Meme Scholar with Madness (PhD)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

R.I.P. NASA Astronaut William Alison Anders (17 October 1933 – 7 June 2024)




June 8, 1794: Maximilian Robespierre inaugurated the French Revolution’s new state religion, known as the "Cult of the Supreme Being". This day was designated as the first day of national celebration of the Supreme Being. Every locality was ordered to hold a commemorative event.


King Louis: Who must go?

Robespierre: You.

Guillotine chopping sound.

Robespierre: Who goes next?

The Revolution: You.

Guillotine chopping sound.

7 weeks later Robespierre was executed for the execution of more than 17,000 "enemies of the Revolution". Maximilien Robespierre "the Incorruptible" and the deist Cult of the Supreme Being was and is quite the historical controversial character to this day.

However as the great American Author Mark Twain said:

“THERE were two “Reigns of Terror,” if we would but remember it and consider it; the one wrought murder in hot passion, the other in heartless cold blood; the one lasted mere months, the other had lasted a thousand years; the one inflicted death upon ten thousand persons, the other upon a hundred millions; but our shudders are all for the “horrors” of the minor Terror, the momentary Terror, so to speak; whereas, what is the horror of swift death by the axe, compared with lifelong death from hunger, cold, insult, cruelty, and heart-break? What is swift death by lightning compared with death by slow fire at the stake? A city cemetery could contain the coffins filled by that brief Terror which we have all been so diligently taught to shiver at and mourn over; but all France could hardly contain the coffins filled by that older and real Terror—that unspeakably bitter and awful Terror which none of us has been taught to see in its vastness or pity as it deserves.”
― Mark Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court


June 8, 1949: Eric Blair, writing under name George Orwell, publishes Nineteen Eighty-Four. One of Lee Harvey Oswald's favorite books.







In 1961 Freedom Rider Joan Trumpauer Mulholland (born Sept 14, 1941) became one of the first white female civil rights activists in Mississippi. She was famously photographed alongside Anne Moody and John Salter during a May 1963 sit-in at the lunch counter at the Woolworth’s store on Jackson’s Capitol Street.

Joan Trumpauer Mulholland, then and now. Arrested June 8, 1961, in Jackson, Mississippi, with other Freedom Riders.


She later worked at the Smithsonian Institution, the United States Department of Commerce, and the Justice Department, before teaching English as a second language. Joan is retired and lives in Virginia, and has five sons. Due to her actions as an activist participating in at least three dozen sit-ins, not only was she disowned by her family, but she was also hunted by the Klan.

"The white, Southern community around her couldn’t understand why she was doing it" - at 19 years old.
Northern Virginia magazine

The Joan Trumpauer Mulholland Foundation

Meet the Players: Freedom Riders

Joan Trumpauer Mulholland: A Freedom Rider's Story




June 8, 1925: Silent film star Lina Lamont (Jean Hagen) signed a contract with the studio that holds them responsible for positive media coverage. This prevents Kathy Selden from being credited for her dubbing work as Lina's voice.


Jean Hagen (born Jean Shirley Verhagen; August 3, 1923 – August 29, 1977) was an American actress best known for her role as Doll Conovan in The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and as Lina Lamont in Singin' in the Rain (1952), for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.

Lina Lamont: "What's wrong with the way I talk? What's the big idea? Am I dumb or something?"

Lina Lamont: "If we bring a little joy into your humdrum lives, it makes us feel as though our hard work ain't been in vain for nothin'. Bless you all."

Rod: "Lina, you're a beautiful woman. Audiences think you've got a voice to match. The studio's gotta keep their stars from looking ridiculous at any cost."

Cosmo Brown: "Nobody's got that much money."

Both actor/director John Huston and star Sterling Hayden were members of the Committee for the First Amendment, which stood against the blacklisting of alleged Communists working in the film industry during the Red Scare. John Huston first met Sterling Hayden in Washington, DC, during a protest against the House Un-American Activities Committee investigation of "subversives" in the film industry. Huston had never been a Communist, although Hayden at one point had been. Definitely by Dr. Strangelove he was a full blown anti-commie!

The song "The Green Green Grass of Home", which was the first #1 hit for Tom Jones, was written by Curly Putman after he watched Sterling Hayden's death scene in this film.


The poster in The Asphalt Jungle showing Marilyn Monroe in a purple dress was created much later, after she became a household name. Monroe was basically unknown when the film was made in 1950 and only has a very small role. She certainly wouldn't have been given top billing at the time. In fact, she wasn't named on the original posters at all. Marilyn regarded this as one of her best performances. This film has been preserved in the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress in 2008.


June 8, 1967: Israeli airplanes attacked USS Liberty, in the Mediterranean, during the 6-Day War: 34 crew were killed and 171 wounded. The ship was in international waters when hit. The Israeli and US government inquiries ruled it a mistake (mistaken for an Egyptian ship), but some studies reckon it was deliberate and the controversy remains to this day.




June 8, 1968: as seen from Robert F. Kennedy’s funeral train, en route from New York to Washington. Of all the images of Americans waiting by the track to pay their respects as Robert F. Kennedy's funeral train passes by, this one is particularly moving in representing as I think it does, the hope that working people & those in poverty had placed in him. Photo by Paul Fusco.


Robert F. Kennedy’s Funeral Train

Paul Fusco: The Second Edition of Robert F. Kennedy’s Funeral Train

Remembering Paul Fusco’s Legendary RFK Funeral Train

“Who Advanced This?”: The RFK Funeral Train (JFK Library Blog)

By Abigail Malangone, Processing and Reference Archivist

New York Times reporter Charlotte Curtis recorded in her notes that the train carrying the body of the late Senator Robert F. Kennedy lurched out of New York City’s Penn Station at 1:07 pm on June 8, 1968. This funeral train, carrying Kennedy and hundreds of mourners, was due to arrive at Union Station in Washington, D.C. four hours later; it arrived at 9:09 pm.

It is unclear who gets the credit for suggesting a train. Dave Hackett gave full credit to John Seigenthaler, while Seigenthaler intimated that it would have been the family’s decision. In any event, the plan to have the funeral at St. Patrick’s Cathedral and the burial at Arlington National Cemetery made the train as transport a practical decision. The two days between Senator Robert F. Kennedy’s death and burial were a sleepless blur for many Kennedy staffers, friends, and family as arrangements were made to honor the fallen Senator with a fitting funeral and burial. Details big and small were delegated to and carried out with efficiency by individuals in various camps in New York City and Washington, D.C. This work began in the early hours of the morning on June 6, 1968 and did not end until the late hours of the night on June 8, 1968. Unfortunately, the sheer number of individuals involved, the geographic dispersal of duties, and the unfathomably quick turnaround time for planning leaves the Kennedy Library with very little documentation of these arrangements.

A document about Reagan’s “Star Wars” and tech spin off from the British archives:

“sending a man to the moon was a round about way of developing a non-stick frying pan.” The blue underlines are Margaret Thatcher’s.


Is there a tech innovation that wasn't developed in a national lab or byproduct from a weapons program? I'm sure there's a few, but very rare.


Meanwhile, another day in dystopia techdom. Former CEO of Google Eric Schmidt is "quietly developing" kamikaze killer battle drones. These AI-powered combat drones are being made through his "secretive venture, initially known as White Stork and now rumored to be called Project Eagle."


Eric Schmidt Is Secretly Testing AI Military Drones In A Wealthy Silicon Valley Suburb

There isn't a corner of the tech industry that isn't in bed with the Defense Industry and Intelligence. If anything, their consumer products are a byproduct to subsidize these kind of projects. Like all those fun trending apps that made your face look older or younger, beautified, etc. - were just training for Facial Recognition Software. What happened to Google's motto: "Don't be evil".

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Today is the start of a new era in Europe:

France: National Rally wins a historic 31.5% of the EU vote, forcing Macron to dissolve the national parliament.

Germany: AfD (Alternative for Germany) surges to become the 2nd largest party, liberal parties tank.

Belgium: Prime Minister resigns after his crushing defeat against the right.

Italy: PM Giorgia Meloni's Brother of Italy wins in a historic landslide.

Austria: FPÖ doubles their seats and becomes the largest party in the nation. FPÖ Freedom Party is pro-Russia.

Spain: Right beating the left by 10%.

Luxemburg: First ever seat for conservative ADR (Alternative Democratic Reform Party).

Poland: The top party among young voters (18-29) was Konfederacja, a very right wing and anti-immigration party.

Apparently, the pendulum is swinging. Good, bad, doom for EU, somethin in between?


June 9, 1949: the Red Scare howler THE RED MENACE opened in Los Angeles.


a cheeseball propaganda film designed to instill terror into Americans about communism’s plans for global domination. You get plenty of subterfuge here, along with lots of betrayals and a few brutal beatdowns, and one of the commies, Betty Lou Gerson would later portray purest evil by voicing Cruella de Vil in Disney’s One Hundred and One Dalmatians. Ironically, when The Red Menace premiered the U.S. government was entering into a period during which it would sponsor numerous anti-democratic coups in Latin America, Asia, and the Middle East. This was unknown to most Americans, but it’s debatable whether they would have been concerned.


June 9, 1957: the headless and handless body presumed to be that of Lieutenant-Commander Lionel Crabb aka Buster Crabb found floating in the waters of Chichester harbor. Foul play was suspected. He was a Royal Navy frogman and diver who vanished during a reconnaissance mission for MI6 around a Soviet cruiser berthed at Portsmouth Dockyard in April 1956.


New evidence has emerged of Britain's attempts to cover up the fate of a diver who vanished in 1956, while apparently spying on a Soviet warship.
BBC news (2006)


Look magazine, June 9, 1959.


Not, in fact, the whole story.


June 9, 1972: Middle-aged salesman, David Mann, was driving on a business trip, when he was involved in a prolonged road rage incident with a demon truck driver. Date is known thanks to the scorelines mentioned on the radio.




Where has the time gone?

Don’t answer that.




Oh what a surprise, sigh...


Noa Argamani was held captive in Al Jazeera journalist's home

The Jerusalem Post

Always two sides to every war story and many questions remain unanswered.


My House Will Always Be Open – Stories from the Gaza Siege


You can tell that the protests outside the White House are completely organic by the fact that every participant has the exact same tent. Soros Shanties...


The Soros Camping & Tent Supply Organization.


Round-up time and air drop'em over Gaza.


Across the pond...

The Sunday Times

[EndtheMadnessNow]

What is the first film you think of when you see...


Judy Garland was born June 10, 1922. Recent FBI records on the FBI applicant investigation conducted on her manager, Carleton Alsop, who worked in a psychological warfare unit for the CIA & became its most valuable Hollywood asset.

An apparent truth of the Carleton Alsop files is that those reported for decades to have abused and exploited Judy Garland seem to have included a man who became a CIA asset, or at least his neglect and complicity potentially factors, even if that is not the primary takeaway of the Carleton Alsop story. One might consider the circumstances somewhat reminiscent of the George White saga, an apparent rogue narcotics squad cop with a drinking problem who became an MKULTRA asset, haphazardly managing Agency brothels under its notorious Operation Climax.

Judy Garland Manager Became CIA Asset


June 10, 1940: With France on the verge of military defeat, Italy, led by Mussolini, declared war on France and Britain, and became Hitler’s ally. Hitler commented privately: "First they were too cowardly to take part. Now they are in a hurry so that they can share in the spoils."



On the same day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt denounces Italy's actions in his "Stab in the Back" speech at the graduation ceremonies of the University of Virginia.

"Unfortunately to the regret of all of us and the regret of humanity, the Chief of the Italian Government was unwilling to accept the procedure suggested and he has made no counter proposal." ... "On this tenth day of June, nineteen hundred and forty, the hand that held the dagger has struck it into the back of its neighbor." - FDR


June 10, 1942: SS forces killed every male over 15 in the Czech village of Lidice, in a horrific reprisal for the assassination (or justifiable homicide), of the leading SS figure, Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich, who died on June 4, 1942 after a bomb attack on his limousine on 27 May 1942.


Czech Radio digitises full archive of trial with key figure in Lidice massacre



June 10, 1944: 642 men, women and children were killed by the German Waffen SS Panzer Division in the village of Oradour-sur-Glane, France. Charles de Gaulle ordered that the village be left as a permanent memorial. The village was never rebuilt and featured at the opening of the first episode of the classic 26-part documentary series The World at War (TV Series 1973–1974) narrated by Laurence Olivier. The whole series should be required viewing for every school child.




The Tragedy of Oradour-sur-Glane: The Slaughter of an Entire Town


June 10, 1957: (TIME magazine) Mind over Matter: Latest findings by psychosomatic medicine men on the interaction of body & soul in causing disease: Monday Morning Virus?





PHOTO OF THE DAY. Norwich City council has a state of the art computer delivered (1957):


Elliott Brothers (London) Ltd was an early computer company of the 1950s and 1960s in the United Kingdom. It traced its descent from a firm of instrument makers founded by William Elliott in London around 1804. The research laboratories were originally set up in 1946 at Borehamwood and the first Elliott 152 computer (developed for naval gunnery control) appeared in 1950. In 1957, the company changed its name to Elliott Automation Ltd.

Elliott 405 (1956) One donated by Nestle to The Forest School, Winnersh and named Nellie. See the vid at Watch Nellie, the British School Computer of 1969


The balloon saga continues... 2024 POO WARS BEGIN - this time North Korean dirty bombs.


Over 330 Balloons carrying Sewage, Trash, and other Objects have crossed the Korean Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) from North Korea in the direction of the South, with several Balloon Landings already being reported in and around the Capital of Seoul.

Reminds me of what the Japanese did to the Chinese back in WWII era, dropping a lethal pathogen on the population.


Meanwhile, can we afford to be decommissioning ships at this point in time?
The US Navy seems to have perfected the art of decommissioning ships.

The decommissioning schedule for the U.S. Navy’s remaining 13 Ticonderoga-class guided missile cruisers has been set. Next to leave service will be the Vicksburg (CG 69) in June 2024, followed by the Cowpens (CG 63) in August, Antietam (CG 54) and Leyte Gulf (CG 55) in September. Overall, the last two cruisers will likely be Chosin (CG 65) and Cape St. George (CG 71), both to be decommissioned in fiscal 2027. The close of their careers will bring an end to the service life of the class, the world’s first to be equipped with the Aegis combat system.

Vicksburg and Cowpens had been two of the seven cruisers inducted in the mid-20-teens into the Navy’s Cruiser Modernization Program, and the cost of their protracted, never-finished modernizations has approached nearly one billion dollars. Although Congress had directed otherwise, the U.S. Navy in early 2024 ordered all further work on the ships to stop and they were placed on the decommissioning list. Of the seven cruisers in the program, only Gettysburg and Chosin have been redelivered, with work continuing on Cape St. George. Two other ships in the program, Hue City (CG 66) and Anzio (CG 68), were decommissioned in 2022 in poor condition and far from completion.

This list presents the 13 remaining cruisers in the order they’re currently scheduled to be decommissioned. Specific projected dates such as these are subject to change, but there is not expected to be any change in the overall order or in the decision to inactivate all cruisers by the end of fiscal 2027, which is 30 September 2027. Unless otherwise noted, all ships are to become Logistical Support Assets – that is, spare parts sources. After that, they presumably will either be scrapped or used in sinking exercises (SINKEXs).

The cruisers are being decommissioned approximately at the end of their planned 35-year service lives. They are being replaced in the air warfare commander role by new Flight III Arleigh Burke-class destroyers, only one of which currently is in service.

This list presents the 13 remaining cruisers in the order they’re currently scheduled to be decommissioned. The dates are from the most recent Navy directive regarding fiscal 2024 inactivations and an appendix from the 2025 30-year shipbuilding plan, issued in March 2024.

U.S. Navy’s Cruiser Countdown to Decomm

Ship is named after then-super warrior badass Marine Corps Private First Class, later United States Army captain Jacklyn H. Lucas (1928–2008), recipient of the Medal of Honor for his actions at the Battle of Iwo Jima, five days after his 17th birthday. Let that sink in. He is the youngest Marine and youngest serviceman in World War II to be awarded the United States' highest military decoration for valor. When the keel of USS Iwo Jima (LHD-7) was laid in 1997, Lucas placed his Medal of Honor citation in the ship's hull, where it remains sealed.


Potassium boost for the Banana Republic...


https://x.com/pilotsam4/status/1799694458855866716

United Fruit Company, now known as Chiquita brands, has an interesting & sordid bloody past. The absolute best tasty-sweet superior bananas I ever had was in the Philippines.


UK #1 on June 10, 1990: New Order - feat. John Barnes - World In Motion.

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Seems to be shakedown on the world chessboard.


https://x.com/TPostMillennial/status/180...9510436008

June 30, July 7: elections in France
July 4: elections in UK
July 11: Trump sentencing

Enjoy your summer!


I like this feller, Lt Col, USAF Retired, Meteorologist. He's a hoot smacking down clueless climate alarmists, the Greta party of trolls and fake narratives.






Meanwhile, Scottish 'researcher' is alarmed...


The Guardian Narrative


Many say "I am going to become the Joker", but Sen. John Fetterman might have actually done it...LOL. And a reading from the Prophet Babylon Bee last year sorta came true:


https://x.com/FoxNews/status/1799744455928402065 Or Fox news website

Meanwhile: Sen. John Fetterman, wife Gisele, involved in car crash in Maryland Sunday morning - A warning: Don't you dare go astray!



https://x.com/FunkerActual/status/1799933085527552224

0:30 mark - "Let me know what is going through your head right now."

That is Donut Operator (@DonutOperator) level humor right there.
Full video at Funker530 website. If this were in Commiefornia the cops would still be negotiating 12 hours later and all the neighborhood donut shops would be empty.


IDF release footage showing the rescue of hostages Almog Meir Jan, Andrey Kozlov, and Shlomi Ziv by forces of the elite Yamam unit and Shin Bet agents. Amid the fighting at the home of Abdallah Aljamal, Yamam officer Ch. Insp. Arnon Zmora was killed.
I'm betting there is a ton of footage like this from the war in Gaza that we haven't seen.

https://x.com/manniefabian/status/1800228192051155086

So, where are the five American hostages? Enquiry minds would like to know.


Tic Tacs from spaaaaaaaace...




Words to start the week...


Meet me at the van down by the river to learn more and listen to tall tales of a previous world I once knew.

The gate is open, stop by for tea...

[EndtheMadnessNow]

June 11, 1963: George Wallace’s stand in the schoolhouse door.
President Kennedy’s address to the nation on civil rights.

The next day a shot is fired.


June 12, 1963: American civil rights activist and the NAACP's first field secretary in Mississippi was assassinated by former Marine, Byron De La Beckwith VI. In 1964, he was tried twice on a murder charge in Mississippi. The all-white male juries each ended in hung juries, and De La Beckwith went free. In 1994, based on new evidence, he was tried again. He was convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison. Died in prison at age 80 in January 21, 2001.


June 11, 1976: 2024 sneak preview...




June 11, 1979: "The Duke" John Wayne died (aged 72). He appeared in some 150 movies over the course of his long film career and he established a tough, rugged, screen persona, primarily in westerns. He gained 1 Oscar as Best Actor as Marshal Rooster Cogburn in True Grit.




Looks like we're back to high profile airplane crash season.


Malawi’s vice president and 9 others are confirmed dead after their plane’s wreckage is found


Hackers or...

International hackers stole nearly a half-million dollars from the town of Arlington [Massachusetts] by impersonating a vendor working to rebuild the community’s high school, town officials said.

The theft is the latest in a series of costly cyberattacks on area municipalities. In this case, Arlington was targeted by a complicated spoofing and hacking scheme, according to Arlington town manager Jim Feeney.
Over a four-month period, $445,945.73 was wired to accounts supposedly controlled by a legitimate vendor working on the high school construction project, but that were actually controlled by a “well-resourced” group of cybercriminals.

The scheme, according to town officials, was a detailed ruse that began when hackers compromised some town employees’ emails.

The hackers were able to monitor email discussions of the high school project between Arlington officials and outside vendors. Using a fraudulent email domain to pose as an established vendor, the hackers requested that the town change payment methods, from check to electronic transfer. Four monthly payments were transferred under the new payment method.

“Thread-jacking,” the cyberattack strategy used to target Arlington, is relatively common, according to Brian Krebs, a cybersecurity researcher and consultant.

“These types of attacks are some of the most frequent, and they are among the most profitable,” Krebs said. “It’s fairly remarkable, because they don’t really require much, if any, upfront financial investment by the attackers. And they potentially net them millions or tens of millions of dollars, when they trick state and local governments into moving money where they shouldn’t.”

Arlington loses nearly $500,000 in high school construction funds to hacking scheme

Sounds like lax security and “well-resourced” group of social engineers.



While it's not shocking that the hostages were suffering from malnutrition (because all of Gaza is); Stockholm syndrome is not actually a thing and has never been included in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM). Note they quickly renamed the article title and removed Stockholm Syndrome...


Rescued hostages said suffering from malnutrition; leaning on each other for support


Right on schedule for summer fear...


6 SUSPECTED TERRORISTS WITH ISIS TIES ARRESTED IN MAJOR U.S. STING
Will the people connected to this policy be held accountable for any terrorist attacks (false flags) it makes possible? Of course not.


Apparently, I missed the memo as I never heard of such flag till now...


National Hostage and Wrongful Detainee Day and flag

Maybe I did hear of it and blurred it out. Anyways, it's been codified into U.S. law, this flag will fly every March 9, Flag Day (June 14), July 4, and every time an American hostage is freed or perishes in captivity.



Cold War days are back...

Russian Nuclear Sub, Frigate with Long Range Land Attack Missiles Operating Off East Coast


The Outcome By J. B. WOOD, 1952

The world's great cities lie in dust, And the clouds above are atom mist
The rocket steel is left to rust, And only the vultures still exist...

Silence now, and dying sun, No longer heard are the plans of men;
Rusting steel, and broken gun, And the black rocks cool in the night again...

A hundred million dreams are dead, And the air is calm where the vultures glide;

While the atom mist makes the stars shine red,

And the land is silent, and the space is wide.

Siouxsie And The Banshees - Cities In Dust



"Time is more complex near the sea than in any other place, for in addition to the circling of the sun and the turning of the seasons, the waves beat out the passage of time on the rocks and the tides rise and fall as a great clepsydra."
— John Steinbeck

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Deadly fogs, moralistic diatribes, debunked medical theory — in his essay “Bad Air” Brett Beasley explores The Doom of the Great City (1880), a piece of Victorian science fiction considered to be the first modern tale of urban apocalypse:

Scarcely can I portray in words the dire and dismal scenes that met my vision here. . . . For here, where on the previous night had throbbed hot and high the flood-tide of London’s evening gaiety, was now presented to my poor fevered sight, the worst, the most awful features of the whole terrific calamity. I had entered into the very heart and home of horror itself.

This is the way the world ends: not with a bang but a bronchial spasm. That is, at least, according to William Delisle Hay’s 1880 novella, The Doom of the Great City. It imagines the entire population of London choked to death under a soot-filled fog. The story is told by the event’s lone survivor sixty years later as he recalls “the greatest calamity that perhaps this earth has ever witnessed” at what was, for Hay’s first readers, the distant future date of 1942.

Bad Air

June 12, 1963: The hugely expensive movie Cleopatra, starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton, premiered in New York City. It was the highest-grossing film of 1963, earning box-office receipts of $57.7 million ($574 million on today’s value).



The making of the 1963 film version of "Cleopatra" is an epic story all on its own. Read about how Elizabeth became the first actor to get a million dollar contract for a single role, her spellbinding performance, and an off-screen scandalous romance:

All Roads Lead to Rome: The Making of “Cleopatra” (1963)


Standby for heavy rolls! Time to grow yer sea legs, matey. In 1960, USS Bennington (CV-20) spent 40 straight hours making 308 left circles within a 2,000-yard area as part of an antennae radiation test. At the end of the test, the carrier had a persistent (but temporary) list to port. Almost the entire crew had vertigo.




Your reminder that the Mexican Navy has an active duty tallship and the US Navy does not. ARM Cuauhtémoc is a sail training vessel of the Mexican Navy, named for the last Mexica Hueyi Tlatoani Cuauhtémoc who was captured and executed in 1525. The coast Guard has one, but they don't count.



USS Constitution is most noted for her actions during the War of 1812 against the United Kingdom, when she captured numerous merchant ships and defeated five British warships: HMS Guerriere, Java, Pictou, Cyane, and Levant. The battle with Guerriere earned her the nickname "Old Ironsides" and public adoration that has repeatedly saved her from scrapping.

Technically, the HMS Victory is the oldest commissioned vessel by 32 years, but she has been in dry dock since 1922. So, the US Navy periodically tugs Old Ironsides around the Boston Harbor to one up the British.

Coast Guard cutter "Eagle" original name was "Horst Wessel" when it was built and commissioned in 1936 by Germany. Namesake is Horst Ludwig Georg Erich Wessel who was a member of the Sturmabteilung, the paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party, who became a propaganda symbol in Nazi Germany following his murder in 1930. The ship was captured in April 1945 by the British. At the end of World War II, the four German sailing vessels still surviving were distributed to various nations as war spoils. Horst Wessel was won by the US in a drawing of lots with the Soviet and British navies, and requested by the US Coast Guard. She was transferred to America and commissioned in May 1946 into the United States Coast Guard as the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Eagle; nickname is "America's Tall Ship". Apparently, German sailing tech is good stuff & fuel is cheap! LoL.


June 12, 1981: Raiders of the Lost Ark is released.




On the morning of June 12, 1982, as the sun shined down on the green grass in Central Park, people began to gather carrying signs for nuclear disarmament. Throughout the morning, buses arrived from around the country. By the afternoon, nearly every blade of grass was covered. Citizens filled second, third, fifth, sixth, seventh, and Madison avenues. By mid-afternoon, the police estimated that over 750,000 people were in Central Park demanding an end to nuclear weapons. By the end of the day, that number had swelled to 1 million.
It was the largest anti-nuclear protest in American history.


It was a diverse crowd from activists to feminist and LGBT campaigns to mom & pop. It was reported that no violence, no looting, no burning, no racial tension occurred and it played a role in Reagan changing course, and helped get us the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. Bruce Springsteen, James Taylor, Jackson Browne, Joan Baez, Linda Ronstadt and Gary U.S. Bonds performed for a million protesters at the Rally for Nuclear Disarmament on the Great Lawn in New York’s Central Park.

The vast parade and rally, organized by a coalition of peace groups, brought together pacifists and anarchists, children and Buddhist monks, Roman Catholic bishops and Communist Party leaders, university students and union members. There were delegations from Vermont and Montana, Bangladesh and Zambia, and from many other places. The smiling, hand-clapping line of marchers was more than three miles long, and the participants carried placards in dozens of languages.

"There's no way the leaders can ignore this now," said Alex Willentz, who drove overnight from Utica, N.Y., for the event. "It's not just hippies and crazies anymore. It's everybody."

Late in the afternoon, Alice T. McGillion, a Police Department spokesman, said there might be as many as 600,000 or 700,000 people around the park. "There's so much movement it's hard to be certain," she said.

The sponsor of the demonstration was the June 12 Rally Committee, an umbrella organization of religious and secular peace groups. The groups participating ranged from radicals seeking immediate unilateral disarmament by the United States to moderates asking a resumption of negotiations on arms cutbacks.

Perhaps the only dissenters in the huge throng were a group of about 40 people who stood for a time at 42d Street and First Avenue. They carried signs saying, "Build Up or Freeze to Death" and "Peace Is a Soviet Weapon of Conquest." Leonard Holihan, a businessman based in London, said his organization was called Coalition for Peace Through Security. Profusion of Placards

Among the marchers, there was a profusion of placards: "Choose Life"; "Bread Not Bombs"; "No Nukes"; "Reagan Is A Bomb - Both Should Be Banned"; "U.S. Out of El Salvador"; "Freeze or Burn"; "Build Houses Not Bomb Shelters"; "A Feminist World Is a Nuclear-Free Zone," "Arms Are for Embracing." A little girl carried a sign saying, "I Hate Nuclear War," and one marcher had an inflated rubber whale with the legend "Save the Humans."

Further along the route, one policeman stood in the center of a group of marchers and talked to them. "I was in the service in the 60's," he said. "You know how they brainwash you there. Well, when I got out, most of the marching in '69 was over, and there was a new era. But now, it's just like a resurrection. This march is for everybody. Whatever happens, we're going to get toasted."

THRONGS FILL MANHATTAN TO PROTEST NUCLEAR WEAPONS

Orson Welles speaks before a crowd of 700,000 at a nuclear disarmament rally in Central Park on June 12, 1982: (audio only)




June 12, 1987: At the Brandenburg Gate, U.S. President Ronald Reagan gives one of the most famous Cold War speeches in publicly challenging Mikhail Gorbachev to tear down the Berlin Wall.




A cycle of repeated "unprecedented" events, LOL...


After a 21 gun salute the Russian frigate Gorskhov-class FFG Admiral Gorshkov enters Havana harbor. Possibly the most modern Russian war ship to ever visit Cuba.

Video of Gorshkov's arrival: https://x.com/Archer83Able/status/1800897931102548096

Every few years this "unprecedented" stuff happens again...

2017: Russian Spy Ship Spotted 30 Miles Off Connecticut Coast Near Naval Base


Recent foreign film: Konvoi (The Arctic Convoy) trailer. War cinema told differently: a Norwegian merchant vessel in summer 1941 struggles to deliver arms to Russia.




A few of BIAD's banners are fitting for Traffle.







An edgy, dicey title for a poem in 2024, But this was published in 1929 by D.H. Lawrence...

If you want to have sex, you've got to trust
at the core of your heart, the other creature.
The other creature, the other creature
not merely the personal upstart;
but the creature there, that has come to meet you;
trust it you must, you must
or the experience amounts to nothing,
mere evacuation lust.

[EndtheMadnessNow]

A Satirical View of the Stock Exchange (1785) in Aquatint print by Francis Jukes.


The caption reads:
"An historical emblematical, patriotical, and political print representing the English balloon or national debt in the year 1782 with a full view of the Stock Exchange and its supporters the financiers, bulls, bears, brokers, lame ducks, and others, and a proportional ball of gold the specific size of all the money we have to pay it with supposing that to be twenty millions of pounds sterling, the gold and silver trees entwined with serpents and upheld by dragons for the pleasure of Pluto & all his bosom friends."
- London, Publish'd as the Act Directs, by W. Phelps, July 1, 1785 - Yale Center for British Art


June 13, 1984: the Leander-class frigate HMS Jupiter collided and became wedged under London Bridge after the captain had declined to use available tugs to help navigate the currents of the Thames. The accident resulted in significant damage to both the ship and the landmark.



The ship's captain, Commander Colin Hamilton, was later court martialled at Portsmouth on December 4, 1984. Hamilton was severely reprimanded. Ship was sold for scrap in 1997.


Imagine if everyone had a nuclear bomb. Your own personal security blanket, a nuclear football. The ultimate brinkmanship. Everyone would be so terrified all the time, even more so than now. Crime would go down or else. The future would look much brighter encased in fear like a diamond. (sarc)

June 13, 1986: Marshall Brickman's THE MANHATTAN PROJECT was released.






Military Times


Oh sure, this will help boost recruiting...


Washington Free Beacon

Feelin nonplussed yet. I'll wager there is none of that crap to be seen in the Pentagon or DC.



"We control events better when when we control opinion."






Noel Gallagher's High Flying Birds - Open The Door, See What You Find




The art of Ralph McQuarrie, born June 13, 1929.




Thursday words...
Twitter is the lodestone for every walk & crawling of life imaginable, and then some. Horrors & delights beyond your wildest dreams or nightmares. In other wordly news, Florida is experiencing a lot of nimbuses lately.





'Nonplussed' means "perplexed," but since the mid-20th century, 'nonplussed' has increasingly been used to mean “unimpressed” or “unsurprised,” and this use, though often considered an error, has made the confident deployment of this word a fraught issue for many. (According to Merriam-Webster)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

On this day in 1777, the Second Continental Congress adopted the Stars and Stripes as the flag of the United States. In 1949, President Truman signed an Act of Congress designating June 14 as Flag Day.





June 14, 1775: Happy Birthday to US Army, the Continental Congress enlisted 6 companies of expert riflemen from PA, MD, & VA to join and support the New Englanders besieging the British forces in Boston, establishing the foundation for today’s modern army that still (we are told) bravely defends America.

June 14, 1937 – Pennsylvania becomes the first (and only) state of the United States to celebrate Flag Day officially as a state holiday.


June 14, 1954 – U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower signs a bill into law that places the words "under God" into the United States Pledge of Allegiance.


June 14th TIME covers. (1943, 1954, 1963, 1971)
"Czars may come and czars may go, but he goes on forever." (U.S. at War)




Jan 14, 1951: in Albuquerque, NM: The world premiere of Billy Wilder's classic film ACE IN THE HOLE. Starring Kirk Douglas and Jan Sterling.


A frustrated former big-city journalist now stuck working for an Albuquerque newspaper exploits a story about a man trapped in a cave to rekindle his career, but the situation quickly escalates into an out-of-control circus.



June 14, 1959: Submarine Voyage opened at Disneyland. The "subs" were built with advice from General Dynamics' Electric Boat Division and named for actual Navy subs. Walt boasted he had the 8th largest sub fleet in the world. The attraction's theme is now based on FINDING NEMO.




June 14, 1999: While visiting a farm in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Texas Governor George W. Bush announces that he is running for President in 2000. C-SPAN video


June 14, 2000: USS Buchanan (DDG-14) proved to be a tough ship. She remained afloat after being hit by three AGM-114 Hellfire air-to-surface missiles, three Harpoon anti-ship missiles, and a 2,400-pound (1,100 kg) laser-guided bomb in the Pacific Ocean off Hawaii. The job was finally done by 200 pounds of C-4 explosive charges set by an EOD team.



You can watch her go down after multiple sortie attacks:



At 21:26:30Z (11:26:30 AM HST) on 14 June 2000, Davy Jones piped her aboard at her final resting place at 22:54.38N, 160:27.68W, 64 nautical miles northwest of Kauai in 2,540 fathoms (15,240') of water.


It is all a Monty Python skit...with a Clark and Dawe press conference.


US military considers temporarily dismantling pier off coast of Gaza for second time due to rough sea conditions

Q: Senator, why did the front fall off?
A: Well, a wave hit the ship
Q: Is that unusual?
A: Oh yeah. At sea? Chance in a million!

Clarke and Dawe - The Front Fell Off
"Bob Collins, Australian Senator" Air date: July 26, 1991.




Ooof, a headline like this is out of a Neal Stephenson dystopian novel...


OpenAI appoints Retired U.S. Army General Paul M. Nakasone to Board of Directors

He brings special interests from the NSA and only shows you are corrupt and compromised at the very highest level and infiltrated by Chinese, North Koreans & probably Russians too. It's not hard to understand that the US big brother has full operating control and influence over this app.

"We began the ability for us to defend the presidential elections not today, not six months from now. We began it the day after the midterm elections."
- General Paul Nakasone, Cybercom commander (Feb 2020)


The 2027 alien contact theory has made its way to Russell Crowe...

Are you not entertained, is this not why you are here!!??


https://x.com/Truthpolex/status/1801348773958062167


Feisty Friday bonanza of words...



A Writer's Dilemma

In the grip of ardscalpsie, a sorrowful sight,
Palimpsest discarded, unable to write.
I ache for smultronställe's sweet sun dappled shade,
And the calm of the trunnels' path through the glade.

Ache be gone, tonight I dine in heavenly strawberry shortcake & tomorrow too!

Bonus Friday word: "Mumpsimus", 16th century: one who insists that they are right (or wronged) when all evidence points to the contrary. The current Banana republic administration is the lodestone of mumpsimus maximus.

[Bally002]

Had a bit of an Australian theme to some of that lot.  Cheers.

Like me some RIMPAC stuff.

Bally)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

June 15, 1864: Arlington National Cemetery established on 200 acres once owned by Mary Anna Randolph Custis Lee, wife of Gen. Robert E. Lee.


How Arlington National Cemetery Came to Be


The phrase “Kilroy was here” started at Fore River Shipyard in Quincy, MA by  ship inspector James J. Kilroy (1902–1962) during WWII, according to most historians. The picture was added at some point. He would mark "Kilroy was here" on the portions of liberty ships he inspected at the Fore River Shipyard. His signature became a symbol of reassurance for American troops, who saw it as a sign that the ship had been properly inspected and was safe. It’s a legit war meme that confounded enemies. Unbeknownst to anyone at the time, it would become a legendary, almost mythical part of American military culture and the history of the war. 


Kilroy was found in ship holds, bathrooms, bridges, and walls, and even painted on the shells of Air Force missiles. It was found scrawled across France, Germany, the entire Pacific theater, and more.

Even Japanese enemy forces were confused and intrigued by the tiny man peering over the wall. Japanese troops were reported to be perplexed by the meme they found all over the Pacific theater. They found it painted onto the sides of tanks and missiles in Guadalcanal and other islands. 

Kilroy’s most notable appearances are the two inscriptions hidden in the World War II memorial in Washington D.C. Tucked away, in small unassuming corners of both the Atlantic and Pacific sides of the memorial, Kilroy has been carved into the marble.

It serves as a tribute to his legacy and impact on the war effort. Many myths and legends cropped up to explain the sometimes baffling and mystifying graffiti man. However, the “Kilroy Was Here” phenomenon was primarily – and remains so – a lasting symbol of the American military during World War II and beyond.  Kilroy even made a comeback in the days of the Korean War. He was similarly spotted in Iraq and Afghanistan. Wherever American troops go, Kilroy seems to follow.

Exploring the Enduring Legacy of “Kilroy Was Here”


June 15, 1971: Conservative Education Secretary, Margaret Thatcher, announced that she planned to end free school milk for junior school pupils, prompting the famous slogan: “Thatcher, Thatcher, milk snatcher”. She later admitted her decision was a major political error.




LGBTQ SPY HISTORY!
Neo-Nazis were distressed to learn a song they adored, Tomorrow Belongs to Me from Cabaret, was written by Fred Ebb, a Jewish gay guy. The patriotic song from Cabaret, in the Biergarten in pre-war Nazi Germany, sung by the Arian Hitler youth. In the vid below you see many young and old people getting taken up by the song, but you also see the old man who remembers WWI and knows what will happen.




Jeremy Clarkson is right, we're living in absurd times. He’s saying what the vast majority of people are & have been thinking about the absolute clown world enforced upon us by our control hungry political leaders.




The world is about to be over and no price is too high, which is why the entire Climate Emergency Fund and A-22 network which funds Just Stop Oil, Extinction Rebellion (both here & across the pond) and others completely legally shields all donors and maintains tax deductible status. You can even sponsor a hunger strike! We ONLY FUND people willing to annoy everyone else. We ONLY DO NOT FUND people who may sue a company in our portfolios or who want to conserve the resources we want to strip mine for our green revolution! Careful there could be people partaking in 501c(3) eligible activities here.


Climate Emergency Fund


New banner motto in light of the WaPo's recent management issues.


NY Times (archived)


Robertson Panel. Disney and Hollywood to control the narrative...




Are you ready for the GONG SHOW??


The Sun’s Polar Magnetic Field will Soon Flip – And GONG is Watching

The sun's magnetic field is about to flip. Here's what to expect


"Trees are sanctuaries. Whoever knows how to speak to them, whoever knows how to listen to them, can learn the truth. They preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life."
— Hermann Hesse






C-ya tomorrow on the same cat channel.

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Happy "Mad Men" Father's Day!




John Tyler, 10th POTUS (1841-1845), fathered 15 children: 8 with his 1st wife and 7 with his 2nd. His grandson Harrison Ruffin Tyler is still alive!

President John Tyler was born in 1790 during the Washington administration. Tyler was an originalist, meaning he was a vehement devotee of the Constitution, holding that it was the most supreme governing document in the land and should be adhered to with no hesitation or compromise. He held this belief during his entire life, but it was especially solidified during his collegiate years spent at the College of William and Mary where he studied law. Political upheaval was constant during the 19th century as the issues of states rights and slavery moved to the political forefront; as abolitionist groups augmented in number, so did the number of staunch supporters of the system of slavery. Tyler was a fervent supporter of states rights, including regarding slavery – when serving in the House of Representatives for the 23rd district of Virginia, he voted against the Missouri Compromise of 1820 because the federal legislation would make Missouri a slave state and Maine a free state in perpetuity. As the states were not obliged to decide on the issue of slavery for themselves, it was for this reason that Tyler voted against it. Tyler did own slaves though he was opposed to the institution.

*Author’s Note: It is said that William Henry Harrison was the first victim of the “Tippecanoe Curse”. Also known as Tecumseh’s Curse, this urban legend is said to have emerged after the Battle of Tippecanoe in 1811 when then-Governor of the Indiana Territory (Harrison) defeated Tecumseh’s united Native American forces. The curse is said to affect United States Presidents voted into office in years that end with zero and can be divisible by twenty.

So far, the curse has been very effective: 1840 – President Harrison died in office from illness, 1860 – President Lincoln was assassinated during his second term, 1880 – President Garfield was assassinated by an ex-Oneida madman, 1920 – President Harding died in office after suffering a heart attack, 1940 – President Roosevelt died while in his fourth term in office, 1960 – President Kennedy was assassinated while visiting Dallas, and 1980 – there was an attempted assassination on President Reagan, who thankfully survived and may have broken the curse.*

“White House Kids” Series – Harrison Ruffin Tyler, Grandson of 10th President John Tyler

June 16, 1858: Abraham Lincoln gave his "House Divided" speech in Springfield, Illinois. 

"I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free.

I do not expect the Union to be dissolved -- I do not expect the house to fall -- but I do expect it will cease to be divided.

It will become all one thing or all the other."


From early childhood, Marilyn Monroe's hero was Lincoln.



June 16, 1933: FDR signed the Glass-Steagall Act. Banking Act of 1933. It separated commercial banking from investment banking and established the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC). FDR also signed the Farm Credit Act, the Emergency Railroad Transportation Act, and the National Industrial Recovery Act, which created the Public Works Administration. This day also marked the end of the first hundred days of the presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Those one hundred days were a period of frenetic activity.


The investment of federal monies in a series of public works programs, which provided desperately needed jobs, formed an integral part of Roosevelt’s domestic agenda, the New Deal. Under Secretary of the Interior Harold Ickes, the Public Works Administration initiated and oversaw about 34,000 public works projects. Millions of unemployed Americans went to work in the 1930s in programs such as the Work Projects Administration (originally named the Works Progress Administration), the Civilian Conservation Corps, and the Tennessee Valley Authority.

The Folklore Project of the Federal Writers’ Project, a New Deal program established in 1935, employed writers to collect life histories from a broad spectrum of American citizens. Many of those interviewed expressed gratitude for the New Deal programs:

    I am heartily in favor of the New Deal, and its results are apparent even in my neighborhood. In former years, my pastor…was often hard put to it to take care of some of his flock. But the work furnished and the wages paid to those in our neighborhood on the WPA [Works Progress Administration] are apparent, and if it is so in this small section, what must its accomplishments and rehabilitative affects be throughout the United States?

    “Mrs. Eulalia McCranie.” Rose Shepherd, interviewer; Jacksonville, Florida, ca. February 23, 1939. American Life Histories: Manuscripts from the Federal Writers’ Project, 1936 to 1940. Manuscript Division

A New Deal: The First 100 Days

June 16, 1963: the world’s first cosmonette, a dimpled Russian girl who wore lipstick into space.


Cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova (1937 - still alive) became the first woman in space.


June 16, 1999: David Sutch, known as "Screaming Lord Sutch", died (aged 58). He founded the Official Monster Raving Loony Party, serving as its leader from 1983 to 1999. He holds the Guinness record for losing more than 40 parliamentary elections in which he stood from 1963 to 1997. Imagine if this guy was still kickin around today!



As a singer he worked with Keith Moon, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, Ritchie Blackmore, and Charlie Watts. He also had some rocking tunes...



Here's a rare interview with "Screaming Lord Sutch":





Bat boy never had a chance. He thrived in war but could not exist in peace, that was the central contradiction of his character.




Here's Ms Vampira...The original glamour ghoul herself, "Vampira", of late night 1950s television, believed to be the first television "horror host" was actually born Maila Elizabeth Syrjäniemi (later changed to the easier surname Nurmi) on December 11, 1922 in Gloucester, Massachusetts (not Finland as she often claimed).


Of course, her unusual figure was a key factor to her success, as Vampira claimed to be gifted with the following measurements: 38-17-36! Her uncle was the multiple Olympic medal runner Paavo Nurmi.

She was raised in Astoria, Oregon, where she worked in tuna and salmon canneries. She relocated to Los Angeles in 1940, with hopes of becoming an actress. After several minor film roles, she found success with her Vampira character, television's first horror host. Nurmi hosted her own series, The Vampira Show, from 1954 to 1955, on KABC-TV.

In the 1940s, Nurmi claimed she had a child with Orson Welles; since Welles was married to Rita Hayworth, the child was given up for adoption.

Retired lawyer is the son of Vampira but is Orson Welles the father?

A DNA check and Ancestry.com confirmed that retired attorney David Putter of Montpelier, Vermont, is Nurmi’s biological son.

“My partner here is always accusing me a blood-sucking lawyer now. She didn’t use to use that term, now she does,” Putter, 76, joked in an interview with WCAX-TV, CBS-3, in South Burlington, Vermont.

However, there has been no DNA test to determine if he is related to Welles — and the claim might best be taken with a grain of salt.

However, Nurmi revealed in an interview weeks before her death in January 2008 how she met Welles in a New York casting office while he was separated from Hayworth. Welles was living in New York in the spring and summer months of 1946 when he was staging Around the World on Broadway. Nurmi said she and Welles dated for several months before he reunited with Hayworth to film The Lady from Shanghai in October 1946.

Nurmi made it clear to the interviewer she did not get involved with married men, but Welles and Hayworth were separated at the time.

The CUBE is being powered up right now. Jun 14, 2024 – Jun 19, 2024. Harvested 14 bodies...


They circle the Kaaba seven times counterclockwise, to turn back time.

Sky News


Across the pond to the north when 79F has you like...


UK weather: 48-hour 26C heatwave to hit

[Freija]

OMG! 26C with a high of maybe 30C? How will they survive? (That's 78.8 and 86 F)

All last week and all weekend I've worked outside all afternoon on my woodworking project and am looking forward to the cool down to start the week. Looks like on Tuesday I might need a sweater?



It was 44.44 today.

41.66 Monday
40.55 Tuesday (brrrr!)
41.66 Wednesday
45.55 Thursday
45.55 Friday
45.55 Saturday

I bet we're going to break 115 (46.11C) within a week? Last summer we had 55 days where it hit 110 (43.33) with 31 of them being consecutive with overnight lows in the mid to upper 90s (35-36C ish). We hit 115 (46.11) fifteen times and we hit 119 (48.33) twice.

Before anyone says "but it's a dry heat", let me point out that your oven and blast furnaces are also a dry heat!

Because I'd rather not spend all my money on my electric bill, I set my thermostat at 93 (33.88) during the day, turn it down to 85 (29.44) at 7:00 PM when my peak energy rates go down and turn it down to 82 (27.7) when I go to bed. I do keep a fan on at all times though - I'm not stupid!

Summer is just getting started - wait until July! 

[BIAD]

Grey Monday sky and drizzle as I type.

[Bally002]

Grey Monday sky and drizzle as I type.

Crikey.  Those temps are our maximum here in winter where I am.

Min here presently is about 2C.

Bally)

[EndtheMadnessNow]

But, but it's a dry heat, damn it!!! What doesn't kill you, makes you stronger. LOL

I don't mind 100-105 but starting around 107-108 and the body begins to feel the strain and 109+ really wears on me. Spent 3 brutal days in 124-127F in Death Valley (July 2017) while rescuing some dumb lost French tourists who were near dead. So long as I'm drinking a gallon of water per hour while working outside I'm fine. After 5pm I'd be downing beers followed by a quart of water before bedtime. Next day, repeat. Don't do it anymore though. Heavy hot humidity makes you miserable while that hot dry heat can kill you right quick.


June 17, 1939: In the last "public" guillotining in France, Eugen Weidmann, was executed outside a prison in Versailles. The German serial killer had been convicted of multiple kidnappings and murders, including that of a young 22 year old American socialite, Jean de Koven on July 23, 1937. The "hysterical behaviour" by spectators was so scandalous that French President Albert Lebrun immediately banned all future public executions.


In the crowd watching was 17 year old Christopher Lee (later Dracula). Lee said he could not bring himself to watch Weidmann’s execution. "I turned my head, but I heard," he told a documentary in 1998. Footage of the execution with him in the frame was restored and used in Faces of Death III, released on VHS in 1986.

The Last Public Execution by Guillotine

LIFE magazine (Jan 3, 1938)


June 17, 1972: five men were arrested for breaking into the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C.

"Wills on duty"

Watergate office building, Washington, D.C.

And so it begins.

On the night of June 17, 1972, security guard Frank Wills was making his usual rounds when he noticed a piece of duct tape covering the lock of the back parking lot door to the Watergate Office Building in Washington, D.C. As noted in the Security Officer’s Log (NAID 304970), he removed the tape, only to return thirty minutes later to find that another piece of tape had reappeared. Wills quickly contacted authorities about his strange observation. The local police arrived at the building and searched each office suite. The police, along with Wills, found five men hiding in the Democratic National Committee (DNC) Headquarters office. These men were identified as Bernard L. Barker, Virgilio Gonzalez, Eugenio Martinez, James W. McCord Jr., and Frank Sturgis. All of these men had connections to Richard M. Nixon’s reelection campaign.

“Wills on Duty:” The Guard that Discovered the Watergate Break-in

June 17, 1983: The Police released their 5th and final studio album "Synchronicity".




On the night of June 17, 1994, an estimated 95 million people watched as O.J. Simpson, riding in a white Ford Bronco, led the LAPD and California Highway Patrol on a low-speed snail chase along Interstate 405 in Los Angeles, California.




"Americans cannot keep a secret. Or so it increasingly seems to frustrated Government officials who decry what retired Admiral Bobby Ray Inman, former deputy director of the CIA, terms the "hemorrhaging" of classified information." - "The Xerox machine is one of the biggest threats to national security ever devised," says retired Admiral Thomas Moorer...




1st time the Pope has ever attended a G7 summit and he leads the talk about AI...


Pope attends G7 summit in historic first, warns of dangers of AI

The G7 ITALIA Summit


Why did the Gaza Pier fail. Why can't we reopen the Red Sea. Why do these desert nomads keep harassing the most powerful navy? Why can't we build more Navy ships? Yada, yada.

Answer:




If Blinken is sincere here, it’s a testament about how detrimental having "democracy brain" is to thinking about the world. Disaster.

QUESTION:  Well, you said yesterday at some point if one side continues to change its demands, you have to question whether they’re proceeding in good faith.  So let’s be direct: Is Hamas negotiating in good faith?

SECRETARY BLINKEN:  The proof will be in whether we can bring this to a conclusion, and bring it to a conclusion quickly, fast. From our perspective, it’s time for the haggling to stop; it’s time for a ceasefire to start.  And you have one man who’s probably somewhere deep underground in Gaza for Hamas, Mr. Sinwar, who’s making all of these decisions.  Well, he’s relatively safe underground.  The people that he purports to represent, they’re suffering every day.  So if he has their interests at heart, he will come to a conclusion to bring this to a conclusion.

Secretary Antony J. Blinken With Savannah Guthrie of The Today Show on NBC (June 13, 2024)

Flashback: "Or, more likely, the world will descend into chaos & conflict, & the jungle will overtake us, as it did in the 1930s. ‘America First’ is only making the world worse. Here’s a better approach..." essay by Antony J. Blinken and Robert Kagan (January 4, 2019) for the Brookings think-tank.


‘America First’ is only making the world worse. Here’s a better approach - Blinken's foreign policy has been a dumpster fire of epic proportions.


These social media clips ALWAYS miss (intentional cut-out) the context.


Full vid & transcript: Secretary Antony J. Blinken and Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama at a Joint Press Availability (Feb 15, 2024)



Activist Gilbert Baker created the original pride flag in 1978. Baker was urged by Harvey Milk to create a symbol for the LGBT community and he chose a flag, which he saw as the most powerful symbol of pride.


A Guide to LGBTQ+ Pride Flags - I think Britannica missed one as Baker added a nine-stripe version of his original 1977 flag, adding in 2017 a lavender stripe to symbolize diversity. Meh, who can keep up anymore.


LOL, par for the course...


Gov. Hochul considering a face mask ban on New York City subways
State overlords: Those damn masks are blocking our biometric surveillance on the sheeple.
Witch Hochul: I'll make all masks illegal with stiff fines.


New week, new words...



The Poet's Struggle

The lallycodler, pen in hand, prepares to spill his soul.
Şafak's first blush, already gone, the hours take their toll.
Opiferous inspiration, calms his inner rage.
Nubivagant thoughts come flooding in, scrawls across the page.

[BIAD]

Grey Monday sky and drizzle as I type.

Crikey.  Those temps are our maximum here in winter where I am.

Min here presently is about 2C.

Bally)

Yeah, the MSM like to frighten the public!

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Children in Dundee, Scotland at Albert Square protest in February 1971 after the BBC announced they would be pulling Scooby-Doo from their schedule. Were all those kids that upset or the parents.

At the corner of Whitecross Street and Old Street in East London, on the walls above Jane Roe Kitchen, you’ll see a commemorative blue plaque dedicated to a certain Miss Priss Fotheringham, who has laid claim to the rather salacious title of “the second best whore in the city.” The title was awarded to her in 1660 by John Garfield in The Wandering Whore, a directory of prostitutes working in 17th century London.



Born in Scotland around 1615, Priss Fotheringham later moved to London, where she worked as a prostitute. In her youth, she was described as a "cat-eyed gypsy, pleasing to the eye," but by her thirties, her face had been scarred by smallpox and worsened by quack medicines. Years of heavy gin consumption also negatively affected her appearance.


In 1652, Priss was charged with running a house of ill repute, after being discovered “sitting between two Dutchmen with her breasts naked to the waist and without stockings, drinking and singing in a very uncivil manner.” She was convicted and sent to Newgate Prison.

In 1656, Priss married Edmund Fotheringham, whose mother ran a seedy brothel on Cow Lane, Finsbury. Edmund used to bully and beat her and acted as her pimp, forcing Priss to leave her husband for a sword sharpener, taking much of her husband's money with her. In 1658, she was arrested again by Middlesex Justice of the Peace:

For being a notorious strumpet, a common field walker and one that hath undone several men by giving them the foul disease, for keeping the husband of Susan Slaughter from her ever since December last and hath utterly undone that family, and also for threatening to stab said Susan Slaughter whenever she can meet her, the woman being very civil woman, and also for several other notorious wickedness which is not fit to be named among the heathen.

When the money ran out the sword sharpener left her, and she returned to her husband who reported her for theft. Once again, Priss found herself before the judges who decided that the sooner they hanged the depraved lady, the better. But the new Lord Protector Richard Cromwell stepped in and pardoned her.

Priss spent about a year in Newgate Prison, where she met fellow brothel-keepers Damaris Page and Elizabeth Cresswell and the writer of The Wandering Whore, John Garfield. After her release, Priss established herself as the madam of The Jack-a-Newberry, a tavern located at the corner of Whitecross Street and Old Street. She later renamed the tavern to The Six Windmills, where she gained notoriety through London's burgeoning printing industry. References to the Fotheringham's brothel appear in John Garfield's The Wandering Whore (1660), and The Unparalleled Practices of Mrs Fotheringham (1660), Strange and True News from JackaNewberries (1660), the Strange and True Conference between Two Notorious Bawds (1660) and Man in the Moon (1660).

The more sensitively minded of you may want to skip the next few paragraphs, as it shall be proved that 17th Century Londoners took as much pleasure in bizarre and kinky sex acts as they do today. If curious hit this link:

Priss Fotheringham: London’s Second Best Whore


William Goines who passed away last week at the age of 88. Goines was the first African-American U.S. Navy SEAL when it was created in 1962 by President John F. Kennedy. He later joined the parachute demonstration team the "Chuting Stars". He attended 43 military training schools, which included unarmed combat, SERE school, jungle warfare, demolitions, Airborne school, reconnaissance, and Ranger school. Goines became "Plankowner" of SEAL Team 2, a term applied to original members of newly commissioned units. Fluent in French and Spanish, Goines served in Cuba, three tours in Vietnam, and other classified missions worldwide.


He retired as a Master Chief Petty Officer in 1987 after 32 years of service. He then became Police Chief for the school system of Portsmouth, Virginia, for 14 years. The Virginian-Pilot


Everything in this realm is "recorded". The Office of Naval Intelligence allegedly confiscated the tech that contactee George Van Tassel describes here: (Original air-date: June 18, 1964)





June 18, 1966: The start of the 1966 24 Hours of Le Mans race. Ford racer, Ken Miles, had to pit after only the first lap when his bloody door wouldn't shut.




June 18, 1983: NASA Astronaut Sally K. Ride launched on STS-7 and made history as the first American woman in space. She trained at NASA's Johnson Space Center for five years before her first spaceflight. Sally Ride inspired women and young girls across the country and paved the way for our past, current, and future female space explorers.




June 18, 1991: Sen Daniel R. "Bob" Graham (FL): "If you build it, they will come. We did not build it, and they came. I can assure you that there were many reasons why 13 million Americans decided that they wanted to come to Florida."






Here is the original article from Liberty Times Net (Taiwan news site). The fisherman made an assessment that the sub was under distress. Unclear what kind of distress a sub can be in yet still have propulsion and can get underway at a high rate of speed. In English with more details at The War Zone


June 18, 2019: crew members from U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Munro chased down and boarded a narco-submarine in the Eastern Pacific, seizing 17,000 pounds of cocaine with an estimated value of $232 million. Two vids in @727Sky's thread


Meanwhile, Germans score bigly...


Details (suspects included citizens of Ukraine)


Chris says the quiet part out loud...a bit early in the game.


“When mystiques implode, when they are exposed as lies, a central foundation of state power collapses.”
— Chris Hedges

[Freija]

Did you forget it’s Pride Month? Your bit on Sally Ride failed to mention she was gay and in a loving relationship with another woman for 27 years!

Sally Ride was very good at keeping secrets. As the first American woman in space, she protected countless confidences during a lifetime of public appearances. During her post-NASA years, she regularly wrote and reviewed classified government material on high-profile commissions. When she died in 2012 of pancreatic cancer, a diagnosis hidden from all but a tiny handful of family and close friends, I started unraveling the mysteries for her biography. She was a brilliant, mischievous enigma.

But the most surprising revelation was the one that came at the end of her obituary: that for 27 years, she’d been in a loving relationship with another woman, Tam O’Shaughnessy. The collective gasp from an admiring public reverberated for days. A small minority complained that she’d squandered an opportunity to speak out for their rights. A few spouted homophobic hatred. Selfishly, as her pal of more than three decades, I was stunned; hurt, that I did not know Sally fully, that I could not celebrate her happiness with Tam. Then I thought, why does her sexual orientation matter? Finally, I got it.

Never before had the words astronaut and lesbian appeared in the same sentence. Google them today, and you get more than half a million hits, all pegged to Sally Ride. Most salute her as an icon with an added, posthumous message of hope for the LGBTQ community. So why the secrecy?

What made this 61-year-old pioneer—so bold in her actions, so non-traditional in her choice of careers and devotion to science; this baby-boomer whose life had been transformed by the space age and the social revolution of the ’60s and ’70s—keep silent, so long, about being gay?

Sally Ride’s Secret: Why the First American Woman in Space Stayed in the Closet

Why Sally Ride waited until her death to tell the world she was gay

Astronaut Sally Ride brought women and the LGBTQ+ community to the final frontier 40 years ago

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Did you forget it’s Pride Month? Your bit on Sally Ride failed to mention she was gay and in a loving relationship with another woman for 27 years!

Sally Ride was very good at keeping secrets. As the first American woman in space, she protected countless confidences during a lifetime of public appearances. During her post-NASA years, she regularly wrote and reviewed classified government material on high-profile commissions. When she died in 2012 of pancreatic cancer, a diagnosis hidden from all but a tiny handful of family and close friends, I started unraveling the mysteries for her biography. She was a brilliant, mischievous enigma.

But the most surprising revelation was the one that came at the end of her obituary: that for 27 years, she’d been in a loving relationship with another woman, Tam O’Shaughnessy. The collective gasp from an admiring public reverberated for days. A small minority complained that she’d squandered an opportunity to speak out for their rights. A few spouted homophobic hatred. Selfishly, as her pal of more than three decades, I was stunned; hurt, that I did not know Sally fully, that I could not celebrate her happiness with Tam. Then I thought, why does her sexual orientation matter? Finally, I got it.

Never before had the words astronaut and lesbian appeared in the same sentence. Google them today, and you get more than half a million hits, all pegged to Sally Ride. Most salute her as an icon with an added, posthumous message of hope for the LGBTQ community. So why the secrecy?

What made this 61-year-old pioneer—so bold in her actions, so non-traditional in her choice of careers and devotion to science; this baby-boomer whose life had been transformed by the space age and the social revolution of the ’60s and ’70s—keep silent, so long, about being gay?

Sally Ride’s Secret: Why the First American Woman in Space Stayed in the Closet

Why Sally Ride waited until her death to tell the world she was gay

Astronaut Sally Ride brought women and the LGBTQ+ community to the final frontier 40 years ago

Actually I did forget, damn it! BUT I posted her a while back mentioning that fact. Besides I figure that Pride timeline of flags I posted yesterday was enough. LOL. She kind of reminds me of that woman in "For All Mankind" tv series.


Some more just for kicks...

June 18, 1812: the U.S. declared war on Great Britain due in part to the impressment of sailors. The Royal Navy was known to stop U.S. ships to ask the crew to say "peas". Sailors who pronounced it "paise" rather than "pees" were deemed to be British deserters and then seized.


However, according to American Battlefield Trust, the War of 1812 was an avoidable conflict, which was a "result of ineffective foreign policy." Huh, sounds familiar today.




The streets of Pyongyang are adorned with portraits of the Russian President, and the flags of Russia and North Korea. Rocketman personally greets Vladimir Putin at Pyongyang airport. The North Korean elites are excited on the arrival of Putin for his second trip to the country after 24 years.




Flashback...



Looks like a Blancpain (Swiss) watch or more likely a Hublot Big Bang (also Swiss & extremely expensive but less than a Rolex):


Fingers look suspicious but anyways women have also been known to fall out of windows unexpectedly.


In other RT funnies...


They can switch off Tesla cars remotely. Next, they can also switch us off remotely with neuralink chips. This takes mind control to whole new level.


Ironic, how the corporate solution to worker stress is to recreate the brainwashing montage from the Parallax View...


Blood in the Machine: The Newsletter

Ads are out of control...







Fake AI still kickin ass & takin names...lol




Nice to see that being alive is no longer a requirement to work for the BBC. Explains a lot, actually. Dead, deaf, zombies, apply now!


UK Express

[EndtheMadnessNow]

Noble merchant (representative of the Grand Sherif) with his Circassian slave.


Gatekeeper of the Ka‘ba [Ka‘bah] (from the Shebah family [Bani Shaybî], who have held this office since pre-Islamic times) [1888-1889] | found at NY Public Library, Rare Books Division


It is commemorated on the anniversary date of the June 19, 1865, announcement of General Order No. 3 by Union Army general Gordon Granger, proclaiming freedom for slaves in Texas.

In June 2021, Stepford Biden made Juneteenth, officially Juneteenth National Independence Day, a forced federal holiday.



Condoleezza Rice: Juneteenth Is Our Second Independence Day

Also note that this date in 1865 was not the freeing of the last slaves after the Civil War. Many American Indian tribes, like the Choctaw, continued to own slaves in to 1866.

Dorothea Lange (born Dorothea Margaretta Nutzhorn; May 26, 1895 – October 11, 1965) was an American documentary photographer and photojournalist, best known for her Depression-era work for the Farm Security Administration (FSA). Lange's photographs influenced the development of documentary photography and humanized the consequences of the Great Depression.


You can view Lange photos/prints in high resolution at Shorpy American Historical Photo Archive

“After de War I was what you call a freedman. De Indians had to give all dey slaves forty acres of land. I’se allus lived on dis land which jines dat of Ole master’s and I’se never stayed away from it long at a time.” Thus did Frances Banks, a formerly enslaved African American, describe herself and the situation for other formerly enslaved people in Indian Territory when interviewed by a Works Progress Administration (WPA) field worker in 1938.

Banks was born on a farm near Doaksville in the southeastern corner of the Choctaw Nation before the Civil War. Her parents belonged to the Wright family, whose prominent members included Allen Wright, principal chief of the Choctaw Nation from 1866 to 1870, and later a judge by the same name in the state of Oklahoma. Her short interview—which, like many conducted with former slaves, was transcribed using stereotypical Black speech patterns—offers a provocative glimpse at slavery, the Civil War, and emancipation, all familiar subjects in American history, but from a less familiar vantage point: Indian Territory.

Although the term “enslaver,” for most Americans, is likely to conjure up the image of a white plantation owner, Native tribes such as the Choctaw also enslaved people of African descent and had done so for more than a century before the Civil War. European traders and settlers introduced the Choctaws to enslaved Africans as early as the 1720s. By 1831, a federal census conducted in preparation for removing Choctaw Indians from the Mississippi River Valley to Indian Territory enumerated 17,963 Indians, 151 white persons, and 521 enslaved people. Just eight years later in 1839, there were approximately 600 enslaved people of African descent living among the Choctaws. And by 1860, enslaved people of African descent made up 14 percent of the population in the Choctaw Nation...

Choctaw Confederates

Alan J. Pakula's political assassination conspiracy thriller THE PARALLAX VIEW was released 50 years ago today. Freelance graphic designer Scott Saslow created this awesome anniversary poster!



In 2021, the film was reissued in a deluxe Blu-ray edition by the prestigious Criterion Collection. If you’ve seen the film, you know the sequence. It is the mind-blowing four-and-a-half-minute tour de force of "visual material" that is screened by the diabolical Parallax Corporation for Joe Frady (Beatty) to determine if he has assassin potential. Film Comment later called it "an ingenious montage of primally evocative images...with astutely manipulative music scoring."

Here's the "visual material" clip:




PARALLAX VIEW Reviews...

Several years ago, I began researching the history behind this extraordinary piece of filmmaking. I obtained copies of some of the production records and I interviewed one of the key people behind its creation. In addition to reading the original novel and screenplay adaptations, I also reviewed numerous articles, reviews and book excerpts.

This post presents what I have learned about THE PARALLAX VIEW Test Film.

“SOUNDS A LITTLE CRAZY”

If you want to learn the finer details behind "Test sequence" see this blog post:

AMERICAN BAROQUE: A HISTORY OF THE PARALLAX VIEW TEST FILM

More pride poster art for the 30th anniversary this year of "The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert". Never seen it, but I like the poster art:


Two drag-queens (Anthony/Mitzi and Adam/Felicia) and a transgender woman contract to perform a drag show at a resort in Alice Springs, a resort town in the remote Australian desert. They head west from Sydney aboard their lavender bus, Priscilla. En route, it is discovered that the woman they've contracted with is Anthony's wife. Their bus breaks down, and is repaired by Bob, who travels on with them. Starring pre-Matrix Hugo Weaving, it has a rather high score on IMDB. A road-trip through the desert, filmed at "Alice Springs" + agent drag Smith just got itself added to my must watch list. A few screen caps for your pleasure...




The digger archivist folks over at Government Attic just posted a successful FOIA'd material from a FEMA dirty bomb and Black Plague exercise in 2002-03. Threat Level Red!


Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) Top Officials Exercise (TOPOFF) After Action Reports (AAR) 2003-2007... over 1,000 pages.
TOPOFF 2 (T2) After Action Summary Report (PDF)


Praise be, endless sunshine!!




Unity in strange places? Scotland the Brave & Amazing Grace (André Rieu live in Bahrain)