The Fabulist, Gad Saad, Complains About Being Called a Fabulist

Gad Saad @6:35 mark of the video linked below ("What Science Tells Us About ..."): "... and so, evolu.. You see what I mean? And so it's [evolutionism] just incredible. And this is what frustrates me so much, by the way, about the people who hate evolutionary theory. Because the amount of exquisite scientific explanations and predictions that evolution offers is so bafflingly great; and yet people accuse us of just engaging in 'Just-So' story-telling.  It's really galling."

People accuse evolutionists of "just engaging in 'Just-So' story-telling" because that is exactly what they do. Evolutionists, especially of the Darwinist stripe, observe some fact in the world ... and then "explain" it with what literally *is* a 'Just-So' story.  It doesn't matter to the evolutionist that his "explanation" doesn't make sense in light of general human knowledge/belief; it doesn't matter to the evolutionist that his "explanation" implicitly reifies and deifies evolution, attributing foresight and planning to 'Evolution!'. Hell! It doesn't even matter to the evolutionist that his "explanation" contradicts basic premises of "evolutionary theory".

To the best of my knowledge, it was the late Australian philosopher, David Stove (died by suicide in 1994) -- and who, by the way, was at least as much an atheist as Gad Saad is -- who popularized mockery of Darwinian "explanations" as "Just-So Stories". As I recall (in the book, 'Darwinian Fairytales' ), he was especially scathing of what is now called "evolutionary psychology", that is, Gad Saad's specialty.

To paraphrase David Stove (to the best of my memory): "To the extent that Darwinian explanations are true, they are trivial; to the extent that Darwinian explanations are non-trivial, they are non-true."

I'm not convinced that psychology simpliciter even counts as 'science', given that the "results" of "psychological studies" are notoriously difficult to replicate, but at least it has an observable subject matter; to wit: living human beings. But, turn mere psychology into evolutionary psychology, and there is no subject matter at all to study: and thus, the *only* thing that evolutionary psychology can offer is 'Just-So' stories, frequently couched in terms of "cave-man days".

Rather than repeat what I said then, I direct Gentle Reader's attention to my post: "How Evolution Explains Sex Differences ... Or Not"

I link to the Alexander Grace video to give Gentle Reader a premium example the sort of 'Just-So' story-telling and ad hoc reasoning/explanation in which evolutionism, and especially evolutionary psychology, specializes. I don't recall (nor care) what Mr Grace's degree was in, nor its level (that is, whether he had enough sense to not waste further time chasing after a PhD); the point is that he always attempts to justify his observations and claims in terms of evolutionary psychology (and, he frequently makes literal reference to "cave-man days" as "explaining" today's observable reality).

Alexander Grace @3:25-4:25 "... but you can't overcome the biology of gender [sic]. Evolution has shaped male and female instincts in a very specific way. Over countless generations, it [evolution] has incentivized a talent and an aptitude in certain tasks.  Men who are good at building things, at finding and manipulating objects and using them as tools for survival were more likely to survive and therefore were more desirable as mating partners; and so women would 'shack-up' with those kind of men, who had those talents. And then, of course, over time, 'Evolution!'  reinforces this through gene-selection.  Women who have personality traits of kindness and, you know, nurturing, they're going to be good mothers, and good mothers are more likely to ensure their children survive, and pass on those genes to the next generation. And, of course, men are specifically attracted to women who are kind and nurturing, the ones that are gonna make good mothers.  And so, again, 'Evolution!' through sexual selection reinforces this.  And so you can see, over countless generations, how 'Evolution!' has incentivized men to be one particular way, and women to be another way. ... [and so on]"

As I have pointed out more than once: IF there are evolutionary "explanations" for the generally-observed differences between the psychology and behavior of men compared to women, THEN, even to BE 'evolutionary', those differences MUST be encoded in the DNA of the respective persons. BUT, the genetic difference between men and women is limited to the small number of Y-Chromosome genes which do not engage in cross-over with corresponding X-Chromosome genes.

Jordan Peterson and Gad Saad:  "What Science Tells Us About Firstborns, Middle Children, and Lastborns"

Alexander Grace (engaging in evolutionary psychology 'Just-So' story-telling):: BEWARE! There's 3 Sides To Every Woman

When Is Charity Not?

Notice the high-lighted claim this "whistleblower" makes -- the "migrant shelter" he was running was charging the tax-payers of Massachusetts $180 per room per night, even if the room was empty. *Someone* is making bank from this "charity".

Most institutional charity involves some sort of scam, and often fraud; it the very least, it is based on false premises. If there is "government money" involved, you can be sure that there is fraud involved ... and *you*, Dear Taxpayer, are on the hook for funding the scam.

I live in the middle of a city of 50K. This is an older part of the city, so the lots are on the small side, but they still average at least 50x150; that is, they are large enough that the residents could have a nice garden, did they wish to do the work to put in and maintain one.

Several years ago, the city -- at tax-payer expense -- put in a "community garden" on a vacant lot a few blocks from my house. During the summer, the city sends a water-truck around to water the "gardens". Shortly after creating the "gardens", the city -- again at tax-payer expense -- had to put a fence around the lot, to protect the "gardens" from vandalism (*). This wasn't a cheap fence; it's wrought-iron. And, it's gate is kept locked, except at posted times. So, that means that the city pays a public employee to come around to unlock the gate. I presume, but don't know, that that employee stays on the premises, at tax-payer expense, during open hours.

A few years ago, at a lot perhaps 1/2 mile from my house, a "charitable group", I presume a church, started serving a free meal once a day (at noon), regardless of weather. Because weather exists, they built a roof over the serving area. Then, due to the behavior of their clientele, they had to install ground-to-ceiling fencing around the roofed area. And, no surprise, the picnic tables are chained to weights.

I sometimes see some of the regulars "served" by this "charity". They tend to smoke, at the very least cigarettes; I've seen some of them "paper-bagging" alcohol. My point is that by indiscriminately giving people "free" food, what the "charity" is *really* doing is subsidizing their tobacco, and pot, and alcohol, and smart-phones.

(*) It's possible that what the city saw as vandalism was actually damage from deer. You see, while I live in the middle of a city of 50K, there is a family of deer who make my property their home-base. And that "community garden" is certainly close enough to be visited by them.

Every year, the matriarch doe has two fawns. Just the other day, I startled this year's twins. She seems to allow the previous year's fawns to stay with her, and I sometimes see all five together. A couple of years ago, I stepped out the front door and encountered a buck. It's not uncommon, as I'm working in my (fenced) garden, to notice one or two young deer watching me.

Believe you me, you don't want deer living in your yard: they eat nearly everything you try to grow.

Ex-Migrant Shelter Director Blows Whistle on Fraud

When Is a "Disabled" Person Not A "Disabled" Person?

Q: When Is a "Disabled" Person Not A "Disabled" Person?
A: Most of the time; and especially if there is a blue "Handicapped-On-Board" danglie on the rear-view mirror.

Diagnoses of 'Disability' -- whether in the military or in civilian life -- are in large part a scam of well-off people against the rest of us.

Consider the seemingly less contentious issue of "handicapped parking" -- When have you *ever* seen someone who is clearly "handicapped" using a "handicapped parking" spot?

No, what you almost always see played out is something I witnessed a few days ago at a home supply store. I had parked, and as I was opening the truck's door, another fellow parked near me ... and *then* affixed one of those blue "Handicapped-On-Board" danglies to his rear-view mirror Apparently, he didn't want other drivers to think he was a gimp. So, I sat in the truck to watch. He was not handicapped; I later encountered him in the store a couple of times. He was not handicapped.

Look, my mother was "handicapped" ... and I *detest* the "handicapped" mentality, and indeed the very term. To use *honest* straight-forward language, my mother was crippled. She was crippled from birth ... and her condition was made worse when she was a small child by *American* doctors and government bureaucrats using her as a human guinea-pig, much as was being done at the same time in Weimar Germany.

I can assure you, from many years experience of taking a crippled person shopping, that "handicapped parking" spots, no matter how close they are to the store entrance, are not really much of a help (*) to people who actually are "handicapped". But, they are indeed very useful to a certain type of upper-middle-class person (of either race) who wants the extra benefit of "reserved parking".

(*) It is much more helpful to your "handicapped" person to pull up to the entrance, help him or her exit the vehicle, go park it, and then meet the person. Why in the Hell would I have made my mother do all that extra walking (on crutches) just so that I had a "reserved" spot nearer the entrance?

Chicks on the Right: This Is Not What Disability Is Meant For!

Epstein Could Not Have Hanged Himself

This is how we can know -- without possibility of error -- that Epstein did not, and could not have, killed himself:

They -- the government officials -- reported to us that he was found hanging by the neck from the railing of the upper bunk, with his heals on the floor before him and his buttocks suspended in the air.

Allow me to repeat the key point: "with his heals on the floor before him".

THAT IS: regardless of his hypothetical dedication to murdering himself by suffocation, when the suffocation-panic set in, his BODY would have overridden his WILL, and he would have stood up and loosened the noose around his neck.

It is physiologically impossible to hang yourself to the point of suffocation and death so long as you can get your feet under yourself and your hands are free to remove the constriction to your breathing. Why do you think that suicides have to jump off a chair?

Stop Telling Little Girls "You can be anything you want to be!"

Women should not be cops. No woman should be a cop, but especially short, fat women, who can't even kneel, should not be cops. Once a female cop enters the "situation", the likelihood that someone is going to get shot, and generally unnecessarily, dramatically increases.

For that matter, the male deputy in this situation doesn't appear to be all that fit, either.

The insanity on view in the body-cam footage -- the female deputy's unnecessary shooting of the criminal, and her endangerment of the male deputy's life -- lies ultimately at the feet of the high-level bureaucrats and politicians who care more about their damned DEI spreadsheets, and thus their raises and promotions, than they care about the lives of the citizenry, or of the cops, or of the criminals.

EDIT:

Apparently, the criminal died. While it's true that I have no sympathy for criminals, the fact remains that his death was utterly unnecessary ... and he's dead precisely because the raises and promotions of high-level bureaucrats follow from their DEI spreadsheets.

PS:

The criminal's relatives are going to file a wrongful death suit against Harris County (Texas), and they're going to win a massive pay-out. And who is on the hook for that? As always, the taxpayers, but never the politicians and bureaucrats who are causing the problem in the first place.

PPS (2025/05/30):

To be clear: it appears in the video that the fellow was initially cooperating with the deputies. It appears that he started resisting and fighting when she tried -- recall: short, fat, can't kneel -- and failed to cuff him. It appears that she twisted his arm into an unnatural and painful position, and that that is when he started fighting. It appears that the entire escalation, and his resulting death, is due to her inability to do a job for which no woman is really qualified.

Hodge Twins: Female Cop Just Stands There While Partner Fights Suspect Alone

A Glimpse of Old South Bend, Indiana

I was born in South Bend, as was my mother, and I lived there until I left for college. I recall an old-world looking area downtown, on the river; long since demolished for "urban renewal", its interesting topography leveled ... and then left vacant for decades.

The neighborhood of interesting old houses in which my grandmother had owned several properties, one of which we owned after her death, is long gone; prey to "urban blight" and then "urban renewal" ... i.e. properties turned into "Section 8" or welfare rentals to extract as much income as quickly as possible while expending as little as possible on maintenance.

Mansfield Ohio, where I have lived since 1982, never flew as high, nor grew as large, as South Bend did. And so, oddly enough, there is still more of the "old-world look" left in Mansfield. At the same time, Mansfield did demolish its old, and beautiful, government buildings to replace them with modernist monstrosities, whereas South Bend sometimes re-purposed its old government buildings when the government "outgrew" them.

Interestingly, the now-extinct Studebaker Corporation, which fueled most of the growth of South Bend, was originally founded in Mansfield.

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EDIT: As I'm watching the video, especially toward the end, he keeps voicing some weird, inchoate conspiracy theory about not trusting the timeline. I suspect that he's pushing that "Tartaria" bullshit. Oh, well; it was nice seeing pictures of beautiful old buildings, some of which I recall from my youth.

PS: I attended the Studebaker Elementary School, an old photo seen at the 23:26 mark (in my time, it had extensive single-storey modern additions 'round about), in kindergarten and first grade, and then again in 6th and 7th grades. After that, my father managed to get us into a private Christian school ... because the administration of the school wanted to come down on me -- a mere kid -- for calling out, to their faces, their cowardice in the face of mob behavior by "ghetto" black students. Mind you, this was way back in the early 1970s; that is how long the people who rule us have been winking at, and indeed encouraging, the very sort of "ratchet" behavior which is destroying or civilization.

Old World South Bend Indiana

Exploding the Myth of "Three Co-Equal Branches of Government", with Stephen Miller

Please understand what Stephen Miller is saying in the linked video.

Well, the Constitution is clear. And, that [i.e. the Constitution] is. of course, the supreme law of the land. ... Look, a lot of it [i.e. suspending habeas corpus with respect to illegal aliens] depends on whether the courts do the right thing, or not. At the end of the day, Congress passed a body of law, known as the Immigration and Nationality Act, which stripped Article III courts -- that's the Judicial branch -- of jurisdiction over immigration cases.  So, Congress actually passed -- it's called 'jurisdiction stripping legislation'.  They passed a number of laws that say that the Article III courts aren't even allowed to be involved in immigration cases.  Many of you probably don't know this.  I'll give you a good example: Are you familiar with the term 'temporary protected status', or TPS, right?  So, by statute, the courts are stripped of jurisdiction from over-ruling a presidential determination, or a secretarial determination, on TPS when the Secretary of Homeland Security makes that determination. So, when Secretary Noem terminated TPS for the illegals that Biden flew into the country, when courts stepped in, they were violating explicit language that Congress had enacted saying they [i.e. Article III courts] have no jurisdiction. So, it's not just that the courts are at war with the Executive branch, the courts are at war -- these radical rogue judges -- with the Legislative branch as well, too. ...

Understand -- Article III courts are the normal courts of the federal Judiciary branch: the single superior court [i.e. so-called "THE Supreme Court" (*) ] and the various inferior courts that Congress has, from time to time, established pursuant to Article III.

Understand, what Stephen Miller is discussing here is Congress' power, under Article III, Section 2, to limit, or even strip, the jurisdiction of the federal courts (**) over all but a few specific sorts of cases as explicitly enumerated in Article III, Section 2.

Understand -- the "Three Co-Equal Branches of Government" dogma that we all were taught in high school civics class is not only a myth, but a lie, and a pernicious lie at that. The lie was invented by lawyers/judges (***) to disguise their imperialistic power-grab over the other branches, and indeed, over our very lives.

So, since the three branches of the federal government are not "co-equal", where does that leave us? It leaves us where we always were: the three branches each have explicitly enumerated powers -- and no powers not explicitly enumerated -- and the Congress is the "supreme" branch.  That the congresscritters do not want to do their jobs is another matter ... and, in the end, the fault lies with the electorate for allowing them to shirk their duty.

(*) As I have pointed out repeatedly, Article III of the US Constitution does not create "THE Supreme Court". Rather, it establishes "one supreme Court" -- one highest-level or superior court -- and as many inferior courts as Congress may decide to create.

This is the text of Article III, Section 1 (emphasis added ):

"The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The Judges, both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their Offices during good Behaviour, and shall, at stated Times, receive for their Services, a Compensation, which shall not be diminished during their Continuance in Office."

(**) This is the relevant text of Article III, Section 2"

"In all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction. In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make."

(***) Understand -- No matter the legal system, the lawyers of that system *always* eventually seek to corrupt the law to make it serve their own interests. Also remember -- judges are just lawyers who dress funny.

Tim Pool: Stephen Miller Says Trump SERIOUSLY CONSIDERING Suspending Habeas Corpus

When is a "Refugee" not a Refugee?

Isn't this odd --

1) Illegal aliens from Central and South America (and from all across the world, actually) -- from countries which are poor, certainly, but in which people are not being murdered for political reasons -- who, were they actually "refugee", have traversed any number of "safe" countries, in which they were required by "International Law" (such as it is), flood into America ... and the leftists insist that they are "refugees" who *cannot* be sent home.

2) The Trump administration is attempting to allow Afrikaners -- white South Africans who *are* being murdered for racist political reasons, and with the connivance of the South African government -- to *legally* come to America as refugees ... and those same leftists mock their designation as "refugees".

Why, one might get the impression that leftists hate white people as much as they hate America. 

Concerning My Contention that *ALL* Atheists Are Intellectually Dishonest, With Reference to Alex O'Connor

The purpose of this post is to expand upon, or explain in more detail, something I had written on GAB. Basically, the purpose here is to reiterate my own approach to the 'Argument From Reason' and by it to defend my assertion that *all* 'atheists' and 'agnostics' can thereby be known to be intellectually dishonest.

Recently on GAB, I had said in passing that I consider Alex O'Connor -- a smarmy young Englishman to whom many 'village atheists with an ethernet cable (*)' currently look to be the salvation of their anti-rational belief-system, and whom many internet apologists for Christianity foolishly extol for his current (**) winsome approach to asserting that 'God is not' -- to be intellectually dishonest.

Someone later asked: 

I'm curious. I have watched Alex for sometime. What did you find particularly intellectually dishonest about him?

I responded in two parts, the first specifically about Alex O'Connor, and the second quickly outlining why I consider *all* 'atheists' and 'agnostics' to be intellectually dishonest.

Concerning Alex O'Connor, I said:

I'll admit that I *haven't* watched/listened to him all that much -- I have an almost physical reaction of repugnance to him. Even in his more recent/current iteration of winsomeness, as compared to his earlier stridency, he strikes me as aiming to be the next occupant of Dawkins' papal throne.

It's his more recent/current pose of "I'm just asking questions; I really want to see 'evidence' of God, but I just don't see it" that I mark as *doubly* intellectually dishonest (*) -- he's *not* just asking questions, and he's *not* looking for evidence of God: he's demanding answers which are category errors; he's refusing to acknowledge that you can't "find evidence of God" when you're insisting that God is like Zeus.

(*) His initial pugnacious iteration was also intellectually dishonest, but at least it was straight-forward attack-mode.

Concerning 'atheists' and 'agnostics' in general, I said:

My position, though I won't detail it here, is that *all* atheists, including the ones who try to hide behind the 'agnostic' label, are intellectually dishonest (*). The main difference between one atheist and another is how obnoxious or strident one is compared to another.

(*) In a nutshell -- IF God is not, that is, IF atheism/materialism is the truth about the nature of reality, THEN there can be no such things as rational beings, there can be no such activity as logical deduction from premise to conclusion, and there can be no such thing as true knowledge -- including the alleged knowledge that "atheism/materialism is the truth about the nature of reality". BUT, there *are* rational beings, and logical reasoning *is* possible, and true knowledge *does* exist and *can* be known.

Atheists and 'agnostics' -- *all of them* -- are intellectually dishonest precisely *because* they persist in their denial of the reality of God even as that denial logically entails the denial of their own natures as rational beings and free wills (**), able to reason logically and to know truth. AND, the cherry on the top is that most of them pose as paragons of reason and logic, and attempt to denigrate Christians as irrational.

(**) It's a misstatement to say that "we have free will", as though it [i.e. the reality of 'free will'] were analogous to having or not having two feet; rather, we *are* free wills.

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So, to expand on the above --

Notwithstanding the title of a post I'd made last February ("There Is a Fourth Metaphysic", which title was in response to an attempt to get around the "Problem of Minds" by splitting the single metaphysic of atheism into three distinct metaphysics), there are two, and only two, logically possible metaphysics: that is, the truth about the nature of reality is encompassed, without remainder, either by "theism" or by atheism ... but atheism is anti-rational and indeed self-refuting, as it logically entails the denial of all manner of things we know to be true of ourselves.

Understand, the fatal flaw in atheism isn't due to materialism -- materialism is simply the primary expression of any atheism which acknowledges the reality of a physical/material world. No, the fatal flaw of atheism is that it denies -- necessarily -- the primacy of mind, and thus of free-will, as a causal explanation for events and state-changes in the world, which leaves mechanistic necessity as the *only* causal explanation for events and state-changes in the world.

To make use of an illustration by the Oxford mathematician John Lennox, if you were to ask me, "Why is that kettle of water boiling?", I might explain the boiling of the water by listing a series of facts of mechanical necessity, starting with the the fire under the kettle.  Or, I might answer, "Because I want a cup of tea". Now, while the mechanical necessity explanation isn't false, so far as it goes, it is quite incomplete: it doesn't get to the *real* reason that the kettle of water is boiling; namely that I freely initiated the series of mechanistic events and state-changes which resulted in the water boiling.

C S Lewis distinguished these two different (though not contradictory) explanations for the cause of the water boiling as cause-and-effect (the fire under the kettle and subsequent physical state-changes) on the one hand, and ground-and-consequent (my effecting of an act of will to initiate the series of  physical state-changes which result in the water boiling) on the other hand.

But, see, the problem for atheism, it's fatal flaw, is that IF atheism is the truth about the nature of reality, THEN my "decision" to initiate that series of mechanistic events and state-changes which resulted in boiling water was itself merely the mechanically necessary result of some prior set of state-changes; that is, under atheism, there are no such things as decisions, as we all intend that term, much less any such thing as free-will.

The two, and only two, logically possible metaphysics -- 

On the one hand, IF "theism" is the truth about the nature of reality, THEN the primal fact about reality is 'Mind' (***). That is, logically prior to anything else, before there are any states or events or state-changes, there is a mind, there is a rational being, there is a Who who freely chooses to act or not to act, who freely creates all else that is, who intends 'this' but not 'that'.

On the other hand, IF atheism is the truth about the nature of reality, THEN the primal fact about reality is 'Not-Mind'. That is, definitionally: however it is that states, and state-changes, initially came to be, they came to be unintentionally, and thus any and all subsequent events and state changes are, and of necessity must be, the mechanistic result of prior events and state-changes. That is, under atheism, this initial unintentionality pervades all reality and for all time: for 'not-mind' cannot yield, cannot become, 'mind'. 

If 'mind' does not exist already at the initial state of the system, then 'mind' cannot be injected into the system at some later stage of events. For, whence comes this 'mind' to inject into the system? On the one hand, if 'mind' was always "just there, somewhere", waiting in the wings, so to speak, to be injected into the system when "needed" as an explanatory force, then one is just playing disingenuous word-games: one is denying the fundamental tenet of atheism while dishonestly asserting that one is not denying it. But on the other hand, if one asserts than 'mind' just "arises" within the system itself from 'not-mind', then one is *also* just playing disingenuous word-games: but in this case, one is asserting that 'mind' and 'not-mind' are the same thing.

Here is the issue: the existence of mechanistically necessary state-changes is compatible with "theism", but the free-and-intentional initiation of novel events and state-changes is utterly incompatible with atheism. 

Thus (as I said above), to assert that atheism is the truth about the nature of reality is simultaneously to assert the denial of all manner of things which one knows to be true of oneself, including, but not limited to: the freedom of one's will; one's ability to engage in logical reasoning; one's ability to discover truth and know that it is truth; the ability to discover that one has erred in one's reasoning and to correct the error and to know that one has indeed corrected the error.

To deny that God is is ultimately to deny that one's own self is. To put it in the form of a bumper-sticker: You are the proof that God is.

And this is why I contend that *all* 'atheists' and 'agnostics' are intellectually dishonest. And I include in that assessment even the likes of Patricia Churchland, who does with one side of her mouth deny the reality of free-will, while with the other side trying to convince people to believe the proposition that they are not free-wills.

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(*) 'village atheist with an ethernet cable' is a phrase I have long used to denote and deride the sort of 'atheist' one typically encounters on the internet.

(**) Until just a couple of years ago, Alex O'Connor was as deliberately obnoxious as Richard Darwkins or Stephen Fry, or Christopher Hitchens.

(***) Some 'atheists' try to evade this problem by appealing to some sort of woo-woo, such as 'Panpsychism'. But, as I explain time and again, there is no such thing a 'Mind' unless there is at least one actually existing mind.

A Working 1st-floor Bathroom

(now updated -- click on the photos to see a larger image)

2025/01/04:

My sister, Karen, came over from Indiana for a week to goad me into getting some work done on my house.  One of our projects was getting the downstairs bath operational again.  I still have some detail finish work to do, including re-surfacing the tub. This is what the room looked like as of New Year's Day -- 

This bathroom had been a "junk room" for many years, ever since one winter day when a cold draft coming through gaps in the old dry-stone foundation froze the supply line to the toilet and caused the shut-off valve to disconnect from the line. Fortunately, I was home when it thawed, and so I was able to shut off the water in the basement before too much flooding occurred.

Yes, I used a windowed door for this room -- I wanted more natural light to be able to reach the interior/central hall from which one accesses the foyer, the living room, this bath, the "front room", and the stairway.

You might notice the two rust-stains on the door-jamb to the left (fortunately, they will be hidden under the door-stop trim work).  That is from a massive water-damage event several years ago when the supply-line to one of the sinks in the second-floor master bath froze and burst due to raccoons getting into the lower attic and ripping out a lot of insulation.  I was out of town when it thawed (at the time, I worked a 2+ hour drive from home) -- every room in the house, but two, suffered water damage.

 

EDIT 2025/04/ 12:

The downstairs bath is fully functional and is nearly complete; just a few trim pieces to cut and install, and a bit of the woodwork to stain and finish.

This photo is of the bathtub, refinished both inside and out. The outer refinishing involved striping multiple payers of old, probably lead-based, paint, and then applying primer and enamel paint.  While the directions for the refinishing kit (for the inside) say that that it can be applied with a brush, we found that we got a much better result by using small rollers, and the work went much faster.

I may someday look into finding a more decorative faucet for the tub, but for now this functional one is fine.

As mentioned above, the door into this bathroom is a "french" windowed door.  On the inside is mounted a sheet of plexiglass with a decorative film applied to it. I wish the photo did it justice. I'm really satisfied with how it turned out, especially when the door is viewed from outside the room.

In the corner, behind the door, is a cheap kitchen wall cabinet mounted atop the baseboard, for linens and such.  We continued the wainscoting around the side of the cabinet (thus hiding the "raw" particleboard of which it is constructed ... as I said, it's a cheap cabinet).  I built the cabinet's countertop from strips of oak flooring glued together.

To the right of the above photo, you can just see the edge of one of the two in-the-wall shelving units we built. They're to the same design as the open-shelf spice cabinet I built for the kitchen (as seen below).

 

This photo is from the doorway, toward the outside wall. This bathroom is a roomy 8 feet by 8 feet. My mother, who was wheel-chair bound, was still alive when I first designed the room; I wanted to be sure it would be comfortably usable for a person with limited mobility.

The wainscoting is a PVC-based product which I got from Home Depot.  It's lightweight and waterproof, of course, and can be cut with a simple utility knife. But, the ease of cutting it is also its one drawback -- it can be easily dented/deformed by localized pressure.

This photo of of the door, taken from the hallway. It's a better view of the result, but still doesn't do it justice.

I miss beautiful buildings

The linked page has pictures of the old Richland County OH courthouse and one picture of the older courthouse. Both were beautiful buildings, and both are long since demolished.

The current county courthouse is an ugly modern monstrosity, built in 1968. Similarly, the current Mansfield city hall is also an ugly modernist thing.

Come to think of it, Anderson IN, where I lived/worked straight out of college (1980-1982), had also replaced both the beautiful old court house, which was of a similar style to this one, and the old city hall with hideous modern buildings. In the case of the courthouse, it was already falling apart -- there were barricades all around the building, with covered walkways to the major entrances, to protect passers-by from bricks falling from the facade.

My hometown of South Bend IN converted the two most recent "old" courthouses to other uses, rather than demolishing them.

THE OLD RICHLAND COUNTY COURT HOUSE

Even Infinite Buckeroos Will Not Feed Us

In the linked video, Dan Tubb of LotusEaters.com discusses "Modern Monetary Theory", the insane socialistic hyper-Keynesian "economic theory" by which our rulers are destroying us.

My comment/response --

The *point* of an economy is not to "add value", but rather to generate/create wealth. Certainly, "adding value" ... well, adds value. But, if there is not an underlying and robust generation of wealth to which to "add value", then everyone dies, no matter how much "value" is being added as we all die. In the "buckeroo" pseudo-economy, no wealth at all is being generated; that "economy" is nothing more than an accounting trick. Moreover, in its interface with the real economy, it almost certainly destroys wealth, rather than creating it. For, of a certainly, whatever tasks the students do at the hospital to earn the buckeroos will be either pointless waste-of-time make-work, or something that regular employees are already being paid to do. While the "work" the students perform to earn those buckeroos may potentially be "useful" (or not), that work's relationship to the real economy of wealth-creation is no different than if they were made to dig holes one day, and fill them in the next. Now, hospitals are certainly nice things to have, and a well-run hospital "adds value" to its community. BUT, hospitals do not generate wealth; rather, they consume wealth. In that regard, hospitals are luxuries: we cannot have hospitals unless and until we have an underlying economy producing enough excess wealth to support siphoning off enough wealth to fund the hospitals.

Dan Tubb, LotusEaters: The Nonsensical Economic Theory That Affects Your Life

It's an odd world

What an odd world we find yourselves in.

According to many judges (*), including those on the highest court, we mere US citizens do not "have standing" to petition the courts (i.e. said judges) to order that the laws be faithfully enforced by the persons whose sworn duty it is to faithfully enforce the laws. BUT, according to that some gaggle sort of judges, lawyers and NGOs (often, or even exclusively, funded by monies forcefully extracted from us citizens), DO "have standing" to petition the courts (i.e. other lawyers, the ones who dress funny) to FORBID the faithful enforcement of the law.

(*) And remember, judges are just lawyers (**) who dress funny.

(**) Further remember: No matter the legal system, the lawyers of that system will *always* attempt to corrupt it to serve their own interests.

More on "Big Organ Lost One"

I have written about this case before, back in October, 2024.

The news item linked below doesn't claim such, but an early statement in the piece *might* be understood as implying that the reason the man was declared to be "brain dead" in the first place was due to malpractice.

Understand this -- (the fact isn't examined as in depth as it deserves) some of the higher ups in the Donation-Industrial Complex were insistent upon chopping this man for parts, even after it was undeniable that he was not dead.

Understand this -- the *reason* that they now sedate the "corpses" from whom they harvest organs is because they *know* that there is a strong possibility that those people are not actually dead; there have been *many* cases, all across the world, in which "dead" people "woke up" as the surgeons were cutting into them. And thus, they now sedate the "dead" people before cutting into them.

Understand this -- once you know this truth about vital organ transplant (*), it is immoral -- it is damning of your immortal soul -- to take part, in any way, in this industry. It is better to die than to have the heart transplanted into your chest of a man who was murdered to make that heart available.

(*) The one exception I can think of would be to receive a "living donation" of a kidney.

Kentucky family demands answers after organs nearly taken from living man: 'Living nightmare'

On the "Divine Feminine"

I'm linking to the Matt Walsh video as I indend a comment sparked by the title (though, do listen to the video): "Katy Perry Claims Her Trip To Space Connected Her To The “Divine Feminine”?!"

My comment --

For all the stupid things one might honestly fault men for doing, and for all the horrible things that man-hating feminists falsely accuse men of doing, I have *never* heard a man refer to the "Divine Masculine".

Why, it's almost as though for all our alleged phallo-centrism, we men don't worship our dicks nearly to the degree that feminists worship their pussies. And do understand: that is precisely what the term "Divine Feminine" is all about.

Matt Walsh: Katy Perry Claims Her Trip To Space Connected Her To The “Divine Feminine”?!

Q: When Are Your Children Not Your Children?

A: When a passel of God-damned government bureaucrats decide that they have a greater vested interest in the welfare of your own children than you do.

It *appears* that the "neglect" of which government bureaucrats accuse these parents is the rational decision to forego the battery of so-called vaccinations that the "health professionals" -- remember them? the very people who lied to us in various ways, and are still lying to us to this day, about Covid-1984? -- insist infants be subjected to.

And so, since the *parents* of these children made the decision -- as is their right -- to remove their children from the potential clutches of the damned government bureaucrats, the bureaucrats are accusing the PARENTS OF KIDNAPPING THEIR OWN CHILDREN.

Massachusetts Couple Accused of Kidnapping Their Own Five Children from State Custody

The Absurdity of "Judicial Review"

The point, THE WHOLE POINT, of the US Constitution is to delineate the powers of the federal government and to limit its ability to interfere in our lives. But, of course, since governments are just men, and since all men are sinners, all governments seek continually to increase the monies they extract from their subjects and to increase their ability to interfere in the lives of their subjects. That is, all government is forever and always the enemy of the liberty of the people. Government is necessary, but it it nonetheless an evil; and that must never be forgotten.

This is why the very concept of "the federal courts interpret the Constitution" is absurd; doubly so: It's absurd because to "interpret" the Constitution JUST IS to change its meaning; and it's absurd because the courts are themselves agents of "the government."

The US Constitution is a compact, an agreement, between the States and The People; the US federal government is created by the Constitution and is the CREATURE of the States and of The People. Consider how absurd it would be if a number of persons agreed amongst themselves to create a corporation, and drew up its charter, its rules of operation ... and then the *agents* of that corporation asserted that *they* have the power to "interpret" that charter over and against the principals of the corporation.

This is the text of the linked item:

"The year was 1942, and an Ohio farmer named Roscoe Filburn was growing wheat on his own property and feeding it to his own animals. This wasn’t some big commercial operation—Roscoe was just trying to make a living, keep his farm running, and feed his livestock. But the federal government had other ideas.

See, back then, the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 set quotas on how much wheat farmers could grow, all in the name of stabilizing prices during the Great Depression and World War II. Roscoe, though, grew more than his allotted amount—not to sell, mind you, but just for his own use.

The feds caught wind of this and fined him. Roscoe fought back, arguing that what he did on his own land, for his own consumption, wasn’t their business.

The case climbed all the way up to the Supreme Court: Wickard v. Filburn. In a unanimous decision, the justices ruled against him. They said that even though Roscoe’s wheat never left his farm, it still affected interstate commerce. How? Because by growing his own, he wasn’t buying wheat on the market, which impacted supply and demand nationwide.

It was a stretch, but the Court bought it, expanding the Commerce Clause to give the government power over pretty much anything that might touch the economy, even indirectly.

Roscoe paid the fine, and life went on, but that ruling stuck. It’s been a cornerstone for federal overreach ever since—everything from regulating backyard gardens to mandating health insurance.

So when you’re mad about the Supreme Court, just remember: they’ve been finding ways to justify big government for over 80 years. Roscoe’s wheat didn’t stand a chance, and neither do most of us when they set their minds to it."

https://gab.com/americaneducationfm/posts/114206273415144633

What Is Your Citizenship Worth?

Will American citizens *ever* get it into their heads that the Democratic Party is the sworn enemy of the American People and of our Republic? Or are too many Americans content to vote against the interests of their children and grandchildren, so long as they are told that "the rich" are being made to suffer?

Will black American citizens *ever* get it into their heads that the Democratic Party *despises* them and is *using* them as a cats paw? Or are too many black Americans content to cut off their noses to spite their faces, so long as "the white man" is made to suffer?

EDIT (2025/06/06):

The Democrats are now openly/explicitly calling illegal aliens "undocumented citizens". No one who has been paying attention can be surprised at this, as making your citizenship worthless has been their over-riding goal for many decades now.

So, again: "What Is Your Citizenship Worth?"

"It's Un-American" - 19 Democratic State AGs Sue To Stop Trump Blocking Non-Citizen Voting

Doom, All the Way Down

This -- adults brow-beating 12/13 year-old girls to change clothes in front of a boy -- is the world that *women* demanded. And it will not be solved until *women* abandon feminism, root and branch.

By the way, the late Phyllis Schlafly -- remember her -- *warned* us that if the ERA were ratified, that *this*, and worse, would be among the inevitable results. Thanks in large part to Mrs Schlafly, the ERA wasn't ratified ... but the leftists figured out how to use the "Civil Rights Act of 1964", coupled with judicial imperial over-reach, and the craven acquiescence of elected officials, to achieve the same vile goals.

Things are only going to get worse unless *women* reject feminism, and that must include refusing to vote for *any* Democrat or *any* RINO. And, it most assuredly means abandoning the immoral claim that women have a right to murder their babies.

Matt Walsh: Mom Reveals HORRIFYING Details Of Woke Middle School Corruption

Where Are All the Democrats, So Quick to Stir the Pot At Any Other Time?

I wasn't able to speak for hours when my father died. I can't imagine how difficult it would be to speak after losing a child in such a horrible and senseless manner.

The answer to the question posed in the video's title is: No. And we all know it, and we all know why, and we all know how things would have gone were the races reversed. And we all know the why of that: Democratic Party racist hypocrisy.

Where is B Hussein "If I Had a Son" Obama? Where is Ben "Can I make It Worse?" Crump? Where is Elie "Q-Tip" Misstal? Where is Al "Oddly Slim of Late" Sharpton? Where is Joy "Less" Reid? Where is Don "Wanna Snif?" LeMon? Where is Cory "Spartacus" Booker? Where is Keith "Tanktop (if you know, you know)" Ellison? Where is Jasmine "Ratchet" Crockett? Where is Hakeem "Dimestore Obama" Jeffries? Where is Ayanna Pressley? Where is Kamala "Middle Class" Harris? Where is Maxine "Mad Max" Waters?

Where is Chuck "We Will Win! We Will Win!" Schumer? Where is Nancy "I Got Mine" Peolsi? Where is Adam "Lying Pencilneck" Schiff? Where is Tim "Timpon" Walz?

Surely, these notables (and so many others I haven't named) have some Words of Wisdom to share with us!

Quartering: Will Cities Burn For Him? White Track Star SNUFFED Out By Thug Over Sitting In The Wrong Seat

Fox: ‘HUG YOUR BABIES TIGHT’: Grieving mother, brother of murdered teen speak out

Further Doom

This is why America is doomed -- men don't have the balls to say "No" to the lies, intellectual dishonesty, and ever-escalating demands for special treatment -- disguised as "equality" -- of women.

This isn't about "rights for parents in Congress" -- whatever the Hell that is supposed to mean. These bitches and bastards were not elected to Congress to "be parents", they were elected to SHOW UP TO WORK, to represent the people of their district in Congress. And they don't want to do that; rather, they want to *expand* Nancy Pelosi's corrupt "proxy voting" scheme.

As one person said -- "$150,000 a year and you can't afford a babysitter? Figure it out or resign."

Speaker Johnson suffers defeat in his push to block new parents in U.S. House from proxy voting

Here is a Democratic Party congresscritter @16:00 mark whinging about her desire to subvert-and-evade her duties as a US Representative, but still get paid --

Serious people -- adults -- don't even *use* the words 'mom' and 'dad' in a serious public setting, much less apply those words to themselves. Those words are for the familial setting, and especially when speaking to children.

GOP Reps DEFECT, Joins Democrats To BLOCK TRUMP, Want SPECIAL Rules For Women, GO FULL WOKE

Congresscritters ... and Public Accusations, While Shielded From Liability

Back in February (of 2025), Congresscritter Nancy Mace (R-Feminism) used -- misused -- her congressional immunity from legal liability to accuse four men of some terrible crimes -- 

Nancy Mace Makes EXPLOSIVE Sexual Assault, Voyeurism Allegations On House Floor

Apparently, she has a habit of accusing people (which is to say, men) of various foul deeds. She accused a fifth man of assaulting her during an event at the Capitol last year. On Tuesday (2025/04/01), federal prosecutors moved to drop charges against this man: Charges dropped against Illinois man accused of assault by Rep. Nancy Mace

Note this quote from the linked article:

Several eyewitnesses disputed Mace’s characterization of the Dec. 10 incident, suggesting it looked like a “normal handshake.”

A few days ago, I had seen a YouTube video which purported to show the video of the encounter.  IF that video was indeed a record of the full encounter, then I have to agree with the above quote.

Apparently, this most recently accused man is a "trans-rights activist" -- which means that he is as despicable as she is. But, this intellectually dishonest game of "Won't You Strong Brave Men Protect Poor Little Me No Matter What Accusation I Make?" played by feminists, in general, and she, in particular, must be called out, and it must stop.

Non-Familial Males ... and Miscarriages

During the time when the commies had Forced The Shutting Down Of The World's Economy, I saw a mainstream news article stating that gynecologists/pediatricians were reporting a noticeable decrease in miscarriages.

This immediately brought to mind the scientific observation that when pregnant mice are exposed to "strange" males, their incidences of spontaneous abortion increases.

And, this lead me to wonder whether the *reason* that almost all ancient civilizations segregated their wives from most contact with non-familial males was precisely because there is a similar, albeit weaker, physiological effect in humans as in mice to cause spontaneous abortions upon contact with "strange" males.

This question will never be studied. of course -- feminism will not allow the question to be asked, nor an honest answer to be given.

Why America Is Doomed

These sorts of abominations (as see the linked 'X' post) sprout from the anti-Constitutional Civil Rights Act of 1964, and they are rooted in the 17th (Popular Election of Senators) and 19th (Female Suffrage) Amendments. That the federal government is killing the nation via taxation and reckless deficit spending is rooted in the 16th (Income Tax / Direct Taxation of the People) Amendment.

And this is why America is doomed:

1) Almost no American man is willing to acknowledge that Female Suffrage was a civilization-ending mistake, lest women whine at him;

2) Almost no "conservatives" are willing to acknowledge that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is fatally flawed, and that it is the basis by which the commies are undermining our liberties (and very much including the liberties of black Americans), lest the communists call them racist.

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LAWFARE: An Obama-appointed judge has blocked Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth's mandate, which required all U.S. soldiers to meet uniform physical fitness standards, ruling that it discriminates against those who are not physically fit.

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Post on 'X'