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Instapunk Wasn’t Born Yesterday

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  Yes, it became an annual Nightline Ceremony Now that the first battlefield casualties of ‘Trump’s Iran War’ have been recorded (6 as of 3/2/26), Ivan hear the bells tolling on the soundtrack of the Alphabet News networks lamenting the names of dead military personnel they don’t care about in any other respect. Soldier deaths are one more cudgel that can be used to beat the America First crowd with.  We’ve been here before. The article reproduced below is one I wrote for the original Instapunk blog almost exactly 20 years ago. The occasion was a forthcoming — and much promoted — edition of Nightline dedicated to intoning all the names, one by one, of American military personnel killed in Iraq. A not so subtle undermining of ‘Bush’s Iraq War,’ by a TV program that began as a nightly update on the American hostages taken by Iran in November 1979 after Jimmy Carter handed that nation over to the Ayatollah Khomeini. The ironies abound. Nightline was outraged by the plight of the ...
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The Daily Media Routine (Whether you’ve noticed or not)

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  In sunnier days, this would probably have been a Friday Follies post. But we’re talking a wilder take on recent antics being fed us through the mass media. More like Friday FAFO Fun. Just how batshit crazy we should feel about the hallucinogenic diet we’re on depends more than somewhat on what side of the aisle we’re viewing it from. For example, if you’re MAGA, as many of my readers are, you probably feel compelled to check in on the War Room on a fairly regular basis. Where the hunt seems to be on for that one more fatal trap the cunning Dementocrats will be using to steal yet another election.  I’m not taking questions here. This is just how the daily drear if RAV is striking me. Note that the part of “Hang On” Steve is being played here by Jon Voight, and wait for the relief of seeing Julie “the Smart One” Kelly being played by Sigourney Weaver. You and I should consider ourselves Stanley. Is that better or worse than being one of wet behind the ears voyeurs of the left ...
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Faint Praise and Other Hump Day Lumps

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Jesse Jackson (1942-2026) Honestly tried to find an appropriately hagiographic portrait of Mr. Jackson on the occasion of his death, but I came up pretty empty. Mostly photos of him with other famous people, usually Democrats and Civil Rights bigwigs. I really did make an effort to turn an old photo of him into something more. His was a career full of activity and effort but little glamor. He ran for President twice in two of the weakest candidate pools the Dems Hadhad before the current slagpile. In 1984 he lost the nomination to Mondale, who went on to lose 49 of 50 states. In 1988 he polled worse than Al Gore and Michael Dukakis, who also lost bigly in the general. What little attention I paid him then and subsequently is probably due to his participation in the phenomenon of Reagan Derangement Syndrome, that new streak of personal hatred which entered National Democrat politicking after Watergate. Then he gradually dropped away into the background.  Honestly, I probably would l...
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Ice Crashing 2006

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With all the ruckus about U.S. athletes showing off their jock insight about politics and patriotism this year (“me, me, effing ICE killers, and uh, me”), I haven’t paid much attention to the competitions in Milan, a city in which I had some fine evenings decades ago. Why spoil those memories with graceless images of Ugly Americans embarrassing themselves and us?  What has seeped through my indifference is four American performances on, ironically, ice. Two were disasters, gold medal candidates in figure skating who failed dismally under the Olympic spotlight, and two sterling American gold medal victories by a charismatic young legal immigrant from China and a Women’s Ice Hockey Team that beat Canada thrillingly in Overtime. Any karma involved here and there? Could be. Regardless, I’m not going to replay any of these turns on ice here. Let the dead past bury its dead self and let the long lasting glow of triumph reveal itself again at intervals as occasions warrant. Why such a hig...
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The Wild West of News Media

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  DISCLAIMER: If you’re anything like me (attentive to the things I’m attentive to), you’re behind the curve in this whole podcasting phenomenon. I’d seen short clips of podcasts at ‘X’-Twitter, heard about the land office business Tucker Carlson was doing right after he left Fox, and didn’t pay that much attention to people like Joe Rogan until Barron Trump suddenly got credit for stealing the media narrative from the alphabet media (ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN, PBS, NYT, WAPO) during the election campaign. Honestly, I’d regarded solo “pundits” filming themselves being smarter than everyone else as an opportunity for satire rather than serious analysis. Why this disclaimer. I have put my own oar in the podcasting water. Several times. Trying to figure out how normal people could produce a regular series of programs on their own hook. So I took a crack at it on the down low. I wake up early, long before dawn, so I experimented with filming myself on the iPad. Without a printer I coul...
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Legacy is a 6-letter word…

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  One of these gentlemen was named Hugh Walpole. F-a-a-a-mous Writer. Some other famous writer once wrote that “the good is oft interrèd with their bones.” It’s no secret that the reputation of Stephen King has taken a bit of a hit of late. Too much with the tongue-lashing of Donald Trump for some of his more down-home fans. Should this extremely rich and prolifically prolific author be fretting about his legacy in the annals of literature?  Hard to say. Have you heard of the prominent writer and “Commander of the British Empire (CBE) Hugh Walpole? No, not Horace. He was the one who wrote so swimmingly about fishing. This was Hugh, who has quite a lengthy write up at Wikipedia. Here are the most salient excerpts: WIKI: <<Sir Hugh Seymour Walpole , CBE (13 March 1884 – 1 June 1941) was an English novelist. He was the son of an Anglican clergyman, intended for a career in the church but drawn instead to writing. Among those who encouraged him were ...
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A Near-Perfect Microcosm of “The Swamp”

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Ontogeny recapitulates philogeny. There’s an intensely contemporary reason for taking a close look at Scientology. The Swamp is so huge it seems like the Borg. But what are the stripped down essentials of the Borg? Here’s a look at a laboratory example, a microcosm if you will. In the interests of full disclosure, I did encounter Scientology back in the weird year of 1968. I was in Boston, got scooped in to a “Dianetics” exercise, and got speedily thrown out for having too much “charge” to participate. The one in charge was blond, bland to the point of creepy, and I almost (but not quite) succeeded in making him lose his temper. In further interests of disclosure, I spent years on Facebook, debating Trump-haters. They did lose their tempers. But they also exhibited the exact same repetition of Talking Points the lefties (and Scientologists) employ. Exact. Same. Words. How I made the cult connection. Overview Like it says. Troublemaker. Destroy Utterly  Horror Show Squared More ... ...
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F1 Forever… and Clark… and Hamilton… Forever…

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  He died he did in ‘68.. So sorry. So sorry. How the best, most tragic story of F1 ever, unfolded. Jimmy Clark. Just possibly the real GOAT of Formula 1. Grosjean. Made podium one year into Indy racing. Last weekend at Indycar’s Laguna Seca, Romain Grosjean put on an F1 Show not seen since Jimmy Clark won the Indy 500 in 1965. Grosjean waged a war. Americans might not know that Grosjean’s F1 career went up in smoke a year or so earlier in a fiery crash that should have ended his competitive driving forever. His hands were badly burned. People didn’t think he’d drive again. Said similar things about Niki Lauda. F1 is where the superheroes live. Presently, three F1 drivers competing in Indy stuff. Ericsson, Sato, and Grosjean. All fast, no hurt and rebuild on the fly, and forget the ad-heavy car costumery… Yet… Burned his hands, bad. So he came to America. In 100+ F1 starts, Grosjean had scored, well, this: In that same approximate period of time, Lewis Hamilton registered 99 wins, ...
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Party Time

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  No, I’m not going 100 percent Youtube on you. Truth is, the post I did the other day about the Progs  getting nutso when elections don’t go their way was an accident. I was really searching for the songs I’ll be posting here, and those political clips kept showing up in the sidebar. So I grabbed a few of them just to remind you that they really are out of their minds out there.  Right now, of course, a lot of MAGA people are also out of their minds, with very little power or insight about what’s going on behind the media tantrums. That’s why i started collecting this little musical refuge. When is it the right time to party? By which I don’t mean drug yourself into a coma but find a sound and a best that will make you dance or at least reach a philosophical state of equilibrium. It’s always time for that. Because not all party songs are happy things. Some of them are quiet reflective moods when the dancing and singing are winding down. Not a bad place to be when you thi...
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Soul Music for 2024

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A soul needs exercise, especially when confronting turbulent times in life. It needs to stretch wide, dig deep, unify the mind by way of the many senses we are born with. Music is the perfect soul exercise. Here’s a collection, without explanation, in no particular order, which means you’re free to pick your own. Hang on to this link. Come back at intervals. Don’t be afraid to stretch or dig. Being afraid is the very worst state of being. Time to overcome it and breathe again. Maria Callas, Un Bel Di: Gershwin, Rhapsody in Blue: Tom Waits, Hold On: Chopin, Nocturne Op. 9, No. 2: Duke Ellington, Mood Indigo: Ry Cooder, Crossroads: Rachmaninov, Sym 2, Adagio: Copland, Appalachian Spring: Nina Simone, Sinnerman:[Good lifelong Democrat. All the klansmen… Democrats. Still love her] Celtic Woman, Coast of Galicia: Mozart, Clarinet Concerto in A Major: Gorecki, Symphony of Sorrowful Songs: Rolling Stones, Heaven: Johnny Cash, Redemption Day: Maria Callas, La Bohème: Miles Davis/John Coltrane,...
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