Tuesday, 16 February 2016

By on February 16th, 2016 in business, personal, technology

11:32 – More sleet and freezing rain came in yesterday afternoon and through the night, but not enough more to matter. Our mail ran late this morning, but it was the replacement guy delivering on the Tuesday after a Monday holiday, so that was expected. The garbage pickup service didn’t run yesterday, but they’ll get here eventually.

I just closed my Stamps.com account. It’s a PITA to use their software, and with USPS Click-N-Ship now supporting Regional Rate boxes again at the Commercial Base Pricing, I wouldn’t save enough money with Stamps.com to offset the $16/month fee.

The Lenovo Core i7 micro-tower is setup and running fine under Windows 10. When I get a spare moment, I’ll pop the lid, disconnect the Windows drive, install a new hard drive, and install Linux Mint. I’ll just leave the original hard drive in the unit, where I can find it if I ever need to run Windows again.

I did pull three DVDs of the original Windows installation, or at least I think I did. I was expecting each restore/recovery set to span more than one DVD+R disc, but each set fit on one DVD with something like 1 GB to spare. I have no clue where to find the activation key or whatever they call it now. I expected at least a sticker on the system unit, but there isn’t one. Search around in Windows, all I found listed was a long string of all X’s and hyphens, with only the last few characters being a part of the actual key. Have I ever mentioned how much I hate Microsoft?


94 Comments and discussion on "Tuesday, 16 February 2016"

  1. OFD says:

    Rest assured there’s a way somehow to find or bypass whatever “activation” keys might be on that o.s. I haven’t been interested enough to find out and won’t ever be “upgrading” to 10.

    “Have I ever mentioned how much I hate Microsoft?”

    +1,000

    If you wanna ratchet up that hate, try working as a help desk drone at an exclusively Windows site for a few weeks. I suppose it keeps a bunch of sys admins in jobs, though.

  2. Richard says:

    Bob,

    So obviously you bought a Lenovo PC. Did you have any pause with buying from Lenovo because of their the backdoor history or Chinese ownership?

    Thanks,
    Rich

  3. DadCooks says:

    The activation key is hard coded into the BIOS of all new computers, to be there forever and a day. In fact even one of my 4-year old laptops has the Windows 7 Pro Key hard coded into the BIOS, that may have been one of the first years that Microsoft and the OEMs started doing that.

  4. Robert Bruce Thompson says:

    Re: Lenovo

    I’m aware that it’s a Chinese company, but then anything I could buy (or build) would have a high percentage of Chinese components, so what’s the difference?

  5. Miles_Teg says:

    So, is Mint the distro of choice nowadays?

  6. Robert Bruce Thompson says:

    It’s mine, anyway.

  7. Lynn says:

    Alice’s list of people to visit in bad times:
    http://dilbert.com/strip/2015-12-19

  8. Lynn says:

    Scott Adams says that Hillary may have had Scalia killed:
    http://blog.dilbert.com/post/139421165806/scalia-and-the-pillow

  9. MrAtoz says:

    Scott Adams says that Hillary may have had Scalia killed

    In the blog he says just the opposite.

  10. DadCooks says:

    WRT “Scott Adams says that Hillary may have had Scalia killed:”

    As I interpret Scott Adams writings the last paragraph says it all. His pattern hold true in this case.

    There is no way that I will ever be convinced that Scalia was not helped to the Pearly Gates. There are way too many coincidences. The latest talk is that he is being cremated which is something that as an Old School Catholic, who rejected the liberalisations of Vatican II, he would not have allowed.

    Think for a minute how Field Marshall Erwin Rommel met his end.

  11. OFD says:

    Rommel was given the option.

    “His grave can be found in Herrlingen, a short distance west of Ulm. For decades after the war on the anniversary of his death, veterans of the Africa campaign, including former opponents, would gather at Rommel’s tomb in Herrlingen.” (Wikipedia article)

    We’ll never know about Scalia one way or the other, obviously. Cui bono?

  12. Ray Thompson says:

    I have no clue where to find the activation key or whatever they call it now.

    It is either in the BIOS or is stored on MS server’s as a digital entitlement. There are no keys for Windows 10 for people that have upgraded from W7 or W8/8.1. The install creates a digital signature of your system and that becomes known to Microsoft. If you ever install again the same digital key is generated and compared against what is stored in Microsoft servers. No one know what happens if you replace too many components. I know that Microsoft considers a new motherboard a new computer and requires a new activation key.

  13. Lynn says:

    I have no clue where to find the activation key or whatever they call it now. I expected at least a sticker on the system unit, but there isn’t one. Search around in Windows, all I found listed was a long string of all X’s and hyphens, with only the last few characters being a part of the actual key. Have I ever mentioned how much I hate Microsoft?

    That was a one shot activation key. To reactivate, you will need to call MS and get the key, or maybe a new one. I have heard that they will eventually give you a new key after some threats or harassment.

    This is why I buy retail versions of Windows. Except for mine, which is a MSDN version.

  14. Lynn says:

    Scott Adams says that Hillary may have had Scalia killed

    In the blog he says just the opposite.

    Scott Adams says MAY. He thinks that Scalia died of natural causes. But, no one will ever know now.

    I have had a major heart attack (and severe heart distress on a frequent basis). You do not put a pillow or anything on your face. You are too busy thinking about how to get more air in the system. You cannot take deep breaths because the pain is so bad and expanding your rib cage makes it infinitely worse. My left arm hurt so bad that it was almost immovable but I got it up in the air when I was shuffling into the ER so I could get more air in my chest.

  15. Sam Olson says:

    I’ve been using “The Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder” for many years now. Here’s the link …

    https://www.magicaljellybean.com/keyfinder/ProductKeyFinder

    The Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder is a freeware utility that retrieves your Product Key (cd key) used to install windows from your registry. It also has a community-updated configuration file that retrieves product keys for many other applications. Another feature is the ability to retrieve product keys from unbootable Windows installations.

    If you need something more powerful, please compare Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder with a wonderful tool called “Recover Keys”. This advanced product key finder is not free, however it doesn’t cost much for what it does.

    One of the best things about it, is that it’s still FREE !!

    Of course, Microsnots stores it in the Window’s “Registry”; where else could they put it so you would NEVER find it in a million YEARS !! Once you have it via MJB Key-finder, you can always use regedit to find out where they put it !!

    P.S. That Scott Adams blog-post is totally hilarious !! Thanks for sharing Lynn. If you’d like to learn how to possibly reverse your heart ailments check out Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn at the Cleveland Clinic. The name of his book is …

    Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease: The Revolutionary, Scientifically Proven, Nutrition-Based Cure
    Paperback – January 31, 2008
    by Caldwell B. Esselstyn Jr.

    His website is …

    http://www.dresselstyn.com

    He also has lots of excellent videos up on YouTube.com.
    Just do a search. His program really works !! Similar to Dr. Dean Ornish’s program. They both claim that heart disease is almost totally preventable !! And in many cases is actually reversible !! I bought both of their books years ago. I’m 66 and take absolutely no meds. And my bp is 115/70. Of course I’ve been vegetarian/vegan for most of my adult life.

  16. Lynn says:

    Here is the laugh of the day. A person using a cracked version of our software in India is asking for technical support. Apparently, it keeps on crashing on him.

    The audacity of some people!

  17. Lynn says:

    BTW, my accountant’s 74 year old uncle died of a heart attack on Monday while shoveling snow in St. Louis. I guess that they are serious about that warning.

  18. Lynn says:

    “Hard Drive Reliability Review for 2015”
    https://www.backblaze.com/blog/hard-drive-reliability-q4-2015/

    “By the end of 2015, the Backblaze datacenter had 56,224 spinning hard drives containing customer data. These hard drives reside in 1,249 Backblaze Storage Pods. By comparison 2015 began with 39,690 drives running in 882 Storage Pods. We added 65 Petabytes of storage in 2015 give or take a Petabyte or two. Not only was 2015 a year of growth, it was also a year of drive upgrades and replacements.”

    Uh oh, the WDC 2 TB and 3 TB drive failure rate is climbing. And the WDC 6 TB is scary also. I own three of those.

  19. Lynn says:

    If you’d like to learn how to possibly reverse your heart ailments check out Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn at the Cleveland Clinic.

    I wish. My heart condition is probably congenital. Probably from birth. My right coronary artery is only two inches long. It should be eight inches long. So, I do not get any freshly oxygenated blood to the back side of my heart. Which, is dead.

  20. Sam Olson says:

    @Lynn ~ Yeah, congenital conditions can be the occasional exceptions to the rule.

    Both Dr. Dean Ornish and Dr. Caldwell Esselstyn probably learned how to prevent and especially reverse heart disease from Nathan Pritikin, who ‘cured’ his through diet. Here’s a link to a fascinating live interview of Nathan Pritikin by Dr. John McDougall …

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2rzyZQRGbik

    Nathan Pritikin interviewed by Dr John McDougall

    Published on May 31, 2014

    Back in 1982 Nathan Pritikin and Doctor McDougall discuss the benefits of the 80-10-10 Plant-Based, High starch low fat diet. 32 years later, scientifically proven correct, the general public is still completely unaware that the Standard American Diet is the cause for all the major diseases.

    There is a whole new generation of nutritional doctors out there now who I think are pretty close to the truth.

    The new paradigm is 80-10-10 — 80% carbs, 10% protein, and 10% fat. The SAD (Standard American Diet) diet is probably more like 40% carbs, 30% protein, and 30% fat !! A diet guaranteed to cause all of our diseases of civilization/affluence. Then there are the paleo-diet folks. And a few others, of course.

    P.S. Notice that Nathan Pritikin was not a medical doctor !! But he was a brilliant man, and quickly realized the truth about how to reverse his heart disease using diet !! Watch the YouTube video, it’s an eye-opener !!

  21. Ray Thompson says:

    That was a one shot activation key.

    Nope. I have activated three times on such a system without issues. Never had to call Microsoft on any of the activations. This was over the course of a couple of years.

    I’ve been using “The Magical Jelly Bean Keyfinder” for many years now. Here’s the link …

    That only finds the keys in case you have not written them down. The actual key must still activate against a MS server to determine if the key is valid. It is not just a checksum value, but something that must exist in some database managed by Microsoft.

    You will also find that all systems that converted to W10 from W7 or W8/8.1 all have the exact same activation key.

  22. pcb_duffer says:

    [snip] My right coronary artery is only two inches long. It should be eight inches long. [snip]

    That’s what killed Pete Maravich, the professional basketball player, at the age of 40, and a woman who was very close to me at the age of 49.

    I assume you can still buy licenses of Win10 independent of a computer; I haven’t had a store bought desktop computer since the early 1990s.

  23. DadCooks says:

    What an absolute embarrassment, Obuttwad is doing a presser. He is stumbling and stammering, not answering the questions. He is talking nonsense. He needs to be put in a straight jack and hauled off to the looney bin. He has the face of a little boy caught with a dead puppy.

  24. OFD says:

    We don’t have no stinkin’ convoluted activation keys in Linux. No license. No serial numbers. No registrations. Costs nothing. And distros like Mint are virtually indistinguishable now from M$ desktops and laptops; nice colorful GUI’s with lotsa pixels, and codecs included for all the media pixels, too.

    I take that back, partially; yes, you need a “license” key of sorts with Red Hat, that is, if you wanna do the updates, upgrades, patches, and security stuff and have tech support. If you can’t or don’t wanna pay for that, you have CentOS and Scientific Linux, both downstream clones of Red Hat.

    Reading all this jive about the usual Winblows hoops to jump through and knowing they go outta their way to leave back doors and spyware on their machines, and their attitude that they’re gonna squeeze every last friggin’ dime out of the market when they already have a corner on it and have for years; how many billions are enough??

  25. OFD says:

    “…Obuttwad is doing a presser.”

    About what, Scalia? World War IV in Syria? Crumbling infrastructure? Tanking economy? Mass invasions from south and east of peeps “not like us”?

    Flags at half-staff around here today. Of course now we lower them for foreigners, too. So our best SC justice is at the same level now as some derps who got themselves massacred somewhere.

  26. DadCooks says:

    Obuttwad did say Scalia gets 30 days of American Flag at half-staff. His seat at SCOTUS is all draped in black as well as the door to his office. Obuttwad is also going to appoint someone and make a big stink if they are not immediately confirmed.

    Bring it on.

    Just like Rommel, Scalia will get full honors. Unlike Rommel, Scalia didn’t get a choice.

    I keep flashing back to scenes in the Godfather.

  27. Lynn says:

    [snip] My right coronary artery is only two inches long. It should be eight inches long. [snip]

    That’s what killed Pete Maravich, the professional basketball player, at the age of 40, and a woman who was very close to me at the age of 49.

    I survived that first heart attack which means I will probably survive the next 7 or 8 before I go down for the count. Ol’ Pistol Pete did not have a right coronary artery at all. His left coronary artery was over a 1/2 inch inside diameter.

    The UK actually ran a study of several hundred people over twenty years with missing right coronary arteries. One dude lasted to the age of 83. The formula was either died of the first heart attack (at age 15 to 75???) or had a series of heart attacks over the years. I had my first heart attack at age 49 which sucked for longevity.

    My big problem now is that I have intermittent tachycardia and atrial fibrillation. We’ve got the tachycardia shut down via a nasty drug (rythmol) but the atrial fibrillation is getting worse. I had it a couple of weeks ago for 24 hours which makes me short of breath and just a lazy old dude. My electrocardiologist wants to do an heart ablation but I want to wait until I have constant atrial fibrillation. Something about sticking a scope up one groin artery and a cattle prod up the other groin artery is not very attractive to me. The wife says I am a chicken.

    Cluck, cluck.

  28. Lynn says:

    Obuttwad is also going to appoint someone and make a big stink if they are not immediately confirmed.

    The rumor I saw was that Loretta Lynch is probably going to be his nominee. If confirmed, she would be the first black woman on SCOTUS.
    http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/scotus-analyst-tom-goldstein-loretta-lynch-most-likely-candidate-replace-n518916

  29. OFD says:

    We desperately need a black communist female on SCOTUS. I’m all for it. Load it up, pack it good. And by all means, let’s get Cankles into the WH; she’s not long for this world, is my prediction, and the VP choice could be interesting. We desperately also need to know who the next WH sock puppet will be.

    Bring it. Let’s get this show started. More Murkan derps need to aware and angry. And get off their asses. Right now there are too many still fat, dumb and happy.

  30. MrAtoz says:

    We desperately need a black communist female on SCOTUS.

    I hear “The Blind Sheik” is available. Why not go all in.

  31. OFD says:

    Absolutely, MrAtoz; I dig the way you think, man! Hell, we’ve got Protestants, Catholics and Jews on the Court but never had a musloid; beeyooteeful, baby! Allahoo Ahbah or whatever!

  32. DadCooks says:

    Now all we need is someone from the flaming LGBT+59 more persuasion.

    Wait a minute, since there are now 63 identified genders the SCOTUS is going to have to be a lot bigger.

    BTW, every time I see SCOTUS I think scrotum. /insert joke here/

  33. RickH says:

    @Lynn …. I’ve had ‘lone paroxysmal atrial fibrillation’ for years, probably caused by sleep apnea. Right now, well-controlled with Flecanide, plus one full strength aspirin per day.

    I get the occasional episode, usually lasting up to 4-6 hours, no pattern to the startup. Not racing as much, just irregular. I take a Metopolol (sp?) when an episode happens to help calm things down.

    The episodes are tiring. And cause my lymph nodes (under chin) to be a bit sore. But livable, at the moment.

  34. OFD says:

    “Now all we need is someone from the flaming LGBT+59 more persuasion.”

    Unless I miss my guess, at least one or two of the current members of SCOTUS fit that category, so yeah, we gotta get a musloid next. Is Huma available? Can she unwind her stems from around you-know-who’s head for a minute to answer?

  35. MrAtoz says:

    Can she unwind her stems from around you-know-who’s head for a minute to answer?

    Maybe that’s why Cankles is having those coughing fits.

  36. dkreck says:

    Obama knows he won’t get a nominee past the senate. He will however blame it all on the the republicans; that’s what he did this afternoon.(he also said his golf score was classified. HO HO HO. how droll) The republicans cannot let him. McCooCoo just played his hand too soon. Let Baraako name some one. Then Bork Bork Bork… rinse, repeat.
    It quacks like a lame duck…

  37. OFD says:

    With any luck she’ll be smothered in the throes of passion or have a damn stroke/haht attack.

    I keep saying, I don’t think Field Marshal Rodham is gonna last too long; she’s clearly got a chit-load of stuff wrong with her, medically, and no doubt psychologically. Who will be the VP in a Cankles administration??

    In terms of the Roman Empire, are we now in the Galba-Otho-Vitellieus stage? Waiting for Vespasian?

  38. Lynn says:

    “Why switch to Windows 10 or a Mac when you can use Linux Mint 17.3 instead?”
    http://www.zdnet.com/article/why-switch-to-windows-10-or-a-mac-when-you-can-use-linux-mint-17-3-instead/

    “My buddy David Gewirtz recently wrote about the question of whether you should move from Windows 7 to Windows 10 or a Mac. I have another suggestion: Linux. Specifically Linux Mint 17.3, Rosa, with the Cinnamon desktop.”

  39. Chuck W. says:

    So, is Mint the distro of choice nowadays?

    I am moving away from it, and already have CentOS installed on the replacement for my now dead 9 year-old Asus dual-core laptop that served me through most of the Germany years. YMMV, and it really depends on your needs. I have extraordinary audio and video needs above that of almost everyone else, and Mint has been an increasing problem that I just do not want to deal with anymore. During 2015, there were virtually no updates coming down the pike; that has changed since the end-of-year holidays, and the updates are now flooding in. Mint almost looked like abandonedware for a while. Until last month, video editor Cinelerra would not work from the time I upgraded from Mint 15 to Mint 17. 17 has been a ride in reverse, as many things that worked in 15, ceased working in 17. The file manager Nemo lost several features as they rebuilt it from scratch for 17, and still does not work as well as what 15 had. For instance, when I try to open up the radio automation drive with 40,000 WAVE files in it, Nemo takes a good 5 minutes to display the results. And navigating in that list is often slow.

    In Mint’s support, I will say that I basically have loved the Cinnamon interface (although most distros are coming together and looking alike). For a couple years, Mint has felt to me like the next natural evolving of WinXP. It never dumped the Start Menu as did so many others—including Ubuntu for a while.

    Another real show-stopper for me is Mint’s refusal to get Evolution up-to-date, which is a complaint in nearly every comment about it in the Software Manager’s repository listing. Google changed the authentication method for Google Contacts over 2 years ago, and although Evolution’s current build swung with the change and interfaces fine, the Mint repository version of Evolution has not been updated since Google finally dropped all support for the old method (almost a year ago) and is at v3.10.4 while the latest stable Evolution hit v3.18.x way back in September. I can’t like that, because I have been a heavy user of M$ Outlook since its first release, and Evolution is otherwise a very fine clone of Outlook. Since most of the world that I deal with uses Outlook and sends various appointments that Evolution automatically schedules in my Calendar, I am going to be sticking with it.

    There is only one program in Windows that I miss, and that is the fork of the old Gulliverki video player, now known as MPC-HC (Media Player Classic—Home Cinema). MPC-HC is a very lightweight, flawless piece of work that will instantly switch from normal speed to slower speeds, play in forward or reverse at any speed including frame-by-frame, zoom in and out on any video scene, and saves and remembers configurations much better than what most people around me seem to use: VLC. VLC is an open-source program of the French. It will not zoom, takes forever to switch speeds—even on a fast computer with lots of dedicated video memory,—will not go in reverse at any speed except frame-by-frame which takes forever in reverse, will not remember that I want subtitles NOT displaying as my default, and has very limited shortcut abilities.

    However, VLC will do a ton of things most people are not aware of. See Lifehacker’s article.

    http://lifehacker.com/the-best-hidden-features-of-vlc-1654434241

    It will act as a podcast catcher, file format converter, and will record from a variety of sources, including a live stream, your desktop, or your computer’s webcam. I use the Android version of VLC for streaming audio in the car, so I do not have to put up with Tune-In’s commercials. Which leads to the question—how do you get the URL’s to put into VLC?

    Up until lately, it has been difficult to get the actual URL’s of streams you may have been listening to or watching. That situation is improving. Although I use Net Video Hunter for downloading media files when browsing with Firefox, I have recently re-installed the Firefox plug-in Video Download Helper. They now have a menu option to ‘copy the stream link location to clipboard’ which will allow you to feed that to VLC or download the video/audio file (if not streaming) by just pasting it into the browser address bar. A complicated process using Wireshark and rtmpdump (for Linux) is available here

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8PuUnQCS7DQ

    Firebug (Firefox add-on) can also be used; Firebug displays the current page HTML and you hover over the GET command and it will display the link location, but you have to be able to read HTML and find the right GET command (there are usually dozens).

    So in short, I do not recommend against Mint, and have loved everything about it until the failings with media applications cropped up in Mint 17, but my mileage is over territory most people are not seriously involved in. The Cinnamon desktop just cannot be beat if you really liked XP.

    Meanwhile, Google is clearly driving the look of menu interfaces. If you have an Android phone, you know what I mean, with your current position indicated at the top with a click on an upper-left arrow displaying menu choices down the left side. I am beginning to see that menu structure in other places on the computer, so I suspect it won’t be long before computer programs start adopting it. All my Android apps have switched to the new menu interface with the GnuCash expense logging program having been the last to switch over the year-end holidays.

  40. SteveF says:

    Maybe that’s why Cankles is having those coughing fits.

    No, that can’t be it. The peachfish doesn’t have any bones to get caught in your throat.

  41. Ray Thompson says:

    Who will be the VP in a Cankles administration?

    Could she chose Obutwad? Then after a few months in office resign (or croak) for health issues and then we get Obutwad for another 3+ years.

  42. MrAtoz says:

    No, that can’t be it. The peachfish doesn’t have any bones to get caught in your throat.

    How about those cobwebs, sawdust and scabs Huma has. She’s married to Weiner, ya know.

  43. OFD says:

    “The peachfish doesn’t have any bones to get caught in your throat.”

    Cankles is apparently drunk half the time so she may have been busy at the wrong orifice and caught something else in her throat.

    We’ve got Mint 17 on a Lenovo netbook as wife’s backup for her Windows 7 laptop. For that purpose, it’s fine.

    I have CentOS 7 running as a vm under VMware Workstation in one monitor while I do RH/CentOS courses on the other one.

  44. Chuck W. says:

    I have had atral fib for at least a decade (first noticed then, but I may have had it before then). In my case, I never notice it, except occasionally when I lie down to sleep if it has increased my heart rate. The doc says my case is rare as it presents no problem for me. A shock with the paddles (while I was knocked out) put things back in sync. For 90 minutes.

    Since the externally-applied shock results were so short-lived, he does not think the internal shock treatment would be any more effective, and since I really do not suffer like others do, I just take Metoprolol twice a day.

    Atral fib is a common accompaniment to sleep apnea, which I also have. As I said earlier, I suspect apnea is what did Scalia in. It is rare that seriously overweight people (which he was) do not have it. As for a pillow over his head, how many pillows were there? I have awakened with a pillow over my head in strange beds in hotels where there were multiple pillows. I figure I mistook the pillow for the covers while sleeping and pulled the pillow over me, instead of the covers.

    My guess is that Mitch McConnell finally has done himself in. The people of Kentucky wouldn’t, but he’s pretty much of an ego-centric idiot, just like Indiana’s current governor and enemy to LGBT’s. McConnell is not going to win when push comes to shove over this gridlock issue. Good riddance to a really bad egg who cares about as much for citizen wishes as Hitler did for the people he incinerated.

    You conservatives mistake where the problem is. It is among your own ranks, not with the so-called liberal opposition. As I said long ago, I have been to the future, and the European model is where this country (and the world in general) is headed—with full approval of Millennials, who will be taking over as time goes by. Resistance is useless. What is accepted as conservative “values” today have nothing to do with the conservatism of my grandparents. Today’s conservatism has brought us the TSA, increasing subjugation to authority, the loss of freedom in many areas and challenges to it in others, injustice in the justice system, and economic practice that repeatedly and quite obviously leads to the wrong results. But keep doing the same things and let’s have more of its ineffectiveness. Only brings SHTF closer sooner.

  45. OFD says:

    “Could she chose Obutwad? Then after a few months in office resign (or croak) for health issues and then we get Obutwad for another 3+ years.”

    I gather that there is some bad blood/friction between Obola and Cankles, probably with Larry Klinton in the mix there somewhere. There’s a better chance she’d appoint him to SCOTUS, but he may wanna go on out and start raking in the kinda dough that the Klintons have been scarfing up since they left the White House. To the tune of tens of millions, including from foreign powers. Apparently no one thinks that is odd or wrong or even cares. And it’s evidently occurred to very few peeps that these scum run for political office while running over their own grandmothers and infant children if necessary, for what? OK, power. But how about when they finally leave office as multi-millionaires on that crummy Congressman’s or VP’s pay all those years?

    Nope, no one cares. And no one has for a very long time in this country, because the Almighty Dollar is the highest-level deity, above even the minor goddesses Diversity and Democracy. It is the absolute duty to make as much as possible as fast as possible for as long as possible, and if the choice is between letting an orphanage, hospital or company go under and making another Roosevelt dime, a true Murkan will go for that dime every friggin’ time.

  46. MrAtoz says:

    This just totally sucks. What’s next, my home builder has to break down my front door just because the Feds say so. Microsoft has to crack my Surface Pro. At least Apple hasn’t budged on iOS 9’s default total encryption. But they probably will when the IRS threatens them. Show some balls, Apple.

    Apple must help the FBI break into an iPhone belonging to one of the killers in the San Bernardino, Calif., shootings, a federal judge ordered Tuesday.

    Tashfeen Malik and her husband, Syed Rizwan Farook, shot and killed 14 people in December. The couple later died in a gun battle with police. The iPhone was recovered from their vehicle in the aftermath of the attack.

  47. MrAtoz says:

    Here’s BlackLivesMatter at it’s finest.  Thugs at best. I’d call them Nigga’s, but Kanye West says that is a term of endearment for the rap/thug community. Since I’m WHITEY!, it’s a macro aggression if I use the term “Nigga”.

    An Iraq war veteran whose bravery inspired two statues says he was beaten by a group of teens in Washington, DC on Friday night after they approached and asked him whether ‘black lives matter’.

    Chris Marquez, a decorated US marine,  was eating in a McDonald’s when the youths walked up and started questioning him, WJLA reported yesterday. ‘I felt threatened and thought they were trying to intimidate me, so I figured I’m just going to keep to my food, eat my food and hopefully they’ll leave me alone,’ Marquez told the station.

  48. OFD says:

    “It is among your own ranks, not with the so-called liberal opposition. As I said long ago, I have been to the future, and the European model is where this country (and the world in general) is headed—with full approval of Millennials, who will be taking over as time goes by.”

    Just so we remember there are “conservatives,” as you describe above, and genuine conservatives. And I agree we’re headed to the leftwing Euro model, which has been bankrupting the southern tier over there and also let in massive swarms of barbarian scum that will eventually overrun the entire Continent. This is a different kettle of fish over here, though, with a cussed population of violent bastards armed to the teeth. Eventually enough of them will be pissed off enough to prove that resistance is not necessarily futile.

    But yes, you are certainly right about the problem being within our own ranks; as illustrated above by the difference between phony Fox Nooz neocons and country-club Repub ass-hats, and genuine conservatism as represented by our grandparents and great-grandparents, and the people at the Rockford Institute out there in Illinois and Chronicles Magazine. Further back, the late Russell Kirk and the very late Edmund Burke and the anti-Federalists. In addition to that, we have the usual squabbling, backbiting, and treachery that any political movement has, while the more disciplined commies have had things their own way all through their Long March through all our cultural institutions.

    So here we are on the ramparts; facing swarms of orcs from south and east while their temporary dhimmi allies undermine us from below and behind. We begin to fight back and hope for Gandalf and Bilbo and those elves and miners to show up anytime now….before the whole land becomes Mordor…

  49. OFD says:

    “Show some balls, Apple.”

    Doubtful. Everybody caves, when the Feds get involved and a Fed judge is in their pocket. We’re at the mercy of a criminal junta.

    “Here’s BlackLivesMatter at it’s finest.”

    Scum. I just wish to hell these animals would try this schtick with me sometime. Hit me in the head? Better make it count and I don’t get up again. I recommend a crowbar swung for deep center field by someone of substantial size from behind. Even that might not do it. In any case, I’d hopefully be watching for just this sort of attack; they only do it when they have the numbers and when it’s an ambush. Yellow fucking cowards.

  50. medium wave says:

    Out: Poly Sci, Sociology; In: Business Law, Computer Programming

    Very enlightening comments!

    Byzantine Medieval Feminist Poetry (assuming it exists) isnt something you study at home, assuming you have to read the stuff in Greek, Latin and Aramaic, with an understanding of the Christian theology, ethics, and etc., plus a decent knowledge of the ancient classics. And who knows what else. Remember, it’s full of references to Zosimus’ controversy with Isidore, and that conversely they are quite on the side of the wicked and servile passions, when it comes to particular charioteers, that sort of thing.
    They do have to read Procopius’ histories in the original, both the public ones (boring) and the secret one (not so boring).

    It’s really quite a challenging major, or at least I’d like to think so, if there were such a thing. Leave us to our fantasies.

  51. lynn says:

    “Lessons Learned: One Year After Moving to Our Bug out Location”
    http://www.theprepperjournal.com/2016/02/16/one-year-after-moving-to-our-bug-out-location/

    Sounds like way too much work for me.

  52. nick says:

    eh,

    work is hard, that’s why it’s called “work” not “play”

    country life is different from city life

    a radical change in lifestyle is disorienting

    some people don’t take this sh!t as seriously as others

    I was hoping for some specific examples. Not general whinging, which is a bit ironic since he complains about others whinging…..

    nick

  53. DadCooks says:

    Just as we have talked about RINOs for a long time we really have CINOs and DINOs. Labels mean nothing these days, other than being fightn’ words.

    Look at a person’s fruit and you will see what is really in their heart.

    I think it was George Washington that warned us against the formation of political parties. Say what you want about Our Founders, they had forethought that most people do not comprehend.

    My Uncle Fred had a bag full of names for every ethnic group. I can remember when he called a personne noire a jigaboo. Just for grins I just looked it up in the Urban Dictionary and found this as the first definition: The funniest sounding racial slur known to man. Now I know why my Uncle Fred always laughed when he said that.

    I’ll readily admit that I profile and prejudge and am at least 90% right. And so we come full circle in my thought for the morning. A bible (Matthew 5:16) phrase that I try to live by is:Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven. Also being fully aware of Matthew 7:2 For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.

  54. Dave says:

    For much of my life, I have been slowly becoming less prejudiced. Not that I was all that prejudiced to begin with. I am the son of college educated liberals. Sadly, the most significant change in my life during the Obama Administration is the reversal of this trend.

  55. OFD says:

    “It’s really quite a challenging major, or at least I’d like to think so, if there were such a thing. Leave us to our fantasies.”

    I dunno if it’s actually a college major somewhere but I would not be surprised in the least; the fembat harpies can locate “feminist” poetry in any epoch of human history, including ones that they make up out of whole cloth, from before the last Ice Age, you know, when the world was governed by a benevolent matriarchy until nasty and evil men fucked it all up.

    I actually took a course back in grad skool, had to, the slick way they manipulated “distribution requirements;” “Women of the English Renaissance.” Not hard to find a small handful of hitherto ignored women poets, playwrights and letter scribblers, a couple of them quite genuinely talented. And as for Byzantine feminist poets, look no further than Anna Comnena’s “Alexiad,”

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexiad

    During my sentence back at the grad skools, and focusing on medieval epic poetry, the Byzantine end of things was getting short shrift; maybe that’s changed by now, but yeah, you need to know Latin, Greek, and a couple of modern European languages, and be conversant in the history and culture of the Empire, not to mention Eastern Orthodox theology and practice, plus the Crusades.

    “Sadly, the most significant change in my life during the Obama Administration is the reversal of this trend.”

    And I maintain this has been by design, with malice aforethought; a national manifestation of the old Eric Berne “game” of “Let’s You and Him Fight.” Set us against each other out here, by race, ethnicity, religion and class, sit back, and enjoy the show. Working pretty well, isn’t it?

  56. SteveF says:

    If Obuttsuck wanted to start a three- or four-way race war in the US, what would he be doing differently?

  57. MrAtoz says:

    Apple shows one ball as Tim Cook says Apple will fight the judges order to hack the iPhone in San Bernardino. Yay, for now. Boo, The Mighty Trump thinks it should be hacked.

  58. MrAtoz says:

    Cankles is cackling about GOP “coded raciss terms” about not approving our Lord and Commander Ofukstik’s SCOTUS nominee. In other words, if you ain’t with her, you is a raciss!!!! The Blind Sheik for SCOTUS ™!

  59. OFD says:

    “If Obuttsuck wanted to start a three- or four-way race war in the US…”

    I think he does what he’s told, or at least does things that are approved before they’re implemented. But yeah, it’s convenient to use him as the label for what’s transpiring here. Before him the Bush crew was on the case, along with Larry Klinton, et. al. White House sock puppets.

    This year is gonna be a pisser.

  60. H. Combs says:

    In the next 10 years we will see the European model collapse as the EU commits suicide by immigration.

  61. OFD says:

    “…we will see the European model collapse as the EU commits suicide by immigration.”

    You don’t think we’re doing that here?

  62. H. Combs says:

    Not as far down the rabbit hole as the EU and we are armed whilst they are not so we may still be able to turn it around

  63. ech says:

    The new paradigm is 80-10-10 — 80% carbs, 10% protein, and 10% fat.

    There is substantial evidence that low fat, high carb diets are bad for your health. They can cause per-diabetes and heart disease. It’s what the current research is showing at the major heart centers.

  64. ech says:

    Hell, we’ve got Protestants, Catholics and Jews on the Court

    No Protestants on the court now. All went to Harvard or Yale law. All but Roberts from the east or west coast, 3 from NYC. Scalia commented on this, see Instapundit from yesterday.

  65. Robert Bruce Thompson says:

    Whatever happens, we have got
    the Maxim gun, and they have not.

  66. Robert Bruce Thompson says:

    There’s no evidence that low-fat diets are good for people, and considerable evidence that they are not. Neither is there any evidence that saturated fats are harmful, and considerable evidence that they are good for people. As I’ve said, if it tastes good (bacon!), it’s probably good for you. If it tastes bad (so-called healthy foods), it’s probably bad for you.

  67. Lynn says:

    Whatever happens, we have got the Maxim gun, and they have not.

    Pardon me for being dense but I do not understand this comment?

    Got it, you are talking about waves of illegal immigration from the middle east.

    Not gonna happen, SCOTUS Lynch is a gun grabber.

  68. Lynn says:

    BTW, I figure that Lynch will be on SCOTUS by March 15.

    The real question is, will the reversal of Heller cause a civil war in the USA?
    http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2016/02/17/randy-barnett-antonin-scalia-new-originalism-heller-second-amendment-column/80450446/

  69. dkreck says:

    Obama will get no one. He already has Kathy Bates and Senorita Meeeyor. This will be the true test of the republicans’ will to stand up to him.

    “Don’t do what I did”
    http://www.mediaite.com/tv/josh-earnest-obama-regrets-filibustering-alito-in-2006/

  70. OFD says:

    “This will be the true test of the republicans’ will to stand up to him.”

    Whoa! Stop it, you’re killin’ me here! I needed a good laff today, thanks!

    OFD figures the bastards are gonna keep pushing and pushing; they won’t be happy until they actually HAVE kicked off another civil war, apparently.

    Get yerself squared away accordingly; things could get sporty later this year.

  71. Lynn says:

    Obama has no shame. He will do what he thinks that he can get away with. It is all about the agenda and he is a gun grabber.

    BTW, I am repeating Rush Limbaugh’s radio show today. He says that the Repubs in the Senate are backpedaling already. And, he named names.
    http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2016/02/17/what_you_talkin_bout_tillis_republicans_begin_to_fold_on_scalia_s_replacement_after_just_two_days

  72. Lynn says:

    “This will be the true test of the republicans’ will to stand up to him.”

    Whoa! Stop it, you’re killin’ me here! I needed a good laff today, thanks!

    +1,000

  73. dkreck says:

    Usually I’m the biggest cynic in the room (well maybe 2nd or 3rd here). But I’m serious about this. If you have a republican senator (we’re hopeless here in California) push hard for them to stand firm. NO more judges for the left. They’ve pretty much killed Obama’s big agenda except for healthcare. He was so full of himself he never realized he could lose it in only two years. Make this last year his worst.

  74. OFD says:

    It’s too late. We can get 100 new “Repub” senators and a whole new “Repub” slate on the SCOTUS and another “Repub” in the WH and “Repubs” governing all fifty states, or is that 57, I forget, somebody phone Obola…

    Makes no diff. Game Over.

    Reason One: The national debt (the figure they admit to and the real stat)

    Reason Two: Two generations of citizen-subjects lost to the educational system, MSM and neo-Marxist socialism.

    Reason Three: Unlimited invasions from south and east continuing, which will drastically change the body politic and the society as a whole

    Reason Four: Powderkeg-in-a-pool-of-gasoline-with-our-bozo-leaders-flicking-a-Zippo-repeatedly chance daily of World War IV.

    Reason Five: Total war has been fought for decades now against the middle class here and we’ve clearly lost; our earning power is the same or worse than it was in 1970 and a dollar doesn’t buy anything much now that it could back then. My dad took care of a wife and five kids and house and car and we ate three squares, got ice cream once in a while, and decent Xmas and b-days, all on $13,000 a year. And we could walk a mile or two to skool by ourselves fearing nothing more than other kids being assholes to us. In any weather. Try any of that now.

    Rather than Obola’s worst year, he intends, with the approval and direction of his handlers, to make it his “best,” and we can see it coming now.

  75. dkreck says:

    Like I said, I’m not first here.

  76. OFD says:

    That would probably be me, I guess. Blame working for Uncle so long ago. And the cop jobs. Plus the grad skool experiences. And too much reading.

  77. DadCooks says:

    Obuttwad has a golf game on Saturday, will be unable to attend Scalia’s funeral.

    I wonder who paid for Scalia’s little trip to the “ranch”. Word is that the ranch owner picked up the whole tab including the chartered jet. This is highly irregular and actually illegal for the Supremes to accept any freebees.

  78. OFD says:

    “…will be unable to attend Scalia’s funeral.”

    Perfectly understandable; it’s a Roman Catholic funeral and they’ll use holy water there. The screams of “It burns, it burns!” would be kind of disruptive.

  79. SteveF says:

    What would be Obuttwad’s “Precious”, a goat’s colon?

  80. dkreck says:

    It burns, it burns.
    Hey that’s the line I always use when at the church and he starts tossing that around like we all need showers. Wife and daughter are good cathaholics. I’m just a heathen that has to go along sometimes. I prefer the BBQs and such. At least they drink. (fund raisers you know).

  81. OFD says:

    Does your head spin around when that water hits you? Do you spew green bile in retaliation? If not, you could become a good Catlick like wife and daughter. Wait–y’all get BBQ’s? I gotta run this by our pastor…

  82. dkreck says:

    Hell yes they do BBQ. Right now during lent KOC does fish fry every Friday night in the hall. Of course they sell beer, wine and other liquor too. All about the fund raising. Rather well off parish and they just got their first new priest in 22 years. His story of his life used to be drugs, sex and rock and roll. Still ain’t converting me.

  83. Robert Bruce Thompson says:

    Biologically, holy water is typically cleaner than raw sewage, but dirtier than typical ditch water. I sure wouldn’t let it touch my skin. Seriously.

  84. DadCooks says:

    Back when the Episcopal Church was still a real Church there was a saying that whenever 2 or 3 Episcopalians are gathered there will always be a 5th. Communion wine was always the good stuff, no gallon jugs, varied between a Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, and very occasionally a Burgundy. At church suppers even the kids were offered watered down wine.

    Our Holy Water came from the tap and was Blessed by the Bishop, that is what made it “Holy”. Every time the Bishop visited the Church he had to Bless a bunch of gallon jugs of water to “Holy-fy” it for later use.

  85. OFD says:

    “Right now during lent KOC does fish fry every Friday night in the hall.”

    Well, that’s the KOF, an RC fraternal org; still, we don’t hold with that sorta thang up here. The occasional spaghetti supper or breakfast after mass, but certainly no booze.

    “His story of his life used to be drugs, sex and rock and roll.”

    Not something to be bruited about, one would think. I’d mention it once or twice and then leave it be.

    “I sure wouldn’t let it touch my skin. Seriously.”

    I’m still here, above ground, and haven’t got sick after decades of holy wotta. Of course my skin and general self are already pretty toxic anyway.

    “… there was a saying that whenever 2 or 3 Episcopalians are gathered there will always be a 5th.”

    A jocular and perhaps borderline blasphemous parody of the prayer usually heard back then during Evening Prayer by Saint Chrysostom and Matthew 18:20.

    I do, however, remember fondly those years of the Protestant Episcopal Church of the U.S.A. and the Anglican Communion. The choirs and organists and music and beautiful liturgies (Rite I), etc., but they tossed all that in favor of uber-SJW values and the Secular City of Libturdism.

  86. SteveF says:

    At church suppers even the kids were offered watered down wine.

    As kids, we were often offered beer and wine, but that was less a religion thing than an alcoholics in the family thing. Kind of makes me question any person or group which lets kids have alcohol.

    (Actual children “kids”, not late teens “kids” or even 25-years-and-11-months “children”.)

  87. brad says:

    It’s pretty normal for kids to be offered beer and wine here. Legal drinking age is 16 for anything but spirits, which is 18. Drinking in the home before that, i.e., with parents, is a non-issue. Sure, some people do drink excessively, but it’s not a widespread problem, and all trends are downwards. Not having any sort of “forbidden fruit” aspect helps a lot.

    Both of our kids drink socially – but only to fit in – neither of them actually like the stuff, and basically never have more than 1-2 drinks in an evening. This isn’t just them, but also their circles of friends. My wife runs a whisky business, and one time the younger son took some sample bottles to a party. They came back 3/4 full.

    I think the problem in the US is a cultural one. There are still too many people with puritan tendencies (including most of my family :-/ ). Those who reject that puritanism too often go to the opposite extreme. Raising the drinking age to 21 was just dumb, and is a perfect example of this problem.

  88. SteveF says:

    There are still too many people with puritan tendencies

    You’ll get no argument from me. I’ve been saying for years that Europe oughta give the US a big, sloppy thank-you kiss every year because we took so many of your danged religious whackadoodles over the centuries.

  89. brad says:

    @SteveF: You’re not wrong. Purely by coincidence, I just ran across mention of a Christian organisation in my hometown that figures all members of other religions are possessed. So they run around doing involuntary exorcisms. It’s not quite clear to me what that involves. As an atheist, maybe it’s best if I don’t inquire to closely…

  90. SteveF says:

    Oh, I have a feeling how the the laying on of hands gets decided.

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