  The nature of the medium is to produce, produce, produce—a constant churning of content.  That doesn’t mean we should be irresponsible with our words, but that it’s easy to forget old posts and arguments.

What brought this post to mind was a comment from the Quora contributor whose answer to a question inspired this post.  He commented over Thanksgiving and asked that I remove his name from the post, which I did.

Here was his comment in full:

I’m the one you’re quoting in this piece, and the connection you’re trying to make is utter nonsense. If you’d like me to explain the difference between trying to drink the ocean and altering the CO2 content of the atmosphere, I’d be happy to do so, but given the utter lack of scientific understanding displayed here, I’m guessing you wouldn’t care.

As a scientist, I’m offended that you’re peddling this kind of misinformation, and using my name to do it. As a Christian, I’m offended that you’re invoking the name of deity (and a diametrically wrong reading of scripture), to argue in favor of ignorance and lack of responsibility.

If you’re going to sell this kind of garbage, kindly leave my name out of it.

I respectfully disagree.  I think the poster missed the point of my piece.  Obviously, drinking from the ocean is not perfectly analogous to pumping carbon dioxide into the atrmosphere, but the two do seem related:  if we meaningfully affect sea levels by taking a collective drink from the ocean, it seems unlikely that we can meaningfully affect the ozone layer.

But the comment proves my point:  here’s a man so enslaved to the dogmatism of scientific materialism, he’s spending his Thanksgiving calling people stupid online.

I mean, I’m no scientist, and I probably am stupid about a lot of things, but I also didn’t shut down the global economy and civil society for two years and demand people trust my authority because I wear a lab coat.  My whole life I’ve heard that “science is our religion now” (probably true) and that “scientists are the new high priests of society.”

Well, they’re doing a pretty lousy job of it.  I wonder how many Westerners will freeze to death this winter because our priestly caste demands we bow obsequiously to Mother Gaia?  If questioning their dogmatic faith is “misinformation,” then I am proud spreader of the same.

With that, here is “TBT: Climate Hysteria Robs Us of Joy“:

Read More »

You’ll Get Everything and Not Like It

The Portly Politico9 Comments

Being one of three brothers who came of age in the 1990s—the golden age of watching ribald, edited-for-television comedies on basic cable—I was constantly exposed to humorous quips and one-liners from hilarious movies.  One perennial favorite was the raunchy (again, edited for television) comedy classic Caddyshack (1980), about a bunch of blue-collar kids working at a tony country club’s golf course (and Bill Murray trying to blow up a gopher).

My brothers and I still reference one brief but oft-quoted scene:

Judge Smails irate handling of his ingrate nephew is a classic, and something I have probably said to a student.  My older brother loves saying it to my younger brother’s kids, who, while not rotten, and definitely spoiled (a good bit by their Uncle Portly).

My older nephew, is nearly six, likes to invert the phrase, shouting at his other uncle, “You’ll get everything and not like it.”  It’s one of his many (unintentionally?) Zen utterances.

I was contemplating this amusing bit of familial banter on the way to work yesterday.  My sweet little nephew is right—we Westerners do have everything—and we’re miserable!

Read More »

SubscribeStar Saturday: Considering Secession

The Portly PoliticoLeave a comment

Today’s post is a SubscribeStar Saturday exclusive.  To read the full post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more.  For a full rundown of everything your subscription gets, click here.

It seems as though I post about “the s-word”—secession—about once a year (2019, 2020, 2021), and always on Saturdays (two of those posts are behind paywalls for a reason; it’s amazing how charging a buck for something on the Internet is the best way to ensure no one ever sees it).

The recent, abysmal midterm elections got me thinking about the topic again, but what really got the juices flowing was this map my brother forwarded to me:

Secession Sentiment

The map comes from this post at Bright Line Watch, an organization that—so far as I can tell—gauges how the health of “our democracy,” to use the parlance the Left loves so well (it’s pedantic to point out, but we’re a constitutionally-limited federal representative republic with democratic mechanisms—at least, we used to be—not a democracy).  Like most such outfits, I suspect they are institutionally Leftist, but in this case, I don’t think ideology infects their numbers.

Note that 66% of Republicans in the South support secession into a new regional union, spanning from Texas to Virginia (I’d say let’s stop at the border between South and North Carolina, but that’s just me), as do 50% of Independents.  Only 20% of Democrats do, but that makes sense—they’d probably not much like being in a Southern Union dominated by conservatives.

I do think it’s a tad far-fetched to think that 66% of Southern Republicans pine for secession.  Most Republicans I know are still flag-waving Boomer types who worship Abraham Lincoln (what I was until just a few years ago).

Still, (allegedly) 44% of Southerners supporting the idea of breaking out into a thirteen-State union (the old Confederate States of America, plus Oklahoma and Kentucky) is ridiculously high.  It only takes a dedicated minority of 20% to shape policy and push change at a societal level (thus the concepts of the “Silent Majority” versus the “Noisy Minority”), so 44% is more than double that threshold.

Does it mean anything?  Is America headed for The Civil War II?

Disclaimer: I do not want or advocate for a violent revolution; I am merely exploring an issue of growing interest in our fractured political times.  The restoration of true federalism is the preferable answer, but barring that, a peaceful separation of the States could—not necessarily is—another possible outcome that prevents widespread violence and continued tyranny at the national level.

To read the rest of this post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more.

Trumparion Rising

The Portly Politico4 Comments

It’s official:  God-Emperor Donaldus Magnus is running for President in 2024.  It’s a Thanksgiving Miracle!

We all knew this announcement was coming, but making it official seals the deal and ends any lingering speculation.

Here’s another announcement of far less significance or magnitude, but one of importance to yours portly:  The Portly Politico officially and formally endorses President Donald J. Trump in the Republican primaries and for President of the United States.

Read More »

SubscribeStar Saturday: Floozies

The Portly Politico2 Comments

Today’s post is a SubscribeStar Saturday exclusive.  To read the full post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more.  For a full rundown of everything your subscription gets, click here.

Ah, women.  Can’t live with them, can’t live without them.

Literally—without women, the human race would cease to exist.  That many of them are shirking their God-given gift to do so—and a disturbing chunk of those want the Molochian freedom to slaughter their own children—does not bode well for the future of humanity, at least not in the West.

Modern women have bought into a narrative that the path to true fulfilment lies in eschewing marriage and motherhood in favor of a career in graphic design.  Rather than tending to their man and their children, they’ve been duped into thinking it is somehow better to keep some strange man’s calendar, or to dedicate their most (re)productive years to maintaining the social media accounts for some megacorporation.

Of course, men—who perhaps shortsightedly permitted such rights to be extended to the fairer sex—bear all the blame for when things go awry.  There are “no good men” left, meaning something equivalent to “there are no men earning six-figure salaries who are willing to wife me up after spending my twenties riding the carousel of one-night stands and non-committal flings.”  Some men take advantage of this sexually-liberated situation to bed unsuspecting floozies, but many of those same women believe they’re “living their best life” by engaging in multiple sexual liaisons with strange, predatory men.

But expecting women to recognize their folly and to restore themselves and our culture is unreasonable.  As Jack Nicholson’s character said in 1997’s As Good as It Gets, when asked how he writes women so well:  “I think of a man, and I take away reason and accountability.”

In that same film, however, the same character tells former babe Helen Hunt “You make me want to be a better man.”  Do modern day floozies still inspire that drive to improve, to build, to conquer?  Forget Helen Hunt; are there are any Helens of Troy out there?

To read the rest of this post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more.

Ponty Pans: Halloween Kills (2021)

The Portly Politico25 Comments

Halloween might be over—noooooooo!—but the Halloween film franchise will never die—or End, as the latest installment claims.  If you’re like Ponty and myself, you try to watch at least the 1978 John Carpenter classic at least once a year, preferably on Halloween.

Unlike Ponty, I haven’t seen the plethora of sequels, besides—of course—Halloween II (1981) and the unusual Halloween III: Season of the Witch.  I’ve also seen the “soft reboots” since 2018, thought I haven’t seen Halloween Ends (2022) yet.

As Ponty points, I, like many others, will.  I’ll also see Halloween Ends Again or whatever comes out next.  Heck, I’ll probably see Halloween Ends Again III: Season of the Witch: The Musical, with an original score by Andrew Lloyd Webber, including that annoying Silver Shamrock jingle.  These franchises know how to hook in suckers like yours portly, who will never hesitate to drop a $1.25 RedBox coupon to sample some tasty trash.

But I digress.  Ponty asked to take a stab—no pun intended—at reviewing 2021’s Halloween Kills, a film I reviewed last November.  Ponty assiduously avoided my review, so it’s interesting (though not entirely surprising) that we walked away with some similar reflections on the film.  “Evil dies tonight!”—ugh.  How could anyone miss that braying mantra?

Regardless, Ponty’s review goes far deeper than my own, delivered with his own brand of acerbic and longsuffering wit.

On a lighter note, he also includes some pictures from his and Tina’s Halloween festivities.  Well done on the decorations, Tina!

With that, here is Ponty’s review of 2021’s Halloween Kills:

Read More »

Myersvision: Eye on Idaho

The Portly Politico32 Comments

I’ve been clamoring for some beefy Bigfoot footage c/o our very own Audre Myers, and she’s satiated my cravings for all things cryptozoological—for now.  If ever there were a better creature to represent manly, protein-rich snack foods, it would be Bigfoot—the perfect, hairy spokescritter for beef jerky.

Perhaps our insatiable lust for marketing is one reason why the great ape-man has been so aloof.  Why reveal yourself to the modern world, a world in which everything, including one’s own identity, is a commodity to be bought, sold, traded, collateralized, and mortgaged?  Better to pee naked and free in the forest than to put on a tie and punch in at eight o’clock for a shift in the cubiclized salt mines.

I imagine Bigfoot would be put to use doing more blue-collar work—lifting heavy objects, for example.  But perhaps Bigfoot is smarter than we realize, if he’s managed to conceal himself from us for so long.

The other, obvious alternative—that he does not exist—is one I’d rather not entertain.  Although dear Audre alleges that I like “to gently tease… and poke” her because of her “98% belief in bigfoot,” my interest in the topic—and my interest in her interest in the topic—is entirely sincere.  Audre is a fascinating individual; her nearly-complete belief in Bigfoot is one of the qualities I find to be the most interesting about her!

But I digress.  Audre’s shared up some tantalizing Bigfoot footage, straight outta Idaho.  Read on:

Read More »

SubscribeStar Saturday: Disappointment

The Portly Politico10 Comments

Today’s post is a SubscribeStar Saturday exclusive.  To read the full post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more.  For a full rundown of everything your subscription gets, click here.

Well, the midterm elections have come and gone, and my primary reaction is bitter disappointment.

I’d been tepid about the elections this year, barely taking notice of them, but allowed myself to fall for the “red wave” hype.  In a sane world, that should have happened—a major backlash against inflation and insanity.

Instead, we have a brain-dead automaton in the United States Senate and a lean Republican majority in the House—a majority, I fear, that will be ultimately meaningless.  At the time of writing, the balance in the Senate itself is questionable, and the Democrats may even walk away controlling it—completely the opposite of what we all thought would happen.

I was a fool to get my hopes up about national politics.  Even had the Republicans taken huge majorities, what would have been the result?  Would anything have substantially changed?

Perhaps with time I’ll take a more measured response to events, but right now, it seems like our national republic is a joke, and the American people are addicted to government largesse and cultural degradation.  We don’t want to improve, and we don’t want to be free.  We want to be children, and children can’t govern themselves.

To read the rest of this post, subscribe to my SubscribeStar page for $1 a month or more.

Election Day 2022

The Portly Politico15 Comments

Well, here it is—Election Day 2022.  The much-vaunted midterms have arrived, and it looks like it’s going to be a pretty good day for Republicans.

I’ll admit, I’ve been tuned out from and burned out on politics of late, and while I’m optimistic about today’s results for Republicans, I’m a tad disillusioned with the state of electoral politics generally.  Will a “red wave” result in some meaningful reform this time around, or will GOP Establishment types wrangle the feisty upstarts and neutralize the MAGA Wing?

I’m not a “doomer” by any stretch—I sincerely hope for the latter, and I think it is the future of the Republican Party, if the GOP hopes to survive as a viable political party.  History, however, is not an encouraging indicator.

That said, a sweeping Republican victory is, by any measure, vastly preferable to a sweeping Democratic one.  At worst, I know a Republican House and Senate won’t screw things up further, and may make some marginal improvements; but a Democratic House and Senate, at worst, will double-down on the current insanity of lawlessness and moral relativism.

Read More »