JS BACH - Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring

Merry Christmas, everybody.

 

Luciano Pavarotti and Placido Domingo - O Holy Night

The Christmas Truce, World War II version

I had never heard this story, but it's true.  US and German soldiers lost in the Battle Of The Bulge had Christmas dinner together rather than killing each other, all due to a good German Hausfrau who had had enough of war on Christmas.  You have to jump ahead to around 6:30 for the story - before that, it's mincemeat pie recipe from the WWII US Army Field Cookbook (which also seems pretty interesting). 

And while it's not (quite) Christmas yet, Hans Gruber is fixin' to fall off of Nakatomi Plaza.

All I want for Christmas

James emails this bit of awesome:

 

Dad Joke CCCLXV

What do you call someone who is afraid of Santa Claus?

A Klaus-trophobe. 

Georg Frederick Handel - Hallelujah Chorus from The Messiah

With a Flash Mob at Macy's, and accompanied by the Wanamaker organ - the World's largest pipe organ. 

Brad Paisley & Steven Tyler - Run Run Rudolph

You're welcome. 

Andy Williams - It's The Most Wonderful Time Of The Year

This looks like a number from The Andy Williams Show, maybe late 1960s.  We all watched this back then. 

Reports of the GOP's demise have been exagerated

We are swimming in reports of how badly the Republicans are going to do in next year's election (no links because I'm lazy but these are a dime a dozen if you look).  I disagree.

In general, mid-term elections favor the party out of power.  This is true so often that it is almost considered a law of nature, particularly during a President's second term.  What you don't ever see is anyone ask why do voters reject the party in power in the mid-terms? There's quite a simple answer.

Fatigue.

The voters have had some time to get used to the Administration and starts to tire of the typical amount of scandal, incompetence, and general dum-assery that any administration accumulates.

That's not at all what we see today.  The main focus of the Trump 47 administration has been border security, deporting criminal illegal aliens, economic growth, and lower inflation.  There are remarkable results for all of these, despite the legacy media's frantic efforts to hide them.

Each of these are 80% issues - i.e. the issues all get 80% support in polls.

I would go so far as to say that the voter fatigue is on the other foot.  It's the Democrats who spent the last four years stumbling through a morass of dumb-assery.  And who are all on the 20% end of the issues that voters care about.

Voters have short memories but remember that Trump has only been back in office for 11 months and has remarkable achievements - achievements that for the previous four years the legacy media said were impossible to achieve.

The polls for the Democrats are a dumpster fire.  There's a reason for this.  Action, reaction. 

What is particularly ironic is that now it's basically proved that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump. If the Democrats in Fulton County hadn't done this, Trump 46 would have bumbled through a second term with his appointees working with the Deep State to undercut him - just like his 45 term.  Instead, they gave him four years to plan this remarkable turnaround.

Sure, he still grates on a lot of people, but at the end of the day most voters will go with what's working for them.  They got plenty of pretty promises from Biden, promises that never panned out.

Donald Trump has an ability to reverse the laws of gravity, and mid-term voter fatigue will be just another example of this. 

Thurl Ravenscroft - You're A Mean One Mr. Grinch

For years I thought this was sung by Boris Karloff, but he only narrated the show.  It was actually sung by Thurl Ravenscroft - the voice of Tony The Tiger.  And sang in "A Pirate's Life For Me."

And yes, Dr. Seuss wrote the lyrics. 

AI Browser Extensions considered harmful

Well, duh:

Ad blockers and VPNs are supposed to protect your privacy, but four popular browser extensions have been doing just the opposite. According to research from Koi Security, these pernicious plug-ins have been harvesting the text of chatbot conversations from more than 8 million people and sending them back to the developers.

The four seemingly helpful extensions are Urban VPN Proxy, 1ClickVPN Proxy, Urban Browser Guard, and Urban Ad Blocker. They're distributed via the Chrome Web Store and Microsoft Edge Add-ons, but include code designed to capture and transmit browser-based interactions with popular AI tools.

I believe that the very first of Borepatch's Laws of Security - from way, way back in 2008 - was "Free Download" is Internet-speak for "Open your mouth and close your eyes".

Plus ca change ... 

So you really shouldn't use them. 

 

Yet another reason to love James Earl Jones

He was a 1911 guy.  And funny as all get out about it: