Wednesday Link Roundup - 30 November

Pirate's Cove starts things off with Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup

5. Pacific Pundit notes the groomers at NBC
6. Outside The Beltway digs deep into 2022 ticket splitting

Bacon Time!!!! - Sunday Linkage

The Intrepid Reporter: Back From NC and Memes
Watts Up With That?: “There’s No Emergency” – Dissident Climatologist Dr Judith Curry on Climate Change

Political Hat - News of the Week (November 27th, 2022)

Court Blocks N.Y.’s Requirement of Express Owner Permission to Carry Guns on Private Property
From a decision today by Judge John Sinatra (W.D.N.Y.) in Christian v. Nigrelli

EBL - Biden's Baggage Bandit Brinton Busted 😬⚛

The media is mostly ignoring this story. Sam Brinton is only in charge of nuclear waste disposal under the Biden Administration. What could go wrong? Britton is not fired (yet) just out on leave.
AoSHQ: Morning Report 11.29.22

A View from the Beach - Nuclear Waste Queen Charged with Felony, Mess in Maricopa Continues, Elon to Release Twitter Censorship Files

NYPo reveals Hunter Biden’s love child snubbed again in White House stocking display. A baby with a stripper for a mother, a crack-head for a dad, and a president for Grandpa. Paul Bedard at WaEx calls Investigate! 62% want Hunter Biden probed.

Vlad Tepes - Major Twitter and China news: Links 1, November 29, 2022

4. Meanwhile, in Pre-Musk Twitteropia: Massive Twitter data breach was far worse than reported, reveal security researchers

Don Surber - Highlights of the News

ITEM 5: Life News reported, "Six Months After Abortion Activist Firebombed Pro-Life Group’s Office, No One Has Been Arrested."
The FBI was too busy trying to frame Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago.

Again from Wombat-socho - In The Mailbox: 11.29.22 (Evening Edition)

Gates of Vienna - News Feed 11/29/2022

Miguel Almaguer was a regular fixture on NBC’s “Today” and “NBC Nightly News,” but ever since his revelatory report on November 4 was inexplicably retracted by the network, the Los Angeles-based correspondent has seemingly disappeared, according to Fox News.

Cafe Hayek - Some Links

Michael Senger correctly observes that the covidian tyranny now haunting China is the same sort of tyranny that covidians throughout the world called for in their own countries.

J.J. Sefton at Ace of Spades HQ - The Morning Report — 11/29/22

Daniel Greenfield: "The first deputy assistant genderfluid secretary is in trouble. . . The real nuclear waste isn’t deep underground, it’s walking the streets of Washington D.C."
Biden’s Nuclear Drag Queen Stole Women’s Clothing

Maggie's Farm - Monday morning links

A new study says time spent with dogs increases brain activity in the prefrontal cortex
Finding peace in the countryside

Doug Ross - Larwyn’s Linx: The Bureaucracy’s Democrat Majority Made America a One-Party Government

• Republican Thomas Massie Gives Voters Excellent Example CTH
• We Don’t Need Biden’s Permission To Own A ‘Semi-Automatic’ Gun David Harsanyi

Anonymous Conservative - News Briefs – 11/29/2022

Secretary of State Katie Hobbs sues Cochise county for failing to certify rigged election she stole from Arizona voters.
Arizona Mohave county board supervisors say they voted to certify election ‘under duress.’

I leave you with Sunday Memes … from MaddMedic, Sunday Funnies For 11-27-22 from Stately McDaniel Manor, Sunday Funnies from Flopping Aces, and WHAT??? It's still Monday? gifdump from Wirecutter.

Chicago Woman Shoots Carjacker in the Head

Concealed carry in the Windy City: Chicago woman with concealed-carry license foils attempted carjacking by shooting man in head | Fox News

She did get shot in the arm.

A 23-year-old woman with a concealed-carry permit defended herself against four armed men who attempted to carjack her last week on the South Side of Chicago. [SNIP]

When one of the men attempted to open her car door while holding a gun, the woman shot the would-be carjacker in the head before running away from the car.

The three ran and left their buddy there. He was taken to a local hospital in critical condition.

Crime has spiked in the Windy City in the last year, with homicides reaching an all-time high in a quarter-century in 2021.

Robbery reports have surged 15% in 2022, according to Chicago police records. Holdups have gone up 11% since 2020 and 2019, though they decreased 10% compared to 2018.

People (not the in-the-bag-for-the-Democrats part of the media) have begun to notice that concealed carry works. Concealed carry to the rescue! Chicago woman shoots gunman as armed gang tries to enter her parked vehicle

Concealed carriers in Chicago have tallied several successes this year in protecting themselves and others from life-threatening situations. In September, gunmen opened fire at partygoers outside a Chicago home and shot a 13-year-old boy in the head. The victim's 21-year-old cousin, a CCL holder, subsequently pulled out his gun and shot back, causing the gunmen to flee the scene. In July, a woman with a CCL license shot at a group of males who pointed a gun at her as they attempted to steal her car. One of the would-be thieves was shot in the process.

Self-defense in the Windy City is becoming more common. I wonder if the would-be bad-guys will get the message?

Self-defense is a human-right.

California Turns Pedophiles Free after One Year

It's almost as if they want it to be normalized, and don't want to treat abuse of children as a crime. EXCLUSIVE: 'It's frightening for society.' Thousands of convicted pedophiles in California are being released from prison in less than a year for horrific acts, including rape, sodomy and sexual abuse of kids under 14, Daily Mail investigation reveals

Analysis of a California database of sex offenders shows thousands of child molesters are being let out after just a few months, despite sentencing guidelines.

Current and former sex crime prosecutors said the figures are 'terrifying' and 'shameful'.

More than 7,000 sex offenders were convicted of 'lewd or lascivious acts with a child under 14 years of age' but were let out of prison the same year they were incarcerated, data from the California Megan's Law database says.

And it seems that some editing of the data is going on.

A Megan's Law record for [one guy] from three years ago says he was released from prison in 2016. There is no longer a record for him in the current Megan's Law database.

All this is because keeping violent offenders in jail is unfair.

The lawyer, who now represents victims of sexual abuse, pointed to policies backed by California Governor Gavin Newsom allowing for shortening of sentences to reduce the prison population.

What. The. F*ck?

Is this being reported in the American press? I hardly read the US press anymore, with a couple of exceptions to get local news, so I honestly don't know.

Shut Me Up

Lindsay Ell is an up and coming country singer that I quite like. Like today's song, I don't hear a tremendous amount of "country" in her work. But then I haven't heard all that much of it.

This is "Shut Me Up" by Lindsay Ell. It is an acoustic version from The Ell Sessions.

I say she is up and coming, but she's produced 5 albums and one EP. She is going on tour next year as the opening act for Shania Twain.

NYC Non-prosecuting Attorney A. Bragg

Just let the felons go. Bragg apparently can't be bothered to prosecute. Convictions plummet, downgraded charges surge under Manhattan DA Bragg

Soft-on-crime Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has downgraded more than half his felony cases to misdemeanors — while also managing to lose half of the felony cases that do reach court.

Since taking office on Jan. 1, Bragg has downgraded 52% of felony cases to misdemeanors — compared to 39% in all of 2019. Between 2013 and 2020, under District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr., the percentage of cases the office downgraded had never exceeded 40%, according to data made public by the DA’s office.

But then he was hired/elected to be soft-on-crime, because keeping violent offenders in jail is unfair.

The conviction rate for cases he does prosecute is also down. Maybe he just isn't very good at his job.

“The people in charge right now want to talk about gun violence and getting these shootings down,” said Jennifer Harrison, the founder of Victims Rights NY. “But I wonder how many of the incidents [where] the charges were downgraded or dismissed or dropped involved guns or weapons, and how are we going to eradicate this kind of violence when people like Alvin Bragg are in charge?”

And the people of NYC wonder why crime is on the rise. Because turning criminals loose does have an impact.

Bragg was accused of giving a sweetheart plea deal in August to Justin Washington, accused of raping a teen-age relative, only for Washington to be arrested on new sex-crime charges the next month. The DA’s office said he would seek a greater sentence in the rape case.

Things will have to get much worse before they get better, and they won't start to get better while Alvin Bragg is district attorney.

Tuesday Links

Flopping Aces has some disturbing news: As an Oncologist I Am Seeing People With Stable Cancer Rapidly Progress After Being Forced to Have a Booster

[A letter] by Dr Angus Dalgleish

Stately McDaniel Manor, with a post I should have included last week - School Attacks: The High Cost Of Virtue Signaling

As you’ll find, gentle readers, should you review the School Attacks series, educators tend to be leftist, and this is particularly so in colleges, where they tend to be flaming, true believing leftists. They’ll argue allowing teachers to carry guns will result in terrible carnage. Teachers carrying guns somehow destroys a pristine educational environment. It’s not a teacher’s job to be police officers, and they’d have to be trained to be police officers to carry guns. Teachers have to focus every second of their efforts on teaching, not on shooting attackers.

The Other McCain - Idaho Breakthrough: A Serial Killer?

Wait just a minute here — what day of the week was Aug. 13, 2021? It was a Friday. Just a coincidence, perhaps, but then you see that the Idaho victims were also killed on the 13th, and while it may be a bit of a stretch to connect these crimes, which happened 400 miles and 15 months apart, investigators don’t seem to have any other leads, so maybe this is more than a coincidence. Because one of the Oregon victims survived the attack, we know that the killer wore a mask, but they don’t say what kind of mask. Was it a hockey mask? Like Jason in Friday the 13th?

Massad Ayoob - HITTING A MILLION. A 7 minute video worth a look.

Yours truly is one of several content providers on the Wilson Combat channel on YouTube. I recently learned that one of mine there had surpassed a million views.

Meep at STUMP - ESG and ERISA: Pity the Poor Tort Lawyers Their Lost Business as Biden Gives a Safe Harbor For Now

FTX had stellar ESG ratings right before implosion

Oh, look who had the best ESG ratings, including the one I like, which is governance:
FTX Bankruptcy Exposes ESG’s Flaws

Again from The Other McCain - ‘Blood On Your Hands’? Is Anyone Really Endangered by Twitter ‘Amnesty’?

The problem in the United States is almost the diametrical opposite situation, i.e., critics of the regime have been banned, because Twitter staff were working with the Democratic Party to effectively prohibit dissent.

Granite Grok - A Quick Word about The Democrat Party’s Fascism

No, the American Federal Government does not own or control the means of production, but they have oligarchs in Energy, Public Health, and increasingly in other sectors of the economy. And the accumulation of our National debt creates an excuse for a massive confiscation of private property (to save the nation or something). To do that, they will need a police state mentality or its equivalent, and such despotisms are inherently fascist.

Armed Homeowner Captures Fugitive for Police

That is what this headline should say, but even in Houston, "Professional Journalists" don't like the idea of armed homeowners. UPDATE: Investigators capture man after on-campus chase near Westside High School in Macon: Investigators captured the suspect after an hours-long search | KHOU

A guy was spotted near a high school with a firearm. The school went into lockdown, and cops swarmed the area.

The man went to a nearby home and asked the homeowner to let him hide there. The homeowner refused, which started an argument between the two. The homeowner shot at the suspect's feet, causing him to drop the rifle that he had been carrying during his escape from police. The suspect ran away from the scene. No one was hurt.

After a while he went back to that home to hide.

According to Bibb County Sheriff David Davis, the suspect went back to the house where he had previously tried to hide. The homeowner there was able to capture the suspect, allowing investigators to make the arrest.

So even in Texas we have media bias against homeowners. Marginal, but still there. They did report on the fact that the homeowner captured this miscreant, but they couldn't seem to get the facts right in the headline.

I have no idea why a story from the 16th is only now making it into my news search. Probably the internet (in the form of Bing, which provides services to DuckDuckGo) doesn't want you to know about stories like this.

Self-defense is a human-right, and occasionally an armed citizen helps out the police. I have the feeling that it happens a lot more often than the media would have us believe.

The Illusion of Safety

You may "feel safe," but that doesn't mean you actually are safe. Two Markham home invasion victims speak out after attack | CTV News

So a family was the victim of an armed home invasion. Armed intruders broke open a glass door at the back of the house and entered.

Two men came to his room, one armed with a gun and another with a hatchet.

The other victim who spoke to CTV News Toronto said a third man came to his room, taking everything from his shoes to his headphones.

Cops were able to shoot two and arrest two because they were involved in multiple home invasions.

Then there is the illusion of safety.

They have been literally picking up the pieces, but—like their glass door—they say the illusion of safety has been broken. 

They are 'adding additional security' measures, though they don't say what that could be in Canada.

You think you are secure, but have you studied your security? Have you installed anything to make it hard to kick in your front door or back door? (It is called Door Armor.) If someone throws a brick through your window, what would you do to keep them out? Do you have any more than an illusion of security?

And as I have said, many times, you are not protected by your zip code.

How Is That Bail Reform Working Out?

Not too well if you go by the number of victims. #50: Twice-convicted gun offender shot a random driver while on felony bail, prosecutors say

Prosecutors say a man who was on bail for selling nearly $3,500 worth of cocaine to an undercover cop shot a motorist who was driving to work near his home on November 3.

Giovanni Montes, 24, is the 50th person accused of killing or shooting—or attempting to kill or shoot—someone in Chicago while awaiting trial for a felony this year. The alleged crimes involved at least 88 victims, 22 of whom died.

The next story brings the victims to 89 and the deceased to 23. I suppose the Left is happy that he didn't use a gun. #51: Chicago drug dealer, free on felony bail, beat a customer to death in a vacant lot for paying him with fake money, prosecutors say - CWB Chicago

On the northwest corner of Chicago and Ridgeway avenues in Humboldt Park sits a vacant lot. A Chicago Police Department surveillance camera hangs from a light pole next to a small hand-painted billboard that declares the corner a “safety zone” with no gambling, drugs, or guns allowed.

In that vacant lot around 5:40 p.m. on November 9, Jacquail Jones used a brick or rock to beat 52-year-old Michael Foley to death because Foley gave him fake money in a drug deal, prosecutors said Friday.

All of this is due to the position of the Left that keeping violent offenders in jail is unfair.

As for this pillar of the community...

After the beating, Jones returned to the convenience store, bought a bag of chips, and walked away, prosecutors said.

Civilization was nice while it lasted.

The History FTX

I find this whole thing fascinating. How the "smartest guys in the room" got taken to the cleaners. FTX Post Mortem Part 2 Of 3: How Did We Get Here?

And we know that they are the smartest guys in the room, because they almost never miss a chance to tell us that. Well, they have been suspiciously quiet on the subject since FTX imploded. I'm sure that they will start telling us that again as soon as they think that we've forgotten about FTX and Steve Bankman-Fried (SBF).

The history goes back all the way to 2021. Well, 2021 is when it gets interesting.

What if Alameda’s goal wasn’t to make money, but to lose money to other traders in a perverse growth hack used to attract the next round of “smart money” investors?

After all, at best Alameda had been making a few hundred million from trading over the course of its existence and likely much less than that. As spreads closed with more market makers flooding into the asset class it’s much easier to take money from Sequoia and Softbank than it is to make money trading.

Running an unprofitable casino is a terrible business, but selling an unprofitable casino that looks extremely busy to a private investor is a fantastic business.

There is so much in that article about SBF, about the corporate structure of Alameda and FTX, and the overlap between the two, about loans and the quest for venture capital and more. There is even a bit about how the son of two compliance lawyers, one of whom specializes in tax havens, engineered a system where he apparently believed that he could legally access client funds. You should click thru and read the entire thing.

And though Zero Hedge says that SBF was apparently using FTX as his personal slush fund, that really doesn't explain the 6 to 10 billion in missing assets. Bad management does, however.

here is no way that Alameda could have sold off all of those liquidated customer positions as the token collapsed. This type of liquidation transaction is known as “toxic flow” and is a surefire way to bankrupt a market maker.

If FTX’s famously specialized liquidation engine simply meant that customer positions were shunted onto the Alameda balance sheet to be cleared at a later date, then the amount of toxic flow from junk tokens in the last year would build up quickly.

This seems to be the only way the size of the hole makes any sense.

I find this fascinating in the same way I found the implosion of Bernie Madoff's empire engrossing. "The smartest guys in the room" (they will tell you that!) fell for one of the oldest cons in finance. I'm not sure whether or not you can call FTX a Ponzi Scheme, but it isn't far removed. It was certainly a house of cards, and not the Sure Thing™ that the venture capitalists, the Pundits were telling us it was.

The week before Thanksgiving Twitter was reminding everyone what Jim Cramer of CNBC's Mad Money said about SBF back in June. And some people were bring up other statements by Cramer on other topics.

And then there are the political questions. Like I said, click thru.

My Dark Symphony

After Roy Khan retired from Kamelot and music, due to "burn out" and health/family issues, it was wondered if he would return. In 2018 it was announced he would be reuniting with his 1990s band, Conception.

I think I have mentioned that I love Roy Khan's singing voice.

This is "My Dark Symphony" by Conception from their 2018 EP My Dark Symphony.

Good Guys 4, Bad Guys 0

They thought it would be a good idea to invade an occupied home in Georgia. Gresham Road shooting started as home invasion, 1 dead: Police | 11alive.

Actually 4 is an under-count of the bad guys, but police are only giving info and the ones who were shot. More on this in a bit.

Detectives at the scene and hospital began questioning those involved, which authorities said revealed that the four men were were attempting to break into a home. While they were trying to get inside, police said that the group exchanged shots with someone who lived there.

At this time, police said the shooting "appears justified" and no charges are expected to be filed against the the person who fired the shot.

That is because Georgia has not morphed into a copy of New Jersey.

As for the total number of people involved...

"Several other parties" who were also allegedly involved were detained at the scene with the help of SWAT officers, who police said were already in the area.

Self-defense is a human-right.

F*c*book is Evil, and So are the Tax Programs Sending It Data

This is insane, and it should be illegal. "This Is Appalling": Major Tax Filing Services Have Been Sending Financial Information To Facebook | ZeroHedge

The services include TaxAct, H&R Block, and TaxSlayer.

The data includes names, email addresses, income, filing status, refund amounts and college scholarship information - which is sent to Facebook regardless of whether a person even has a Facebook account - or with other platforms owned by Meta. The company can then be used to fine tune advertising algorithms.

Intuit’s TurboTax "did not send financial information to Meta but rather usernames and the last time a device signed in."

Harvard Law School lecturer and tax law specialist Mandi Matlock said the findings showed that taxpayers have been "providing some of the most sensitive information that they own, and it’s being exploited."

"This is appalling," she added. "It truly is."

That info is being provided to F*c*book, which is using it for advertising.

Privacy is such a 20th Century concept. (Hat tip to Gates of Vienna.)

And They Wonder Why Crime Is Going Up

I could have hoped that Texas was immune to some of this insanity, but big cities are big cities everywhere. Study: 56 Percent of Violent Crime Suspects Released in Dallas - Texas Scorecard

And while the headline is bad enough, the subtitle tells even more:

“Bail reform” led to 34 percent of murder suspects arrested in 2021 being released on bail or their own recognizance.

These statistcs come from criminologist Michael Smith of the University of Texas at San Antonio. Dallas Police Chief Eddie Garcia is responsible for that study. The statistics published as a part of the study include "about 75 percent of offenders charged with weapons law violations, about two-thirds of those arrested for aggravated assault, and 34 percent of those arrested for murder."

Click thru for more, including info about the soft-on-crime DA, a court suit by the ACLU, and a statement by the Sheriff. Oh, and some backpedaling by the DA once a light was shined on what he was doing to destroy law and order.

This is all happening because the Left has decided (with help from Soros-funded non-prosecuting attorney's, and others) that keeping violent offenders in jail is unfair.

The "How Dare You Live Without Me" Attitude Never Works

Some people just don't under stand the "ex" part of ex-girlfriend. Woman charged with setting ex’s Southwest Bexar County home on fire after burglarizing it, records show

In a Facebook post, BCSO said Soto was upset with the man because a woman, who turned out to be his relative, answered his phone.

And so because of that, she broke in and set his house on fire.

A witness saw Soto taking items from her ex-boyfriend’s home in Southwest Bexar County on Sunday and putting them in her gray Kia Optima, charging documents state.

She is charged with "arson of a habitation/place of assembly and burglary of a habitation."

Does this count as "crazy people are dangerous?"

Speaking of Crypto... more on FTX

So why haven't any charges been leveled? Sam Bankman-Fried ran FTX like 'personal fiefdom' as firm spent $300M on luxury real estate

FTX’s bankruptcy team detailed the wild spending under 30-year-old Bankman-Fried in a closely watched court hearing on Tuesday — revealing rampant mismanagement by top executives until the platform collapsed with more than $1 billion in client funds missing.

Attorneys said the $300 million spent on real estate was mostly used to buy mansions and beachfront vacation properties for Bankman-Fried and other senior FTX executives.

There is more, and you should read the whole thing, including a snarky remark by an attorney about the Emperor having no clothes.

The Media Notices that Black Americans Own Guns

The reporter in this case can't seem to decide if that is a good thing or a bad thing. Gun ownership among Black Americans rising nationwide

Tuesday night is Ladies’ Night for the 9th Cavalry Buffalo Soldiers Gun Club in Atlanta.

Karine Alleyn joined in 2020 and now she represents one of the fastest growing groups of new gun owners — Black women.

“I feel like I’ve accomplished something,” said Alleyn.

Overall it is a fairly good piece of journalism. Aside from the 9th Cavalry reference, they also talk to Phillip Smith, the president of the National African American Gun Association. And they provide links to the organizations' websites.

Phillip Smith, said membership jumped by more than 10,000 in 2020 alone and that was a record for the organization.

Now, the organization has 40,000 members nationwide.

They do have to point out how a lot of people think guns are bad and guns cause crime, but they do give a chance for one of the women they interviewed at ladies' night a chance to address the issue. (Hat tip to Keep and Bear Arms.)

“None of the other riders intervened to stop the attempted kidnapping”

That quote captures exactly my view of NYC. No one will step out of their way for anyone. Teens save brother, 10, from kidnapping on Midtown train

A creep tries to kidnap a 10-year-old kid off the subway in NYC. His 15-year-old brother and his 16-year-old sister are the only two who come to his defense. No one tries to stop this guy from escaping. No one does a damn thing.

None of the other riders intervened to stop the attempted kidnapping, the children’s mother said.

Because individual action and individual responsibility has been beaten out of the people in the Blue Cities. You must rely on the State for everything. You must not get involved. Not even to save a 10-year-old from a kidnapper.

As several people in comments to that article asked, where were the cops? Didn't both Adams and Hochul say they were going to put more cops on the subway? Although Hochul did say she didn't know why people thought crime was such a big deal. And the DAs won't prosecute anyone anyway.

Western civilization was nice while it lasted.

I'm Shocked - Shocked! - to Think There May Be Corruption in Politics

OK, so I'm not that shocked that there are shady dealings in NYC. Sliwa urges city probe of Adams links to felons, suspect hires

Possible free meals. Dealing with convicted felons. Hiring "unindicted co-conspirators." Sounds like standard operating procedures for politics in Chicago, though this is NYC.

Eric Adams’ Republican rival in the election for City Hall last year, Guardian Angels founder Curtis Sliwa, is calling on the Department of Investigation to probe the mayor’s dealings with convicted felons and his hiring of cronies with checkered pasts or questionable qualifications for top government posts.

“It’s one outrage after another outrage,” Sliwa said in a letter sent to DOI.

Sliwa also raises questions about whether the mayor is getting free meals from a restaurant, a practice that cops are forbidden to do.

None of this would surprise me, or the other things he brings up. Corruption in politics? Isn't that like a dog-bites-man kind of story. Hardly news where I'm from.

Saturday Roundup of Link Roundups - 26 November

Wombat-socho at The Other McCain is up first with In The Mailbox: 11.23.22 (Afternoon Edition)

The Lid: Dummy Wokesters Want Diverse Dummies
Legal Insurrection: Biden Administration Slammed for Signing Away $1 Billion in Climate Reparations

The Right Way - Top of the News

How Caroline Ellison Found Herself at the Center of the FTX Crypto Collapse - American Power
The Club Q shooting and the religion of the left - American Thinker

EBL - And now another shooting in a Virginia Walmart...Update: The Shooter Identified (he's probably not MAGA)

Update: TOM: Yet Another Inconvenient Mass Murder Destined for the Media’s Memory Hole
Instapundit: PJ Media: Will the left ever stop blaming the right for mass shootings? 

Don Surber - Highlights of the News

ITEM 3: Just the News reported, "Enough Chinese-made recreational drones have been spotted in restricted airspace in the Washington, D.C. area to raise foreign espionage concerns among U.S. government agencies and lawmakers alike.

The Daley Gator - Opinions and news links

Bearing Arms- Media gets the vapors over new Sig rifle
Blazing Cat Fur- Those PETA folks are freaky…..

Wombat-socho again - In The Mailbox: 11.23.22 (Evening Edition)

Transterrestrial Musings: Germany’s Green-Energy Delusions, also, Is There A Naval Architect In The House?
Victory Girls: Mayorkas: Resignation May Come To Fruition

Battleswarm Blog - LinkSwarm for November 25, 2022

“Texas Democrats Blame Lackluster Midterm on 2021 Election Reform, Redistricting, and Poor Border Messaging.” Note that the word “policies” appears nowhere in the article…

Flopping Aces - The Week in Radical Leftism, 11/25/2022

11/18 – Michelle Obama Is So Stunning And Brave, You Guys
11/19 – Fake Hate: San Diego Vegan Food Truck Owner Charged With Arson, Insurance Fraud

And again from Wombat-socho - In The Mailbox: 11.25.22

Gab News: There Is No Freedom Of Speech Without Freedom Of Reach
Rumor Control: The Soft Opening Of Rumor Control

Gates of Vienna - News Feed 11/25/2022

Tiantian Kullander, a former Morgan Stanley trader who co-founded digital-asset trading platform Amber Group, has died. He was only 30 years old.

J.J. Sefton at Ace of Spades HQ - The Morning Report — 11/23/22

"Given the way things have been going in Biden’s America these days, we’re not sure we can entirely rule out the latter possibility."
As Shortages Persist Under Biden, It’s Time To Ask: Is This On Purpose?

Maggie's Farm - Wednesday morning links

Is this like government-controlled credit cards? Or what?
 Elon Musk Teaches Leftwing Activists That Actions Have Consequences

Anonymous Conservative - News Briefs – 11/23/2022

Herschel Walker, Raphael Warnock within margin of error in Georgia’s Senate runoff.
Majority of American voters rightly concerned about vote fraud.

I leave you with Wednesday gifdump from Wirecutter, Quick Hits Of Wisdom, Knowledge And Snark #792 from 90 Miles from Tyranny, and This Wednesday is for Skipisms ~ 2 from Woodsterman.

Expecting "The System" to Protect You is a Losing Bet

The System™ doesn't care about domestic violence until it ends in murder or attempted murder. Felon broke into ex-girlfriend’s Washington Park home and shot her after breakup, prosecutors say

Chicago police had responded to 10 domestic calls involving 47-year-old Tarnche Hill and his former girlfriend, prosecutors said. No arrests were made, even though the 28-year-old woman repeatedly reported that Hull attacked her.

Now that he shot her, maybe they will do something about it. But it is in Chicago/Cook County, so they might ignore the attempted murder. They have ignored actual murder, so it wouldn't surprise me.

Light It Up

Orianthi is an Australian guitar player, who probably had her first big break when she played on the 2nd stage at the 2007 edition of Eric Clapton's Crossroads Guitar Festival, which was held in Illinois that year. The Wiki (take it with a grain of salt) says her break came when she appeared at the 2009 Grammy Awards show, as guitarist for Carrie Underwood. Though you could say that meeting Carlos Santana, and how he helped her to get signed with Geffen Records in 2006 was what really mattered.

She is quite a guitar player, and not a bad vocalist.

She published a new album in October. Today's song was released as single from the album in July.

This is "Light It Up" by Orianthi from her new album Rock Candy.

Friday Links - 25 November

The Other McCain is up first with Disney Not Gay Enough Yet? New Plan: Get (More) Woke, Go (More) Broke

When it was announced that Disney CEO Bob Chapek had been ousted in favor of a return to former CEO Bob Iger, a lot of conservatives started high-fiving on Twitter, erroneously assuming that this must signal some kind of admission by Disney that their left-wing cultural war agenda had failed as a business model.

Granite Grok - Exposing the Fraud: They Make Climate “Fudge” Over at NOAA, Too!

Science used to be about comparing reality to your theory. These days it is about reshaping the perception of reality until it proves your theory. Global Warming (dba: climate change) is an excellent example. With the earth refusing to satisfy any of their predictions, the experts have taken to tampering with data.

The College Fix - Jury awards $645,837 to Auburn professor demoted for criticizing lax degree standards

Stern had sued the university for retaliating against him when he criticized the preservation of an easy major for the sake of athletics.

Wombat-socho at the Other McCain - Continuity & Tradition

So it pleases me to see that the Wall Street Journal, whose editorial page has been a bastion of conservatism* for as long as I can remember, has rejected the whining of sundry annoying leftists and once again reprinted a pair of classic editorials by former editor Vermont Royster: The Desolate Wilderness, as well as And The Fair Land.

The Gateway Pundit - Unbelievable: Researcher Claims Anti-vaxx Groups’ Fear Mongering and Scare Tactics Cause Vaccine-Related Adverse Events Like Blood Clots and Heart Attacks

You can’t make this up.

Just when you thought the Covid-deranged establishment medical community couldn’t lose any more credibility, Raymond D. Palmer, a self-identified mRNA alchemist from Western Australia, admitted that there are serious risks associated with Covid-19 vaccinations, but he blamed the anti-vaxxers for it.

Again from The Other McCain - Mystery Solved? Did This CANADIAN Get @rsmccain Banned From Twitter?

My categorical hatred of Canada is notorious, of course, and I probably should have known that those fiendish Canadian scum had spent years plotting their revenge against me, but now I feel like Don Corleone after he figured out who was behind Sonny’s murder: “I didn’t know until this day that it was Barzini all along.” And my Barzini is Scaachi Koul.

Self-defense is Legal in Kansas

Two months to make that decision isn't bad, as the pace the legal system can move. Leavenworth investigation rules deadly shooting self defense

According to the county attorney’s office, the homeowner woke up when his dog started barking. The man told investigators he then heard the door of his vehicle opening and closing. When he looked out the window, the man said he did not recognize the man outside.

In a news release from the county attorney’s office, the homeowner later told officers he grabbed his pistol and headed toward his front door. Before he reached the door, someone outside started hitting and kicking the door. The homeowner told investigators the door started bowing. Then a man outside started yelling and cussing telling the homeowner to open the door.

He fired 3 times through the door and called 911. There is security video from the house across the street.

So 2 months, from September 22nd, isn't moving at light speed, but it isn't too bad either. Though I suppose I would have made such a decision after viewing the video. Of course I'm not a lawyer, and it doesn't say if the district attorney in question was up for reelection this year.

In any event, it seems to have been decided that self-defense is your legal right in Leavenworth, and it remains a human-right as well.

Walmart Shooting: No Mention of the Criminal

It is as if the gun went off by itself, if you listen to the media. From The Other McCain - Yet Another Inconvenient Mass Murder Destined for the Media’s Memory Hole

Wednesday I was watching CNN (so you don’t have to) and they were still leading every hour with Tuesday night’s shooting at a Walmart in Chesapeake, Virginia. The gunman killed six people and wounded four others before turning the gun on himself and committing suicide, shortly after police arrived. In CNN’s coverage, however, there was almost no mention of the gunman, and I had to Google to learn that police had identified him as Andre Bing, a 31-year-old who worked as team leader on the overnight shift. Co-workers said he was a weirdo

They can't mention the shooter, and they won't show you his picture, because he's black.

Democrats won’t be satisfied until Americans are completely disarmed, but they can’t say that out loud and still win elections. Meanwhile, however, this story presents yet another Case of the Disappearing Perpetrator.

If the shooter had been a white guy, especially some sort of right-wing type, the perp’s mug shot would have been featured at the top of the hour, every hour, on CNN, but instead Andre Bing is barely mentioned (and his photo never shown) in CNN’s coverage. This is your big “tell” that what they’re doing is not exactly news, but rather political propaganda on behalf of the Democratic Party.

There is a lot more. Read the whole thing.

This Was a Story I Didn't See in the Media

I guess the narrative collapsed too quickly for it to catch fire. (Did you see what I did there?) Suspect arrested after 7 fires set across Mississippi capital city, including at churches and field at Jackson State University

Though to be fair, there is (at least) one article on CNN on the arrest of this guy.

When two black churches were burned, I guess the twitterati immediately jumped on "those evil white people are to blame" bandwagon. That bandwagon hit a speedbump a couple of hours later when a black man was arrested.

After a search that lasted several hours, the Hinds County Sheriff's Office announced Tuesday afternoon that they had arrested Devin McLaurin in connection with the arsons. They did not provide any information about McLaurin's motivation. A spokesperson for the Jackson Police Department said he is being charged with felony malicious mischief. He is being questioned by Federal Bureau of Investigation agents and may face additional charges.

That was apparently followed by everyone moving on to the next thing.

This is Ruined Leon's video: Black Churches Get Burned Down & Twitter Blames The Whites Again. Leon never fails to entertain, and he usually has a good point to make. The video is 8 minutes, so grab a coffee.

The De-industrializing of Germany

Probably all of Europe. From Lawrence Person's BattleSwarm Blog: The Ukraine War Is Crushing Germany’s Green Energy Delusions

The combination of pretending to transition to a green energy future combined with dependence on Russian gas and the fallout of the Russo-Ukrainian War has Germany looking at some very tough choices:

The are many, but the impacts on agriculture will kill people, and the impact on metallurgy will kill economies.

“No one is making nitrogen-based fertilizer in Europe anymore. No one is smelting aluminum anymore. A lot of the steel foundries are shutting down.”

Modern agriculture is dependent on nitrogen fertilizer. Aluminum is an energy expensive business, as is producing steel.

And winter hasn't arrived yet.

I suppose that some of this might actually make sense if Germany had managed to convert to some other kind of power, but all they've done is cause problems for themselves.

More Anti-Asian Hate on NYC Transit

No where in the article do they write that the 3 attackers are black. They do include photos of the 3 haters. Trio wanted in anti-Asian attack on Manhattan subway

A racist trio demanded a man and a woman give up their seats on a Manhattan subway, then yelled anti-Asian remarks in a hate-fueled Saturday night assault, according to cops.

The suspects, a man and two women, approached the victims on the shuttle train from Grand Central to Times Square at about 8 p.m., police said.

And yet there are those on the Left who will tell you that blacks can't be racist, because reasons.

In spite of the fact that there are fairly good pictures of the three miscreants, I don't believe that anything will be done, because the powers that be in New York City don't really care about anti-Asian hate, and they really don't care about crime, whether that crime is on the subway or not.

An Object Lesson in Jumping to Conclusions

From The Other McCain: Crazy People Are Dangerous: No Motive Yet in Colorado Springs Shooting UPDATE: Shooter Is ‘Non-Binary’?

Because nearly everyone in the media, on the Left side of social media, and the usual suspects did jump to conclusions.

Meanwhile, people are angry at Tucker Carlson for pointing out that we don’t yet know what the gunman’s motive was. It is easy to guess that some kind of anti-gay bias may be involved — he shot up a gay bar, OK? — but speculation is not proof.

Then there was the 4-hour standoff with police in June, for which no charges were filed. There was also no explanation for why he was not charged.

And now it comes to light that he is non-binary and uses they use they/them pronouns. So, probably not a Trump supporter IYKWIMAITYD. I don't expect social media to let go of this, but I do expect the media to drop it like a hot potato; it doesn't fit anyone's narrative.

Wednesday Link Roundup - 23 November

Bacon Time!!!! is up first with Sunday Linkage

The Intrepid Reporter: Mountains and Snakes
Watts Up With That?: Methane: Much Ado About Nothing

Pirate's Cove - Sorta Blogless Sunday Pinup

1. GeeeZ has your Sunday faith blog
2. Flag And Cross notes the GOP already investigating Biden’s foreign ties

Political Hat - News of the Week (November 20th, 2022)

Concealed carry permits surge to 22 million, 25 states don’t even require it
The gun craze sparked by the 2016 presidential election, the COVID crisis, and the flurry of random and mass shootings has also led to a record-breaking issuance of concealed carry permits

Wombat-socho at The Other McCain - In The Mailbox: 11.21.22

CDR Salamander: Pre-Thanksgiving Maritime and Natsec Feast – on Midrats, also, A Portuguese Man of … Curiosity?
Chicago Boyz: A Grand Puzzlement

EBL - The English

AoSHQ: Emily Blunt is rather blunt about the "strong female character" (read the whole thing)
AoSHQ: Morning Report 11.21.22

A View from the Beach - CBS Agrees Hunter Laptop Real

Scott Johnson at Power Line, CBS reports: Inside Hunter’s Biden’s laptop. From Twitchy, Glenn Greenwald has media dead to rights on Hunter Biden laptop coverup, ‘a gigantic scandal’ in its own right. David Strom at Haut Hair adds My $.02 on Hunter Biden laptop.

Pixy Misa at Ambient Irony - Daily News Stuff 22 November 2022

Did Sam Bankman-Fried buy off the media? (Reason)

Signs point to yes.

Gates of Vienna - News Feed 11/21/2022

France: No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Afghan Migrant Stabs 73-Year-Old Man 30 Times After Being Allowed to Stay at His Apartment in Paris
A 31-year-old Afghan national was arrested for the stabbing murder of a septuagenarian.

Don Surber - Highlights of the News

ITEM 8: The Washington Examiner reported, "After Democrats defied historical trends and political expectations in the midterm elections, some Republicans are reconsidering their party’s resistance to ballot harvesting, voting by mail, and extensive early voting periods.

Vlad Tepes - Doctors knew all along, Tomorrow an IMPORTANT live hearing with CSPO, Mocking masks: Links 1, November 22, 2022

2. Ohio bill permitting ivermectin, alternative COVID-19 drugs gets hearing
3. Naomi Wolf on newest Klaus Schwab speech

Cafe Hayek - Some Links

George Selgin busts a few myths about a famous theory offered by some recent Nobel laureates in economics and the connections of that theory with the demise of FTX.
Art Carden ponders (and pictures) economics while walking in the park.

Maggie's Farm - Monday morning links

A sex war is coming. American politics is being shaped by the AWFLs
 Female Molotov Cocktail Lawyer Sentenced To Only 15 Months in Jail

I leave you with Sunday Funnies For 11-20-22 from Stately McDaniel Manor, Quick Hits Of Wisdom, Knowledge And Snark #786 from 90 Miles from Tyranny, Tuesday Memes from Daley Gator, and And You Thought Your Monday Sucked gifdump from Wirecutter.

Crypto Is TOTALLY Not Full of Fraud and Deceit!

They will pinky swear! Traders Smell Blood: The Prevarications by the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) In Revealing Its Cold Wallet Addresses Is Deepening Its Discount

And to be clear, I have no idea if Grayscale is run by a bunch of liars or if they are as honest as the days is long. But something is fishy in the state of Crypto.

The surprising collapse of the FTX exchange has unleashed a clarion call for greater transparency across the crypto world. In this volatile environment, the dithering of the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust (GBTC) in publishing its cold wallet addresses has raised the proverbial hackles of traders, who are now preparing to pounce on the passive investment vehicle’s perceived underlying weaknesses.

I thought it was Republicans who pounce.

Grayscale Bitcoin Trust units are trading at a 45% discount over the theoretical price, based on Bitcoin. No one is trying to take advantage of an arbitrage situation because no one believes what Grayscale is saying.

At the heart of this divergence lies a growing sense of foreboding as to the Grayscale Bitcoin Trust’s underlying exposure to Bitcoin. To allay such concerns, GBTC published a report, aptly titled “Safety, Security, and Transparency,” late on Friday.

They won't reveal their Bitcoin Wallet IDs, so that people can independently verify the amount of Bitcoin. They reference "security concerns."

Of course, this is utter balderdash, as wallet addresses themselves do not constitute any significant security-related issues.

Hat tip to Pixy Misa at Ambient Irony: Daily News Stuff 22 November 2022, in which he categorizes this in the following way.

Trust us, we totally have $10 billion worth of Bitcoin, says Grayscale. (WCCFTech)

"Can we see it?"
"No."

They are currently trading at about half of their claimed value.

When Seconds Count, Police Are Only Minutes Away

20 Minutes away. Or more. Target 11 Investigates delayed police response times

Target 11 Investigator Rick Earle spoke with two women who are raising questions about the response time.

“I came back up like this, went like this to the door. I locked it. I grabbed this knife,” said Jordan Seiler.

Holding a butcher knife behind her door, Seiler frantically called 911.

A man follows you into your apartment building. As you are entering your apartment, he is running up the stairs after you. You call 911 and wait 20 minutes.

One, you need more than a butcher knife. Two, you should not expect that the police will save you. Three, she wasn't the only person they interviewed about long response times. In the other incident where they interviewed a victim, it took police more than 90 minutes to respond.

So what was the status of "Defund the Police" in Pittsburgh?

“At the end of the day, the simple answer is there’s not an officer available to respond to that,” said Allegheny county Emergency Services Chief Matt Brown.

Police academy classes were canceled or postponed because of COVID. They even canceled the 2022 class. 401 officers have retired or resigned since 2017. They didn't have data on how many were recruited and trained. That may not sound like a lot when you compare it to the thousands that have quit NYPD, but the Pittsburgh Police Department 838 officers, including 50 on medical leave, military duty, or not working for other reasons. That makes the 401 number look a lot worse. They also don't say what the expected staffing level should be for a city the size of Pittsburgh.

How Is That Bail Reform Working Out?

The victim count seems to indicate that it is not going well. #49: Chicago man stabbed acquaintance 30 times while awaiting trial for two felony cases, prosecutors say - CWB Chicago

Chicago — Prosecutors say a 19-year-old North Side man stabbed an acquaintance 30 times for no apparent reason while awaiting trial for multiple counts of robbery and possessing a stolen motor vehicle in juvenile court.

In addition to those pending matters, Avondre Carroll has been arrested by Chicago police eleven times since he turned 18 last year.

Overall, CWB has the number of victims at 87, with 22 of those victims having passed away. In 2022. So since bail reform has been such a success in Chicago and Cook County, the Democrats are bringing it the entire State of Illinois starting in January. Because keeping violent offenders in jail is unfair.

Hava Nagila

Dick Dale was one of the 1960s premiere players of Surf Rock. He turned "Miserlou," an old Greek melody with Middle Eastern roots into a Surf Rock classic. But that wasn't the only time he interperted a folk song.

This song is "Hava Nagila" by Dick Dale and His Del-Tones from the 1963 album King of the Surf Guitar.

Tuesday Links - 22 November

The Other McCain is up first with Lauren Boebert Reelected

For some reason — I don’t know, I barely pay attention to this kind of stuff — Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert is the one Republican that Democrats most hoped to beat this year. And . . . nope:

Flopping Aces - The FBI could have stopped the Jan 6 events because they knew what was coming. Why didn’t they?

And the NY Times reports “the FBI “had as many as eight informants inside” inside the Proud Boys, in the months before AND after the January 6 riot.”

The FBI knew what was coming. The big question is why did they let it happen? They could have shut the whole down and charged many with conspiracy, but no.

All I can think is they wanted to let it happen.

Again from The Other McCain - Payback Time: McCarthy Will Boot Infamous Jew-Hater From Committee

Force them to play by their own rules.

Meep - FTX, Dickens, and Business Fraud. (The audio is about 24 minutes.)

In this episode, I look at FTX through the lens of two Dickens novels: Martin Chuzzlewit and Little Dorrit. Wait, don’t go! I swear, it’s more interesting than it sounds. Heh. Charles Dickens knew business fraud and the boom-and-bust of the Victorian London business scene, capturing it very well in his novels. The base motives at the heart of these schemes keep rolling on.

Sultan Knish - Using Military Wokeness to Justify Affirmative Action

The Air Force has dropped its commitment to an 75% to 80% aircraft readiness rate to take ”a more holistic view of readiness.” Instead of having 8 out of 10 planes that can fly, the holistic approach means that we ought to be satisfied with 5 out of 10 FF-22 stealth fighters, 6 out of 10 F-15Es, 7 out of 10 F-35As, and 5 out of 10 CV-22 Ospreys.

The Other McCain again - Will the Media Ever Admit That Christine Blasey Ford Slandered Brett Kavanaugh? (In a word, no!)

What’s astonishing is how, even after most intelligent people concluded that Blasey Ford was a liar — probably motivated by pure partisanship — the media refused to confront the reality that they had promoted a perjurious false accuser to defame an innocent man. Instead, as Judge remarks, they doubled down.

Adaptive Curmudgeon finishes off our list of links with Hunting And Election After Action Report: Part 6: Canning

In the middle of the process, my hunting partner wound up carrying a tub of 20# of raw meat while our dog just completely went bonkers. The dog is a good 90 pounds and it tried to climb into his back pocket to get at the meat!

The poor dog was completely out of sorts! Not aggressive, but more like an addict who’s realized you’ve got a pound of cocaine in your hand. We gave it a few treats, carefully placed in its bowl (to avoid teaching it to beg) and that just barely kept the dog from exploding. (Mrs. Curmudgeon has given the dog all manner of treats so don’t blame me if it’s a begging dog. Also, no dog is so utterly civilized that 20 pounds of cubed raw game meat won’t blow a few circuit breakers.)

The "How Dare You Live Without Me" Attitude in Action

It never really works out. Man shot trying to get into former girlfriend’s house in Washington County

He apparently thought he had the right to enter his ex-girlfriend's home, even though she told him to leave.

Police said the 26-year-old man tried to enter the home through a locked screen door and was advised to leave by the homeowner.

Police said the man continued to break the screen door and enter to get in and that’s when a resident shot him one time in the torso.

He had to be airlifted to a trauma center. If he survives, I believe he will be charged with something.

People need to learn to understand and accept the sentence, "It's over."

Self-defense is a human-right.

The FGC9 MKII - 3D Printed Gun

The FGC9 MKII is an interesting firearm. It is a combination of 3D printed parts and some metal bits that you can buy off the internet. Some of the metal bits you might get from your local Big Box hardware store. The barrel starts life as a piece of seamless steel tube, and is rifled by way of electro-chemical machining (ECM), which uses electricity, and some ingenuity to cut rifling inside the tube.

This is the Print Shoot Repeat video The FGC9 MKII | Making Tyrants Afraid Again. The video is a bit long at 19 minutes, and a great deal of it is probably only of interest if you are considering building one, but the first 5 or 10 minutes of the video is of general interest and I can recommend it.

Hat tip goes to Imrpo Guns: The FGC-9 MK2 – Making Tyrants Afraid Again. There is a second video at that link that is only 20 seconds

Personally, if I were going to build my own firearm from scratch, I don't think I would go the 3D printing route. The guns do have some problems. There are plans to build guns completely out of metal, and I'm not talking about 80% kits, though I think those are cool as well. There are guns built completely from steel bar, and plate, and tube. I do like the idea of ECM machining, though there are simple ways to build sine-bar cut rifling machines. I've even seen a video by a machinist who cut his own rifle button on a lathe, and pushed it through a barrel blank with a hydraulic press. (That is a bit out of my reach.)

Native Hawaiians Guilty of Anti-white Hate Crime

Haters gonna hate. Native Hawaiian men found guilty of hate crime against a white man in Maui | Daily Mail Online

Two native Hawaiian men have been found guilty of a hate crime after a white man was beaten with a shovel while renovating his new home in a remote Maui neighborhood.

Kaulana Alo-Kaonohi and Levi Aki Jr were detained Thursday pending sentencing on March 2 over the sickening 2014 assault in which they told the victim he 'had the wrong color skin.' 

State and local authorities wouldn't pursue hate crime charges, but the federal government decided to bring charges in 2020.

Kunzelman released surveillance footage of the 2014 attack which showed the men yelling at him and saying that the incident 'wasn't personal' but he had the 'wrong color skin'

I'm sure the Left is already screeching about how whites can't be the victims of racism.

The FBI's Endless Investigation of Trump

From The Other McCain - Orange Man (Still) Bad: Anti-Trump Witch Hunt Must Continue, Says Garland

“Show me the man and I’ll show you the crime,” said Stalin’s notorious secret police chief Lavrentiy Beria, summarizing the method by which totalitarianism destroys its chosen enemies. Specious accusations of “Trotskyism” were enough to justify arrest and prosecution and, as Beria said, the NKVD could always discover (or rather, invent) “crimes” used to justify the summary execution of whatever “enemy of the people” (vrag naroda) had aroused Stalin’s paranoid fears. Likewise, with Merrick Garland in charge of the Department of Justice, the more or less permanent “investigation” of former President Donald Trump.

The FBI is more like the Stazi every day. And I compare them to the Stazi, or the Ministerium für Staatsicherheit (Ministry for State Security) from the old East Germany, because they were the "law enforcement" branch of the Communist Party, and the FBI has morphed into the law enforcement (or secret police) branch of the Democratic Party.

Dead Inside

Nita Strauss had been working as the lead guitarist for Alice Cooper's band for nearly 10 years. (She recently moved on from that gig.) She is also a member of The Iron Maidens, an all female Iron Maiden tribute band. This is a solo outing. Well, with some help from David Draiman.

She is an amazing guitarist.

This is the reception the song received: Nita Strauss becomes first solo woman to top Billboard Mainstream Rock Airplay chart in over three decades.

Guitarist Nita Strauss has become the first woman in almost three decades to top the Mainstream Rock Airplay chart with her new track Dead Inside, featuring Davcid Draiman of Disturbed on vocals. The last time the chart was topped by a female solo artist was 1990, with Alannah Myles’ Black Velvet.

This is "Dead Inside" by Nita Strauss, with vocals added by David Draiman of Disturbed. It was released as a single in October of 2021, but it was working its way through the Spotify Kickass Metal playlist in February, which is where I first found it.

On a side note, I have looked for a recording of The Iron Maidens, but I have never run across one with decent audio. That isn't to say that one does not exist, but there are an awful lot of cellphone videos of their performances to wade thru. If anyone knows of a good-quality recording, leave a link in the comments and I will include it in a future Musical Interlude.