County Fair
ghostsniper brought up county fairs in a recent post. Here’s a preview of what’s coming up this summer
The magic appears at night; the day, not so much.
County fair Kentucky, August nights
The New American Digest
For Followers of Gerard Van der Leun's Fine Work
12″ sausage sando slathered in peppers and onions and a dollop of brown mustard
warsh the whole mess down with a plastic 48oz cup of frothy golden goodness
Hot August Nights, with the leaves hanging down / And the grass on the ground smellin’ sweet ?
I’m looking at a picture above my desk of a 1951 Studebaker truck loaded with hay. I sold that load of hay to the circus that was visiting our county seat in the summer of 1996. I hope the elephants enjoyed it.
Now that could be the basis of a very good novel. Hay for the elephants.
When our son was about 5 we went to a circus in Fort Myers, FL.
He and I got to ride a full grown elephant.
There was no saddle or anything, just a big firm mat.
It was BIG and mostly flat with a little bit of wave and was kinda like sitting on the floor.
As the elephant slowly walked it swayed side to side to and fro.
Comfortable, could probably fall asleep on it.
OT: Bad news. Apparently a KC-135 has been lost in western Iraq.
https://nypost.com/2026/03/12/us-news/us-refueling-aircraft-crashes-in-iraq-after-incident-in-friendly-airspace-rescue-efforts-under-way/
I have some speculations here, but I’ll give it the 48 hours before I comment.
“Well, it just seems so insane based on what he ran on. I mean, this is why a lot of people feel betrayed, right?” Rogan said. “He ran on no more wars, and these stupid senseless wars, and then we have one that we can’t even really clearly define why we did it.”
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Anybody remember this? Three came down. Remember when Silverstein made the following comment ““I remember getting a call from the fire department commander, telling me that they were not sure they were gonna be able to contain the fire, and I said, ‘We’ve had such terrible loss of life, maybe the smartest thing to do is pull it.’ And they made that decision to pull and we watched the building collapse.”
How could they have “rigged” the building in a few hours to cause a controlled collapse. It is not possible. Or this
Larry Silverstein bought the WTC complex in 2000 and immediately got $3 billion dollars of coverage on WTC 1 and 2 and insured them for all damage including total destruction. The insurance contract included rights to build on top of the complex in the event the buildings were destroyed. A year later, both buildings are destroyed. Even though he took a meeting every morning from WTC, he wasn’t there on 9/11 because his wife booked him a dermatologists appointment. He lives. He argues that each plane hitting the towers constituted a separate terrorist attack, so he should be paid $3 billion for each destroyed building. He ends up winning $4.5 billion dollars, the largest insurance payout ever, and built an entirely new complex on ground zero, which Silverstein Properties owns to this day
Trump is a puppet in wolves clothing.
The only thing that surprises, and disappoints me, anymore is the gullibility and cowardice of the american people. Yes, little a.
-100,000,000 the first year.
The burn off will be glorious.
IMO, Trump’s pre- and post-election rhetoric on war has been simultaneously braggadocious and naive. His claim that [name the event] would have never happened had he been President at the time is something that no one can know. Is he a stronger personality and President than Biden, or Obama? No doubt, in my mind. But [the bad event] that happened on Biden’s or Obama’s watch would have taken a different form had he been President.
It takes two to tango, and when a President or candidate says that he’s running on a “No more wars” platform, he is simply inviting a potential adversary to rachet up his actions. That a war is “senseless” to you or Joe Rogan does not mean that the other side sees it that way. Putin sincerely believes (and has repeatedly said as much in public) that Ukraine is Russian soil. The Ukrainians and most Europeans disagree (and I join them in that disagreement).
If you’re asking why Trump has chosen to go to war with Iran, I think that you’re asking the wrong question. The real question for me is: How long has Iran (and much of the wider Islamic world) been at war with America and the West? The explanation for “why we did it” is that this war has been bubbling along right in front of us for decades. There is a straight line between the airplane hijackings of the 60’s, to the bombings of the Marine Barracks and Embassies, to the nightclub shootings, to 9/11, to the horrors of October 7 and to the lone wolf attacks of this past week. The Islamic world is pushing against the West everywhere. In my view, we are seeing the end of the beginning of a Reverse Crusade.
And that begs the question, “What are we willing to do about it? Are we willing to live our lives on terms set somewhere in the Mideast?” You are free to see it differently, but I don’t think that I am.
I am glad that Trump has taken on Iran. Iran is our biggest Islamic enemy and we would be involved in actions against them in one way or another no matter how you look at it. This is not to say that I think that our war today will be easy or quick (and here again I think that Trump’s rhetoric does not serve him well). By virtue of their geography, Iran can easily disrupt commerce through the Strait of Hormuz.
I may have more thoughts on this tomorrow but we’re spending time with the grands and they have the priority on my time. My thoughts here will lead to China (“Chy-na”), but for now I’m headed to bed.
azlibertarian, I understand your thoughts on this but it is my belief that we (Americans) should concentrate on our own problems. We are crumbling as a nation. It is my opinion that all of our problems stem from the pulpits. We have become an amoral nation without any sense of purpose or direction, a lackey no less for a foreign government that is very content to suck us dry (their words not mine). My American roots go back to the American Revolutionary War, a straight line of service for 250 + years of service. My ancestors are turning over in their graves as I type. Thanks.
My roots also go back to the American Revolution (and before) on both sides 🙂
Our first war (against foreign powers – first “war” was the Whiskey Rebellion) was against Muslims in 1801. I believe the “tolerance” of this nation towards the Marxist/Muslim connection, especially since the 60s, has led to the deterioration of the nation. I’ve no problems taking the war back to them; they’ve been fighting one against us on our own soil for a long time now. Fine had it right: choice between dogs and muslims is an easy one.
I agree with you about the pulpits. Preachers are high on my list of “don’t trust”.
You do understand the comment by Randy Fine?
DEI hire?
Update #1: 4 confirmed dead, 2 missing. Midair collision between 2 KC-135s. Surviving plane made it to Tel Aviv with substantial damage.
My father spent a career as a KC-135 navigator.
Could be that a collision story is preferable to a shot down story. Can’t believe anything they tell you, even if it’s something you want to hear – even if it’s true.
Not only do we not want to have an aircraft shot down anywhere, but especially over Iranian controlled territory, we also would not want that story to get out there. Just as with the kinetic part of the war, there are also cyber and information wars being fought.
But what is put into the information war, if less than the full truth, has to be believable. Early on, the Iranians claimed to have shot down an Israeli F-35. The photo illustrating their claim was incredibly bad, and those who believe it are known as “morons”.
But the images included in that Brietbart article* of the damaged tail of that -135 look to me to be exactly what I’d expect of substantial, but possibly survivable damage coming from a midair collision.
* If they didn’t leak the images themselves, there will be some guy who wears stars who is livid that some troop-with-a-cellphone took a picture of that tail damage and let it get wild into X/Twitter. OPSEC has to mean something to everyone, right down to the E-2 who fuels planes for a living.
Update #2: If this topic hasn’t gone stale here,, my guy on YouTube for aviation matters, Juan Browne, has thoughts.