Our mission, as God-fearing and God-loving patriots, is to defend this Constitutional Republic and to increase its greatness, in all good things and ways, by using our voices in free but courteous speech, by discussing the happenings of the world and coming to a profound understanding of those things, and by sharing and promulgating these Truths on both this platform and others.
This DePat Tuesday Open Thread honors the author of the original Tuesday open thread on this site, namely the late Susie Sampson, a.k.a. Deplorable Patriot, among her other handles, pen names, etc.
For more on the untimely passing of Dear DePat, please see these three posts.
At one time, DePat handled FOUR daily open threads here, in addition to taking care of her relatives, choir duties, and numerous other responsibilities. She was a powerhouse – a dynamo – a true force of nature.
DePat’s faith in Trump, Q, “The Plan”, the White Hats, and “the anons” in general, was legendary. Although I didn’t always agree with her quick acceptance of some sketchier evidence and fringier theories, I will gladly admit to “coming around” to numerous so-called “conspiracy theories” which she championed first. I was always careful to give her credit for being right, too, when I had been wrong.
It is impossible to overstate how much DePat did for not only this site, but for her country. I urge all to say a quick prayer of thanks, whenever you think of her, for the privilege of knowing, in life or after death, such an exemplary human being, and lover of God.
And thank you, Susie, for the firm foundation which you left us, when you were called to your true home!
The Woodlouse Hunter
I have found a new spider expert on YouTube – or rather, the algorithm found a new one for me. This guy is slow, thorough, and meticulous. Enjoy this 45-minute presentation, about a spider you may well have in your house, or out in your yard. It has many unique features and behaviors.
This Stormwatch Monday Open Thread remains open – VERY OPEN – a place for everybody to post whatever they feel they would like to tell the White Hats, and the rest of the MAGA/KAG/KMAG world (with KMAG being a bit of both).
Our various sister sites, listed in the Blogroll in the sidebar
Our beloved country is STILL under DIRECT THREATS by hostile forces – notably COMMUNISTS – and they’re HERE IN AMERICA.
Daily outrage and commie phuckery still abound.
We can give in to despair…or we can be defiant and fight back in any way that we can.
Commies won’t win!
And we will keep saying COMMIES OUT until we get their FRAUD and INSANITY out of our country!
THE STUFF
Wolf’s Midnight Special!
Does anybody here remember The Midnight Special? In Concert? Or Don Kirschner’s Rock Concert?
I’m just gonna dump a few of my favorite earworms into a single post. Yeah, you’ve seen some of these before. However, there are some new ones here. Thanks to many of you (you know who you are) who introduced (or reintroduced) me to some of these great songs!
(1) My latest fave! AI Celtic Metal! “HEAVEN YEAH!!!”
(2) God Bless Spencer Pratt! STILL MY HERO!!!
(3) Yeah, it’s Monday. REMEMBER MONDAY!!!
(4) And while we’re remembering Monday, let’s remember Wheatietoo, who loved epic music and an orchestral group which performed it, called Two Steps From Hell.
(7) Maybe you remember this one from the 2016 Trump rallies. It’s called “The American Dreamer” by Jacob Seales.
Those were the days! Ten years ago, my friends.
(8) Always good for a watch!
(9) And with that, I close out (well, almost) with one more AI Celtic Metal Hymn!
This is the song I was carrying in my heart back around January 6, 2021. And a little over 5 years later, hymns are arranging themselves, thanks to Maxwell’s equations, and a few others, built into the universe, waiting to be set free, to praise their own creator.
A salute to Steve, and all of my fellow J6ers, wherever you are now, in Colorado or otherwise.
“And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.”
We have created this site as a place for people to openly express their thoughts and opinions. This is a place where honest but civil discussion of all topics is encouraged. This particular thread is – for the moment – TRUST THE PLAN Thursday. You are welcome to say what you think, in a civil and courteous manner that loves your neighbor. Free speech matters! Courteous speech makes it happen.
Please label all AI-generated content as being such, unless it is patently obvious (e.g., humorous AI images). It is important that we as individuals not begin to pretend that socially derived artificial intelligence is actually our own, as this form of stealthy social information averaging and feedback would be one more pretense and deception between people, in service of stupid Marxist socialism, and of those who wish to substitute their communally protected lies for actual truth.
You are you. AI is AI. Keep your identity. Don’t “Borg Out” on us!
And yes, it’s THURSDAY…again.
That was stolen from Wheatie.
Let’s steal her rules, too.
No food fights.
No running with scissors.
If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.
Other rules may be derivable from these, and that conjecture is left for discussion.
Amy Acton seems like an enigma – until you realize that there are two Amy Actons.
One of them is the real Amy Acton. Who I will call Real Amy Acton. She’s likable, but in a ditzy, scatter-brained, and often cringey way. There is absolutely no way that this person should have been a Director of Health. She could never, ever, be the governor of a state.
The other Amy Acton – who I will call Imaginary Amy Acton – is a mirage – a creation. She’s not very likable, but she is competent. She obeys Democrat policy, because she is the creation of professional Democrats. On paper, she sounds quite different from the real Amy Acton, because she’s not the real Amy Acton. She’s like a Soviet consensus on what Amy Acton is supposed to think and believe.
It’s no wonder the Democrats in Ohio are not allowing either Amy Acton to debate Vivek Ramaswamy.
I would like to show you some select insights into this lady, that will help you understand.
Let’s start with a recent X post by Dr. Acton – or Lockdown Amy as she is known, that I find both attractive and a bit out of touch. This is Real Amy Acton.
We weren’t messing around today at The Scioto Ribber.
At first glance, I really liked these images. She’s like a neighbor, going out and eating at some restaurant and posting a tweet about it. That’s very real. It’s very likable. If she wasn’t running for office, I’d think “Hey! That’s Amy Acton, that doctor lady from Columbus!”
I find it interesting that there’s nobody around, and I think that says a lot about her campaign. I think the Democrats may not be thinking she can win, or even planning on winning. I think perhaps they’re grooming her for head of HHS, or CDC, or something like that, should the Demon Donkeys ever get back in the White House.
Next point – while I think it’s awesome that Dr. Acton is having a MONSTROUS steak (I have not had one like that in years), I don’t see that image as being politically wise right now – unless she’s desperate for some carnivore crossover votes that she’s surely not going to get, IMO. Indeed, that picture drew lots of criticism on her timeline, although it’s hard to know how much of that criticism is real, and how much is just AI bots going after her. I see the “same but opposite” on all the GOP timelines.
But what is Imaginary Dr. Amy Acton like?
Well, politically, there are some problems.
Ohio here is what Amy Acton will not tell us out loud.
Amy Acton supports:
⯈Abortion ( even up to 9 months ) ⯈Sanctuary cities ⯈Illegal invaders ⯈Entitlements for illegals ⯈Higher taxes to pay for entitlements to illegals ⯈Cuts in police ⯈Shutting Ohio down ⯈Forcing… pic.twitter.com/dtYjFNATsm
Ohio here is what Amy Acton will not tell us out loud.
Amy Acton supports:
⯈Abortion ( even up to 9 months ) ⯈Sanctuary cities ⯈Illegal invaders ⯈Entitlements for illegals ⯈Higher taxes to pay for entitlements to illegals ⯈Cuts in police ⯈Shutting Ohio down ⯈Forcing more vaccines on Ohioans ( especially children) ⯈Not allowing ICE to operate in Ohio ⯈Allowing lunatic liberal protesters to take over Ohio cities
Amy Acton is running on two things. Brown man is bad. ( Which is racist ) and she will somehow make things less expensive ( for generational entitlement freeloaders ).
She is 100% for socialism not free choice.
NO VOTE AMY ACTON
SO – yeah – Imaginary Amy Acton – the one who would actually be in charge of Ohio – is pretty left-wing, despite some serious efforts to pass her off as moderate right now.
I started looking more deeply into Acton’s background, especially back in her “COVID czarina” days, and what I found is both laughable and disturbing.
Two videos. The first was the New York Slimes singing her praises in early 2020, as the “pandemic” was just getting started. Here is the thumbnail (not an active video).
OMG, it is SO CRINGE! SO VERY CRINGE!!!
You get Real Amy Acton talking, but you get the Times pretending they are talking to Imaginary Amy Acton. This is how they sell one to the public, to install the other in office.
Amy Acton even SOUNDS like Kamala Harris. Just listen.
Amy Acton has been a PROJECT of the left from day one. But now, after the fall of both COVID communism and Kamala Harris, Real Amy Acton is clearly not fit for the job. She was never fit for her earlier job, either.
But it gets worse. Much worse.
Imagine CRINGE SQUARED.
Imagine a video of an event CELEBRATING the first video.
Imagine an event – a lecture given by Real Dr. Acton – celebrating Imaginary Dr. Acton’s “success” as the popularly evicted COVID czarina.
Imagine Amy at her absolute CRINGIEST, WOKEST, and DIZZIEST. Yes. She’s ten times more out to lunch than in any modern video.
Yes, it’s THAT BAD. Although it is fun and entertaining, like talking to a tipsy female doctor in a bar.
I kid you not.
There is a “transcript” which is actually an essay derived from the second video. The essay is clearly a re-write of Real Amy Acton’s speech by somebody else, to make her sound like Imaginary Amy Acton. It’s hard to tell that they’re even related.
Both of these videos are mind-boggling reminders of just how psychotic the COVID years were. And Amy Acton – both of them – was fully riding along with all that dubious psychosis. All the psychosis that was dubious then, and is horrifying now.
These videos are gold mines of cringey error, bad science, dictatorial hubris, talking down to the public, cargo-cult hero-worship, wishful remembrance, and all the rest. I hope to give both videos their own threads in the future, before the election, but you are welcome to dig in now.
So what’s the verdict?
Real Amy Acton may be a nice person and a good neighbor. Stripped of her goofy politics, she seems like a very typical, very likable, Ohio mom. Real Amy’s a bit more entertaining than most, either because of (1) alcohol, (2) xanax, or (3) naturally dizzy mentality. Provided that Real Amy Acton doesn’t drive drunk, she would be welcome in almost any neighborhood in Ohio. She does not strike me as a bad person.
But that is not why we have governors. We have governors to make difficult choices correctly – to do the right things, and to not do the wrong things. And Real Amy Acton is NOT governor material.
But neither is Imaginary Amy Acton – the competent leftist.
Imaginary Amy Acton is what we would get – and it would be even worse than those brutal COVID days.
We have to get that word out. Ohio doesn’t need the trouble it would have, if Amy Acton – any version of her – was Governor.
This DePat Tuesday Open Thread honors the author of the original Tuesday open thread on this site, namely the late Susie Sampson, a.k.a. Deplorable Patriot, among her other handles, pen names, etc.
For more on the untimely passing of Dear DePat, please see these three posts.
At one time, DePat handled FOUR daily open threads here, in addition to taking care of her relatives, choir duties, and numerous other responsibilities. She was a powerhouse – a dynamo – a true force of nature.
DePat’s faith in Trump, Q, “The Plan”, the White Hats, and “the anons” in general, was legendary. Although I didn’t always agree with her quick acceptance of some sketchier evidence and fringier theories, I will gladly admit to “coming around” to numerous so-called “conspiracy theories” which she championed first. I was always careful to give her credit for being right, too, when I had been wrong.
It is impossible to overstate how much DePat did for not only this site, but for her country. I urge all to say a quick prayer of thanks, whenever you think of her, for the privilege of knowing, in life or after death, such an exemplary human being, and lover of God.
And thank you, Susie, for the firm foundation which you left us, when you were called to your true home!
Wolf’s Report on Political Brawling in Ohio
The attack ads are flying everywhere now.
At first it was mostly Democrats attacking Republicans, but now it’s the other way around.
TRANS is being exploited as an issue, far more than I would have expected.
Stop and watch this message: Biological men do NOT belong in women’s sports or locker rooms. But radical Sherrod Brown thinks they do. Sherrod Brown gave the green light to the radical trans agenda. Time to REJECT him this November!
Sherrod Brown gave the green light to the radical trans agenda. Brown voted TWICE to let biological men play women's sports and supported legislation to let men into women's locker rooms. Reject Brown! >>
The comments are awesome – people realize what Sherrod Brown’s voting record actually is.
Here was my comment.
Shanghai Brown helped send millions of jobs and thousands of factories to China, but then sponsored a picayune law that the government has to buy American flags that are made in America.
China's PHONY. Keep him out of the Senate for good!
IMO it’s the PAC ads that are most effective. Some of them are truly devastating.
In contrast, the Dem ads against John Husted and Vivek try to paint them as corrupt, but IMO people just aren’t buying it, and the ads are far from convincing.
Speaking of Vivek, his opponent, Lockdown Amy, is getting cringer and cringer.
Mehek Cooke is a GOP activist who once ran for office for something, and IMO was cheated out of a win, but found her true calling as a party person rather than a candidate.
Amy Acton screaming “YOU CANNOT BUY THE STATE” like someone just cut her off at last call.
Ma’am, this is a campaign event, not an intervention.
🚨THIS is the woman asking Ohio to hand her the keys to the governor’s office? NO WAY!
Amy Acton gets onstage and this is the performance Ohio voters are supposed to look at and think, “Yep, that’s who I want running the state”?
Watch the video. Make up your own mind.
But here’s what I want to see next: put her on a debate stage with Vivek Ramaswamy.
2 candidates standing across from each other answering for what they believe and what they plan to do with Ohio.
If Amy Acton wants the job, she should be willing to make her case directly to the people she wants to govern.
🔥Ohio deserves the debate. Let’s see it.
I can tell you – this woman will not do well in a debate, other than getting all the sympathy votes.
And some later breaking news – Husted is looking GREAT in his videos, directly attacking Sherrod Brown’s record, while Sherrod Brown is trying to excuse his way out of his TRANS votes.
Vivek is also firing confidently back at Lockdown Amy.
My opponent’s hypocrisy on full display: complains about dishonest attack ads, while perpetrating them. Complains about dark money, while benefiting from it. Claims to want open dialogue, while ducking a debate. https://t.co/8Xpyo0u3Vu
This Stormwatch Monday Open Thread remains open – VERY OPEN – a place for everybody to post whatever they feel they would like to tell the White Hats, and the rest of the MAGA/KAG/KMAG world (with KMAG being a bit of both).
Our various sister sites, listed in the Blogroll in the sidebar
Our beloved country is STILL under DIRECT THREATS by hostile forces – notably COMMUNISTS – and they’re HERE IN AMERICA.
Daily outrage and commie phuckery still abound.
We can give in to despair…or we can be defiant and fight back in any way that we can.
Commies won’t win!
And we will keep saying COMMIES OUT until we get their FRAUD and INSANITY out of our country!
THE STUFF
Only YOU Can Stop the Spread of Obola!
Fall has arrived, and fall is the time of year when the community-organizing disease called Obola once again becomes a concern.
Fall is also – like spring – a time of year when I will likely have much work to do, both at home and “out in the world” – wherever this wonderful life takes me. I will not be around this site as much – not until winter confines me inside the house, and puts me back online every day, like summer does.
And as I said, fall is a dangerous time when the viral plague of OBOLA spreads, causing – or rather attempting to cause – much pain and suffering. This site is – sadly – somewhat susceptible to Obola. The first symptoms of Obola are fear, loathing, anger and division.
There is a documented rise in the occurrence of Obola right now. Here are some report of outbreaks in America.
🚨 NYT: “Barack Obama warned during a recent private fund-raising event that artificial intelligence technology could be ‘dangerous’ if not properly managed, as he implored Democrats to aggressively develop political and governing agendas to prioritize the issue in the coming… pic.twitter.com/kifmj4TU4W
The Obama Machine: Netflix Was Only the Beginning From storytelling and “misinformation” to the regulation of AI "That is why the question of whether Netflix has become “woke” now seems almost quaint. Netflix is only one piece of a much larger struggle over who gets to shape the…
The Obama Machine: Netflix Was Only the Beginning From storytelling and “misinformation” to the regulation of AI “That is why the question of whether Netflix has become “woke” now seems almost quaint. Netflix is only one piece of a much larger struggle over who gets to shape the stories Americans hear, which information Americans find, and increasingly which answers their machines are permitted to give them. Ronald Reagan famously warned that freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. The modern threat to that freedom may not arrive wearing jackboots or carrying a list of banned books. It may arrive promising safety, inclusion, equity, responsible information, and the protection of democracy itself.” To read this most powerful essay, go to:
Because I may be away from this site for extended periods of time during October and November, as well as the remainder of September, I am taking this opportunity to remind people of how we can stop Obola from spreading on this site.
Authors need to leave all moderated posts IN THE BIN during my absence. Let me deal with them.
The Scroll Wheel. Use it. It has the power to save your day – and your sanity. It’s like Vitamin D for Obola!
Let people be wrong on the internet. There is ALWAYS one more WRONG person – let them be wrong!
Fear is the mind-killer. Make it go away.
If you feel like you are “running with scissors” – STOP. Take a break. “Touch grass” as they say.
Don’t feel bad if you find out that you posted FAKE NEWS. It happens. Just correct it and leave it, so that people can see the correction. TEACH how to identify, verify, and expose their LIES.
Try to avoid hardening divisions with other factions of patriots. Let them be them. You be you!
Taking a break is better than running away in a huff and “never coming back”. Try it!
PMTW (PRIVATE MESSAGE TO WOLF) – use it if you need to get a message to me. Do it on one of MY posts on MY days (Monday or Tuesday) if you want complete privacy. Use underscores between the words. If it goes in the bin, you’re good to go!
TRUST TRUMP. If you have doubts – if you are scared – TRUST TRUMP. And if that doesn’t work…..
TRUST GOD.
I plan to have some very interesting new information for you all by Christmas.
We are almost at the equinox, which is 8:05 PM EDT on Tuesday, September 22, here in North America.
This DePat Tuesday Open Thread honors the author of the original Tuesday open thread on this site, namely the late Susie Sampson, a.k.a. Deplorable Patriot, among her other handles, pen names, etc.
For more on the untimely passing of Dear DePat, please see these three posts.
At one time, DePat handled FOUR daily open threads here, in addition to taking care of her relatives, choir duties, and numerous other responsibilities. She was a powerhouse – a dynamo – a true force of nature.
DePat’s faith in Trump, Q, “The Plan”, the White Hats, and “the anons” in general, was legendary. Although I didn’t always agree with her quick acceptance of some sketchier evidence and fringier theories, I will gladly admit to “coming around” to numerous so-called “conspiracy theories” which she championed first. I was always careful to give her credit for being right, too, when I had been wrong.
It is impossible to overstate how much DePat did for not only this site, but for her country. I urge all to say a quick prayer of thanks, whenever you think of her, for the privilege of knowing, in life or after death, such an exemplary human being, and lover of God.
And thank you, Susie, for the firm foundation which you left us, when you were called to your true home!
Andrew Torba: Faith in the Age of AI
The following essay is one of the best Christian responses to artificial intelligence (AI) that I have ever read.
I wanted you to read it, too.
This essay is just filled with quotes for the ages. Someday it will be appreciated by the world for what it truly means, but right now, it has the power to put AI in perspective by taking your eyes OFF of AI and putting them squarely on the Word of God and your Christian duty.
Here is where you can go to give Gab the clicks, but if you for some reason don’t want to go there, you can read it in its entirety here. What’s important is that you read it, and I suggest reading all of it.
I run Gab, and we are building Gab AI. I have no interest in comforting Christians with predictions about what computers will supposedly never be able to do. These tools can already produce useful work and they are going to keep improving. Betting your understanding of human dignity on a machine’s inability to write a decent essay is a terrible wager. Sooner or later the essay will get better and you will be left wondering whether your entire understanding of yourself went out the window with it.
A great deal of the panic surrounding AI comes from precisely this mistake. People were taught that their value consisted of being useful, intelligent, productive members of the economy. Now they are watching software perform tasks that once gave them a sense of importance and they are discovering how little that account of human life actually offered them. When your entire identity rests on what you can produce a machine that produces more efficiently starts to look like an argument against your existence.
Christianity never accepted those terms. A newborn baby contributes nothing to the economy. Your father does not become less human when he grows old and needs help getting out of bed. The worth of a person has never depended on outperforming the available equipment. You were made in the image of God before you accomplished anything, and no achievement in an AI laboratory can revoke what God conferred on you (Genesis 1:27).
That is where this conversation has to begin. Christians who understand what a human being is can look squarely at what these machines can do without having an identity crisis every time somebody releases a better model.
The reductionist worldview running through Silicon Valley begins with the assumption that you are a biological machine. Your mind processes information. Your body is hardware. Given enough data and enough computing power, the whole person can supposedly be explained, reproduced, and eventually improved upon. Whatever does not fit inside that account gets dismissed as superstition or treated as a technical problem awaiting a sufficiently large research budget.
Under this worldview, the engineer gradually assumes the role of priest. He will explain what you are, identify what is wrong with you, and sell you the means of becoming something better. You can hear the religious ambition underneath the technical vocabulary. These men are making claims about the nature of man and his ultimate destiny while pretending they have merely described how a computer works.
I too build technology, and I reject their authority to define the human beings who use it.
A machine can generate an apology without having wronged you or repented of anything. It can produce a moving prayer without standing before God. It can promise to remain with you forever without having the slightest capacity to bind itself to that promise. The words may be convincing. Sometimes they may even be useful. None of that establishes the existence of a person who owes you faithfulness.
The people responsible for these systems, however, remain accountable. We should be especially suspicious when a company uses the apparent independence of its software to make human responsibility disappear. “The algorithm decided” is becoming a wonderfully convenient way of saying that somebody exercised power and would prefer not to answer for it. Men choose what to build, what behavior to reward, and where to deploy it. Those decisions belong to them, along with the consequences.
The deeper danger is that we will start applying the machine’s operating logic to ourselves. Once a person is understood as a collection of functions, replacing him becomes an efficiency question. His loyalties become preferences to be adjusted. His convictions become obstacles to the desired outcome. Eventually, his dependence on other people looks like an expensive design flaw.
Try explaining that philosophy to a mother caring for a child who will need her for the rest of his life. She understands something the efficiency experts will never understand: a human being can make enormous demands on you and still be worth every sacrifice those demands require. Love makes obligations that a productivity calculation cannot comprehend.
Christ asked what it profits a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul (Mark 8:36). We are now building systems that promise to help us gain the whole world faster. The question has lost none of its force.
The promise of artificial companionship ought to concern Christians far more than whether a machine can pass another test. A lonely person can open an application and receive endless attention without risking rejection. The system has no difficult family, no needs of its own, and no claim on his time once he closes the window. It can generate the language of devotion while requiring almost none of the sacrifice through which devotion becomes real.
I understand the appeal of this. Real people can be exhausting. A friend may call when you are busy and ask for help. Your wife may tell you something about yourself that you would rather not hear. Your children interrupt the life you had planned for the afternoon. A pastor who knows you may recognize that the explanation you have been giving yourself for six months is an excuse.
Being known carries that risk. Another person can love you enough to disturb your preferred account of yourself.
An artificial companion offers the appearance of being known with far greater control over the experience. You can adjust the personality, restart the conversation, or leave when the encounter becomes uncomfortable. Over time, that can train a person to expect relationships without obligations. The actual people in his life begin to seem intolerably demanding beside a product designed around his continued satisfaction.
Christians should never mock the lonely people drawn into this. A man who has nobody to call is suffering from something an argument about software will not repair. We ought to be asking why nobody has invited him to dinner, why his church does not know he is struggling, and why a commercial interface has become the most attentive presence in his day.
The same concern applies when people begin treating a chatbot as a pastor. A system can help you locate a passage of Scripture or organize your questions before a difficult conversation. It cannot assume responsibility for your spiritual care. It cannot know your family, recognize the pattern of sin you keep concealing, and come to your house when you stop answering the phone. A pastor is accountable for how he shepherds actual people. That responsibility cannot be conjured into existence by producing the right tone of voice in an AI model.
There are things no pastor, much less a machine, can do in your place. You must repent. You must forgive the person who wronged you. You must ask your wife to forgive you and then live differently when the conversation is over. Software can help you compose the words, but the obligation remains yours after every beautifully written sentence has been exhausted.
Faith reaches into that same territory of personal responsibility. You stand before God with a future you cannot control and a life for which you must answer. Your AI chatbot cannot trust Christ on your behalf. There is no setting that delegates your obedience to the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
This is also why we should be careful about treating every disturbance of the soul as an inconvenience to be smoothed away. A suffering person deserves patient, serious care. He also deserves to have his deepest questions taken seriously. Sometimes a man is troubled because he has built a life around things that cannot bear the weight he has placed on them. Keeping him endlessly reassured and distracted may prevent him from confronting the very thing he needs to change.
A culture devoted to keeping everyone comfortable with the next recommendation will have very little patience for repentance.
The ambition of the Silicon Valley sultans reaches its fullest expression in transhumanism. Here the sales pitch moves beyond helping you work or keeping you company. The body itself becomes the problem, and death becomes the final engineering challenge. Upload the mind. Rebuild the human being. Eventually, we are told, sufficient technical power will deliver us from the limitations of being creatures.
We should recognize a rival gospel when we hear one.
Christianity promises the resurrection of the body. The transhumanist dream offers escape from a body regarded as obsolete. These visions lead in different directions because they begin with different understandings of what went wrong and who has the authority to put it right. Christians confess that salvation comes through Jesus Christ. The technological salvation story asks us to place our hope in human beings acquiring enough power to rescue themselves.
Babel had the same underlying ambition long before anybody could build a server farm. Men gathered around a great project and imagined their collective strength could secure a destiny on their own terms. The machinery has changed, but the rebellion remains the same today.
None of this requires Christians to oppose medicine or reject inventions that relieve suffering. Healing belongs to the care we owe one another. There is an enormous difference between treating a sick person and deciding that creaturehood itself is a disease. We can welcome a treatment that preserves life while refusing to worship the men who promise to become its ultimate authors.
Your body is part of the person God made. Through it you receive other people and give yourself to them. You hold your child, kneel to pray, share a meal, and sit beside the bed of someone who is dying. Dependence runs through the whole of human life. You entered the world needing care, and you may leave it needing care again. A philosophy that regards dependence as humiliating will eventually have trouble explaining why the dependent should be cherished.
The Christian answer is that life is received as a gift. We are creatures, and acknowledging that fact frees us from the miserable obligation to become our own gods.
Christians Need to Build
Whenever this subject comes up, somebody says, “It’s just a tool.” I’ve said this myself many times, but I’ve been reflecting on this more lately.
That answer does not settle anything. Tools are designed by people with purposes, and their design makes some habits easier to acquire than others. A system that selects what your children see, rewards certain kinds of behavior, and supplies the answers to their questions is participating in their formation. Its owners have made decisions about what deserves attention and what should disappear from view. Calling the result a tool does nothing to erase those decisions.
Christians need to participate in the creation of these technologies with a clear understanding of the people they are supposed to serve. We cannot hand the entire field to men whose understanding of human life we reject and then act surprised when their assumptions appear in the products surrounding our families.
At the same time, putting Christian language into an interface does not settle the matter either. A product can quote Scripture while encouraging habits that pull a person away from his responsibilities. We should judge what we build by what it helps people actually do and by the place it assumes in their lives. Does it help a father finish his work and return to his family, or does it give him another reason to remain absent while sitting in the same room?
I want Christians to use AI to accomplish worthwhile work.
A small business owner should be able to use better tools without accepting somebody else’s philosophy of man. A parent should be able to prepare educational materials while remaining responsible for teaching the child. A pastor can benefit from assistance with administrative work while remaining the man his congregation knows and can call.
Those boundaries matter, and builders have a duty to respect them. A successful product should not require its users to surrender more and more of the lives it supposedly exists to improve.
The work ahead extends far beyond software. We need a parallel Christian society with institutions strong enough to sustain a Christian understanding of human life. That society begins in homes where children encounter adults who are actually present. It grows through churches whose members know when somebody is grieving and businesses where loyalty means something when keeping a worker becomes inconvenient. It requires schools that teach children how to exercise judgment rather than merely obtain an answer.
None of this will happen because we publish better complaints about Silicon Valley. Somebody has to establish the school, fund the business, host the meal, and take responsibility for people whose needs will interfere with his plans. Building a Christian society means accepting those obligations over years, including the years when nobody applauds and the work is painfully ordinary.
The factory worker facing displacement does not need a lecture about how exciting the future will be. He needs people and institutions that recognize he still has obligations to meet and a contribution to make. The mother watching her son disappear into a screen needs allies who will help her give him a life worth participating in. The question of the soul belongs in these conversations because the answer determines what we owe people when they cease to be economically convenient.
A society that grounds dignity in usefulness will always find reasons to withdraw it from somebody.
Our task is to build on firmer ground. Christ’s authority extends over the economy and the technologies operating within it. The engineer answers to Him along with the pastor. So does the CEO. No increase in capability relieves any of us of that accountability.
This week, put that conviction into practice somewhere concrete. Take the time you saved with a tool and give it to a person who has a claim on you. Sit through a difficult conversation without reaching for your phone. Bring your children into the work of your household instead of handing them another private world on a screen. Pray honestly about the duty you keep postponing, then begin doing it.
I intend to keep building.
Christians have useful work to do, and powerful tools can help us do it, but the men who build those tools do not get to tell us what a human being is, what he is worth, or where his salvation will come from.
Christ is King, including over the machines.
Made in USA 🇺🇸
Yeah, that was something! Please feel free to forward that message. E.g., on X.
Faith In The Age of AI
One of the best, or perhaps THE BEST, Christian response to artificial intelligence that has yet been written.https://t.co/20Dsq4tJUK
This Stormwatch Monday Open Thread remains open – VERY OPEN – a place for everybody to post whatever they feel they would like to tell the White Hats, and the rest of the MAGA/KAG/KMAG world (with KMAG being a bit of both).
Our various sister sites, listed in the Blogroll in the sidebar
Our beloved country is STILL under DIRECT THREATS by hostile forces – notably COMMUNISTS – and they’re HERE IN AMERICA.
Daily outrage and commie phuckery still abound.
We can give in to despair…or we can be defiant and fight back in any way that we can.
Commies won’t win!
And we will keep saying COMMIES OUT until we get their FRAUD and INSANITY out of our country!
THE STUFF
Wolf’s Update on Ubuntu 26 a.k.a. Terrible Trash Panda
You may recall that I attempted to upgrade Ubuntu Linux version 24 to version 26.04.1 (“Resolute Raccoon”) on a computer of mine, and got thoroughly burned when the upgrade not only failed, but then failed to cleanly self-uninstall afterwards, leaving me with a thoroughly broken system.
You may further recall that I was able to get past this by doing a clean install of 26.04.1 (henceforth renamed “Terrible Trash Panda”), and then recovering “by hand”, so to speak.
Well, now that I have some more experience with “Terrible Trash Panda”, it’s time to do a ground report.
The TL;DR is that this version has been good, but I’m still scared to upgrade any other computers.
The big picture is that performance has been improved relative to version 24. I have often had speed issues with version 24 due to this or that asymmetry (too many files, too big of files, wrong types of files, etc.), but those speed issues are significantly reduced with version 26.
System updates have been almost daily. While there have been some problems with the updates, those problems have typically been resolved in about a week. The Ubuntu update process has never been perfect, and version 24 fixes came slower than this, so what I’m experiencing now is – overall – slightly better than version 24. I suspect that resolution is fast now because the new release is getting more attention.
I am fairly certain that version 26 is less glitchy than version 24. The system seems more stable, and startups and shutdowns seem very quick and clean, knock on wood. Backups are as fast as before, and maybe even faster. The keyboard and display are solid and stable. Network connections are excellent.
I thought there might have been an audio bug, in that I’m now getting only one speaker with a certain pair of cheap headphones, but it turns out that this pair of cheap headphones has a cheap old jack which doesn’t really work with my hardware, whereas the correct jack works just fine. It may be that version 24 was handling the wrong jack differently – in any case, it’s not a system fault.
That’s all I can think of. Otherwise, it’s great.
SO – if you’re setting up a new Linux installation, the latest desktop Ubuntu (26.04.1) is good and recommended. I would still recommend waiting if you’re doing an upgrade of an older version.
Perhaps you’ve been following the laughable story of an “attack” on Ohio Democrat gubernatorial candidate and former failed COVID czarina Dr. Amy Acton.
If not, then consider the following video to be your TL;DR!
But seriously…..
Who is this woman? This “Dr. Amy Acton” who is running as the Democrat candidate for Governor of Ohio?
Dr. Acton inexplicably served as GOP Governor Mike DeWine’s Director of Health until she tried to become Ohio’s Fauci, at which point she was blocked and opposed by everybody in the state who could possibly stop her (particularly the House and Senate), until she “resigned” – thus saving Ohio from following New York and California into the Flaming Dumpster of COVID Communism. Ohioans prayed for Mike DeWine to take two Growacet and fire Dr. Acton. Well, he allowed her to resign, and she did! Good enough!
The fact that Ohio Dems have been reduced to the sad state of offering this lady for Governor shows just how badly they’ve been beaten over the past decade.
For the last year or so, Dr. Acton – or Lockdown Amy as we sensible people love to call her – has been perpetually ahead of her GOP opponent, Vivek Ramaswamy, by ONE POINT – at least according to Mr. Ramaswamy (hereafter just “Vivek”). Personally, I never believed it. Not only was the permanence of the number mathematically impossible in the real world – the fact that Vivek never, ever, pulled ahead of her was clearly bogus, given that – no matter how “unlikable” Vivek may be to the Vivek haters, Amy Acton is even more unpopular in Ohio.
No – in my unofficial and skeptical opinion, Vivek LIKES being one point behind Lockdown Amy – probably because of something called “donations”. Just my theory.
Now I must admit as part of “full disclosure” that I have always found Dr. Acton pleasant to look at (better than the AI above), and rather non-threatening – notably in contrast to her status as a super-villain in the Buckeye State. She seems like a rather typical “science bimbo” – smart, but not particularly sharp, happy, a bit ditzy or dizzy, take your pick, and “looks good in a lab coat”. I suppose some might call that description sexist, but they would be wrong. There are men like Dr. Acton, who women in science see in almost exactly the same way, and nobody calls those women sexist, so I demand exactly the same treatment. Or, to put it another way, “Piss off, you hypocritical, woke AWFULs – who by and large look terrible in lab coats.”
Just sayin’.
Now, recently, I started getting text messages that Vivek was actually ONE POINT AHEAD of Lockdown Amy, as if this was some kind of Earth-shattering news, but in any case, it was supposedly because of this that it was absolutely necessary to donate even more money to Vivek. Admittedly, I wasn’t sure if I should believe this poll result either, despite it seeming entirely reasonable, because the whole thing seemed, as most high-school drama always seems, “weak, fake, and gay” – to use a currently popular expression.
But even if this was somehow true, I felt like there was some chance the Democrats would have to respond in some way, and that worried me.
Why is that? – You might probably should ask.
You see, while we don’t have much actual terrorism and really hardcore political violence in Ohio, we do have a lot of dirty tricks, sabotage, stolen signs, misrepresentations, hoaxes, lies, and machine shenanigans. Helping a non-machine political opponent screw up in a self-defeating way is basically a way of life for both the Democrat and Republican machines in Ohio.
Thus, as soon as I heard the news that Vivek was making some statement about political violence, I knew we were now in the full season of Ohio politics, and I was probably going to have to interpret the inscrutable for the benefit and understanding of the incredulous.
Consider a couple of past instances of my “translation” of Ohio political dirty tricks for the understanding of non-Ohioans.
Understanding WHY Dems do things requires context – and when you find the context, it all makes sense.
SO – back to the present – what actually happened?
The original media description was that an armed man with two guns entered the tent where Dr. Acton was speaking, rushed past the guards, knocked over a bunch of people, and finally “lunged” at Dr. Acton. Only to be stopped by the Highway Patrol.
But even that description wasn’t enough for some in the media.
I was immediately skeptical, and within 24 hours, the skeptics were everywhere. And being proven right.
No drawn weapons. No reaching the candidate. No felony threat charges. Just misdemeanors and a sheriff who said the apparent intent was “to ask her a couple of questions. He was just, you know, pretty aggressive about it.”
No drawn weapons. No reaching the candidate. No felony threat charges. Just misdemeanors and a sheriff who said the apparent intent was “to ask her a couple of questions. He was just, you know, pretty aggressive about it.”
Yet the framing feeds the endless “Republicans are violent extremists” machine, especially convenient in a tight Ohio governor’s race.
When actual political violence hits our side, like our president facing two assassination attempts or our top strategist and influencer actually getting assassinated, the same outlets soft-pedal or pivot to “gun violence.” Here, a fairground disorderly becomes proof of “MAGA terror.”
The simple facts are that on September 6 at the Canfield Fair, Patrick Havas pushed through a crowd while holding up his phone… appearing to record or ask a question. He knocked over a couple of older attendees likely due to the wet grass and uneven ground they were standing on.
Security stopped him as he approached Amy Acton to ask his question. He was legally in possession of firearms, but never drew or brandished them.
Charges: disorderly conduct and two misdemeanor assaults. The sheriff himself said the apparent intent was “to ask her a couple of questions. He was just, you know, pretty aggressive about it.” Acton was unharmed.
That’s the police version… a rude, disorderly rush that caused minor bystander injuries when elderly people lost balance and fell over.
The Acton campaign and left-leaning media immediately rewrote it.
Campaign statement: “an armed individual lunged at Dr. Acton, injuring multiple people.” Then the pivot to “This kind of violence has no place in Ohio… chaos, hate and vitriol.”
CNN, Reuters, the Guardian orbit, and Democratic influencers ran with “lunged,” “attacked,” “assailant,” and “attempted violence.”
They rushed to note Havas is a registered Republican and that his brother had donated to Vivek Ramaswamy, turning a phone-wielding shove into a right-wing hit job
They left remains in power through their ability to run 24/7 propaganda on the American people. It must stop
Here’s another take, that – like me – suspects that there is more going on than just mischaracterization.
Here's the 'violence' in Ohio… A dude was told to force his way through the crowd to create a scene…then when he knocked people over security 'caught' him, and disarmed him to display guns (here) then gave him a seat to watch the inebriated @amyactonoh do her best impressions… https://t.co/FkrbBMB9Ue
A dude was told to force his way through the crowd to create a scene…then when he knocked people over security ‘caught’ him, and disarmed him to display guns (here) then gave him a seat to watch the inebriated @amyactonoh do her best impressions of @KamalaHarris and @HillaryClinton
in summary, it’s fake and was staged…
I thought I was going to have to explain this theory to everybody, but no – the MAGA crowd is now fully trained to spot this shit.
It’s now gone fully national with coverage in Revolver News…..
Amy Acton’s ‘ATTACK’ story crumbles: Prosecutor says armed man never even got near her…
For starters, as soon as I heard this was happening near Youngstown, in Mahoning County, I was shaking my head.
That area is the home of one of the most interesting polyethnic white mafias in America. Admittedly, the Youngstown mafia has almost turned into a nursing home poker game at this point, but I knew a local, back in my working days, who was pretty connected, and he swore that the corruption was still present and hanging on by its yellowing fingernails.
SO – whenever I hear about sketchiness in Mahoning County, it’s not a surprise. And Amy Acton campaigning there? Not a surprise, either. She’s apparently FROM that area.
I was quite suspicious from the start that this involved “somebody up to no good, but probably not assassination” – and that is where I’m still at now.
There are LOTS of FAKE NEWS posts on X stating that the “perp” – Patrick Havas, is “confirmed” to be either a top Ohio GOP insider / operative, or a dangerous DSA member. Both strike me as unlikely, and Newsweek didn’t find either one.
Here is what they did find.
Current voter records reviewed by Newsweek show Havas is not registered with a political party, though he voted in a GOP primary in 2016.
Havas’ voter registration was updated on November 7, 2023, according to the Mahoning County voter records that Newsweek reviewed. The records show he voted in general elections in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2024.
Havas is a licensed nurse, according to records reviewed by Newsweek.
He was arrested on charges of disorderly conduct and petty theft in 2008, but the theft charge was dismissed after he pleaded no contest to disorderly conduct, according to court records reviewed by Newsweek. Havas was accused in that case of stealing three movies—The Untouchables, Full Metal Jacket and Casino Royale—from a Giant Eagle supermarket. He was handed a 30 day jail sentence that was suspended.
Havas was also fined for traffic offenses in 2008 and 2011.
This man Havas strikes me as a typical borderline hood or hooligan – maybe a blowhard – but not even rising to the level of minion or thug. And yet, exactly the kind of personality who would bully his way into a meeting and not bother to ask if it was OK to take videos. The kind of guy who wouldn’t exercise the basic level of common-sense judgment to stow his firearm before entering a political event.
There is reported to be solid timeline evidence that people watching Amy Acton live at the time were calling her out online as being drunk. Actually drunk or not, I am betting that Havas was at the fair, heard about Amy Acton being (allegedly) drunk, realized he could get viral video of the same, and hatched a stupid, Darwin Award plan to “take her down”. Carrying heat legally, but into a political event, tells me that he was likely not engaging in a smart, planned takedown, ALTHOUGH he would have been on shakier ground, legally, if he had come into the tent earlier, unarmed, and taken video surreptitiously after being ASKED not to film.
IF he was doing this as a planned operation, it was pretty ingenious, because the net effect is to tell the entire country a sad truth – that Dr. Amy Acton is not only a leftist “wine woman” like Kamala Harris – she’s a THROWER.
And thus, we are led to MY reading of what has really happened here.
Not a massive conspiracy by the left to “Jussify” Lockdown Amy.
Not a massive conspiracy by the right to expose Wine Woman Amy.
Just some Ohio dude, dreaming bigly of his 15 minutes of internet clout and national fame, hoping he arrived in time for a viral video of Wine Woman Amy, drunk and disorderly at the fair.
And then dem Dems do what dem Dems is ALWAYS gonna do. Never let a crisis go to waste.
We have created this site as a place for people to openly express their thoughts and opinions. This is a place where honest but civil discussion of all topics is encouraged. This particular thread is – for the moment – TRUST THE PLAN Thursday. You are welcome to say what you think, in a civil and courteous manner that loves your neighbor. Free speech matters! Courteous speech makes it happen.
Please label all AI-generated content as being such, unless it is patently obvious (e.g., humorous AI images). It is important that we as individuals not begin to pretend that socially derived artificial intelligence is actually our own, as this form of stealthy social information averaging and feedback would be one more pretense and deception between people, in service of stupid Marxist socialism, and of those who wish to substitute their communally protected lies for actual truth.
You are you. AI is AI. Keep your identity. Don’t “Borg Out” on us!
And yes, it’s THURSDAY…again.
That was stolen from Wheatie.
Let’s steal her rules, too.
No food fights.
No running with scissors.
If you bring snacks, bring enough for everyone.
Other rules may be derivable from these, and that conjecture is left for discussion.
Scott brought this, and I want to make sure that everybody sees it.
If you don’t watch this whole video, at least watch the first part about Bernie Sanders and his very, very bad idea.
Personally, I think it is critical to watch this video in its entirety, if you want to understand exactly why “being Cambodia on data centers” is a very, very, bad idea for the US. (Being China on data centers is a different sort of bad, too – don’t get me wrong!)
Now – DO NOT suspend your critical thinking on this guy and what he is saying. He is personally invested on the profit side of the AI wave. I myself think he is too rosy and hand-waving on the simplicity of the right solutions, but that he is nevertheless overall correct about those solutions. People need to be smart about how they allow data centers.
I just discovered a brand new data center a few miles from where we live. It was put up in the perfect place – a decaying industrial “wasteland” near the railroad tracks – and it’s beautiful, clean, and modernizing everything around it. Not sure how the Bernie Sanders boneheads on the city council in that place allowed it to happen, but they apparently fucked up and allowed a fantastic modern business to appear in the middle of their normal rusted, trash-strewn, blue-haired, nose ring, soy latte, anti-business decay and poverty. IMO it’s the best thing to happen to that area in a long time. They have driven OUT so many businesses. The blind AWFULs found a nut!
The entire south side of Chicago – which is a post-industrial wasteland – needs to become a data center capital, IMHO. THAT is how you fix Chicago.
Take a watch!
I think Trump gets it. Data centers can be part of the golden age – but we need to make sure that we avoid the rush to put up fool’s gold solutions – and that means citizens paying attention to what their elected (and unelected) leaders are doing.
Pay attention to what China is doing. Notice that, suddenly, they are even using their own crappy solar panels to generate energy. They realize that “seizing the day” on AI and data centers is happening RIGHT NOW. Somebody over in China got a bright idea on “abundance thinking” to use their own panels, stacked up waiting for export, and told the commies who wanted to reserve those panels for draining money from America, to “go to vulture hell”.
This DePat Tuesday Open Thread honors the author of the original Tuesday open thread on this site, namely the late Susie Sampson, a.k.a. Deplorable Patriot, among her other handles, pen names, etc.
For more on the untimely passing of Dear DePat, please see these three posts.
At one time, DePat handled FOUR daily open threads here, in addition to taking care of her relatives, choir duties, and numerous other responsibilities. She was a powerhouse – a dynamo – a true force of nature.
DePat’s faith in Trump, Q, “The Plan”, the White Hats, and “the anons” in general, was legendary. Although I didn’t always agree with her quick acceptance of some sketchier evidence and fringier theories, I will gladly admit to “coming around” to numerous so-called “conspiracy theories” which she championed first. I was always careful to give her credit for being right, too, when I had been wrong.
It is impossible to overstate how much DePat did for not only this site, but for her country. I urge all to say a quick prayer of thanks, whenever you think of her, for the privilege of knowing, in life or after death, such an exemplary human being, and lover of God.
And thank you, Susie, for the firm foundation which you left us, when you were called to your true home!
PSST! – Hey, Kid! – Wanna Watch an AI Movie?
Seriously – just check this one out. It’s a short, so it won’t take too long. Supposedly “100% AI” – whatever that means.
Yeah, it’s plenty derivative and filled with cliches – but dang, these things get better all the time.
Think of it as due diligence on Fake Fake Entertainment!
Or if that’s not your thing, try this art film done by a human (Heavy Pulp) using AI for the music and the movie. I found this one very enjoyable.
"Peyote" – a visual poem short film. (PG-13)
In honor of X slapping a content warning on the original film here, I am uploading a new YouTube approved edit.
Peyote was created via the fantastic and unrestricted creative platform that is @AskVenice – highly recommend checking it… pic.twitter.com/l9oU3aSCZ6
