LOLOLOL

… we Americans have followed the modern history of the British monarchy with confusion (why does it still exist?) and amazement (did King George really let the Romanovs be shot to bits?).

While we’re vaguely aware that the current Norwegian royal family is just as stuffed with morons and degenerates as the British, we’re less interested because, I mean, history… But the fact is, we remain baffled by the behavior and also the continued existence of The Crown.

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The Guardian has a nice insider’s take on it all, from which maybe we can learn. Let’s see…

The royal family’s defenders claim that they were once the country’s moral anchor. That was rarely, if ever, true. But the Epstein files reveal where entitlement without restraint, and privilege without responsibility, can lead.

Yeah but if it was never true… And if – call it regal evolution – descends ultimately to Andrew (and hey it can always descend lower!), then why…

Public anger is brewing against the monarchy – a keystone of a political order in urgent need of radical reconstruction, along with the electoral system and the upper house. It would seem absurd for the prime minister to ask Mr Mountbatten-Windsor to give evidence to US lawmakers, but not to MPs. The monarchy is not accountable to parliament. Commons rules bar “reflections” on the royals, rendering meaningful debate taboo. In 2011 David Cameron relinquished MPs’ oldest check on royal power: control of the purse. His government replaced annual scrutiny of palace finances with an automatic transfer of crown estate revenues.

Um. Seems to be going in the wrong direction, what?

See? What’s your problem? They deleted it.

Wow. That’s a hot one.

This is one of the more amusing (and informative) takes on the Mandelson/Starmer fiasco. Indeed every elite from every elite walk of life seems to have been hot and heavy w/ J. Epstein…

The remark in my title reminds me of David Bowie’s parting sentiment:

“On the whole, this whole world is run by brutes for the common and the stupid.”

My only link with Epstein (I swear!) is that my friend Lisa Beth (cousin of my ‘thesdan playmate) went to elementary and junior high school in Brooklyn with him (“a mathematical genius, and an overweight nerd”).

… fraud.

The head of the National Council of Canadian Muslims recognizes the absurdity of governments paying for religious schools, many of which inculcate values destructive to the functioning of a modern democratic state (head/body veiling for girls and women, withdrawal from the civic realm, derogation of women); and though he ain’t happy about Bill 9’s extension of secular laws in Quebec, he’s able to understand that there’s Provincial consensus on higher levels of secularization.

… but Lori Zeno stole most of its city, state, and federal money so she could rent a penthouse, tool around in a Mercedes, and take luxury trips to Bali.

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You MUST know, after reading this blog for awhile, that this sort of behavior is absolutely standard.

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The only question UD keeps having in such cases is about discovery. Clearly people around her must have known for some time (she led the outfit for years) that she was dirty. Zeno herself explained to the court that she should be handled very gently by them because she’s been way off her rocker for years. Did anyone notice that?

Or is the real problem the very banality of stealing everything? Like, what’s the big deal. Everyone does it.

Well, we’ll see if UD’s own Maryland can pull itself together to pass this. It would be a beautiful thing.

The Economist notes that such legislation is the wave of the future.

Or uh make that Thirty Under Thirty, its exclusive compilation of the most amazing young entrepreneurs.

Already four of the thirty have gone to jail or are on their way. Stay tuned for more!

Time was that last nugget (this is from a 2024 article) would have knocked us all over: Gee! Tea in BP with the Prince!

Now it sends out alarms – whoop!whoop!whoop! – just as piercing as the alarms set off by the news yesterday that Ariely, Duke U’s highest-profile professor, is mentioned I dunno a billion times in the just-released Jeffrey Epstein stuff. Dey was REAL tight goodfellas.

Ariely was also real close – a research collaborator – with F. Giro, the chick dismissed from Harvard for you-could-die levels of research fraud, and whose life now revolves around an eternal and insanely expensive lawsuit against (and also one from), that institution. Plus you can read with ease many discussions of Ariely’s own uh questionable results.

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Sing it.

Research fraud. Ok.

He brings in the bucks

Let him stay

But what if we’re fucked

By the Epstein stuff?

When’s enough enough?

As a notorious local squatter goes to jail for 90 days and gets a fine, one of Maryland’s bleeding heart pols comments.

Maryland state Del. Teresa Woorman, whose district includes the Bethesda neighborhood where Goode was squatting, said her thoughts were focused on how to help squatters when asked for her opinion on [Tameika] Goode’s conviction …

‘I think we need to look at how it is happening across our state, and figure out how to best address not just people breaking in, but the underlying issues people are having when they have that need to seek shelter,’ she said. 

Homelessness ‘thesda-style, baby! She drove into that four car garage in a $190,000 Porsche, and broke into that house, in her desperate need for shelter — and the cruelty of her neighbors to witness her suffering and send in the goons to drag her away!

You’d think the Moose Jaw location would deter them somewhat; or maybe the Bernie Madoff success rate …

Of course it’s Canada that should/should long ago have done the deterring, but Canada Nice seems to include welcoming people like this with open arms.

Now I’m worried about that ten billion dollar lawsuit of his against the IRS.

If you, like me, miss the Alex Murdaugh trial — and in particular the courtroom testimony of poor uneducated low country folk whose four million dollar personal injury settlements were stolen in their entirety by Murdaugh — direct your attention to Detroit. In that city, not merely lawyers, but also a judge, have been stealing from their most vulnerable wards — old, impoverished, profoundly disabled people who had been placed in this group’s safekeeping.

I mean, any of us would have been tempted. These are no ‘count senile shut-ins who probably don’t expect anything other than the thin gruel and oblivion that is their lot. I mean, go for it.