Category Archives: Non-Fiction/Documentary

The Idealist’s Dilemma

Unless drastic course corrections are made, the republic known as the United States of America will cease to exist in the near future. There might still be a country with that name; it might still have a red, white, and blue flag and a bald eagle for its symbol; and certainly politicians will pay lip service  to ideals like freedom. But living here will be an entirely different experience than what our parents, grandparents, and great grandparents enjoyed.

I offer the following parable as an analogy, to help get across the point I want to make:

Ike the Idealist learned about fighting in kindergarten.  Not only did he learn how to do it, he learned about how not to do it. Basically, he learned that the only honorable way to fight was by Marquis de Queensbury rules.  Kicking was cheating. Biting, scratching, and pulling hair were how girls did it, which was out-of-bounds. Eye-gouging was unheard of. And, of course, using a weapon was cowardly.

Through elementary, middle and high school, these rules were reinforced. Any time Ike had to fight, he did so honorably according to these mores. He considered any departure from this combat etiquette to be despicable.

Then one day, as an adult, Ike surprises some dirtbag in the process of stealing his car. Ike asks what’s going on, and the car thief replies by throwing his dent-puller, hitting Ike in the face, breaking his nose. Then the thief closes the distance between them. Ignoring Ike’s attempts at civilized discourse, he proceeds to beat Ike about the head. Eventually, Ike realizes that the thief can’t be reasoned with, and violence is in order. He assumes the classic pugilist’s pose and punches back.

The dirtbag knees him in the crotch, stomps on his foot, and pulls a knife. While Ike reels from the pain, and shock from such heinous disregard of the rules, the dirtbag stabs him repeatedly. Ike could have kicked the knife out of his hands, but kicking would violate his principles, so that was unthinkable. He peppers the dirtbag with jabs, hooks, and the occasional right cross.

Ike thought the fight should have been more like this.
Ike thought the fight should have been more like this.

The dirtbag tackles him and they both go down. Ike grabs the wrist of the hand gripping the knife, so he won’t be stabbed again. At one point that hand is right in front of his mouth, but Ike just can’t bring himself to violate his principles and bite it. Meanwhile, the dirtbag gouges out an eye with his thumb. Ike doesn’t know what to do, because grappling around like this is most undignified, and he just doesn’t want to engage in such distasteful behavior.

With sober, reasoned dialectic, he protests the dirtbag’s flagrant violation of Ike’s ideals.  The thief slips on a pair of brass knuckles with his free hand and, between those and his elbow, breaks Ike’s jaw and knocks him out. He drives away in the car with barely a minor bruise or two, leaving Ike bleeding out in the street, half blind, with multiple injuries. Most likely, Ike will die right where he lays.

But at least Ike the Idealist can take comfort in the fact that he never sank to the enemy’s level.

wearenotok

I started confronting this dilemma after the election of President Trump when he promised to use Executive Orders to undo some of Obama’s damage. The Executive Order has been abused, beginning in earnest with the Clinton Administration. Obama used it to the point that the USA became a de facto monarchy. All legislation is supposed to originate in the House of Representatives. That is part of the law that all elected officials swear to uphold and abide by. By principle, Trump should not use this dictatorial outflanking tactic to reverse Obama’s illegal actions against our country.

It’s the job of Congress to chop down these treasonous hedgerows. But of course Congress has proven repeatedly that it will not do its job. Make themselves rich at our expense? Yes.  Help unelected bureaucrats destroy our country while arranging golden parachutes for themselves? Yes. Do their job? You must be a crackpot for even asking.

That’s why I didn’t protest Trump’s use of Executive Orders to bypass the obstruction of the Deep State and plug some of the holes the last four Administrations drilled through the bottom of the boat.

In America of the current year, the full half of the glass is that the left’s stranglehold on the flow of information is slipping. Millions of people are aware of the globalist Deep State actively working to destroy the republic. They are aware of the utter corruption of the lapdog (“mainstream”) media, Hollywood, the music industry, etc. And a significant portion of those people are not happy about the betrayals and deception we’ve suffered for generations at the hands of those whores and traitors.

But instead of embracing the fundamentals that made our republic the most prosperous country in history, with unprecedented individual liberty, the wakening masses are instead seeking the answer by fetishizing “muh Westurn Civilizayshun,” and embracing identity politics. It’s truly disturbing how fast middle America seems to be becoming as race-obsessed as the minority subcultures have been since the 1960s.

obomunistflagpoopers

If our public servants in government would just do what we pay them for, most of our problems would rapidly fade. But, as a rule, they’re not going to do anything that will  slow our descent into a 3rd world police state. We’ve let a ruling class take power who see us as their subjects, and will break or ignore the laws they swore to uphold in the maniacal quest to accumulate more wealth, control, and power for themselves.  They’ve infiltrated both parties and turned them into enemies of our freedom. We can’t vote them out because there are so few true alternatives, and there are so many people voting who approve of what they’re doing. Just a few more years of unchecked immigration, and the America-hating Marxists will have every election sewn up for however long elections are still held here. Evidently, even President Trump doesn’t have the guts to stop the invasion and send enough invaders back home to keep this from happening. If the wall ever does get built, it will be too little, too late.

damnflag

They’re stealing our car. They’ve backstabbed us multiple times and gouged out our eye.  And mainstream “conservatives” (whatever that means) are fighting back by drafting statements of support for the police and military. Wow–congratulations. That might have been a courageous stance to take during Vietnam (half a century ago).

If the people would rise up against the traitors and put them out of office, by whatever means necessary, it’s possible we could clean house, drain the swamp, and restore some of what we’ve lost. But that’s not going to happen, either. The government schools have done their job in spreading ignorance. And where ignorance runs out, apathy takes over.

blackbloc

That’s not to say civil war (or revolution, depending on how sloppy your semantics are) isn’t coming, because it is. But a significant component of the bloodshed to come will be racially motivated. Race will be the idol of every side. Preserving or restoring a representative government designed to protect individual rights will not be a priority for anyone with a voice loud enough to be heard. Look around–it’s already not. Attempts to educate simply inspire mockery from the bovine, low-IQ lemmings who surround us.

When the war comes, there is no fence you can safely sit on. We’ll have to pick sides. You can bet that I, for one, will not align with the Globo-Homo Hive Mind. But who does that leave me for allies? Generally, guys who have forgotten how to perceive anything beyond “muh Magic DNA.”

It shouldn’t be this way. It didn’t have to be this way. But it is.

Neither me, nor any other American idealist, can shout loud enough to derail this suicidal zeitgeist. So what do we do?whatisneeded

Some people believe the Income Tax is unconstitutional (hence illegal). Most of them pay it anyway. Some of us recognize random roadside “papers, please” checkpoints by law enforcement to be a violation of our rights (rights that law enforcement officers swear an oath to protect). But if you need to keep your job, don’t want to go to jail and be railroaded by the weaponized “justice” system, you grit your teeth and play the game.

Increasingly, I have to swallow ideals simply to provide for my family and retain what personal freedom I still have. Does that make me a hypocrite, or merely a pragmatist? Inside, I still cherish my ideals, and lament their abandonment. But who cares?

Nobody who matters. (Or, at least, not enough people who matter.)

When it comes to swallowing ideals, I suspect we ain’t seen nothin’ yet.

anglosaxons

I don’t want to associate with folks who blame Jews for everything wrong in the world, or value skin color over content of character. But what choice do I have in the conflict taking shape around us? Demographic groupings which are already consumed by identity politics, and already consider me their enemy–that’s who. Demographic groupings which are 80-95% sold out to anti-American causes (and BTW: what choices do the 5-20% outliers of those demographics have, in the brewing conflict?). Demographic hive minds which only care about what they believe will advance their collective interests. Their “radicals” are already demonstrating their willingness to rape and murder. Their “moderates” have no problem cheating  and stealing. Their “liberals” are already in the habit of lying to advance the agenda they think will shepherd them to Utopia.

That’s how it stands now. How much worse will it be when bullets are flying and they face the threat of starvation or true oppression?

How important will my ideals seem when my choice is to be shot on sight by that side, or perhaps survive another day by holding the line with the side that shoots them on sight?

No, it’s not that bad.

Yet.

But we’re fast running out of options for a peaceful solution.

If I was a Five-Star Admiral in World War II, there’s a good chance I would be bent out of shape about all the losses suffered at Pearl Harbor. But as much as I wished I still had those ships and sailors, I would have to accept reality. And my strategic planning would have to reflect that reality. The debacle at Pearl Harbor could have been avoided in a dozen different ways. But it wasn’t. And lamenting it would not restore my Pacific Fleet to what it was before.

That’s where American idealists are right now. We’ll have to set our course according to the reality we face, and not dwell on what we’ve lost and how avoidable it was, if only _________ or __________ or __________. Frankly, I don’t know how successful I’ll be at this from day to day.

The Cold Civil War Branches Off

…Into an internecine squabble amongst the “Alt-Right.”

I’m way behind on everything. There are several overdue reviews I need to post, articles I need to write, books I need to read…not to mention all of my own projects on the backburner. But this development is significant enough that I’m gonna report on it now instead of trying to catch up.

Myself and others have been pointing out for years that we are in a cold civil war, with those who would destroy America (and their legions of useful idiots) on one side, and patriots, members of the Dissident Right, and the “Alternative Right” on the other. This cold war has not turned hot yet because, frankly, we are still too comfortable–even though the diseased system is in obvious decline.

But just when the voting base that put Trump in the White House should be unified, and reminding him of why we sent him there, we are rapidly becoming consumed with infighting instead.

First of all, the most obnoxious of the white tribalists in the “Alt-Right” finally became so annoying with their vain Racial Purity Diatribes and their Jewish Boogeyman Tropes, that even Vox Day grew irritated with them. For the last few years, Day and his followers have been preaching against ideology-based right-wing politics in favor of identity politics (in other words: “throw out that thar lame-ass Constitution and all them thar losers whut cling to it, ’cause all we need is muh white heritage ‘n’ muh Western Civiluzayshun”).

So far as that went, it was a promising development. National Socialists are not right-wing and never have been, and behold, Vox admitted as much.

The Neo-Nazis and other white supremacist groups are composed of angry white nerds who couldn’t find an outlet for their frustrations in gaming, skateboarding, or vampire cosplay, who are not exactly intellectual giants (those who aren’t actually leftist moles role-playing, that is). So when Vox Day called BS on them, they summoned what cognitive acumen they could pool to strike back.

They called him names.

Here’s where the positive development nosedives into Sewerville, because it was on Gab that they desperately slung their poo at him.

Unlike nearly all social media, Gab is a place where free speech is actually welcomed and encouraged. Specifically, it is an alternative to Twitter. I don’t have much time for any social media, but have enjoyed my Gab experience to date. I try not to follow back idiots, trolls, leftists (forgive the redundancy) or Alt-Retard Stormfront blowhards. So I read news links frequently, post occasionally, live and let live. Identity politics still aggravate me, and I don’t get along with those who blame the Jews for every problem under the sun, up to and including the condition of their parents’ basements. But they are free to spout their sophomoric rhetoric on Gab, just as the leftards spew their sophomoric America-hate and anti-male, anti-white rhetoric on Twatter, Faceborg, and everywhere else, blaming “racist” America for every problem under the sun, up to and including the condition of their parents’ basements. I don’t have to read their posts, and they don’t have to read mine.

Vox Day has been called names before. Just since I’ve become aware of him, I’ve seen a lot of that–and I’m certain that’s just a drop in the bucket. But for whatever reason, he decided that the accusation of pedophilia by some of these moronic cowards required legal countermeasures. He wanted the names of his accusers. Despite Vox Day being an ally and supporter, Gab did not cooperate. They not only refused to moderate the threads in question, but at some point decided to take/make the whole affair personal, as well.

Now Vox Day (AKA Theodore Beale) comes from money, and like many individuals raised with wealth, he can be a pompous ass at times. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if  he was arrogant with the Gab staff when making his demands. But it seems Gab responded in the worst possible way, insulting him, belittling his complaints, etc.

Day may or may not live up to his own estimation of his evil genius, but he does have a network. That network is comprised of competent men from many professions who can (and have) get stuff done for him. Some of those professionals are lawyers.

Both Day and Gab founder Andrew Torba are adamant that the law is on their side. Both can’t be right. But pride can cause even the most intelligent men to underestimate their opponents, overestimate themselves, and act a fool. I’m not an expert in the law, so I don’t know who is right, here. Neither can I predict who will prevail in the pending legal battle. What I can say is, the only people who will benefit from this internecine warfare are the enemies of both Torba and Day.

Meanwhile, Gab has chosen this time to take on the Goolag monopoly. Vox Day is doing the Google lawyers’ work for them by gathering and posting evidence of Gab’s moderation (or lack thereof), while Torba seems to believe it’s a contest to prove he is more of an alpha male than Day is.

The comment threads at Vox Popoli are populated by a few folks so savvy and perceptive I wish there were “like” buttons; some obvious and pathetic leftist trolls; and a whole lot of folks who are little more than denizens of a cult of personality. You would think the Gabbers who naturally support Torba in this conflict would be more inclined toward independent thought, on average.

You would be disappointed.

In junior high and high school, arguments were almost never won by using facts or logic, but by coming up with insults against your adversary to cause the inevitable crowd of onlookers to ooh, ahh, laugh or jeer. I’m sad to observe that little has changed since then. Gabbers are taking this opportunity to trash talk and launch ad hominem attacks against Day, as if ridiculing  everything they think they know about him proves that he will lose this battle. Of course the “Dread Ilk” and VFM (Vox’s “Vile, Faceless minions”) are also trash-talking as if the matter will be decided by bluster alone…but that’s to be expected from them.

And while this was going on, two much-needed debates took place: Vox Day against, in turn, Greg Johnson and someone claiming to be Andrew Anglin, arguing whether or not the National Socialists belong in the “Alt-Right,” or anywhere on the right at all.

They don’t, which is easily proven.

The cultural svengalis have spent 70+ years brainwashing  people on every side that the Nazis, Fascists, and other collectivist movements (sometimes even including Stalin’s USSR!) were/are from the right, so this is a worthwhile debate. And Vox Day is a sharp enough speaker to punch holes through the typical assumptions, even when he refuses to use some of the relevant arguments in the arsenal of info at his disposal.

Neither Johnson nor Anglin had much in the way of an argument, it turns out, though Johnson’s slick rhetoric likely had some goose-stepping halfwits mesmerized for a while. Anglin’s “argument” consisted mainly of asking Day questions and immediately interrupting before he could answer; to declare his ignorance as to the purpose of the debate; to blame “hook-nosed Jews” for all the evil in world history; to whine about personal attacks; and to make personal attacks of his own (for which there was no retaliation). To his credit, Vox Day tried to stay on topic. For whatever reason, I don’t think he was as effective as he could have been, but even by presenting only minimal evidence, he won easily.

However, when both Anglin and Day were finished, the host was absent, so they continued talking. Having abandoned the subject of the debate, Anglin proceeded to ask Day questions about the legal conflict with Gab. Anglin brought up the point that Day had, in the past, advised his followers to answer defamatory rhetoric in kind (his “punch back twice as hard” philosophy, which I believe is a good one in today’s political climate). In fact, Day had once advised them to call someone a pedophile in certain circumstances. In between the ceaseless interruptions, Day attempted to admit that he now understood that to be wrong, and bad advice. But in any event, just before the host reappeared to close the show, Day said, “I may be a hypocrite. You can accuse me of hypocrisy, but that doesn’t change anything.”

I haven’t attempted to comment on these forums for quite a while, but one person made the observation that I would have made: that of everything said during the entire recording, that last statement by Vox Day would be the only remark the Alt-Retards would repeat or remember. That one statement would comprise their entire summary, and it would replace the debate itself in their narrative.

Sure enough: I witnessed that exact prophecy fulfilled in the days following. With all the reasoning quotient of a Common-Core-educated 6th Grader, the trash-talking armchair pundits have conclusively proved that the Stealth-Left (#FakeRight) LARPing socialists are a legitimate part of the right-wing, because Vox Day admitted to hypocrisy regarding a separate issue.

Several Gabbers who support Andrew Torba and Gab (an admirable motivation, separate from the means) have dogpiled on, assuming not only that the statement caused Anglin to win the debate (which concluded before the statement was made), but that Vox Day’s “loss” of the debate somehow guarantees that Torba will prevail in the impending legal conflict.

It was thanks to Vox Day that I learned about the Aristotlian concept of rhetoric, and the fallacy of using dialectic when debating with those for whom emotion trumps reason. This helped me understand my frustrating history of futile arguments with halfwits, midwits and dimwits. I also peruse his blog regularly. That is not to say I agree with him on everything, or even most things. But I do have a fairly good grasp on his personality. He would undoubtedly deny that his strategy has backfired on him, but it’s hard to deny that some of his own tactics are being used against him.

As for Torba, I’d love to see him win against Goolag, and Twatter. And I’d like to see more social media rise up to challenge the ones controlled by the SJW hive mind. This squabble between allies is unfortunate at best, and I wish the parties involved would just drop it. But judging by the egos engaged, that’s just not going to happen. It’s becoming one more obstacle to ever winning the culture back.

The Founder – an Analysis

This movie is “based on a true story.” The way it played out certainly seems plausible–probably even likely–but I don’t know much about the history of MacDonalds, so I can’t vouch for its accuracy. Whatever connection to reality it has, what I find remarkable is a metaphorical aspect that is shocking, in a Hollywood movie.

To summarize:

Ray Kroc is a traveling salesman in the 1954 Midwest who discovers an incredible success story in the food service industry. (Keep in mind that there was no such thing as “fast food” prior to the events depicted in this movie.) He discovers a truly revolutionary food-serving system at a little restaurant run by two brothers in southern California.

After being kicked around by the Great Depression and other hard knocks, the MacDonald Brothers harnessed their ingenuity, discipline, and shrewd business savvy to develop a business model that is successful beyond the scope of any similar venture. Through hard work, they fine-tune their system to nigh-perfection. They’re making good money; their customers love them, and they’re content with what they have.

MDs1

Ray Kroc sees dollar signs and tells the brothers they need to franchise. But the brothers have already tried that–and found that restaurant managers deviated from the business model while letting the quality fall. But, as Kroc has been taught, persistence can elevate a talentless hack into a a tycoon and he badgers them relentlessly. Against their better judgment, the MacDonald brothers  make a franchise deal with him. But they take precautions and insist that he signs off on a legal contract that ensures he uphold their standards, and that the lion’s share of the profits are retained by the franchises.

It’s a struggle from the beginning, and Kroc begins taking credit for their ideas and system. In fact, he doesn’t come up with a single idea of his own, but merely hijacks the ideas of others, twisting them to his own purposes. The brothers’ chief concern is their customers, and the quality of their product. Ray Kroc’s primary concern is his own success, as he defines it. He willingly sacrifices anything to pursue it. He opens restaurants all over the country, and finally connects with  a shady character who teaches him how to screw over his partners.

MDs2

Long story short: he cheats them out of everything, and eventually they even lose their own personal restaurant (where they developed the system that revolutionized the food service industry). Incredibly, they agreed to a “handshake deal” on their cut of future profits, which, predictably, they never received a penny of. The standout dialog of the film is when Kroc admits that the law is completely on their side, due to the contract, but that he’ll win anyway because he can hire better lawyers and they can’t sustain the court battle it would take to retain their rights.

I couldn’t help but notice the similarity in modus opperandi between Ray Kroc, Bill Gates, and the devil himself.

There was another chord this movie struck which I couldn’t help noticing. More than once in the film, M’cDonalds is equated with America itself. The parallels are hard to ignore.

  • The founders of the American republic designed a system which led to the greatest levels of both liberty, and prosperity, in recorded history.
  • Against the better judgment of our forebears, parasites were allowed  to infiltrate, and invited into positions of power.
  • Those usurpers  gradually attained a monopoly on the amazing wealth generated by our free market economy, and of course  put that wealth to use toward the destruction of the very system that gave them the opportunity to accumulate that wealth.
  • Simultaneously, they took over government at all levels; the banks; academia; the press; the entertainment industry; the tech industry; giant corporations…and turned them all into weapons against the revolutionary system of government they benefited from–against our liberty; against our prosperity; against our culture; and even against institutions that predated the republic–like the family itself. Rarely did they contribute anything worthwhile to their respective industries, but nonetheless profited from the innovation and hard work of those who did.
  • What the usurpers have done, are doing, and intend to do, is illegal. The law of our land is against them, but they don’t care about that; and they believe we are too ignorant and/or apathetic to ever challenge them on it. Besides, they now have all the money, control over the police and the courts, and legions of useful idiots spread throughout the population who will defend their machinations fanatically.
  • They have stripped our republic of its remarkable wealth (assigning it to themselves and their proxies) and replaced it with staggering debt that can never be repaid even if taxes were raised to 100% for the next century. Replacing our real money with fiat currency was basically a handshake deal in which the only financial backing to the “US Dollar” (Federal Reserve Note) they left in place was the confidence in the dollar from the consumer.
  • Just as Ray Kroc used some bizarre reasoning that included churches and flags to convince the MacDonald brothers to franchise “for their country,” our domestic enemies have repeatedly appealed to patriotism and Christian morals (both of which they despise) to convince US Citizens to fight and/or support foreign wars that don’t serve the interests of the American people at all. (Quite the opposite, usually.) Furthermore…”The Patriot Act.” ‘Nuff said.
  • Just as Ray Kroc attained ownership of the real property the MacDonalds Empire was built upon, the usurpers have seized the natural resources and “public lands” of the USA for themselves, and use our tax $$ to fund alphabet-soup pseudo-armies quartered among us to deny citizens access to our “public lands” by force of arms.
  • The usurpers intend to leave us completely destitute and dependent on them for sustenance after they have gobbled up every last iota of wealth for themselves, and provided for their own survival of the catastrophe they are developing.

No typical film director in Homowood, Commiefornia, would ever intentionally encode a message like this into a movie, as it works against The Narrative they push onto us with every other cinematic effort. Perhaps this is another instance of a Dunning-Kruger victim outsmarting himself.

Institutional Election Fraud: the Unmasking

There most certainly has been tampering in our national elections. But it was not just in 2016 and it was not perpetrated by the Russians.

One point he can’t resist making is that there is a threat to our electoral system and it has nothing to do with Russia, Russia, Russia. It’s from the crooks pushing the Russia narrative, the Democrats. 

In other words: not the Russians, but the Communists.

Just like the polls showing Hillary leading by 12 points, the claims that she won the popular vote were suspect from the start.

NASCAR Needs to Allow Speedometers

NASCAR stands for “National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing” and, believe it or not, the drivers once raced cars that were factory-stock. That means, present-day race fans, that the cars driven at NASCAR races were once equipped with speedometers.

This is not the case now, which is rather mystifying, considering that penalties are assessed for speeding on Pit Road. In the Cup Race at Kentucky this weekend just past, Kyle Larson had to start the race at the rear of the grid due to finishing Tech Inspection late. He worked his way through the field during Stage One, only needing to pass two more cars to take the lead…

And then a speeding penalty planted him at the back of the pack yet again, and he had to start over. He finished Second behind the winner, Martin Truex Jr., but one has to wonder if that would have been the case without his mistake on Pit Road.

Truexvictorycircle

It’s an easier mistake to make than it ever has been, and more drivers are making it–ruining their chances for victory week after week. Without a speedometer, the driver has to estimate his actual speed based on the tach reading, and what the spotter tells him over the radio. But every single driver wants to gain, or at least maintain, grid position during pit stops, so they will push their cars as close to the speed limit as possible.

At least, that’s what they would do if they had a means to accurately gauge their speed. Then we’d see more races won or lost due to the collective effort of the respective race teams, instead of being penalized for failing to calculate what they are not allowed to measure.

The Situation is “Dire” for Trump

Alex Jones interviews Mike Cernovich, who reports that Trump is about to fall via frame-up if he doesn’t act fast.

I don’t know that much about the minutia of everyday details at the White House, but I did wish Trump had fired all the Deep State operatives on Day One.

Certain voices have been calling for his impeachment since before he even took office. Once he is completely surrounded by backstabbers, all that is needed is the manufacture of some sort of new scandal to take him down, if Cernovich is right.

Defining Pulp Fiction–a Guest Post by Len Levinson

Anyone who has visited either Virtual Pulp, or my old Two-Fisted Blog very much, knows that I’ve been a fan of Len Levinson’s work going way back. I’m honored to have him as a guest blogger today.

– Hank

After attending the Windy City Pulp & Paper Convention on 4/23/2017, I found myself wondering what exactly is pulp fiction anyway.

I’ve written 83 published novels under 22 pseudonyms. All generally are considered pulp fiction so I should know what it is by now, but never thought much about definitions or codifications before.

When the expression “pulp fiction” first was used, it referred to cheap paper used in magazines publishing that kind of fiction. But precisely what kind of fiction was it? What is the difference between pulp fiction and ordinary fiction?

Raymond Chandler said, “I guess maybe there are two kinds of writers: writers who write stories and writers who write writing.”

First and foremost, pulp fiction tells stories. That means they require plots. But not just any old plots. Pulp fiction requires gripping plots. Something vital must be at stake in every story. Suspense is the name of the game. Pulp fiction is not about people sitting around having extended erudite conversations about Heidegger’s theory of being. Pulp fiction usually is about life or death situations, or the possible destruction of a city, or even the vaporization of the entire planet by an evil genius.

Villains must be truly villainous, not nice guys confused about moral issues, although villains certainly can be multi-dimensional. Heroes or anti-heroes must be brave, tough and resourceful, despite occasional human failings. There are exceptions to every rule but exceptions do not invalidate rules.

All characters must be finely etched and real. They should come to life and jump off the page into the reader’s lap. Their dialogue should snap, crackle and pop like Rice Krispies. No meandering pointless conversations allowed. Every word must advance the plot.

Regarding locales, the reader should feel that s/he just parachuted into a scene which s/he can vividly see, smell, hear and feel.. S/he must know precisely what’s happening at all times. But scene description must not be overdone. Good pulp fiction strikes the balance between too much and too little.

Pulp fiction should grab the reader by the throat with the first sentence, not on page 31 after lengthy scholarly expositions. Pulp fiction writing must have momentum, not meander lazily along like the Swanee River. The reader should feel as if s/he just stepped onto a fast-moving train. Ideally, the reader will become so immersed in the story, s/he will feel disoriented and won’t know where s/he is when looking up from the page.

Pulp fiction can be hard-boiled crime investigations, visionary sci-fi extravaganzas, sinister spy thrillers, supernatural fantasy melodramas, sword-swinging pirate bloodbaths, shoot-em-up westerns, bone-chilling horror tales, razzle dazzle action-adventure sagas, bloody exploding war novels, and even desperately passionate Harlequin-type romances. I suppose pulp fiction can be about anything, the weirder the better.

But the stories have got to move. They’ve must be humanly real no matter how offbeat the story. They’ve got to draw in the reader. They’ve got to totally fascinate or enchant.

I don’t intend to denigrate regular fiction. I’ve read and enjoyed most of the classics. But pulp fiction is like a punch in the mouth. It’s got to knock you out. You shouldn’t be able to put a pulp fiction book away and go to bed at night like a normal, decent person. It should excite your imagination and make you forget about going to bed. It should turn you on.

That’s pulp fiction in my opinion, folks. At least that’s how I’ve always tried to write it.

LEN LEVINSON is the author of 83 novels written under 22 pseudonyms, published originally by Bantam, Dell, Fawcett, Harper, Jove, Charter Diamond, Zebra, Belmont-Tower, and Signet, among others.  He has been acclaimed a “Trash Genius” by Paperback Fanatic magazine, and his books have sold an estimated two-and-one-half million copies.  Many of his novels presently are available as ebooks by Len Levinson.

Street Fighting Man

Because we have let the leftist long march through our institutions (public and private) go unchecked for so long, now that some on the right seem finally ready to push back, the irony and absurdity in our culture has been stripped naked for most to see.

Of those actions Trump has taken that would benefit Americans, the most momentous are being obstructed by Marxists who swore to uphold the law, but do so selectively at best. And, of course,  they ignore the rights of American citizens they are paid to protect, in order to champion the causes of foreign interests they obviously consider more important.

This surprises nobody who’s been paying attention.  Same with the Soros-backed crybullies who call themselves “anti-fascist” while demanding absolute conformity of thought and speech, and cold-cocking, pepper spraying, or throwing bottles at anyone with the audacity to debunk their Narrative.

From speech, to state-controlled compulsory indoctrination, to state-controlled industry, to progressive, graduated income tax, to civilian disarmament, these “anti-fascists” are in ideological lockstep with Mussolini’s blackshirts (and Hitler’s brownshirts too, in case you were wondering), but are too ignorant to realize it and too fanatically Dunning-Krugered to ever honestly examine the pertinent facts. (They even dress like Il Duce’s goons.)

antifalosers

It’s no big chore to identify leftist hypocrisy in any arena, so I’ll skip over most of those to the post-Obama riots that seem to be the new fad.

Even before the election,  rabid SJW mobs incited violence with impunity at pro-Trump rallies, and successfully blamed their victims, with the collusion of the lapdog media. But now, for the first time in their cancerous existence, these pampered, privileged, entitled cowards are encountering significant resistance.

Their outrage is as delicious as their ineptitude. Now that they’re getting their asses kicked on the streets,  what can they do? Scream “fascist!” and “racist!” and “Nazi!”even louder and more often? Ooh, ouchy. We’ve never had to weather such a devastating onslaught before. Guess we’ll have to surrender.

Actually, what they’ll do is rely on Soros and their other sugar daddies to exert pressure, via the politicians and courts, to rig the system even worse than they already have, eradicating the 1st Amendment at gunpoint.

If we let them.

In places like Berkley it’s already plain to see the police have been weaponized to do the left’s bidding via the typical selective enforcement of the law, “making examples” of those who defend themselves while ignoring the crimes of the  provocateurs who instigate the violence.

This absurd theater is wonderfully personified by the commie skank porn actress who bragged on social media what a badass she is and all the scalps she would take at Berkeley. But to paraphrase  Apollo Creed’s corner man, her would-be victims didn’t know it was a show; they thought it was a fight. At least, one of them did.

Moldilocks has obviously watched too many action movies (as has everyone who thinks women in combat is a good idea), assuming the pixie-fu fighting skills she inherited by osmosis from the Great Social Justice Spirit would allow her to vanquish any puny male who got in her way, because vagina.

moldilockspatriarchyThe meme material she provided us is rich and deep. Her heroic quest for equality ended upon her first taste of a knuckle sandwich, and she quickly fell back on her true Grrrrl Power. That’s right: she concocted a narrative to make herself sound like an innocent victim of rabid male aggression, assuming white knights both inside government and out will come rushing in from all directions to protect her from the consequences of her actions and punish the man who took her pretensions of equality at face value. A woman’s true inherent superpower is the ability to get men to fight her battles–even when her war is against men in general.

If you run into an SJW going forward, remember to analyze how they compare with Fascists/Nazis on major policies like speech, “gun control,” public education, taxes, state regulation of businesses, etc. Because, as they are so insistently informing us, unprovoked violent attacks are perfectly acceptable  as long as you define the victim as a “Nazi.”

"And anybody who disagrees with us is a fascist!"
“And anybody who disagrees with us is a fascist!”

 

The recent escalation in organized violence has led some to finally realize that the United States of America is in a Cold Civil War. Just as the Cold War never resulted in an atomic Holocaust with the Soviets, so this Civil War may never turn hot. But that’s an extremely optimistic assumption. Prepare yourselves accordingly.

A Rock & Roll Pioneer Dies

I am interrupting Speed Week Plus because I just found out that Chuck Berry died Saturday.

Elvis is still called the king of rock & roll but aside from vocal talent, Chuck had him beat in almost every way. He was a virtuoso with the guitar, wrote clever lyrics and was quite the crazy-legged entertainer on stage for both males and females. He also was the first to cross over the color line in music. Prior to Chuck Berry, white kids would only listen to “race records” on the down low.

ChuckBerry2Ironically, this is not necessarily an interruption of Speed Week, because Chuck Berry was not only a pioneer of rock & roll, but put his love of horsepower into some famous songs that still rock the house to this day. “You Can’t Catch Me” is a musical version of a fantasy many gearheads have probably entertained while wishing they could just rip down the open road at Ludicrous Speed without worrying about going to jail or having mandatory Insurance rates shoot up into the stratosphere. “Maybelline” has been a personal inspiration in many ways. For one, I named my favorite Street Machine after that song title. There is also a subplot in Fast Cars and Rock & Roll that is based on the lyrical Adventure in his invincible V-8 Ford.

The selection below is chosen because it plays on a red pill/neomasculine view of Sexual Market Value (SMV), but in a tongue-in-cheek fashion. His humorous lyrics are catchy and the guitar solo is understated but deft.

I read his autobiography and the man definitely had his flaws. But for a few golden years there in the mid-to-late 1950s, his musical genius really shined. Rest in peace, Chuck.

McCarthyism, “Witch Hunts,” and Coincidence Theory

A lot of people in 2017 are aware of the deceitfulness of the mainstream media, academia, and Hollywood, and the duplicity of those in government. But it would no doubt surprise them to learn this is nothing new. It’s been going on for generations–but with no alternative media to blow the whistle on them.

Before “triggering,” “microagressions,” and “safe spaces” came out of the SJW vocabulary to infect our everyday language, one of the old-school terms left-wingers liked to throw around was “McCarthyism.” Ironically, the term is used to describe what they (leftists/SJWs/feminists, etc.) do to people who challenge their Narrative. Use your own money to support a cause they don’t like:  admit in private that you believe in creationism; wear a T-shirt that they determine “sexist; or even just make a “dongle joke” to a friend; and they will launch a witch hunt of their own that won’t stop until you are fired from your job, or worse.

“McCarthyism” got it’s name from Senator Joseph McCarthy, who noticed our government being hijacked after WWII (actually, it started well before that). It turns out, with declassified documents and a non-hysterical examination of the facts in retrospect, that he was absolutely right in his whistle-blowing. (Not that truth matters to those who craft The Narrative.)

What McCarthy began to uncover was an orchestrated effort to usurp our Constitutional republic. But hell hath no fury like a conspiracy exposed, and it is the Deep State’s M.O. to assassinate the character of anybody who might be taken seriously, who would shine a light on the pattern and connect the dots.

Coincidence theorists, of course, will find some excuse to reject what stares us in the face. And the speaker in this video, himself, might be one, despite all the dots he highlights, just begging to be connected.

Stefan Molyneux has really done a good job assembling a lot of pertinent information. He gives an in-depth background so we have a context to put it in and compiling it into a pretty thorough presentation. Then he breaks down what McCarthy and his contemporaries actually did. If you’ve got the attention span, this is well worth the time it takes to listen.