I've kicked up a hornet's nest at 14ers.com (and The American Southwest)

In planning for a recent vacation, I was eyeing, for various reasons, bagging another 14er, and I settled on Mount Sherman as a possibility. Relatively easy climb, short trail, starts at high altitude for a 14ers trail and other things. I eyeballed 14ers.com's webpage for Sherman, noting that it has two trailheads, one accessible from Leadville, another from Fairplay.

Well, the Leadville trailhead, the road to it is closed 4 miles short of the trailhead. That's CURRENTLY noted on the website, but was NOT at the time I was trip planning. And, no, contra Luciana Nemes, among the people blocked there, I trust my memory that it was NOT on there for this year at the time I planned my trip; I would have seen the ORANGE TEXT color coded tag of "2023 ROAD CLOSURE" with the "i" icon next to it. And no, Bill Middlebrook, website content updater, I'm sure it wasn't, either. I wouldn't have driven up the Leadville route if it WERE.

So, after I got home, I was going to drop a comment about them updating the Leadville route info, and saw that it had been done, including that it was closed a year ago. Seeing no place to comment there, I went to its Hucksterman page and have thoroughly kicked over a hornet's nest. And, by the comments about me and attacks on me, it's well deserved, the kicking is. (I didn't go through all, but I told the guy who suggested I was the "douche award winner," one Peter Chorlton by Hucksterman handle, to have a mirror. Bill Middlebrook by real name, the guy who does most the 14ers route updates on the website, was among those with a "haha" emoji reaction. You get a mirror, too, dude, as you're the one who didn't update the website a month ago to indicate that a 2022 closure was still in place.

And, yeah, all the boldface is deserved, too. 

On that page, Nishan Hainds supports me: "I literally posted this closing a few weeks ago." So, it wasn't posted more than a few weeks ago.

Anastasia Chuykina, no, I didn't "rage quit," but you are among the blocked. 

There's also the many people who said, "but it was posted here more than once," ignoring that it was my first Facebook post and that I had joined the group just to bring that to light. Maybe I didn't say, "This is my first Facebook post," but, some basic inductive reasoning, namely that they hadn't seen me comment to others' posts before, might have offered some help.

And, I left one last comment on my post, summarizing some of the few paragraphs above, and I don't care if I'm booted from the group. 

Well, one person asked my motivation. I didn't block them, but I didn't answer them over there. I will here.

14ers.com bills itself as, as I see it, the premier site for all about Colorado 14ers. One commenter's snark that "this was even on AllTrails" shows they believe it. So, live up to it. Live up to it with less rudeness and much less patronization in offers to "help." (One of the first snooty commenters to my original post, whom I thought I had blocked, offered a patronizing "we're here to help you enjoy the mountains" or similar in response to my final comment there. And, that would be the Peter Chorlton mentioned above. "Yes, I called you a douche award winner but I'm here to help!" Just a big of cognitive dissonance there!)

Also, the many "man up" type comments weren't pretending to offer help. And, to the degree I skimmed the main pages of a few, or their header pix, or other things before blocking them, a chunk of them appeared to be wingnuts, who per myself long before Elizabeth Warren, are the types usually hypocritical on "self-sufficiency." Others? Re what I noted about "first post"? People who themselves had joined the group in just the last couple of years, some recently saying "first 14er," and making no effort to ask about my own hiking history. I believe the word "douche" was mentioned elsewhere. NObody asked me if I climbed Sherman anyway, how many 14ers I've done or anything else.

(And, until a day later, I didn't realize that a friend from elsewhere in the social media world, and one who lives outside the US, was a member of the group. C'est la vie.)

There ARE alternatives. I'm trying to remember the one I stumbled across that, I think included all 68 in the contiguous 48, not just Colorado's, before I went on vacation. (I've not done any of the 12 in the Sierras, and certainly not Shasta or Rainier, both of which are glaciated at top.)

===

As for the actual hike? Technically, I went to about 14,010 feet. There's enough of a knife ridge at the top, and the wind was blowing enough that day that, at my 6-5 height, I didn't feel entirely comfortable going too far past the last false summit. (The husband/boyfriend of a couple coming back down said that the stronger winds were in pockets; she said she hadn't wanted to go but he made her.) And, yes, I know Class 3 and 4 14ers are worse. I noted in my mind that the second time I was at Angel's Landing in Zion, I only went halfway out. In other words, for various reasons, I know my limits, physical and at times psychological, in such situations.

As for Mount Sherman in general? Maybe it is in part that the trailhead is at treeline and there's some psychology, but it has to be the ugliest, dumpiest 14er I've climbed.

Handies? Pretty nice. Ditto, Evans. Bierstadt and Elbert, not bad. (I was in a late-start hiking day hurry to get down off it.) Pikes Peak kind of a rockpile itself and definitely NOT a "purple mountain majesties," and I don't care if Katherine Lee Bates was inspired to that phrase in "America the Beautiful," I still recall it (on an overcast early fall day) as kind of a rockpile.

==

Sidebar: I'd been thinking about leaving THE American Southwest Facebook group for some time. John Crossley is almost as much a Nazi snowflake admin as those at some religious subreddits. A few years ago, he said "no photo links from websites." I forgot he expanded that to "no YouTube links from videos." So, I direct-uploaded one, and that was hauled down too. So, with that, I first deleted every picture post of mine but one, so I could leave a semi-fuck-off farewell there as well as in a separate comment. Besides indicating what I thought of Crossley, albeit without name, also told people I was in multiple MeWe groups that had no problems with photo or video links. That's that. (I did mention Crossley by name on my own Facebook page.)

If Crossley thought he would really get swamped with link spam, call on a couple more assistant mods. (I did not block any of them.)

MeWe dodges that, in part, by being much lower traffic, I know. But, still, there's a principle. And, life is too short to deal with these Nazi and/or snowflake mods.

Texas Progressives talk new hypocrisies

Texas Department of Criminal Justice hates prison guards as well as inmates (even while it joins ROTC in recruiting for new guards in public schools). And, it's abortion/fetal life-hypocritical on this as well.

Ronny Jackson tried to pull the "don't you know who I am" at a rodeo southwest of Amarillo, and DPS and sheriff's deputies were having none of it.

Will House GOP rurales cave on vouchers in another Strangeabbott special section? The Trib looks at the possibility of ideas from a special committee peeling off enough, and getting enough Danny Goebites in the Senate to sign off on a scaled-down version.

A federal grand jury is talking to people about Kenny Boy, aka Warren Kenneth Paxton. In case Tony Buzbee tries to lie about this, there's no double jeopardy because state and federal criminal tracks are separate and because impeachment is not a criminal case. Off the Kuff writes more about that federal grand jury in San Antonio.

 SocraticGadfly, back from vacation, was stimulated by something he saw during it to write about climate change hypocrisy in Colorado.

Could some sort of small-scale version of a voltage regulator boost the potential of backyard wind power? Read here. 

Dos Centavos tells us his feelings regarding the idea of TXDPS on Houston streets after so many fiascos under Greg Abbott.

Neil at Houston Democracy Project says Houston Mayoral candidate John Whitmire wants Texas DPS troopers in Houston, but seems unaware that DPS boss Greg Abbott is himself a public safety threat to Houstonians.

The Monthly notes in a guest piece by Nina Burleigh that some Religious Right group, with the name of "The Nazarene," is grifting at $69 a pop for people to see the fake James ossuary, on tour for 8 weeks in the Metromess. The story adds that none of the Israeli court controversy will be discussed as part of the exhibit. Nor has a finalized list of other display items been given, but they all apparently belong to unconvicted seeming forger Oded Golan. "The Nazarene" website is likewise taciturn, but does note that for those not set out enough by $69, swag will be available at a gift shop. (I will have more on my religion and philosophy blog.)

Texas Monthly explains how the Big XII is still standing as the PAC-12 stands in ruins.  

CultureMap introduces us to a documentary about how the Austin/San Antonio region may soon surpass the Houston region in size.  

Reform Austin reports on how Texas' gun culture fuels the fentanyl trade. 

The San Antonio Report explores the de-religioning of America.  

Chris Geidner looks at a bizarre judge's order allowing an extremist advocacy group to do "religious liberty training" at Southwest Airlines. 

The Austin Chronicle discusses the importance of Travis County DA Jose Garza's re-election bid. 

 Bill Kelly got to visit the White House with the Astros and meet the President, all of which is quite cool.

Progressives, national roundup

Duopolist Liza Featherstone (Mrs. Duopolist Doug Henwood) calls out Dear Leader Obama at duopolist Jacobin magazine. What she says is true, but it's from inside a glass house.

Ryan Cooper shows he's not to be taken seriously if he uses the excuse of "China's going to do it if nothing else" to actively push geoengineering. He's not a left-liberal, he's a left-neoliberal solutionist.

Carbonmonger Joe's Department of Energy passed out more than $1 billion in grants for project-level carbon capture plants here in Tex-ass and in Louisiana. DeSmog has more, including the reminder that energy giant Oxy has one of these, as a greenwashing license to drill more oil

Per Ballotpedia, the number of bills about ranked-choice voting, many by duopoly-controlled state legislatures trying to shut down local options, grew a lot this year. MAGA and BlueMAGA know they're hated, and their only response is to try to block the #duopolyexit exits.

Good piece by Al Jazeera about all the countries jockeying for influence with Pacific Island nations.

I did not have "Who is Brandon Phillips for $500, Alex?" on my Democratic challengers to Warmonger Joe Jeopardy Bingo card.

Hand-counting ballots is pricey and still error-laden. And, it's not some elite academics who said that, but Movaje County, Arizona's county government.

RFK Jr.: Anti-abortion rights grifter and liar. And, yeah, Bob, you were lying about misunderstanding the question.

WHAT Fairfield Lake State Park?

Todd Interests, taking a page from the playbook of Strangeabbott on the Rio Grande, has already started the bulldozers and earthmovers at the former Fairfield Lake State Park, apparently essentially daring the state to not only go ahead with an eminent domain lawsuit, but also to get injunctions issued to stop them.

Ain't happening, and this whole thing is a head fake on the part of the state, IMO, and the Trib agrees:

The agency has yet to file paperwork to initiate condemnation in court.

Remember, this isn't the only Tex-ass state park that's actually on private land. I blogged about this months ago. With Fairfield now former, and that ain't being reversed, there are still 14 others like it, I noted. That includes state parks near the Metromess like Ray Roberts and Joe Pool. Most are on the sites of former coal-fired power plants, and Texas Parks and Wildlife has done no more to acquire their land than it did Fairfield.

Update, Aug. 25: Not that this will affect TPWD's plans to head fake but actually do nothing about Fairfield Lake (or likely the other 14) but yesterday, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission officially adopted a policy limiting its eminent domain only to addressing issues like this. (Again, which it won't actually do.)

Update, Sept. 2: A week after that, TPWD has started the eminent domain process. They'll lose. Todd has already, as noted, started work, and therefore, their "fair value" now has been hugely reset. It ain't $103 million now; it's Todd's expected 30-year or whatever value on that as a development.

Yes, China has homelessness and poverty

That set of essential facts is contra "Aunt Fanny" (Rainer Shea's auntie? Max Blumenthal's? depends on whether she's just clueless or self-deceiving, to be the former's, or a paid shill, to be the latter's) on Twitter claiming neither exist in the Xi Jinping Middle Kingdom.

In any case, they're clearly a Xi Jinping Thought Kool-Aid peddler and drinker, hence pulling out my years-old but still valuable photoshopping.

In my first response, I went with the former, due to the small amount of followers they have:

There's no poverty in China? Really? What planet of fucking gullibility or Xi Jinping PR do you live on? Are you Rainier Shea's aunt from The People's Republic of Humboldt County?

— TheRealSocraticGadfly (@real_gadfly) August 13, 2023

Brookings, among others, sets her straight on poverty. Brookings notes that Xi did declare poverty over in 2020, while dropping hints this may have been in part anti-COVID coverup  PR. As for whether that's true or not, Brookings says yes with a BIG asterisk, the big being the amount of bar-lowering Beijing has done to claim that, as in lowering the poverty bar line by two-thirds from where it should be. Gee, the US would be almost poverty-free, too, by that standard.

Homelessness? The Lancet addresses that in respect to the mentally ill in China. For the big picture, there's this Wiki page aptly entitled "homelessness in China." Per it, homelessness among rural Chinese migrating to big cities for urban jobs has been a known problem for 20 or more years and no, it hasn't gone away. As far as Chinese compassion, The Lancet notes that COVID lockdowns stripped away vital services from many mentally ill homeless people, and cites specific examples.

I mean, China has surely done something to cut poverty and homelessness, but in reality, Chinese data on issues like this are about as trustworthy as legend vs reality on Chinese COVID deaths.

US/NATO/Nat-Sec Nutsack Axis wants to fight PAST the last Ukrainian?

John Helmer reports that with the failure of Ukraine's vaunted counteroffensive, it's doubling down instead on a new PR counteroffensive. He adds that polling inside Russia shows growing support for Putin, despite the wishful thinking of the US-NATO/Nat-sec Nutsack axis, and growing acceptance the war could continue into 2024.

BUT, contra what Helmer and others of us had been led to believe? The Axis apparently is going to ignore its previous end-of-year deadline for Ukraine and is already looking at next year's fight, specifically a spring offensive, because this year's "vaunted Ukrainian counteroffensive" went so damned well. That said, with good info that Zelensky is over 100,000 casualties, where are the warm bodies coming from? I've already, with both hashtags, asked the #NAFOFellas aka #NAFONazis if any of them is leaving the Fighting 101st Keyboarders and going to the actual front lines.

Sadly, from the non-duopoly POV, both the #BlueMAGA and #MAGA parties, outside the House Freedom Fries Caucus, will continue to support this nuttery. Just like Afghanistan. Just like Iraq. Just like Vietnam. And, I'm sure that within #BlueAnon, the Progressive Cuck-us, minus perhaps part of the Fraud Squad, will continue to sign off, too.

Addressing misinformation part 3 means don't spread it first, or, the ballad of the reality of Jessica McCabe and Ryan Knight

Calling out "proud socialist" Ryan Knight this time, with a reminder he was a Berner before he was a Green. Here's the tweet.

She’s right and if your reaction is to mock her then you’re part of the problem too. Until the people of this country come together and reject both capitalist parties who use the state to enrich themselves & their corporate donors things will continue to get worse. https://t.co/ZZ0KdlN15p

— Ryan Knight ☭🕊 (@ProudSocialist) August 10, 2023

In my last response, I said:

And, listening through her rant? She's in Alabama. Tell me where in Alabama you have to have a six-figure salary to get a little bitty place to live. $2,000 for a studio apartment? Trulia shows lots of full 1-bedroom apartments @ $1,000-$1,500. Off to blog https://t.co/7BLVEYOnaz

— TheRealSocraticGadfly (@real_gadfly) August 12, 2023

Simple facts. That's not mocking, Ryan. It's "fact-checking." 

That said, "fact-checking" won't change her mind, but, to riffing on part two of this semi-series, one can't preach against the motivated reasoning behind misinformation without first recognizing that misinformation is at hand. And it is, Ryan.

Jumping from the price of a one-bedroom apartment (I don't know if Birmingham is more or less expensive than Montgomery, Mobile or Huntsville, to cite some other larger places in Alabama) to nearly twice that for a studio is not just hyperbole, it's misinformation, Ryan.

Besides, did said mom live by herself after moving out on her own, or with roommates? Has her son not considered that? After moving back out from my dad's, I never did that, but? I lived frugally. That includes living in an actual studio.

The reason I note Ryan used to be a Berner was that Bernie himself, of course, ostensibly made a class-based appeal to voters regardless of ethnicity in 2016. And, offered up similar blind spots himself.

I'm not saying that Bama Mama is a full-on Karen; I am saying she should be treated skeptically.

 

I add to that by noting that Bama Mama Jessica McCabe's video had the classic social media influencer framing; and, the fact that it was amplified on Fox adds to this. (It also raises the "coincidence or not" angle.) Someone sitting in the front seat of a car, as if they had thoughts that just happened to pop into their head while stopped at a red light, goes off on a rant. (McCabe is also on Instagram. And, she went semi-viral with a radio station profile 14 months ago. And, part of the story there is that she gave a smackdown to one of her sons about just how viral she could go, which means we should be more skeptical yet, right Ryan Knight?)

 

OK, TikTok says Millbrook, Bammy. Metro Montgomery. So, the same Trulia info I tweeted to Ryan with change of city? And, it's even WORSE for her truth-stretching and Ryan's suckerdom. Trulia for Montgomery not only shows plenty of 1-bedroom apartments for $1,000-$1,500 a month, but even duplexes and a few houses (two or three bedroom) that look at least OK.

Millbrook itself? Per City-Data, rents nowhere near that high.

 

Be more skeptical, Ryan. If not, you'll get mocked if anybody does. You're also — yes, we're at that point — going to get mocked for doing a cheap ex-Berner attempted drive-by on Blue Anoners without doing your own research.

And (although he falls into it himself at times)? Per Jeff St. Clair? Ryan, don't be in the more credulous precincts of the left.

 

Finally, the phenomenon demonstrated by Ryan, and also by other Berner types on things like COVID deserves its own hashtag, and so I invent #BernAnon to deliberately play off #BlueAnon. Deal with it.

Branko Marcetic's latest cluelessness, ignorance or stupidity: Woody Harrelson and RFK Jr.

So, Jacobin staffer Marcetic was surprised that Woody Harrelson would endorse RFK Jr.?

Per my tweet below, derp!

Harrelson was a nutter even b4 becoming anti-vaxxer. The fact that Branko couldn't see Woody being an RFK Jr. supporter speaks volumes about him, not Harrelson. (But is not surprising; Branko is still a duopolist who backed voting Green b4 only because he was a butt-hurt Berner.) https://t.co/JeL0LJNs7c

— TheRealSocraticGadfly (@real_gadfly) August 11, 2023

First, Woody's been a nutter long before he became an antivaxxer, as I noted.

Second, yes, as blogged three years ago when I removed Jacobin from my blogroll, he and the mag really aren't that far left.

Third, to the degree they approach being that far left, them and others? I'm a non-Marxist leftist. Not even a post-Marxist; I reject his dialectical materialism starting point.

Fourth, it may actually have been Sunkara who felt that was on Bernie, butt-hurtness and the Greens, but I know it was somebody at Jacobin.

Update, Aug. 20: Eric London of World Socialist roasts Branko's fellating of AOC in this Twitter thread. (London probably won't like me being non-Marxist, but you dance an individual dance with them what brung you to the first slot on the dance card, to modify Darrell Royal.)

The fascist hell in Marion, Kansas

Eric Meyer, owner and publisher of the Marion County Record, speaks in more detail about last week’s police raid on his newspaper, which included seizure of ALL newspaper computers and other items.

The big new takeaway? Besides the story already printed about restaurateur Kari Newell booting Record staff out of a meeting she was having with Congressman Jake LaTurner, and beyond information provided by an anonymous source to both her and the town’s assistant mayor about a previous DUI that might, indeed, have affected her application for a special event liquor permit?

The paper had been investigating information from anonymous sources about newly hired Police Chief Gideon Cody about him possibly leaving his previous policing position rather than face fines and/or demotion over sexual misconduct issues.

That would, of course, be the same person who led and organized this raid, and who would have assisted in getting the warrant for it, and who might have known that federal law requires a subpoena in such cases — and who now claims the Privacy Protection Act’s subpoena requirement does not apply in criminal cases. Per its Facebook statement, there is a HUGE conflict of interest when the Marion PD sets itself up as judge, jury and executioner on deetermining when an alleged loophole on the Privacy Protection Act exists when its own chief is under investigation.

And, Chief Cody (no hiding behind “police department statement,” since you ARE the police department in a small town — Marion is just under 2,000 and probably has three-five cops max outside the chief) is STILL wrong. The PPA notes that when a newspaper or other First Amendment-protected institution faces a warrant without subpoena it is STILL supposed to be given adequate opportunity to file an affidavit of objection. That CLEARLY did not happen.

Let us also add, contra claims by Newell and allies, that the Record is "twisted" or "out to get people" or whatever, that the Record did NOT run a story on her DUI, suspecting it came from her soon-to-be ex-husband and that, per Meyer, "We thought we were being set up." Also, the Record had NOT run any stories so far about Cody's background or hiring, but it DID contact the city with what it had heard, and, according to Meyer, the city LIED about having already contacted the Kansas City, Missouri Police Department.

This is more than just prior restraint, although that’s part of it. It’s also clearly an illegal, authoritarian attempt to uncover anonymous sources.

As a newspaper editor myself, I hope the Record’s federal lawsuit names individuals, not just the city of Marion.