The headlines are "Green Beret Slams Gyneth Paltrow;" "Ticked Off Green Beret Shreds Gyneth Paltrow. "Mocks," "Smacked down," "Torn apart."

Paltrow said the online hatred of her is “is almost like, how in war, you go through this bloody dehumanizing thing and then something is defined out of it.”

To which Green Beret Sergeant First Class Bryan Sikes, "Bad Ass," so-called by a "good buddy," wrote:

"I could see how you, and others like you in “the biz”, could be so insecure and mentally weak that you could pair the difficulty of your life on twitter to my brothers who have had their limbs ripped off and seen their friends shot, blown up, burned and disfigured, or wake up every morning in pain – while just starting the day is a challenge."

And:

"You know what is really “dehumanizing”, Miss Paltrow? The fact that you’d even consider that your life as an “A-list” celebrity reading internet comments could even compare to war and what is endured on the battlefield. You and the other “A-listers” that think like you are laughable."

And:

"You all have actually convinced yourselves that you in some way face difficulty on a regular basis. Let me be the first to burst your bubble: a long line at Starbucks, your driver being 3 minutes late, a scuff mark on your $1200 shoes and a mean tweet do not constitute difficulty in the eyes of a soldier."

And:

"Understand me when I say this: war does not define me. It is a chapter in my life that helped shaped me. Being a husband and father is what defines me. Remember, sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never…be close to what war is."

Yeah! Heh-heh-heh.

Sergeant No-Class, Dumb Ass Bryan Sikes, you are a 'roid enraged, pumped-up, muscle-bound, muscle-head, with an IQ less than your bicep size, a member of a volunteer military, a career "choice" made necessity by your "skills." You are a disgrace to your uniform, which I gather is a tee-shirt, cowboy hat and shades, a disgrace to your assault rifle, over-sized compensation for your small, personal "weapon." You are a disgrace to your country, whose average character and intelligence you enhance with your absence. You spend time reading People magazine online rather than tending to your duties with the 147th Mess Kit Repair Division. And, Sergeant, you pick on girls. Keep calm and get a real job. Punk.

The Soul of America.

"With their acquisitive drive for wealth and happiness, their love of commerce, their economic and (in earlier times) territorial expansiveness, and their universalistic ideology, [Americans] never had it in them to wall themselves off from the rest of the world."
-Robert Kagan in The New Republic. 

Yeh-ep. Unfortunately, what Kagan says there is accurate. The soul of America is the pursuit of happiness. Unfortunately, America pursues its foreign policy by the stars of its birth curse. Unfortunately, as Kagan has written elsewhere, "Americans are from Mars, Europeans are from Venus." Unfortunately, Kagan thinks that is a good thing! He doesn't think the p.o.h. is a curse nor a p.o.h.-based foreign policy star-crossed. Unfortunately, Kagan is influential. Unfortunately, so is his wife, for Robert Kagan is First Laddie to Victoria "Fuck the EU" Nuland. America and its foreign policy are cursed by the two of them. Unfortunately.

Americans are from Mars, Europeans are from Venus; Kagan and Nuland, open your mouths and suck my penis.

Oh, c'mon, you couldn't have resisted those puns either.

The Importance of Being Earnest.

Jay Carney is departing his position of White House Press Secretary for parts unknown. Carney'a replacement is Deputy Press Secretary "Josh" "Earnest."  Josh has already had one moment in the sun. Subbing for Carney last summer, Josh was asked why the U.S. was not declaring the coup d'etat in Egypt a coup d'etat. "It is not in the interests of the United States to make that determination," was his response. He wasn't joshing. He was being earnest. 

The Green Fairy beckons. And I go thither.

It is Friday. 

I should like to offer to Mr. Steve Ballmer, if he is interested in acquiring additional distressed properties, this one, for sale for under $2 billion. 

Made 47 cents this month from Google Ads, 30 cents from the U.S., 9 cents from Singapore, 7 cents from Thailand, one from Australia. 'Preciate it, Google. Thanks. Really appreciate it. Really, really, really, really, really appreciate it.

The Los Angeles Times is reporting that former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer has purchased the Los Angeles "Clippers" basketball team from Donald Sterling nee Tokowitz and his wife for $2 billion. That is four-times the highest price ever paid for an American professional basketball team. Is that the world record for any sports team? I cannot think of another that has sold for $2 billion. Manchester United was not. 

MH370.

Hey: Those pings in the south Indian Ocean? Fuggedaboutem. "False" pings. Came from the search ship or the ping detecter. Search concluded. Plane not in search area. Wrong search area. False ping search area. Waste of time search area. Waste of money search area. Have nice day.

"Edward Snowden is a coward, he is a traitor and he has betrayed his country,” Kerry said in an interview on MSNBC’s “The Daily Rundown” with Chuck Todd. 

Oh my God, the Europeans kid Kerry about the bugging! Lol.

That "man up" there is my hero.

"Chuck Todd: White House, Kerry Have "so much rage" at Snowden."-Medialite.

"That wasn’t political theater. Sometimes you hear anger that’s political theater, that’s real rage. And the anger with Edward Snowden has to do with not the theft itself, but the selective leaks that they hate that they believe has undermined America’s standing in the world.”

And beyond that, Todd reported, Kerry tends to get pretty irritated every time he meets with European leaders and they keep cracking jokes about whether the NSA’s spying on the meeting. “That’s why they have so much rage at Edward Snowden,” he said.

I don't know who Chuck Todd is, but Chuck Todd is right.

My desk is bigger than Hitler's. Messier, too.

Secretary of State, John Kerry stated that National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden “should man up and come back to the United States.” Snowden recently was interviewed on NBC News and mentioned that he only remained in Russia due to Washington deciding to revoke his passport.

Kerry retaliated on NBC “Today” remarking, “Well for a supposedly smart guy, that’s a pretty dumb answer.”

Kerry then went on to say, “If Mr. Snowden wants to come back to the United States, we’ll have him on a flight today.” Kerry continued to say that he would like for Snowden to “make his case to the American people.”

Snowden should "man up." I see. 

Had a whatcha call a reader, pageviewer, whatever, today from Aruba. Aruba, Jamaica...come on pretty mama...That doesn't rhyme, it had to rhyme. Aruba, contuse ya...No. Hated that song, anyway. SOOO stupid. Get's stuck in your head and then you want to shoot yourself in the head. One yesterday from Kyrzackstan. How the hell do you spell that...click on it...No replacements found! That means I wasn't even close. C'mon. That's close. The "stan" is right, the "K." Whadda they want, I don't know how to spell friggin Kyr...it's not "zack," that doesn't look right, "zick? There's a "y" in there somewhere, let's see if it prompts me on Kyrzickstan...Mother-humper...Khyrzikstan? Son of a frigging...Hey Google, nice frigging spell-check. Swine.

So, I'll be moseying right along and I'll say good night to all you'uns, all yinz peoples, all y'all. I don't know, tomorrow maybe we'll have Hitler's desk, or my desk, I don't know. We'll see. We'll take it day-by-day. Play 'em one game at a time. One desk at a time. Maybe we'll branch out into chairs, I don't know. 

Manchester, England was the world's first industrial city and that desk up there, in Chetham's Library, is where Karl Marx wrote The Communist Manifesto. Yes, he did, right-jere. Him and Engels used to meet there. Yes, they did, right-jere. Cool.

MockAfrica.com

Nigerian "Air Chief Marshal" Alex Bedah, today:

"We want our girls back, I can tell you that our military can and will do it, but where they are held, can we go there with force?.

``Nobody should say Nigerian military does not know what it is doing; we can’t kill our girls in the name of trying to get them back.

``So we are working, the President has empowered us to do the work, anybody castigating the military, definitely there is something wrong with him."

``The good news for the parents of the girls is that we know where they are, but we cannot tell you.

"We cannot come and tell you the military secret, just leave us alone, we are working to get the girls back.

``We are not happy at all, because we are killing our own kinsmen and we are killing mostly the youths.

"We cannot afford to eliminate our youths, who are we going to hand over Nigeria to, we can't kill them.

"So, we are using our lives to defend the democracy, democracy must thrive in Nigeria, whether anybody likes it or not.

"People have finally realised that you don't have another military than this one and it is either you support your military or you are looking for anarchy.

"This war should not be fought by the military alone, but by all Nigerians, Nigeria is at war and everybody must put hands on deck.

"So, if you can't do anything else, but you have mouth to support the military, don't disparage it because you don't have another one.

“I know that people from outside Nigeria are in this war, they want to destabilise us.

"This is our country and some people are standing with the forces of darkness; we must savage our country and bring sanity back into our nation."

It is Memorial Day in the United States. This post and this day, in memory of:

Sgt. Nathan Bracken, 133rd Pennsylvania Volunteers Regiment. Killed in action December 13, 1862, Fredericksburg, Virginia.

Lt. John W. K. Ranck, 10th Mountain Division, 5th U.S. Army. Killed in action April 30, 1945, near Nago, Italy.

Ukraine has not yet died.

No, it sure hasn't! Elected a new president Sunday, Petro O. Poroshenko, a pro-Western billionaire businessman. God keep the Ukrainian people and their new president.

Are you fucking kidding me? That is not a still from Roots or some other movie. Those are actual Mauritanian slaves! Slavery was outlawed there in...2007.  One person has been prosecuted. Slavery is still widespread. Culturally embedded. An article I read had it that the Mauritanian government has tried, is trying to end it. The government can't do it? Why? I saw another headline from 2014, the United Nations is, I don't know, looking into it or something. Can the UN take military action? It can, right? Or can it only do peacekeeping? Friends and enemies, we cannot let this continue. Jews say the U.S. should have bombed the concentration camps. I think we did bomb a camp or two or some railroads, belatedly. Good God, I can understand why FDR didn't, or didn't do more: We're going to kill the Jews? No. Hitler had the market on that, we're not going to bomb the Jews in the camps to save other Jews so Hitler could kill them less efficiently. NO.

Now, here in Mauritania, what do we, the world "we," the U.S. "we," me "we" do. Arright, well me personally, I'm out. Too old. Back hurts. Don't have a gun. Not good with a gun when I was young and had a strong back. Almost killed my brother with a shotgun. Hunting. Walking. Behind my brother. Didn't put the safety on. Didn't crack the gun either. Boom. Six inches from his foot. Miles from hospital. Didn't know how to drive. Too young. He would have bled out if I could have driven. So I'm out.

Anyway. These slave owners in Mauritania aren't concentrated, I don't suppose. Can't bomb them even if we wanted to. We could send in commandos to: 1. Take out the government, which isn't doing, or can't do, anything. 2. Find and kill the slave owners and free the slaves.

Why don't we do that? Didn't we do that with "ethnic cleansing" in Bosnia? We did. I don't know why we don't do that. Because the rest of Africa would be mad at us? Would they? Probably some would. FUCK AFRICA! What is Africa going to do, sanction us? Withhold sheep? Locusts? Are we not intervening because the slaves are Black? We frigging intervened militarily to free Black slaves in America. My frigging great-great grandfather bled out at Fredericksburg to free Black slaves in America. It can't be we're not doing it because of race. Dude...and Dudette, if we don't do something, and we can, this is on us. When you don't do something when you could have done something, then you're a frigging ASSHOLE. 

Can't mock slavery.

The Islamic Republic of Mauritania:

French.

HDI, 155th.

From Wikipedia:

"The government of Mauritania was overthrown on August 6, 2008, in a militarycoup d'état led by General Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz. On 16 April 2009, General Aziz resigned from the military to run for president in the 19 July elections, which he won.

In Mauritania about 20% of the population live on less than US$1.25 per day.^[10] Slavery in Mauritania has been called a major human rights issue, with over 150,000 people^[11] – proportionally the highest for any country – being enslaved against their will, especially enemies of the government.^[12] Higher estimates suggest 10% to 20% of the population (340,000 to 680,000 people) is enslaved.^[13] Additional human rights concerns in Mauritania include female genital mutilation,^[14] child labour, and human trafficking."

Makes me physically ill. So far, Africa has made me physically ill. So far, Africa is the asshole of mankind.

The Answer is Islam.

Islam slaughtered twenty more at a market in the Nigerian village of Kamuyya today. On Thursday last, twenty-eight were murdered and the houses in three villages burned. Since the abduction of hundreds of girls on April 14, at least 470 people, all civilians, have been murdered. The government of Nigeria
has
done
nothing.

In our imperfect and as yet incomplete survey of the font of humanity, we cannot help but to have made some generalizations based on our observations, as we cultural anthropologists do.

We note sand. We note sand all over the place, sand of different colors, sand of every race, color and creed.

We note that of the African people profiled so far, about half, it seems to us, have been darkly-complected. Since we left the Mediterranean all have been. None have been of that race of humanity known as "White." Yet...yet: Yet we have not failed to notice, lurking in the dusky shadows, the Pale Horse. Englishmen ruled Egypt, we know. That influence has not turned out particularly well, it seems to us. Those descendants of Englishmen who declared their independence from the Crown in the New World had, until very lately, a strong influence in Egypt also. The bird hit the air pump again. And we seem to remember English influence in other of the north African countries but we're not 100% sure.

More so, it seems, has been the influence, so far, of those pale-faces who are Sons of Napoleon: in Algeria, in Tunisia, in Morocco at water's edge, and in the sandbox, practically every country surveyed to this point. We pay tribute to these seeds of the fleur de lis which have flowered so luxuriantly in the Sahara.

And, of course, we note the benign presence of Muhammad. Everywhere.

MockAfrica.com

Heavens, another blowfish-ish shaped country in Africa.

This is Mali.

Not to be confused with Bali. Or Bally.

This is Mali's Seal.

"Un peuple, un but, une foi" is not to be confused with "Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Fuhrer," on account of it's French. The foi of which there is only une is Islam. So...maybe. Comme ci comme ca.

Mali checks in with a robust HDI rank of 182nd, lagging only slightly behind its blowfish neighbor Niger in quest for bottom.

Among the agreeable cultural practices of Mali is female genital mutilation which adorns 85%-91%
of those eligible. Which nicely correlates with the 90% of Malians who are Muslim.

The fourth Google image that shows actual Malians is this one, a charming shot of a friendly member of the gendarme with a Captain Hook like device in his left hand offering assistance to an elderly un of the peuple. So nice.

The undersigned wanderer has a blurred memory of some upset among the un peuple in the north of Mali so it could be that, too.

Thus Mali.

Where is Voyager?

Distance from Earth	19,013,573,823 KM 127.09789072 AU
Distance from the Sun	19,134,912,110 KM 127.90898708 AU
Roundtrip Light Time from the Sun	35:14:04 hh:mm:ss

That's Voyager 1. It's in interstellar space. Still going--further and further away--since launch 37 years ago in September. The NASA website has the distance updated in real-time.

MockAfrica.com

Niger is a very interesting country. The first thing we have to know about Niger is that it is not Nigeria. This becomes difficult because the people of Niger are called Nigerians and the people of Nigeria are called Nigerians. So we have to use something else. Ok, Niger is the country that looks like a blowfish swimming to the bottom.

 Which actually is where it is in terms of the United Nations Human Development Index. 186th out of 186 countries. Nice! Also, Nigeria is the country with the President named Goodluck, the First Lady named Patience and the Petroleum Minister named Ever. Niger does not have good luck or patience. Ever. What Niger has is sand: 80% of the blowfish is desert.

Niger also has a National Museum, which is one of the best in all of West Africa,

and a palatial Temple to the Law:

Niger also has a modern transportation infrastructure.

Ground transportation is augmented with a fleet of well-appointed taxis and friendly drivers.

There is no traffic congestion in Niger.

Ever.

Reliable motor vehicles are available for rental in case the camel breaks down.

A cheerful "Welcome" sign greets tourists to the capital.

Four- and five-crescent rated hotels, this one from only $102/night, are plentiful.

As is sophisticated catch-and-eat al fresco dining.

All this, without the false comfort of alcohol on account of Niger is strictly Islamic.

Nice!

MockAfrica.com

In our tour of Africa we inadvertently omitted "Eritrea, Eritrea, Eritrea," the country and its imaginatively-titled anthem. We remedy this omission.

Eritrea has been independent (of Ethiopia) since 1993 and has rocketed to the bottom of the planet's countries, ranking dead last in press freedoms, behind even North Korea :o. Which is impossible for us to conceive. But which the Eritreans have done, done, done.

Islam and Roman Catholicism are the only two religions permitted in Eritrea and even Protestant Christians, such as Presbyterians, are persecuted. Which we believe is unique.

Eritrea is a one-party state, which does not surprise us. Elections are required by the Eritrean constitution. But have never been held.

Eritrea's exports are reflected in this tree-map, courtesy of Wikipedia:

Eritrea, Eritrea, Eritrea! Where men are men. And the sheep are nervous.

Cristiano Ronaldo on a penalty makes it 4-1. Oh, a cruel line for Atletico, all of Real's goals coming in the 90th minute and beyond. Congratulations to the champions.

And now Marcelo, in the 118th minute, has wrapped it up for Real Madrid, who will win la decima, their tenth UCL title. 

Gareth Bale scores in the 110 minute and it is 2-1, Real.

Last year it was an all German final, this year it is all Madrid, as Real and Atletico play for the Champions League title. Sergio Ramos scored in the 90th minute to tie and they are now in the 107th minute and still tied.

Goodluck!

This incomprehensible advertisement on Public Occurrences is dedicated to MockAfrica.com.

"And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance...I hope you dance...I hope you dance"

Dedicated to Dion.

"This world was never meant for one as beautiful as you."

Dedicated to Garman.

NSA.

The United States House of Representatives passed a law that would have reigned in NSA. "But," in the words of The New York Times:

"in the last days before the vote, intelligence and Obama administration officials watered down the original bill by the Judiciary and Intelligence Committees, turning many technology companies and advocates against it."

Swine.

When is a coup not a coup?

When it's in Egypt.

A coup d'etat occurred in Thailand today. The United States immediately called it:

“I am disappointed by the decision of the Thai military to suspend the constitution and take control of the government after a long period of political turmoil, and there is no justification for this military coup.”- Secretary of State John Kerry.

John-John still has not called the July, 2013 coup in Egypt a coup. Neither has any other Obama official. Why? It's not in U.S. interests. Swine.

"We Muslims are one body."

Today that one body killed 31 more in Xinjiang, China.

"We Muslims are one body."

Note written by Boston Marathon bomber Dzhokhar Tsarnaev as he lay hiding from police in a boat.

Nationalmuseumofchad.

MockAfrica.com

The U.S. is sending 80 military intel people to Chad to help "Bring Back Our Girls!" Maybe Chad is where the girls are; maybe Goodluck doesn't want the U.S. military on sacred Nigerian soil--I don't friggin know why Chad, but Chad it is:

I take it there's not much water in Chad.

Ominously, this photo's title is "Chad farming."

I do not know if this photo had "Chad housing" in the title. I hope not. My good people, move out of Chad.

"Chad camp." Why, because the other one WAS Chad housing? Is there ANY water in goddamned 

Chad?

What are those things? I demand to know what those things are! Grain storage from the fecund Chad farming? Yurt's or something? Maybe that's where Chad keeps its water. Where the heck are the 80 U.S. military personnel going to stay? What are they going to eat and drink? How did they luck into this assignment?

Wish I had one of those spacesuits.

Good night.

I'm bored, man.

Hey! Look! NASA's new spacesuit! Wowww! Betcha like that more than pageviews by country, huh? Huh! Wow. And don't forget, yesterday morning we had McDonald's new mascot, John Wayne Gacy.

You're welcome.

Hey friends and enemies, show of hands, how many would like a continuation of our popular daily series "Public Occurrences Pageviews by Country," huh how about it!

Thatwillconcludeourpopularseries"publicoccurrencespageviewsbycountry."

May 20:

United States 35
Germany 8
Russia 7
Spain 3
China 2
Indonesia 2
India 2
Italy 2
Poland 2
Vietnam 2

May 19:

United States 32

Turkey 12

Germany 8

Russia 6

Slovenia 5

France 3

South Korea 2

Lithuania 2. Don't worry Lithiums, we'll protect you from the big, bad Russian bear!  Vilnius is JUST AS IMPORTANT to us as Washington! 

Malaysia 2

Australia 1

Hated by some, disliked by many, liked by some, loved by few.

Good morning.

Wow, that is just awful. That is McDonald's new mascot, replacing Ronald. ?? I think Graphic Design got it backwards: McDonald's is where children go to eat, not where children go to be eaten. Honest mistake.

China, America.

Attorney General Eric Holder announced today that five members of PLIP, the People's Liberation Internet Police have been indicted for spying on American corporations, Westinghouse was one. This is not new news; early in 2013, the media, including this little message-in-a-bottle repeated accusations that Unit 61398 in Shanghai had been traced by the Americans as the source of cyber spying. Back then I certainly took the American side of the dispute. As I recall I suggested the inspired response of hacking into China.gov or whatever it is and redirecting all traffic to a gay porn site.  I'm proud of that brainstorm. It was not adopted.

Things have changed since those Manichean days before the revelations that NSA was bugging European embassies, the personal cell phones of foreign national leaders, and had hollowed out the constitutional guarantees of, like, Americans. America was exposed. America was exposed as the rogue nation that it is, as the world's arch hypocrite, for among the activities we have learned NSA to have engaged in has been the obsessive spying and bugging in order to gain an advantage for the US in trade deals.

The Americans draw a distinction between industrial spying for leverage in government level trade negotiations and the direct theft of American corporate secrets for use by their foreign counterparts. The world disagrees with this interpretation, as it should, for the American distinction is hubristically hypocritical. The world sees the soul of America as corrupt and disingenuous. Which it is. So much of what Holder does is hypocritical, intellectually dishonest, and fruitless. Just as much of what his boss does is the same. I'm all for China, and any other foreign governmental entities, stealing what they can get from America. This America must be brought to its knees. I hope that these challenging attacks on the insatiable amoral shark of American predatory capitalism are successful. This America is the arch rogue state in the world. This America should be destroyed.

May 18:

United States 58
Germany 11
Slovenia 7
China 2
United Kingdom 2
Russia 2
Ukraine 2
Australia 1
Spain 1
France 1

Whoa, look at that, Russia TWO. Two? Rooski, dos? You no like? Wish insult? I insult, Rooski, you no wad panties, I insult. I think of good one Rooski and ZAP! Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha. Rooski want zap. Ha-ha-ha-ha-ha.

MockAfrica.com

What a great idea! And the domain was available. From east to west and north to south:

What a way to start, huh? Egypt deserves another one.

Next:

Another one for Libya, too. A composite, Al-Islam, before and after his finger...surgery:

Drop-off in quality here, I allow. Tunisia.

Had to look a while to find a good one for Algeria, but then..."The Domestication of Culture." OHH, OHH! A home run! At least a triple:

 Morocco. That's the king. Yeah, they have a king. That's the king. Maybe he's a gay king. 

Western Sahara. "The Gateway to Western Sahara." The gateway less traveled.
                                                                   

Back east to Sudan. And the pregnant female doctor condemned to be executed because she is Christian.

We'll pick this up next time with Chad. Chad!  Oh boy, oh boy, oh boy, there are going to be some good ones on Chad!