From here,
Relaxed attitudes about marriage trickle down to the working class and the poor. In the 1960s, marriage rates between upper-class and lower-class Americans were nearly identical. But during this time, affluent Americans loosened social norms, expressing skepticism about marriage and monogamy.
Yes they did. Through their mouthpieces in the media, academia, NGOs, etc, they let it be known where the correct thinking people stood. Should they be considered hypocrites for not implementing what they say they believe?
This luxury belief contributed to the erosion of the family. Today, the marriage rates of affluent Americans are nearly the same as they were in the 1960s. But working-class people are far less likely to get married. Furthermore, out-of-wedlock birthrates are more than 10 times higher than they were in 1960, mostly among the poor and working class.
Unfortunately, many took these beliefs that were promoted to heart. Of course, there was government subsidization of the results of those beliefs, all pressed by the same upper class.
Affluent people seldom have kids out of wedlock but are more likely than others to express the luxury belief that doing so is of no consequence.
One wonders what is wrong with these people. With evidence staring them in the face, they believe the stupidest things.
Then there’s the luxury belief that individual decisions don’t matter much compared to random social forces, including luck. This belief is more common among many of my peers at Yale and Cambridge than the kids I grew up with in foster care or the women and men I served with in the military. The key message is that the outcomes of your life are beyond your control. This idea works to the benefit of the upper class and harms ordinary people.
Decisions make a huge difference. How could they not? Perhaps the purpose is to create a horde of people who who mindlessly go about life doing the upper class’ bidding. Or maybe it is just a cynical play for power, at the expense of vast swaths of people. Perhaps you have more ideas.
White privilege is the luxury belief that took me the longest to understand, because I grew up around poor whites. Often members of the upper-class claim that racial disparities stem from inherent advantages held by whites. Yet Asian Americans are more educated, have higher earnings and live longer than whites. Affluent whites are the most enthusiastic about the idea of white privilege, yet they are the least likely to incur any costs for promoting that belief. Rather, they raise their social standing by talking about their privilege.
White privilege is mostly about studying, working and not doing stupid stuff. Not all whites have it, but many do. It is available to anyone. Asians have grabbed it. Perhaps it should be relabeled as a different privilege, one with a different color.
In other words, upper-class whites gain status by talking about their high status. When laws are enacted to combat white privilege, it won’t be the privileged whites who are harmed. Poor whites will bear the brunt.
Ain’t that the truth. But these upper class types will feel better, at least for a bit. This SJW stuff really seems to be a drug to them; needing a fix every so often when the last one wears off.
It’s possible that affluent whites don’t always agree with their own luxury beliefs, or at least have doubts.
I am thinking that they don’t. This makes it all the harder on them, as they need fixes at a higher rate. Naturally enough, all of this is to the detriment of all not in the upper class.
Because, like with diamond rings or designer clothes of old, upper-class people don a luxury belief to separate themselves from the lower class. These beliefs, in turn, produce real, tangible consequences for disadvantaged people, further widening the divide. Just as fashionable clothing will soon be outdated, so will today’s fashionable beliefs. In the future, expect the upper class to defame even more values — including ones they hold dear — in their quest to gain top-dog status.
So here is the suggestion that the upper class is f’ing with he other class for the sake of maintaining their top-dog status. It might be. They perhaps should be careful. One reaps what one sows.
Define rich?
The Demon-Rats say it’s a gross income of 60K/yr. That was in the 1990’s.
When you hear tax the rich .. you won’t be middle class anymore.
As for the cloud-people -vs- th dirt-people .. the cloud folk will leave once the street communication begins.
Heck smart dirt folk should be looking for a soft landing spot .. I know I am.
Because .. it’s gonna be the bloody french revolution all over again.
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The “elites” believe that they are so smart. Too much hubris. Pride before the fall
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I don’t remember posting this before…
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BV, don’t make me insist that you watch this…
I linked to it some days back but have only just to listen to it myself, Starkey is excellent
(Others are welcome too)
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Buzzfeed reporter Scaachi Koul attended the last meeting of Duca’s course for the semester and described the experience as “exactly what Tucker Carlson would envision a liberal journalism class might be” in that it was “a bunch of kids from varied backgrounds, ethnicities orientations, and gender identities who could each afford a $6,500 class, wearing T-shirts that said ‘GenderQueer’ or ‘Kill Patriarchy.’”
https://www.campusreform.org/?ID=13729
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Adding a degree of difficulty to those trying to rile up an electronic mob was the audacious simplicity of Ringo’s argument: “The people voted, and they have to get on with it. Suddenly it’s like, ‘Oh, well we don’t like that vote.’ What do you mean you didn’t like that vote? You had the vote, this is what won, let’s get on with it.”
Ringo has always been an instinctual conservative, though he likely wouldn’t describe himself that way. Indeed, he once declared, “All governments are the same, Labour or Tory. Neither of them offers me anything.” But no superannuated anarchist is Richard Starkey. He just doesn’t trust the government to do anything that isn’t an essential government function. And even then he’s dubious.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/ringo-brexit-stage-right
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Marianne Williamson on nuclear energy: go beyond “hard data” and “think about this with your hearts
— RNC Research (@RNCResearch) September 19, 2019
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And there’s more
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Didn’t think that one through
Media fact-checkers are choosing to ignore a now-deleted social media post by Democratic congresswoman Ilhan Omar (Minn.) that suggests her father has the same family name as her former husband, who many suspect is also her brother
https://freebeacon.com/politics/fact-checkers-decline-to-revisit-ilhan-omar-marriage-question/
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Our military leaders are fully on board with using the military to promote a social agenda at the expense of war-fighting ability. In this regard, their actions betray a sense that they are so superior to any potential adversary that they can afford to indulge in frivolity, no matter what their words might claim.
https://dalrock.wordpress.com/2019/09/20/do-our-social-justice-warriors-deserve-the-best-money-can-buy/
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Opening night for The Minnesota Orchestra. They kindly are closing out with Elgar, Enigma Variations. I first played this in junior high. I think. #9, “Nimrod” is the variation where, after all the decades, I still cover my eyes.
(I’m not reporting from the wonderful concert hall in Minneapolis; listening to it on the truck radio at my camp.)
God is very tired of us, certainly, but I hope He will allow us such music in death. I cannot imagine a Hell that demands consciousness but denies music such as Elgar. But it — that Hell — must be out there. We could not conceive of it if He did not wish it.
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[Surprised that sleep together they do I am]
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[A rather good use of Presidential power think I do]
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“Chick-fil-A does not adequately reflect the anti-LGBT values we hold dear in Saudi Arabia,” Salman said. “They are canceled.”
https://babylonbee.com/news/saudi-arabia-closes-down-new-chick-fil-a-location-for-disappointing-lack-of-homophobia
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BOLIVIA TO BE COMPLETELY FOOD INDEPENDENT IN 2020 BY INVESTING IN SMALL FARMERS
well … okay … i left out, with financial support so far being given to breeding livestock and fish farming, as well as increasing the production of crops like potatoes, tomatoes, wheat, vegetables, coffee, and cocoa.”
🙂
http://undergroundreporter.org/bolivia-food-independent-2020/?fbclid=IwAR3VLbnKHBEgRbHT3ZR7UDN10MzupO_tfrr4Y7AgYKMmaAjeYJ_wi90ZTHo
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With Boris’ difficulties, everything must be just peachy for the left…right?
Said to be more coming during their conference
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Over to the Queen of the Liberal Democrats. A name as descriptive of the reality as the DPRK.
I assume that bawbag is Scottish for ball bag aka scrotum.
[Emphasize the boobs in that image they did not]
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Ed Miliband changed the rules when he was departing leader. £3 to join the party to elect the next leader was how they got Corbyn. The hard left joined in droves and so did normeez looking to stuff up labour. The hard left now own laba and every failure will only cause the to double down and go harder left.
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I am not British in origin. I am Scots-English. I am from the unimportant fields and villages of England and Scotland. We were peasants and crofters.
I hope just one person discovers Elgar and this tune. I’m sure CdO has wearied of Elgar but I first played him in my teens and I never have.
It’s very disturbing to consider an existence without this sort of beauty, but I suppose that’s the way it will go.
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whaaaa???!!!
According to a new scientific publication, genetically engineered mosquitoes produced by the biotech company Oxitec (Intrexon) have escaped human control after trials in Brazil. They are now spreading in the environment. The yellow fever mosquitoes (Aedes aegypti) are genetically engineered to make it impossible for their offspring to survive. After release they were supposed to mate with female mosquitoes of the species which transmit infectious diseases, such as Dengue fever, to diminish the natural populations.
However, the now published research shows that many offspring of the genetically engineered mosquitoes actually survived and are spreading and propagating further. According to the scientists, between 10-60 percent of the mosquitoes in the region concerned are inheriting parts of the genome of the mosquitoes released in the trials. These findings are also confirmed in neighbouring regions where no such trials were conducted.
https://www.gmwatch.org/en/news/latest-news/19127-genetically-engineered-mosquitoes-out-of-control
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Cill mentioned that as a favourite piece some years back. I’m also a fan.
Jupiter from Holst also. Most especially this part
Or, with words
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Alone with one’s thoughts, Bill Evans is good company.
I’m assuming that people here are too young to know who Evans is; apologies if I’m being superfluous. He’s classically trained, which I suspect you can hear.
Evans developed an abundent taste for heroin, which cut things short. But he was unmatcheable for 20 years.
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I am thinking that the Liberal Democrat leader should stick to her tracts of land
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BV,
A lovely addition. A couple of my favorites, both from the same album which I consider to be the best recorded conducting of these pieces.
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The Toccata was not the right link, per normal with BV.
This includes the correct youtube link.
Nimrod, #9.
Michael, who was Time’s classical music critic, then a correspondent in Berlin and Moscow, and is now a cultural historian, novelist, screenwriter, and the like, sent it to me. I’ve never met Michael, but from time to time, in the night, it is as though I’m in my plane going west and he is in his, going east, and we have a brief exchange on the radio, over St. Louis. One is very fortunate for these few words across the ether.
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And now…the destruction of culture
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In CdO’s video of the funerals, note that the bracing men who are pallbearers reserve one hand for their companion pallbearer: One hand for the casket, one for the man adjacent. I’ve never seen that.
Reminds me of the local establishment up here in the woods and lakes. There is a farmer who sits in the tavern when I am there watching the football, and his son often comes in. They speak briefly about the next day, and this hardass farmer, as his son leaves the bar, says, “See you! I love you!” to the 250 pound boy walking out the door. Every night he says that.
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Classics with a new twist

Magic Grandpa Jezza on the left and Tom Watson (his deputy) on the right…or he was
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Ya, CdO, Walsh referenced your VW/Tallis piece etc. I know all this stuff because I was a composition student in my teens (at the state university) and then admitted to the Oberlin Conservatory, but I guess I appear otherwise now. In any event, what I so enjoy about VW, Holst, Elgar et al is how the music has come back to me, or, more properly, I have come back to the music. I played all this stuff as a child but now I’m just fine swimming in it again.
Thanks for linking your two faves.
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This is the correct Bill Evans link. BV is looking mighty wasted, what with all the bad links. BV is not wasted, however. BV is spelling and conjugating verbs properly, and that’s not possible if wasted. BV is enjoying the harvest moon and wishing that everyone else is, too.
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JFC. I don’t even like organ music.
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Meanwhile in Ireland
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“I am thinking that the Liberal Democrat leader should stick to her tracts of land.”
Actually, having enjoyed two glasses of Glenlivet, I would suggest a swift boot in the arse with a size 12 triple A cowboy boot in the unlikely hope of finally engaging her brain ;-D
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Referencing CdO’s book burners, above, I read this morning the 2007 interview with Ray Bradbury. For those living in Rio Linda, Bradbury wrote “Fahrenheit 451”, in which the protagonist is a fireman and required to burn books.
Now, “Fahrenheit 451” is popularly considered to be a warning against censorship (which I think it is). But Bradbury is *really* annoyed by this interpretation. He says its a warning against TV, i.e., a warning against living on/within screens.
My takeaway also was he was still writing one short story a week at 87. He weren’t no retired pussy.
https://www.laweekly.com/ray-bradbury-fahrenheit-451-misinterpreted/
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CdO’s book burner critic, above, is really talking about the tension between the Western, modernist, post-Renaissance, post-Reformation humanism that has characterized human achievement — versus the nihilist post-modernists, who wish to tear it all down.
Michael Walsh’s last two books address this conflict.
This is the most concise essay I’ve read on the problem. I say “concise”, but unless you are a lot smarter than I am, you might want to print it out so you can make notes in the margin, etc.
http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=260
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On a far more happy post, the gobblers showed up after school to pick the early seedless grapes . There were quite a few Himrod green grapes which have an aftertaste of honey, but the Glenora black grapes had too many wasps to get very many bunches. The Sweetie was a little bummed because they sort of taste like blueberries which she loves in smoothies in the winter when she cannot safely eat most commercial fruit.
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Another one that I remember from school assembly. To Be A Pilgrim
aka ‘Who would true valour see’ Sung here by Maddy Prior of Steeleye Span
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Speaking of Steeleye Span
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Sadly I think that the insects have done for my apples this year. A lot of blackberries though
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Here’s the Beethoven Leonore Overture Nº3 that has stirred my blood from the day my dad played it to me when I was a toddler. Put it through a good sound system if possible. Impatient people could go to 13:25:
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My word that’s a powerful Leonore. Bernstein is a showman but I think his orchestra responds to it. And note, he doesn’t have the score in front of him; he doesn’t need one.
Perhaps your children will enjoy “Immortal Beloved” beginning around 7 or 8, Cill.
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They will be raised on classical music, as I was.
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I’ll give this a spin at some point today
Sp Spiked magazine is the home of Brendan o’Neill who interviewed David Starkey in that clip that I linked up-thread
[Endorse this video I do]
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If you listen and watch a few times you see an extraordinary American unleashing German artists. Very unusual. The audience doesn’t even stand for the finest Leonore of their lives. That *is* the finest Leonore they will ever hear.
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Yes. It is. It’s the version I sometimes play on still nights. I stand on the cliff top and conduct the magnificent thing as if the orchestra is out over the sea. There’s only me and my massive sound system, Dog, Horse, livestock, and wildlife in the forest. When it’s finished you could hear a pin drop.
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More Elgar: they sing:
May light eternal shine upon them, O Lord, with Thy saints forever,
for Thou art Kind.
Eternal rest
The soprano here (tall brunette) is astonishing.
I think, as one of the commenters notes, that the church, the sanctuary, sings with them. BV OUT!
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Because the crazier parts of the progressive left increasingly see politics as public theater, with heroes and villains, cheers and hisses from the audience, and costumes, such as outfits from “The Handmaid’s Tale.” Because modern politics is, for the lonely and strange on all sides, entertainment and diversion. And one’s people must be entertained.
Because many progressives believe deep in their hearts that conservative men are both sexually obsessed and repressed, that conservatism is a way of looking at the world in which women are lesser, mere prey. They think this is behind everything, including conservative reservations about or opposition to abortion. In this view, conservative jurists who say things like “60% of my clerks were women” and “I coach the girls’ soccer and debate teams” are engaged in an elaborate cover. They hate the modern world. Behind closed doors they’re always swinging caveman’s clubs.
Because where there’s smoke there must be fire. There was Ms. Ford, then the Yale rumors. There’s no way there isn’t something to it.
So it will never end.
https://twitchy.com/samj-3930/2019/09/20/they-lost-the-battle-peggy-noonan-triggers-metoo-with-piece-on-why-theyre-really-targeting-kavanaugh/
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“[Endorse this video I do]”
Yes. I’ve listened to it now. It’s a goody
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All that ever needs to be said.
Why it is impossible to reset. Ever.
Women want in chronological order:
sexy sex,
babies,
Freedom from work or commitment.
Hence (not my quote)
“There is much chatter these days about men using “Game.” It is mostly big talk and imaginary posturing.
In fact our time is shaped by Girls’ Game: romance the man, stage the party-of-her-life, marry, have kids, divorce when they are in school – then get community property, child support, and independence. The husband provides support during those first few difficult years raising the children, then is dumped. She then gets the children she wants without the bother of having a husband. It is the logical strategy for women raised to value their independence above all else.”
Mic drop
Exit stage left
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Here is where Horseman’s quote comes from
https://fabiusmaximus.com/2019/09/15/teaching-boys-about-marriage/
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White privilege is mostly about studying, working and not doing stupid stuff
I rather like this quote
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One of the definitions of “privilege” is “advantage”.
White Privilege = White Advantage – brought about primarily by those who studied hard, worked hard, and didn’t do stupid stuff.
One would think that is something that most folks could do, regardless of skine tone.
Thanks to all who introduced me to Sir Edward Elgar. Wonderful music. Same with the piano piece by Bill Evans.
Liz recently mentioned the Robert Frost poem Acquainted With the Night. In the same vein as BV and Cill have discussed above, I, too, have been acquainted with the night. There is nothing quite like being outside, alone under the stars, and listening to magnificent music. And Cill has left me with a new image that will join others that will never leave my mind’s eye – a solitary figure, on the edge of the abyss, conducting magnificence. It all brings to mind the last two lines of the Frost poem:
Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.
I have been one acquainted with the night.
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The big news in campus sexual misconduct hearings is that believers in trauma-informed adjudications are on the defensive. What that verbal mouthful means is that apparent weaknesses in a complainant’s case—inarticulateness, contradictions, lying, or being too “frozen’’ or fearful of testifying—must not be automatically taken as evidence that sexual trauma has occurred
https://www.mindingthecampus.org/2019/09/20/fake-claims-of-rape-due-to-trauma-under-scrutiny/
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Most people who are too lazy to think for themselves made an additional mistake by approaching topics from appeals to emotion rather than logical curiosity. Politicians are notorious for this, of course. It is the nature of their business, and ultimately it is why democracy is a poor form of government. Even when the masses get it right, such as Brexit, our leaders attempt to do what they want anyway.
In short, you want to be a skeptical contrarian as much as you can. Which doesn’t mean sitting back and calling bullshit on the world. It means examining the evidence, thinking for yourself, and then calling bullshit on the world. There is a difference.
https://pushingrubberdownhill.com/2019/09/21/the-ability-to-think-for-yourself/
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White nationalism sounds a lot better as a threat than father absence. When are we going to call a hearing on the 74 percent of single motherhood rate in black America today? My guess is probably never, since Democrats are the author of that epidemic, which leaves us – black Americans – 20 times more likely to end up in prison, nine times more likely to drop out of high school, and five times more likely to lead a life in poverty and to commit crime.
https://www.dailywire.com/news/52053/watch-white-liberals-lecture-candace-owens-white-hank-berrien
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[Difficult to “like” that it would be]
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I wish lefties would own up to the damage they have done to black people. It is so obvious, yet they act like are from Mars if you bring it up. It is as if they dont really care about the fate of black people, despite their protestations
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There is a new post
https://spawnyspace.wordpress.com/2019/09/21/young-men-know-what-you-know-and-what-you-dont-know/
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Gratuitous images
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Joe Biden says that if a Male is sentenced to jail, and he identifies as a woman, that he should be housed with female inmates
— CHIZ 🇺🇸 (@CHIZMAGA) September 21, 2019
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Joe Biden backs taxpayer-funded “gender-affirming” surgery
— Ryan Saavedra (@RealSaavedra) September 21, 2019
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So what does that mean? The government will pay for prostitutes?
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[Difficult to “like” that it would be]
“I’m here with my Grandma.”
“Which one is your Grandma?”
“Ummm … the one with the … uhhh … never mind!”
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this is for Cill, if you can pull up the facebook link.
i like listening to this guy’s music (Daniel Morris Music) (watching him drives me nuts b/c he moves around too much for me), but, anyway, in this little clip he has his young son with him on stage … VERY adorable!!!
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oh, cool! it posted the clip! yay!
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What Comes After Transgender?
Make room for the “transabled” and hospitals and doctors forced to perform operations that conflict with their ethical and religious principles.
https://spectator.org/what-comes-after-transgender/
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