The Perfect Coup

cartoon by Bob Gorrell

Andrea Widburg, a/k/a Bookworm Room, posted “The Perfect Coup” - a hypothetical scenario – but one that’s been unfolding before our very eyes:

[Trump’s] indictment isn’t the first step;
it’s the last in a series of steps going back to 2016

If I were trying to overthrow a duly elected president, I’d start by saying that he conspired with a foreign power to cheat in the election. I’d believe I could get away with this charge because I would have the media on my side, relentlessly pounding away at the narrative. It would help that members of the president’s own party, despising him for destroying their cozy little arrangement with the opposition, refused to support him politically.

When it became apparent that the president was hugely effective at governing on those things that matter to ordinary people, such as the economy, national security, immigration, energy policy, etc., and that the false charges of treason and cheating, I’d look ahead to throwing the next election.

What I would need is a way to prevent the president from campaigning and a way to institutionalize election fraud. Thankfully, I would have gamed out long before the election what a government can do if faced with a pandemic infection. COVID’s appearance was providential. 

I would disagree here.  IMHO, COVID’s appearance was deliberate, as were the draconian protocols of vaxxing and masking (see e.g., Emerald Robinson here or Dr Robert Malone’s speech in Mexico City in March 2023).  But the balance of Ms Widburg’s scenario is spot-on.  Click here for the rest of it. 

NOTE:  This blog is moving to Substack during June 2023: the above blog now also appears at the new site here.  If you’re a regular reader, bookmark the new location! 

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George Carlin on rights vs privileges

George Carlin got it right -- and many years ago.  Seen on Bookworm Room:

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You Are Here (for real)

Seen at Bookworm Room:

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Post-SOTU memes

My kind of memes, seen at Bookworm Room (especially fun scrolling through while monitoring DrunkBlogging of the SOTU address):

 

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Why pay cash?

As global digital currency looms ominously in our future, here’s a meme I saw the other day at Bookworm Room that shows one reason that cash is better than digital (or any credit card):

Click to embiggen or go to the link above and scroll down.

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James Woods: King of the Memes

Bookworm Room posted both these memes by actor James Woods yesterday.  Enjoy and weep: 

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Day Before the Election: meme

Meme for the Day Before Election Day, seen on Bookworm Room:

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Student loan “forgiveness”???

Why the scare quotes above?

The headline: Biden's student debt forgiveness will cost taxpayers $400 BILLION over 10 years, non-partisan Congress office says: White House says announcement is coming soon' on massive cancellation plan (Daily Mail UK, by Katelyn Caralle).

The clarification:  (h/t Bookworm Room):

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The Next in the Endless Line of Boosters: Buyer Beware

 

Deborah Birx (Scarf Lady) Meme via BookwormRoom

Frank Camp at The Daily Wire reports:

Fewer than 2% of eligible Americans have elected to receive a new COVID booster shot, according to CDC data.

While more than 4.4 million Americans have received a “bivalent” COVID booster shot, only 1.5% of people for whom the shot is available have actually gotten it since the CDC started recommending it several weeks ago. The latest COVID vaccine booster is designed with Omicron sub-variants BA.4 and BA.5 in mind.

The CDC’s COVID vaccine tracker shows that 67.8% of the U.S. population who are eligible for the vaccine have completed the primary series of shots. The Bloomberg tracker shows that 32.5% have received at least one booster.

On September 1, CDC Director Dr. Rochelle Walensky recommended the booster, providing the following statement: “The updated COVID-19 boosters are formulated to better protect against the most recently circulating COVID-19 variant. They can help restore protection that has waned since previous vaccination and were designed to provide broader protection against newer variants. This recommendation followed a comprehensive scientific evaluation and robust scientific discussion. If you are eligible, there is no bad time to get your COVID-19 booster and I strongly encourage you to receive it.”

As the CDC and many public health officials are recommending booster shots, the White House is dealing with an unforced crisis regarding COVID after President Joe Biden said that the pandemic was “over” during a recent “60 Minutes” interview. . . .

Read the rest of the report here. 

RELATED: At The Daily Mail: FDA vaccine adviser warns healthy young people should NOT get new COVID booster: Says it's 'unfair to make them take a risk' after data suggested shot was not as effective as first batch

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Reasons to oppose Electric Vehicles

 

John Hinderaker at PowerLine shares some common sense objections to California's mad dash to electric vehicles (and yes, it's coming to Ohio also):

Are people finally starting to catch on to the fact that electric vehicles are a terrible idea? I hope so. Bjorn Lomborg makes the case in accessible form in the Wall Street Journal. To begin with, EVs don’t even save much on CO2 emissions:

Over its lifetime, an electric car does emit less CO2 than a gasoline car, but the difference can range considerably depending on how the electricity is generated. Making batteries for electric cars also requires a massive amount of energy, mostly from burning coal in China. Add it all up and the International Energy Agency estimates that an electric car emits a little less than half as much CO2 as a gasoline-powered one.

What does that up to, in terms of climate?

If every country achieved its stated ambitious electric-vehicle targets by 2030, the world would save 231 million tons of CO2 emissions. Plugging these savings into the standard United Nations Climate Panel model, that comes to a reduction of 0.0002 degree Fahrenheit by the end of the century.

On that basis alone, the left’s mania to make us all drive electric vehicles is insane. But from there on, the story is all negative:

Electric cars’ impact on air pollution isn’t as straightforward as you might think. The vehicles themselves pollute only slightly less than a gasoline car because their massive batteries and consequent weight leads to more particulate pollution from greater wear on brakes, tires and roads. On top of that, the additional electricity they require can throw up large amounts of air pollution depending on how it’s generated. One recent study found that electric cars put out more of the most dangerous particulate air pollution than gasoline-powered cars in 70% of U.S. states. An American Economic Association study found that rather than lowering air pollution, on average each additional electric car in the U.S. causes additional air-pollution damage worth $1,100 over its lifetime.

. . .

Left-wing governments are on a collision course with normal Americans. Governments want to force Americans to rely on wind and solar energy, but those sources can’t keep the lights on and are ruinously expensive. Similarly, governments want to force us all into electric vehicles, which are not as functional as gas-powered vehicles, despite being more expensive. And they are a net detriment to the environment. Lomborg is optimistic, perhaps more so than I am:

Read the rest here.

And Mr. Hinderaker didn’t even get to the problems with existing minerals required to produce the batteries, or the disposal of spent batteries, or the horrific damage done by strip mining to extract, say, the lithium (see aerial image at the top).

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Cashless & Jobs memes

 Two memes seen at Bookworm Room: 

and . . .

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Green New Deal: a dangerous religion

We’ve seen the headlines about the crisis in Sri Lanka, with furious protestors storming the palace in Colombo. The imposition of green policies and regulations that reduced Sri Lanka's agricultural output is a prime example of Green New Deal idiocy.  Or perhaps idiocy is not the best word.  BookwormRoom published another meme the other day on another Green New Deal priority - one that is of consequence in America:

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Klaus Schwab channels Karl Marx

Meme seen at Bookworm room:

 

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Arming Ohio teachers

 

meme seen on BookwormRoom

Jeremiah Poff at The Washington Examiner reports:

. . . Arming teachers has had mixed results in the past due to varying levels of participation. A 2020 report from the RAND Corporation found that 28 states already permit armed teachers under certain circumstances, while others, including Texas and Florida, have passed laws specifically encouraging the practice.

Now, in the aftermath of Uvalde, the policy has received renewed attention in state capitols as lawmakers look to enact new measures to harden security at schools.

Ohio

A bill allowing teachers in Ohio to carry firearms is headed to the desk of Republican Gov. Mike DeWine, who has indicated he will sign it.

"My office worked with the General Assembly to remove hundreds of hours of curriculum irrelevant to school safety and to ensure training requirements were specific to a school environment and contained significant scenario-based training," DeWine said of the bill. "House Bill 99 accomplishes these goals, and I thank the General Assembly for passing this bill to protect Ohio children and teachers."

Once enacted, the bill will add Ohio to a list of several states that already allow teachers to be armed. . . .

Read the full report here.

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2000 Mules: “pulling the ripcord”

 

Andrea Widburg at American Thinker has the follow-up to Dinesh D’Souza’s documentary 2000 Mules:

In his smash-hit move, 2000 Mules, Dinesh D'Souza carefully, and entertainingly, demonstrated how True the Vote, a voter integrity organization, was able to prove incontrovertibly that left-wing non-profits used mules to stuff ballots, bringing in, at a minimum, hundreds of thousands of Biden votes in swing states.  The movie, however, describes the data without releasing them and does not identify the non-profits.  Now, though, True the Vote is planning to publish everything.  That's an information bomb that should blow apart any claims that Biden's victory wasn't the result of massive fraud.

The genius of True the Vote was that it figured out how to use commercially available cell phone location data, along with videos of drop boxes, to prove that, in the five critical swing states that gave the election to Joe Biden, leftist non-profits used mules to deliver dozens of ballots to drop boxes.  The numbers are staggering: at a minimum, 400,000 illegal ballots in the states that turned the election in Biden's favor.

In the review I wrote about the movie, I explained in somewhat more detail how the program worked, but I urge you to see the film for yourself.  The only thing I found a bit disappointing was the fact that the movie did not name the non-profits involved.

Well, that disappointment is over. True the Vote has announced that, in a few weeks, it will make available to the public every single bit of information it has regarding the drop-box fraud.  Or, as Catherine Engelbrecht, who founded True the Vote, calls it, pulling the ripcord . . .

Read the rest of Ms. Widburg’s column here.  The evidence is in, and the “fact-checkers” she quotes are just blowing smoke.  My usual question remains: will anyone be indicted?

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Lies and dictators

Seen online at Bookworm Room:

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Weekend meme

BookwormRoom ran this meme in her weekend round-up:

 

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What tyranny looks like: meme

Weekend meme via Bookworm Room:

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Settled science and censorship meme

Meme seen on Bookworm Room:

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Let’s roll: Todd Beamer’s last phone call

 

image of Todd Beamer from Bookworm Room

This blog posted twice on 9/11. But today, I was browsing through the blogosphere and came across Bookworm Room’s transcript of Todd Beamer’s final phone call before Flight 93 crashed into Pennsylvania.  I have always viewed the passenger take-over of Flight 93 as the first American battle against Islamic jihad, but I did not anticipate being as overwhelmed by Mr. Beamer’s courage in the face of certain death.  I was also struck by the emergency operator’s handling of the emergency.  Here’s Bookworm’s transcript:

Todd: Hello… Operator…listen to me…I can’t speak very loud. – This is an emergency. I’m a passenger on a United flight to San Francisco.. We have a situation here….Our plane has been hijacked…..can you understand me?

Lisa: (exhaling a deep breath to herself) I understand… Can the hijackers see you talking on the phone?

Todd: No

Lisa: Can you tell me how many hijackers are on the plane?

Todd: There are three that we know of.

Lisa: Can you see any weapons? What kind of weapons do they have?

Todd: Yes…. they don’t have guns….they have knives – they took over the plane with knives.

Lisa: Do you mean…like steak knives?

Todd: No, these are razor knives…like box cutters.

Lisa: Can you tell what country these people are from?

Todd: No…..I don’t know. They sound like they’re from the mid-east.

Lisa: Have they said what they want?

Todd: Someone announced from the cockpit that there was a bomb on board. He said he was the captain and to stay in our seats and stay quiet.

He said that they were meeting these men’s demands and returning to the airport… It was very broken English, and… I’m telling you…it sounded fake!

Lisa: Ok sir, please give me your name.

Todd: My name is Todd Beamer.

Lisa: Ok Todd….my name is Lisa…Do you know your flight number? If you can’t remember, it’s on your ticket.

Todd: It’s United Flight 93.

Lisa: Now Todd, can you try to tell me exactly what happened?

Todd: Two of the hijackers were sitting in first class near the cockpit. A third one was sitting near the back of the coach section. The two up. front got into the cockpit somehow; there was shouting. The third hijacker said he had a bomb. It looks like a bomb. He’s got it tied to his waist with a red belt of some kind.

Lisa: So is the door to the cockpit open?

Todd: No, the hijackers shut it behind them.

Lisa: Has anyone been injured?

Todd: Yes, ..they…they killed one passenger sitting in first class. There’s been lots of shouting. We don’t know if the pilots are dead or alive. A flight attendant told me that the pilot and copilot had been forced from the cockpit and may have been wounded.

Lisa: Where is the 3rd hijacker now Todd?

Todd: He’s near the back of the plane. They forced most of the passengers into first class. There are fourteen of us here in the back. Five are flight attendants. He hasn’t noticed that I slipped into this pantry to get the phone. The guy with the bomb ordered us to sit on the floor in the rear of the plane……….oh Jesus.. Help!

Lisa: Todd….are you ok? Tell me what’s happening!

Todd: Hello…..We’re going down….I think we’re going to crash……Wait – wait a minute. No, we’re leveling off….we’re ok. I think we may be turning around…..That’s it – we changed directions. Do you hear me….we’re flying east again.

Lisa: Ok Todd…. What’s going on with the other passengers?

Todd: Everyone is… really scared. A few passengers with cell phones have made calls to relatives. A guy, Jeremy, was talking to his wife just before the hijacking started. She told him that hijackers had crashed two planes into the World Trade Center……Lisa is that true??

Lisa: Todd…..I have to tell you the truth…..it’s very bad. The World Trade Center is gone. Both of the towers have been destroyed.

Todd: Oh God —help us!

Lisa: A third plane was taken over by terrorists. It crashed into the Pentagon in Washington DC. Our country is under attack….and I’m afraid that your plane may be part of their plan.

Todd: Oh dear God. Dear God…….Lisa, will you do something for me?

Lisa: I’ll try….if I can….Yes.

Todd: I want you to call my wife and my kids for me and tell them what’s happened. Promise me you’ll call..

Lisa: I promise – I’ll call.

Todd: Our home number is 201 353-1073…….You have the same name as my wife…Lisa….We’ve been married for 10 years. She’s pregnant with our 3rd child. Tell her that I love her…….(choking up)..I’ll always love her..(clearing throat) We have two boys.. David, he’s 3 and Andrew, he’s 1…..Tell them……(choking) tell them that their daddy loves them and that he is so proud of them. (clearing throat again) Our baby is due January 12th…..I saw an ultra sound…..it was great….we still don’t know if it’s a girl or a boy………Lisa?

Lisa: (barely able to speak) I’ll tell them, I promise Todd.

Todd: I’m going back to the group—if I can get back I will…

Lisa: Todd, leave this line open…are you still there?……

Lisa: (dials the phone..) Hello, FBI, my name is Lisa Jefferson, I’m a telephone supervisor for GTE. I need to report a terrorist hijacking of a United Airlines Flight 93….Yes I’ll hold.

Goodwin: Hello, this is Agent Goodwin.. I understand you have a hijacking situation?

Lisa: Yes sir, I’ve been talking with a passenger, a Todd Beamer, on Flight 93 who managed to get to an air phone unnoticed.

Goodwin: Where did this flight originate, and what was its destination?

Lisa: The flight left Newark New Jersey at 8 A.M. departing for San Francisco. The hijackers took over the plane shortly after takeoff, and several minutes later the plane changed course – it is now flying east.

Goodwin: Ms. Jefferson…I need to talk to someone aboard that plane. Can you get me thru to the planes phone?

Lisa: I still have that line open sir, I can patch you through on a conference call…hold a mo…..

Todd: Hello Lisa, Lisa are you there?

Lisa: Yes, I’m here. Todd, I made a call to the FBI, Agent Goodwin is on the line and will be talking to you as well.

Todd: The others all know that this isn’t your normal hijacking. Jeremy called his wife again on his cell phone. She told him more about the World Trade Center and all.

Goodwin: Hello Todd. This is Agent Goodwin with the FBI. We have been monitoring your flight. Your plane is on a course for Washington, DC. These terrorists sent two planes into the World Trade Center and one plane into the Pentagon. Our best guess is that they plan to fly your plane into either the White House or the United States Capital Building.

Todd: I understand…hold on……I’ll…….I’ll be back..

Lisa: Mr. Goodwin, how much time do they have before they get to Washington?

Goodwin: Not long ma’am. They changed course over Cleveland; they’re approaching Pittsburgh now. Washington may be twenty minutes away.

Todd: (breathing a little heavier) The plane seems to be changing directions just a little. It’s getting pretty rough up here. The plane is flying real erratic….We’re not going to make it out of here. Listen to me….I want you to hear this….I have talked with the others….we have decided we would not be pawns in these hijackers suicidal plot.

Lisa: Todd, what are you going to do?

Todd: We’ve hatched a plan. Four of us are going to rush the hijacker with the bomb. After we take him out, we’ll break into the cockpit. A stewardess is getting some boiling water to throw on the hijackers at the controls. We’ll get them….and we’ll take them out. Lisa, …..will you do one last thing for me?

Lisa: Yes…What is it?

Todd: Would you pray with me?

They pray: Our father which art in Heaven

Hallowed be thy name,

Thy kingdom come, thy will be done

on earth as it is in heaven.

Give us this day our daily bread,

And forgive us our trespasses

As we forgive our trespassers,

And lead us not into temptation

But deliver us from evil

For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory

Forever…..Amen

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want…

He makes me to lie down in green pastures

He leads me beside the still waters

He restores my soul

He leads me in paths of righteousness

for His name’s sake

Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death

I will fear no evil, for thou art with me…..

Todd: (softer) God help me…Jesus help me….(clears throat and louder)

Are you guys ready?……..

Let’s Roll……………………

[end transcript]

General Milley is no Todd Beamer. 

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