Saturday, November 22, 2025

An American Father-Son Duo Decides to Super-Charge the Speed on Germany's Autobahn

You could be at risk of being pilfered by officialdom anytime you sit behind a steering wheel. … Federal, state, and local law enforcement have institutionalized shakedowns on the nation’s highways to the point that “forfeiture corridors are the new speed traps,” as Mother Jones observed.
Police can almost always find an excuse to pull someone over. Gerald Arenberg, executive director of the National Association of Chiefs of Police, told me in a 1996 interview, “We have so damn many laws, you can’t drive the streets without breaking the law.” 

 … Almost two hundred and fifty years ago, Arthur Lee of Virginia aptly proclaimed, “The right of property is the guardian of every other right, and to deprive the people of this, is to deprive them of their liberty.” But increasingly, private property is something that officialdom merely tolerates until they concoct some pretext to seize it.

If police can detain and plunder Americans as they please whenever people drive down the road, all the other rights and liberties in the Constitution are of scant consolation.


Over at the New York Times, the Berlin bureau chief for The Times (leading coverage of Germany, Austria, and Switzerland), Jim Tankersley, reports on a drive from Berlin to Dortmund on the famed German highway: Father-Son Bonding at 2 Miles Per Minute on Germany’s Fabled Autobahn.
I taught my older son to drive the same way my father taught me, with equal doses of caution and paranoia. Sometimes, riding shotgun on the interstate, I would spy the speedometer creeping above the limit and hear my dad’s words tumbling out.

“Hey, pal,” I would say to Max. “How fast are you going?”

I found myself recalling one of those moments this summer, behind the wheel of a black BMW. My son sat next to me, watching with glee as we hit 125 miles per hour.

 … As happens when children grow up — and especially when you move a continent away from them — we had missed Father’s Day together. For a belated celebration, my wife had given us tickets to see our favorite band, Wilco, play a rare show in Germany.

When he slid into the car, the band was set to take the stage in Dortmund, on the other side of the country, in less than three hours. Google Maps said the drive would take five.

We could abandon the show. Or we could unlearn some fatherly lessons, at least for a day, and press our luck on the autobahn.

They tell you highway driving is different in Germany, where for long stretches there are no speed limits. 

 … I had a German driver’s license but had not lost my aversion to high speeds. I could still hear my dad, eyeing other cars, reminding me, “They’re out to get you.”

 … This was desperate. On the autobahn, I told myself I would drive as fast as traffic, safety and German engineering would allow. … (We checked trains to Dortmund; none would have delivered us to the show in time.)

On the road, … We blew past windmills and practiced our German. We watched the Google estimate shrink steadily. We started to hope we might catch the second set of the concert.

When the time was right, we called my dad.

“We just hit 200 kilometers an hour,” I said, triumphantly. “That’s 125 in miles!”

To my father’s credit, he laughed.

We made it to Dortmund in just over 3 hours, 20 minutes, parking a block away from the tiny outdoor venue. We’d only missed a half-dozen songs. We patted each other on the back.

Max sang loudly along with Jeff Tweedy and the band. “I can’t believe it,” we kept saying to each other. …

Posted by at 7 comments:

Thursday, November 20, 2025

Ashli Babbitt and the left's first consequence-free taste of MAGA blood: Openly calling the Orcs to man the barricades, the Left's revolutionary cosplay is headlonging into homicidal politics

What worries Duncan Hill is that 

the Dems are losing and a wounded animal is very dangerous. Trump to them and [to] the Globalists (redundant?) is the most threatening man in the World as he successfully dismantles (wounds) the Dem's machine. They've already pulled the trigger twice...must have been DEI hires.

Will the Dems ever understand the difference between good ideas and good ideas that work? Answering my own question...if not by now then never.

In that perspective, read also: How on Earth Can a Democrat Work for "All the People" If He or She Wants Half of Them Shot in the Head?! (Thanks for the Instalink, Sarah.)

This gives Damian Bennett the opportunity to share the following thoughts about "the Left revolutionary cosplay" (and boy, has he accumulated a lot of evidence):  

The left is edging headlonging into homicidal politics. 

Ashli Babbitt's murder in plain sight and the swift exoneration of her murderer, Capitol Police Lieutenant Michael Byrd, gave the left its first consequence-free taste of MAGA blood. Animals that have tasted human blood are preventively put down. But the BLM/J6 blood beast was shielded from the law for four years and has been cultivated, trained, organized, and funded for the past six. It is the Left's militia in the field. Charlie Kirk has been assassinated and, as you note, the trigger already has been pulled on the President. The Democrats are openly calling the Orcs to man the barricades.
It just goes on and on -- rank and file -- on and on and on. And it has borne its intended fruit.
And on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on... Madness. There will be no end to this until the Left revolutionary cosplay is massively challenged by consequential:
  • law enforcement
  • arrests & indictments
  • convictions 
  • fines, penalties & restitution
  • carceral hard-time
Otherwise expect the joke revolutionaries and political karens-qua-gangstas to eventually paint headlines in their own blood. When the Left tries to scale up the revolution from (paid) weekend excursions to full-time 'blood and tears' on the barricades, watch their army of remote workers and AWFLs wilt. This is not the Left of October 1917, this is the Left of Starbucks and boxed wine, of nail appointments and Grindr, of Xanax and Zepbound. 
Posted by at 7 comments:

Monday, November 17, 2025

Calls Multiply in France for a French-Style First Amendment à la française

Obama et Macron : même combat, même vérité unique 
Obama and Macron want to “protect” democracy by muzzling it: censorship of activists supporting facts and reality, shadow-banning on X, fallacious editing on public broadcasts… It is time to strengthen and enshrine our freedom of expression with a French-style First Amendment. 
Thus writes Nicolas Conquer on Atlantico, in an article on freedom of expression titled France Needs a First Amendment. 
A formidable paradox of the present: liberals and democrats want to ban everything. From Obama to Macron, the rhetoric is the same: “regulate” social media to protect democracy. But from what, and above all, from whom? On June 20, 2025, Obama reiterated this at Stanford: “We don’t want diversity of facts.” What the former president—who has become, by default, the ideological leader of the Democratic Party—is challenging is not the fact itself, but its interpretation. In other words: establishing a single, authoritative truth. Orwell imagined such a ministry in 1984. On November 12, 2025, Macron echoed this sentiment on X: “It is important to discuss content and usage in order to regain control.” While platforms bow to political dictates and dissenting voices are criminalized, France needs a constitutional safeguard to guarantee freedom of expression. A French First Amendment.
Sur le sujet de la Liberté d’expression, Nicolas Conquer lance un appel sur Atlantico : la France a besoin d’un Premier Amendement.
Obama et Macron veulent “protéger” la démocratie en la muselant : censure de militant montrant le réel, shadowban de X, montages fallacieux de l’audiovisuel public… Il est temps de renforcer et de sanctuariser notre liberté d’expression par un Premier Amendement à la française.

Redoutable paradoxe du présent : les libéraux et démocrates veulent tout interdire. D’Obama à Macron,  même discours : “réguler” les réseaux sociaux pour protéger la démocratie. Mais de quoi, et surtout de qui ?Le 20 juin 2025, Obama l’a redit à Stanford : « We don’t want diversity of facts. ». Ce que l’ancien président – devenu par défaut commandeur idéologique du Parti démocrate – remet en cause n’est pas le fait, mais son interprétation. Traduction : instaurer une seule vérité autorisée. Orwell en avait imaginé le ministère dans 1984. Le 12 novembre 2025, Macron lui faisait écho sur X : « Il est important d’échanger sur les contenus et usages afin de reprendre la main. » Alors que les plateformes se plient aux injonctions politiques et que les voix dissidentes sont criminalisées, la France a besoin d’un garde-fou constitutionnel pour garantir la liberté d’expression. Un Premier Amendement à la française. 





Posted by at 3 comments:

Sunday, November 16, 2025

Corporations, politicians, media, churches, science, academia, sports, and entertainment all align with the progressive decades-long project to dismantle the family as social bedrock

A couple of years ago, Damian Bennett gave what Duncan Hill called an "Excellent exposé of the modern/post-modern, gangrenous, marxist mind."

Damian mentions Phyllis Chesler (the author of Politically Incorrect Feminist: Creating a Movement with Bitches, Lunatics, Dykes, Prodigies, Warriors, and Wonder Women), whose name appeared twice on this blog 20 years ago (Look Again, The American "Left" has no foreign policy except that of opposing whatever Bush and America do or ever have done — they might as well be French).

Damian Bennett:

  • I would like to try to tie a few things together. Let me start here with this essential viewing:

    Dr. James Lindsay on Marxism, "Woke, A Culture War Against Europe" Conference March 30, 2023

    Some trenchant takeaways:
    • "Woke is Maoism with American characteristics, if I might borrow from Mao himself who said that his philosophy was Marxism-Leninism with Chinese characteristics, which means woke is Marxism."
    • "[Marxism] worked in feudal societies. ... It wouldn't work in actual capitalist societies because Marx was wrong. [Wrong] about one thing, capitalism does not immiserate the worker. It allows him to build a better life."
    • "[Max Horkeimer explained] I developed the critical theory [scil., Critical Marxism] because it is not possible to articulate the vision of a good society on the terms of the existing society." 
    • "Critical Marxism criticizes the entirety of the existing society. Everything is somehow needing to be subjected to Marxist conflict analysis."
    • "When you endure Marxist provocation, Marxist strategy is always of the same type. It's called middle level violence."
    • "If you want to see what your future will look like if we don't stop the woke, look at China. ... If you want to know the future of Europe and America and the Five Eyes...it's China. That's the model."
    (Ahem.

    We’re Not Exporting Our Values To China — We’re Importing Theirs 2019-10-08)

    Dr. Lindsay gives an instructive comprehensive half-hour talk, well worth your time, detailing the larger NWO project, which is the aggregator of all the disparate woke projects. Marxism is the ersatz religion that underpins and coheres wokèdness, which insight explains the bizarre zealotry and violent mentality that pervades woke partisans and their projects because Marxism, whatever it purports to be in theory, is in practice psychopathic. Whatever the particular flavor of Marxism, the social benefit goals are always circumstantially mutable and expendable, soft-edged and swimmy, and off in a near-future that never arrives. However the ultimate unwavering goal of all flavors of Marxism is absolute control. Again, Dr. Lindsay:

    "Critical race theory is calling everything you want to control racist until you control it. But couldn't we say the same about Marxism? It's calling everything you want to control bourgeois until you control it."

    Or homophobic. Or transphobic. Or TERF. 

    So the Marxism project, whether AGW or BLM or LGBT+++ or NAMBLA or whatever, churns the existing society's culture until it is remade in the image of that Marxist project. To be clear, Marxism achieves absolute control through the absolute destruction of the established norms of the existing society. To be clear, to that end, Marxism has a big stake in perverting sexual norms, because sexual norms are a defining component of society-building. The preceding is usually followed by an explicit and hasty assurance that we have queer family and queer friends, we don't want them persecuted, everyone is free to live as they choose, etc. The usual defensive pieties. But such seeming pieties are indicative of our confused 'cake and eat it too' thinking about sex and societal norms. Liberal society, though expansive, is not unbounded. There are limits, limits that keep society safe, stable, and whole. Marxism pushes hard against those limits. 

    To be clear, queer projects like grooming children, normalizing pedophilia, celebrating sexual dysphoria, transitioning children, fantasy 'gender' biology, carve-outs for 'declared' gender identities, and applauding queer hate groups – none of these are righteous projects. They are ex facie evil. Below is another essential viewing for some clear thinking on and pushback against the institutional fringe creep of queer Marxism:

    Rev. Calvin Robinson, Christianity SHOULD NOT Allow Gay Marriage; Oxford Union Society February 15, 2023

    The above is a cleanly reasoned ten-minute argument for what the Anglican Church is, a congregation bounded by originating doctrine and practice – not a parade ground for progressive voguing. Again, well worth your time. (If you are not familiar with Deacon Calvin Robinson, he can be found at GBNews.) How many Christians would attempt Deacon Robinson's doctrinal argument to a progressive? How many to a 'progressive' fellow Christian? Not many for fear of being denounced bigots. At the predicant and leadership levels mainline churches are doctrinally corrupted. Such shepherds go on to collaterally corrupt their flocks.

    Marxism to advance its goal of absolute control cannot allow the existing society to stand. Marxism is that new thing come to overthrow the established order. If you missed my earlier link to the 'progressive decades-long project to dismantle the family as social bedrock', here is the meat of it:

    Mallory Millett [sister of Kate Millett (1934-2017), author of seminal Sexual Politics] has been telling the story of the 12 women Kate brought together in New York City in the late 1960s and early ‘70s. These are the women who laid the groundwork for second-wave feminism, which gave way to the world of woke. ... “At a consciousness-raising...twelve women gathered at a large table. They opened with a type of Litany from the Catholic Church...but, this time it was Marxism, the church of the Left.”

    “Why are we here today?” the chairwoman asked.

    “To make revolution,” they answered.

    “What kind of revolution?” she replied.

    “The Cultural Revolution,” they chanted.

    “And how do we make Cultural Revolution?” she demanded.

    “By destroying the American family!” they answered.

    “How do we destroy the family?” she came back.

    “By destroying the American patriarch,” they cried exuberantly.

    “And how do we destroy the American patriarch?” she probed.

    “By taking away his power!”

    “How do we do that?”

    “By destroying monogamy!” they shouted.

    “How can we destroy monogamy?”

    “By promoting promiscuity, eroticism, prostitution, abortion, and homosexuality!” they resounded.

    Phyllis Chesler confirmed much of Mallory’s account in her 2018 book, Politically Incorrect Feminist: Creating a Movement with Bitches, Lunatics, Dykes, Prodigies, Warriors, and Wonder Women. Chesler, while trying to tell the honest truth of the good, bad, and ugly of the feminist movement, reveals much of the story that has been jealously guarded by feminists for decades: that most of the women in the movement were incredibly broken by mental illness and drug abuse. Chesler calls them “the lost girls.”

    Sow. Reap. 

    The Female Happiness Paradox March 2022
    We find that one part of the female happiness paradox is very robust: when answering questions about negative affect, women are always and everywhere more unhappy than men. This is true across time, country, and across different metrics of negative affect. This is perhaps best illustrated by anxiety: women are consistently more anxious than men, both pre- and post-COVID, and across months of the year and across years. But it is also true with respect to other measures on negative affect such as being depressed, downhearted, tense, lonely, frustrated, stressed, sad, and having restless sleep and other measures.

    ... The evidence suggests women's domain happiness and satisfaction is below that of men. The evidence of declining happiness in the United States is confirmed with evidence of rising deaths of despair, from drug overdoses, suicide, and alcohol poisoning (Case and Deaton, 2019) along with increases in pain in the United States (Blanchflower and Bryson, 2022b), and in distress.

    Unhappiness explains why feminism remains mired in Marxist praxes. Because the unhappiness of the now sells the bliss of Marxist tomorrow-morrow-land.

    Once Marxism is in place, limits are replaced by a singularity, the one and only thing, the hivemind state. The very moment Marxist Critical Theory is completely realized, all the woke projects will fall away or be exterminated. Marxism has no allies. Marxism has no rainbow identities. Marxism has only Marxism, a sort of ultimate narcissism. Every citizen gazing in the mirror sees only the state fully realized staring back.

    He gazed up at the enormous face. Forty years it had taken him to learn what kind of smile was hidden beneath the dark moustache. O cruel, needless misunderstanding! O stubborn, self-willed exile from the loving breast! Two gin-scented tears trickled down the sides of his nose. But it was all right, everything was all right, the struggle was finished. He had won the victory over himself. He loved Big Brother. (pp. 173-174)

    The great irony of course is that today's woke are not preparing a great celebration of self-affirmation but of self abnegation. Wokèdness is the prelude to the individual being zeroed out – he/her, she/him, they/them, abc/xyz, zip/zilch – ground as one into the homogenous paste of the Marxist state. Nobody survives the state. Only nothing survives the state.

    Duncan Hill replies to this "Excellent exposé of the modern/post-modern, gangrenous, marxist mind" that

    Only tangentially related is this conversation between Jordan Peterson and Camille Paglia. Paglia has a wonderful description of the true 60's radical vs the pretenders of today. It goes on from there. Worth watching if you have time.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v-hIVnmUdXM

    Duncan Hill adds:

    Sigh...if only György Lukács and Wilhelm Reisch had lived to see this day. They would be so proud.

    In the last couple of years awareness about the works of György Lukács was growing in the Western world. His fame is due to his alleged involvement in introducing sex education in Budapest schools specifically with the aim of demoralising children and dismantling Christian values.

    https://www.hungarianconservative.com/articles/culture_society/gyorgy-lukacs-the-hungarian-marxist/

    Continuing on.

    ...Helmut Kentler, had been one of the most influential sexologists in Germany. The article described a new research report that had investigated what was called the “Kentler experiment.” Beginning in the late sixties, Kentler had placed neglected children in foster homes run by pedophiles. The experiment was authorized and financially supported by the Berlin Senate. In a report submitted to the Senate, in 1988, Kentler had described it as a “complete success.”

    https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/07/26/the-german-experiment-that-placed-foster-children-with-pedophiles

    In 1960, Kentler got a degree in psychology...He was inspired by the Marxist psychoanalyst Wilhelm Reich, who had argued that the free flow of sexual energy was essential to building a new kind of society. Kentler’s dissertation urged parents to teach their children that they should never be ashamed of their desires. “Once the first feelings of shame exist, they multiply easily and expand into all areas of life,” he wrote.

    https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/07/26/the-german-experiment-that-placed-foster-children-with-pedophiles

    BTW, Reich's own daughter admitted her father was a pedophile.

    The Frankfurt School is the gift that keeps on giving. And don't get me started on Marcuse's "reality principle over pleasure principle" (Eros and Civilization. Herbert Marcuse 1955).

     … you all may be familiar with the psychological technique DARVO; Deny, Attack, Reverse rolls of Victim and Oppressor. If you haven't already seen this technique in action, watch for it. It's standard operating procedure for the Left.

    It pains me to see this degradation of our society can go on and so few people see it or care...(for insight see Letters and Papers from Prison, Dietrich Bonhoeffer..."stupidity is voluntary").  Connecticut used to be socio politically moderate. Now, even my town is careening toward the "Liberal" abyss.


    Damian Bennett replies that

    It will not stop till it is made to stop.

    Now Connecticut Is On The Verge Of Protecting Pedophiles, Too May 17, 2023
    Current Connecticut law defines sexual orientation as being limited to “heterosexuality, homosexuality or bisexuality, having a history of such preference or being identified with such preference.” It excludes any behavior that is a violation of Part VI of chapter 952 the Connecticut General Statutes, which includes a variety of sex crimes, including pedophilia and bestiality.
    According to the Family Institute of Connecticut, “The new definition (as amended) of ‘sexual orientation’ changes in 2 big ways. It becomes untethered from ‘heterosexuality, homosexuality or bisexuality’ and instead ties to ‘identity’. Second, it now includes identities whose underlying behavior would be a sex crime.”

    How is >3% of the population dictating massive social disorientation dissipation? 

    Actually 'how' is pretty obvious as corporations (and here), politicians (and this and this),media (WaPo; NYT; NPR again), churches (and this), science and medicine, schools and academia (and this and this; it just goes on and on), sports, and entertainment (Disney;Superman!; Spiderman!!; Archie Comics!!!) all align with the progressive decades-long project to dismantle the family as social bedrock, which is the 'why' to the 'how'. Progressives have been relentlessly busy. Meanwhile normal folk mistakenly think the small compass of their day-to-day normalcy inviolable, even as they passively sense its trashing. That's how >3% of the population dupes the rest into forfeiting normalcy.

    Sex is but one means to secure beachheads for progressive advances in societal control. But beyond normalizing transgressive sex practices, why the creeping push to formally legalize them? As Joe "Shower Daddy" Biden might say, one word: Jeffrey Epstein. 

    Ghislaine Maxwell 'Set Up Powerful Men With Women They'd Like' November 14, 2021
    Prosecutors In Sex Trafficking Case Plan To Reveal Emails That They Claim Show The Socialite 'Using Her Ability To Provide Access To Women As A Form Of Social Currency'
    Epstein Court Docs List 2,000 Names Of ‘Pedophile Island’ Visitors February 14, 2023
    The Flight Log Reveals The Celebrities, Politicians, Royals And Financial Capitalists That Visited Little Saint James Island...
    Hhmmm...
    Jeffrey Epstein Has Died By Suicide, Sources Say August 11, 2019
    Ghislaine Maxwell Says Epstein Didn’t Kill Himself January 24, 2023
    "I Believe That He Was Murdered. I Was Shocked, And I Wondered, 'How Did This Happen?... '"
    Hhmmm...
    Jeffrey Epstein Hosted Bill Clinton On His Private Island, Documents Reveal July 30, 2020

    Bill Gates On ‘Lesson’ Learned From Jeffrey Epstein Mistake: ‘Well He’s Dead’ September 21, 2021

    Epstein Accuser Sues Prince Andrew, Citing Sex Assault At 17 August 10, 2021
    Hhmmm...
      

    Epstein’s Private Calendar Lists Current CIA Director, Fmr. Obama AdviserMay 1, 2023

    Latest Batch Of Epstein Files Implicates LinkedIn Co-Founder, Ex-Treasury Sec., Woody Allen May 3, 2023

    Lawyer Asks DOJ To Look Into Why FBI ‘Utterly Failed’ To Investigate Jeffrey Epstein May 6, 2023

    Jeffrey Epstein was the poster boy of ruling class deviant sexual appetency. As more and more ruling elites' ties to Epstein are found out, the push to legalize sexual crime -- ideally to retroactively decriminalize it -- could limit Jeffrey Epstein & co. to so much bad press -- if that. 

    Media Blackout Of ABC News' Epstein Story Spike Hits One Week Despite Shocking Developments November 12, 2019
    "I've Had The Story For Three Years... We Would Not Put It On The Air ... It Was Unbelievable What We Had, Clinton, We Had Everything."

    Epstein is connected to Connecticut by his associate, the late Steven Hoffenberger, and, Connecticut being a bedroom commute for NYC financiers, one suspects it is not lacking in Epstein confederates who will welcome pedophilia reimagined in law as something akin to a parking ticket. Connecticut, a blue state, is predisposed to wokery, but will the legislative creep-along to legal pedophilia prove a bridge too far for Nutmeggers?

 

Posted by at No comments:

Saturday, November 15, 2025

"Mired in bureaucracy, irresponsibility, and the mediocrity of its elites": After Publishing a Book on France, Sébastien Laye to Be Ambassador at an AI Conference in Miami

 
Invited to an Atlantico interview, Sébastien Laye explains that his new book is "the chronicle of a country which has let itself be trapped by a technocracy without a compass." 

Des moutons menés par des ânes ? was reviewed by Boulevard Voltaire — in which Jean de Lacoste called it a "brilliant indictment of our out-of-touch élites" — and by la Revue Économique de France; 
Published by Valeurs Ajoutées, Des moutons menés par des ânes ? [Sheep Led by Donkeys?] is a vigorous pamphlet by the French-American economist and entrepreneur Sébastien Laye. Behind this provocative title, the author delivers an uncompromising diagnosis of contemporary France, which he considers mired in bureaucracy, irresponsibility, and the mediocrity of its elites. 

A brutal assessment of French decline 

Sébastien Laye begins with a stark observation: France is sinking into decline, trapped by a rigid and inefficient state system. He denounces the technostructure which, according to the author, has sacrificed industry, energy, and real estate on the altar of an administrative and conformist ideology. 
Apart from that, Sébastien Laye has written an article for the Washington Examiner, Wealth in the Age of AI (Hedge or Harness?). He will serve as both speaker and ambassador at the Family Offices Summit in Miami on November 19-20.
Posted by at No comments:

Friday, November 14, 2025

At a time when submission is called “virtue” and fear “prudence,” Sydney Sweeney's simple frankness serves as an act of insurrection

 
Sydney Sweeney, Javier Milei, Charlie Kirk, Cristiano Ronaldo… Faced with wokism, they are no longer apologizing for being free.
In the magazine Causeur, Nicolas Conquer writes about celebrities' new-found courage, with the hope that it will spread to France. The ROF spokesman goes on to make several religious comparisons about the would-be atheists, echoing Kurt Schlichter's observation that "Leftists … are in the grips of a ridiculous pagan religion and all its tenets." (Merci pour le post Instapundit, Sarah.)
These idols are all guilty of the same crime: refusing to apologize for being free. At a time when submission is called “virtue” and fear “prudence,” their simple frankness serves as an act of insurrection. What if, in turn, we all stopped apologizing for being free? 

At first glance, everything seems to set them apart: a Hollywood actress, an eccentric Argentinian economist, a conservative American commentator, and a soccer legend… 

They share a common choice: honesty over submission. Freely and simply, they choose to say what they think and accept the consequences. … 

Showbiz is less entertainment than a pastoral drama. So, seeing idols rebel against the conformism of the masses is quite an event! … 

In French companies where “Diversity, Equity, Inclusion” training programs serve as a religious confession, in our schools where LGBT propaganda replaces knowledge, in our media where objectivity is reduced to reciting the progressive catechism. Courage isn't reserved for presidents or celebrities: it's measured by the ability to say “no” when everyone else is saying “Amen” in inclusive language! Today's world rewards emotion, not conviction. It admires those who give in, not those who stand firm.
Posted by at No comments:

Thursday, November 13, 2025

Radio Courtoisie Talk Show: Serious Challenges to Trump 9 Months Into His Presidency (+ My Crazy Trek in Trying to Get to Paris in Time)

As Donald Trump passes the nine-month point in power, a new chapter of an hour and a half on his accomplishments and plans takes place Wednesday at Radio Courtoisie.
Evelyne Joslain, assistée d’Eric, reçoit :

Thème : « Trump : Sérieux défis à 9 mois de sa présidence »

ÉTIQUETTES :   

Patron d'émission du Libre journal du Nouveau Monde à Radio Courtoisie, Évelyne Joslain est l'auteur d'une poignée de livres sur les États-Unis et l'Occident. Parmi ceux-ci, son chef d'œuvre est paru il y a queques semaines. Voici la revue du livre La Guerre Culturelle.

• Cliquez sur le lien pour entendre l'émission d'une heure et demie… 
  
I usually try to avoid personal notes in this matter, but here I cannot avoid it: I don't think anybody can deny that rarely has any person spent so much time and so much money in making it to a talk show. 

Having promised Evelyne Joslain weeks earlier to be present at her Radio Courtoisie talk show in Paris, I had to take two trains (actually, three) via Zürich from my parents' apartment in Switzerland. But there was only a 7-minute stopover between trains in Zürich. When the first train ran 4-5 minutes late — very un-Swiss (but the train had originated in… Milan) — I knew I was in trouble. I only got, running breathlessly, to the platform just as the TGV Lyria set into motion to leave the station. 

Out of breath, I staggered over to the information booth to ask for the next TGV to the French capital, but it turned out that the one I missed by a few seconds (10-15 seconds later, I would have made it) had been the last one of the day. The next one was only the following morning, and CFF (Chemins de fer fédéraux suisses) would pay for my hotel room, but the earliest morning train would arrive in Gare de Lyon at noon on the dot, the very minute the RC show was starting. So I figured a night train to Paris was the best solution. Except that… there are no night trains to Paris. But there is a night train to Amsterdam via Brussels and a couple of German cities. So I decided to board that all-nighter and get off, after eight hours, at Cologne at 5:55 in the morning and switch to a Paris-bound TGV 50 minutes later which would arrive at 10:10. But because I had a cat with me, I was not allowed to join the usual six-berth cabin; I had to take a cabin with one single berth, in other words, buy a first class ticket. Two hours later, I climbed into the night train (which was composed of good ol' carriages from my youth in the 1980s, see photo) and took off for a night that proved uneventful.

With ten minutes' delay, we arrived in Köln at 6:05, and I looked at the signs for the platform that the TGV would be departing. The Paris departure was up there, but — in white, not with the usual green color, and with a distressing X next to it. What did I discover but that the TGV had been canceled. There was no solution now other than getting to French capital by car. Was there a car rental in the vicinity and was it open at this hour? There was, and a helpful German lady duly guided me to a Sixt office a street or two away (which had been open since 6 a.m.), where I was asked if I had a reservation, as every automobile was already rented out. I can hardly describe my feelings when I heard that, They did have a six-seater people mover, and since that was my only option, that was what I rented. Because I would not be returning the car at the place of rental (I briefly considered it), but leaving it in Paris, the price tripled instantly. However, because the woman at the desk was thrilled by Jixie Juny, my feline friend, she did some math conversions and got the price only doubled. (Don't ask, I don't want to think about the price…)

Paris was about 475-500 km away, a drive between five and six hours. Now I took off, and on the Autobahn the Mercedes Benz Vito managed a speed of 180/190 km/hour. After an hour or so (I was pretty stressed out, so I didn't really notice the times), I passed the Belgian border, where the usual drama queens have managed to lower the slow(ness) limit — I mean, the speed limit — from 130 to only 120 km/h, so here I decided to be more careful and speed along l'autoroute at 160 km/h. Several hours later, I was in France, where the speed limit is 130 km/h — unchanged from over 50 years earlier, in spite of all the technological improvements of the past half-century — so there my speedometer rose once more, to 170 km/h. I was still pretty sleepy, so I stopped at a gas station in Belgium (I — yawn — think) to buy half a dozen ice coffees for "fuel" for the rest of the trek. I thought I could make the noon deadline, but there were so many traffic jams and so many road works — especially (as usual) in Belgium — that I was rarely up at the speeds I was hoping for. 

After arriving on le périphérique parisien (long) after 12 noon, I had to do what I thought was the hardest part of the journey, finding a parking space. But it was even harder, because I am not used to the length of a six-seater, and I had to try three different parking spaces before I found one in which the car did indeed fit.  I then ran to Radio Courtoisie — with my cat with me — and headed straight to… the restroom, where I had been holding in since Belgium, it felt like. I joined the others in the RC show studio at 43:34.
Posted by at 2 comments:
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)