I could be the very model of a modern major-general but I choose not to.

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Biden Looks Lost at National Bar Association Gala, Angrily Shouts, Stumbles Through Remarks
July 31, 2025

Justice Department Takes Down Dark Web Child Abuse Network — 120,000 Users, Millions of Files in Operation Grayskull
July 28, 2025

House Ethics Committee Finds AOC Impermissibly Accepted Met Gala Ticket for Boyfriend and Underpaid for “Tax The Rich” Dress and Accessories
July 25, 2025

While Cuba plunges into misery, Manuel Anido Cuesta, dictator Díaz Canel's stepson, lives in luxury in Madrid
June 27, 2025

NYT Admits Trump’s Tariffs Generate ‘Significant’ Federal Income — Has Generated $150 Billion in Revenue
August 4, 2025

□ [“Texas Lawmakers Pass Motion to Arrest Democrats"]

One of those moments where the first six or seven words of the headline tells you all you need to know.  We can all support that, moving on.  What?  Well, I guess I'm a little curious about what's going on, maybe I should actually look into it a little further.

Slightly more seriously, I haven't paid much attention but I was aware that Texas was doing congressional redistricting.  Apparently this would add several Republican seats to congress - I think it's state congress, not replacing Democrats in the federal - and the minority Democrats in state congress didn't like that, so they ran away.

They went to Illinois, which is a strange place to go.  Do they need to get close to Obama and/or Canada?  Anyway, the governor has cited laws this is breaking and ordered their arrest if they didn't return to the capitol by this afternoon.  Safe to say none of them obeyed.  There's also a law against anyone giving them money and safe to assume their paychecks have been cancelled so now we'll see how much they have in their bank account.

Because this is such a horrible awful thing, New York is getting ready to do the same thing in response and probably other Democrat-run states will follow.  So then we'll find out if they have actual laws in place for this.  Texas does, or so we're told, but leftists can ignore whatever laws they don't like.  The fact that they're protesting gerrymandering by going to Illinois which is totally gerrymandered shows that they don't mean what they're saying.

Then again Democrats have a habit of making things bad for themselves.  I forget which state it was but they opposed the electoral college so they passed a law to give all their electoral votes to the winning candidate, meaning Trump got their votes even though they voted for Harris.  We can expect to see more of that here.

New York City’s Ranked Choice Voting System Favors Socialist Mamdani
August 4, 2025

□ [“Ambassador Huckabee Slams European Leaders for Siding with Hamas"]

Their willingness to destroy Israel is virtually the only thing that keeps the European elites united.  It's things like this that suggest they've already converted to Islam and are just keeping that secret for the time being.  Either that or they're showing why the infidel will always lose, sucking up to the Muslim invaders who also hate Jews.  France, Britain, and Canada have announced that there's an actual Palestinian state with Australia getting ready for that.  Slovenia has been raising sanctions against Israel, probably not the only nation.

And they're doing this all for Hamas and the people who elected Hamas.  If the Philistines felt oppressed by the people they voted for, they'd do something about it at some point in the last couple decades.  But no, they've picked the winning side and the EU agrees with them.  They're also complaining that Gaza is starving.  The fact that they've been saying this for months shows that it's not working, it's simply not possible to starve for months.  Try it and you'll see.

The food is still going in, Hamas is still taking its share first.  I'm sure it's not comfortable to live that way but they're still alive.  They have to pick this or that specific mutilated child to cry how they're starving.  You'd think it would be easy to just take phone videos through the streets and see thousands of people who are all razor-thin.

No way to know how long this is going to last.  I keep saying Israel should have just cleared out Gaza and the West Bank years or decades ago but no one listens to me.  And now Europe is trying to find unity in Jew-hatred.  They also need to ignore what their citizens think.  This just seems so familiar, where have we heard this before?

Leftist Heckles Sydney Sweeney as “Racist” for Promoting American Eagle Jeans
August 4, 2025

□ [“Fantastic Four Box Office Numbers Way Worse than Reported!  Journos Freak Out!"]

I wasn't expecting to be this pleased over an MCU failure.  I suspect it's because, even though I was never a big fan of their comics, it's still the Fantastic Four.  A Disney fan wouldn't need to enjoy Steamboat Willy to understand its importance, the FF are relevant in a similar way.  So I am offended at what's been done to them and glad to see Disney/Marvel getting its comeuppance.

But it should be noted that this was the most successful Marvel movie of the year, and the last one before the next Avengers, whenever that comes out.  It's also technically in the top-half of ticket sales for every Marvel movie since 2020.  But given what's gone on for the last several years, that's not very impressive.  For whatever reason, Eternals and Shang-Chi get the most attention as failures, but Black Widow is the one I notice.  It was on streaming while in theaters and they were shut down because of covid, it should have been an absolute failure below The Marvels.  But it's still closer to the Fantastic Four in box office revenue.  [Barely, I'm sure it'll be closer to the Marvels the next time ticket sales come out.]

Below is the domestic box office for the first 10 days on every Marvel movie.

$621,277,849 Avengers 4 (2019)
$470,413,982 Spider-Man:  No Way Home (2021)
$453,107,350 Avengers 3 (2018)
$403,613,257 Black Panther (2018)
$395,385,247 Deadpool and Wolverine (2024)
$373,071,647 Avengers (2012)
$313,402,397 Avengers 2 (2015)
$295,966,220 Captain America 3 (2016)
$292,615,327 Dr. Strange 2 (2022)
$287,174,913 Black Panther 2 (2022)
$284,946,699 Iron Man 3 (2013)
$264,884,063 Captain Marvel (2019)
$248,420,911 Guardians of the Galaxy 2 (2017)
$233,903,308 Thor 4 (2022)
$229,229,305 Spider-Man:  Far From Home (2019)
$214,709,726 Guardians of the Galaxy 3 (2023)
$212,068,013 Thor 3 (2017)
$211,200,876 Iron Man 2 (2010)
$207,275,524 Spider-Man:  Homecoming (2017)
$197,123,387 Fantastic Four (2025)
$177,825,024 Iron Man (2008)
$176,515,761 Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
$167,079,387 Ant-Man 3 (2023)
$158,883,032 Captain America 2 (2014)
$152,952,234 Dr. Strange (2016)
$145,097,130 Thor 2 (2013)
$144,516,211 Shang-Chi (2021)
$141,175,831 Falcon America 4 (2025)
$133,083,084 Ant-Man 2 (2018)
$131,609,167 Black Widow (2021)
$127,745,006 Thunderbolts (2025)
$119,455,352 Thor (2011)
$118,115,383 Eternals (2021)
$117,421,571 Captain America (2011)
$106,219,861 Ant-Man (2015)
$97,055,430 Incredible Hulk (2008)
$64,945,395 The Marvels (2023)

Notice how the recent movies are doing about as poorly as the earliest movies and this isn't even adjusted for inflation.  The Avengers themselves are the big winner, which makes sense, as is Spider-Man.  Interesting to note that the Fantastic Four come in about halfway through the list.  I originally just included post-Endgame movies and the FF were still in almost the same spot.  Their importance to the Marvel franchise can't be underestimated but these movies just cannot do very well.

So what's Marvel supposed to do now?  People will need to see all these things to be interested in the next Avengers movies and that's not going to happen.  Then there's the tv shows.  It's been barely half-a-decade since Marvel was on top of the world and look what they've done to it.  And Disney is still doubling-down on this.  How do none of their stockholders complain about it?

Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-IL) at Summit in Mexico City Tells Audience in Spanish: “I’m a Proud Guatemalan Before I’m an American”
August 4, 2025

□ [“CNN Declares Trump as 'the Most Influential President of this Century… and the Last Century'"]

It's the media so we can't trust it.  That said, there's been any number of recent articles where tv networks like CNN are indeed admitting Trump is doing well.  Unfortunately they'll never report on their own internal struggles but they must be having problems.  They need to actually get real viewers after pushing so many away so there's no clue that this will help.

Of course there's still reason to worry that they're trying to set a trap.  No idea what it is, maybe they think Trump will believe them, but this is why the media can't be trusted.  Their regular viewers have spent the last six months being told that we're all doomed and aren't going to change now, so why should the tv networks change?  Of course even those viewers may be looking elsewhere, to learn about the Russia hoax or the economy to get news that won't be reported here.

I do think this will hurt the left in the long run.  They drove enough people away that Trump won the popular vote and have spent the last several months going even more insane about it.  If there's any Democrats with sanity, they've been saying 'knock it off' and realize that they aren't being listened to.  That's going to include non-whites and non-males.  Although I am surprised that we haven't heard much about transgenders for a while, the one think Democrats realized that people don't want to hear about anymore.

They've had enough time for many of them to get to 'depression' and 'acceptance' in the five stages of grief and have to deal with those who haven't gotten that far yet.  The media needs to find a real audience and to do that, they'll need to report the truth.  DOGE and the Big Beautiful Bill has impacted all the funding they're used to so they need to do something that works instead of the usual.  Then there's the overall sense of hope and possibility which had gone missing for years.  I'm not sure which would be better, if Trump and his people planned this or if they're as surprised as we are.

AG Pam Bondi Orders Federal Prosecutor to Present Evidence to Grand Jury in Russia Collusion Hoax
August 4, 2025