The Apocalypse: No More One Dollar Diet Coke at McDonald's

The world has ended officially and thoroughly. 

This week I went to my local McDonald's to partake in one of my few guilty pleasures, a large Diet Coke. I have enjoyed this beverage for years, paying one dollar plus tax. No more. I got hit in one McDonalds with $1.20, and when I went to another in a different town, assuming there was a mistake at the first, I got hit for $1.30. I am not a genius with math, but that, my friends, is a 20-30% jump in price. Thank God, Biden's inflation reduction bill got passed by the Congress. 

Oh, my other guilty pleasure? Dirty Harry--the original, the sequels, well, meh. I suppose the cancel wokesters will eventually ban that film or re-edit it to remove "offensive stereotypes."

Can things get worse? Yes, they can. Biden's ill-thought-out adventure in Ukraine brings us ever closer either to nuclear war or, at "best," to a rebalancing of global power much to the detriment of the West. To point this out, as I have on Twitter, gets one accused of being a "Putin clown." 

Our woke/prog masters want no dissent, no reflexion on the wisdom of the path taken. We get almost no independent news out of Ukraine--no intrepid journalists reporting from the front lines, for example--and must do with the "news" as approved by Kyiv, Washington, and London, e.g., staged photo ops, and billions of dollars, pounds, euros on the way to Kyiv--well, we think, to Kyiv. We have few real journalists willing to ask real questions of the powerful.

Meanwhile, of course, the US and the West continue under assault from a ceaseless wave of "refugees" fleeing from . . . well, we are not allowed to ask. They arrive, with assistance from so-called NGOs--many of them getting public funds--and powerful Mexican drug cartels, full of demands which our struggling cities struggle to meet. Our own infrastructure goes to ruin, e.g., disaster in E. Palestine, Ohio, and our own citizens get taxed and "inflated" out of their earnings, and their jobs go overseas or to the newcomers. We continue to refuse to adopt successful policies of the recent past to control these "migrants," criminal aliens, really. 

We also refuse to adopt recent policies which produced US energy independence, and had freed us from the Middle East, Venezuela, and the kleptocrats of Russia. None of this makes sense except that we are governed by people who hate us, want us poor, subservient, hungry, or dead. 

Tomorrow, I go on another of my periodic visits to Spain for a couple of weeks. I will try to disconnect, but that is not really possible. I will see if I have the mood to write. I do write a lot on Twitter, whenever I want to get insulted. 

"Normal or Crazy" The New Battle Cry?

Despite vows not to watch it, I did. 

I am too much of a political junkie to avoid a free dose of Biden dope via his second State of the Union (SOTU) address. And? Horrible. Absolutely horrible. I hope never to go through a similar experience again. Must get myself to rehab. Maybe Hunter can pay for it?

This was the worst SOTU address, and the worst Joe Biden speech I have ever heard. I don't know where to begin. 

The lies and half-truths spilled out non-stop from start to agonizing disjointed finish. He lied about Social Security, Medicare, and then had to retract it right in front of us. He rambled on and on about airline baggage fees and hidden resort charges. What? This is a priority with the challenges we face? 

His comments about some McDonald's cashier being forced to sign a "non-compete agreement" was pure fantasy. Delusional.

He also used the line, again, about poor mothers having to park in the McDonald's parking lot so their children could use the free WiFi to do their homework. Obsession with McDonald's! So these poor people have cars and computers but don't have access to WiFi except in the McDonald's parking lot? Right. Why not Starbucks? You know, where the cool people go.

He glossed over the threat from the China, ignored Iran, ignored the disaster at the border, mumbled about some inconsequential program to fight the ravages of fentanyl, and lied and lied and lied. 

He stole whole chunks of his address--he, after all, is a known plagiarist--from Trump: his "Made in America" spiel was pure Trump but without any conviction. His description of the "booming" economy was absurd. He lied about his tax program, which will affect every American negatively. His claims about inflation and the energy industry were bald-faced lies. He virtually ignored the disaster in Ukraine except to state briefly we will continue to support Ukraine, "we will finish the job!" He bought the anti-police line of the left, and basically threw the cops under the bus. Shameful. 

I could go on, but won't. 

Governor Sanders' reply was pretty good. I thought the first one-half to two-thirds excellent, the end, however, fell into platitude territory--I can forgive that, I guess. 

She was clearly presenting herself as a serious candidate for President, never mentioned Trump by name but noted her youth and called for a new generation of leaders. Her line that the choices we now face are not between right or left, but between "normal or crazy" was brilliant. She said the quiet part aloud. That is the real division in the US and the West. To have a major politician state this so clearly is liberating and should embolden the normal people of the West to take up the fight against the crazies. I note that much of the MSM/DNC echo chamber is attacking her stark description and warning the GOP not to make it a slogan. That, of course, means that is exactly what should be done.  

Well, gotta go. Preparing for another lightning visit to Spain and the work on my Taj Mahal apartment. Got doctors to see before I go, and taxes to pay. Zelensky and the illegals in NY hotels need my money.