Sunday, December 31, 2017

Our Last Star Wars Film

Well, we've slept on it.

We've consulted friends, family, fans and fellow authors to sort things out in our own head.

The Last Jedi is deeply flawed.

Our eleven year old loved Star Wars: The Last Jedi. This is a dangerous sign.

The plot involves the Resistance fleeing their base and the First Order pursuing. This plot device is silly and stupid and feels like a BSG episode. Most of the events happening around the plot are also silly and stupid.

That said we thought the movie was holding up pretty well. And then the second act happened. One could slip the second act into a prequel. Lots of dumbness.

The third act was unfulfilling and derivative...oh look attack ships closing on AT-ATs!

We liked Rey and Kylo Ren and thought they both had some great scenes and interactions. As readers suspect Rey spends time with Luke in training. Frankly, Mark Hamill is not a very good actor. We are willing to reconsider this after a second viewing, but we just don't think he's up to it. Kylo Ren is the most interesting character and Adam Driver is truly great in this film. His arc is well made and unpredictable.

Po has a dumb and contrived character arc. Finn is absolutely useless in this film and his part is, what's the word? Oh yes, contrived. There's no point to him.

BB8 got stupid.

The Last Jedi doesn't suck like a prequel, but it is not very good. There's just too much wrong with it.










Prediction Review: Trump

Here are our Trumpean Predictions from Inauguration Day.

I'd say we were about half right, which ain't bad, really.

-Obamacare's repeal will happen quickly and easily.
-The replacement will be a hodgepodge of conservative think tank ideas.
-Trump will have a strange, new respect for the Iran deal.
-Trump will sign dozens of executive orders against Obama's executive orders.
-Trump's biggest enemy won't be the Democrats or even the media, but the GOPe.
-Trump will appoint a very conservative justice to the Supreme Court.
-Democrat resistance will be hampered by Red State senators who want to keep their jobs.
-Trump will wage unrelenting war against the media.
-Trump will wage unrelenting war against the Federal civilian work force.
-There will be a comprehensive immigration reform bill that legalizes dreamers, contains employer enforcement mechanisms, builds a wall and forces Mexico to pay for it.
-Mexico will pay for that wall without any but the most pro-forma complaints.
-Most of Barrack Hussein Obama's legacy will be undone within the first 100 days.

The Iran deal is in Limbo. We've already noted Obamacare. There seems to be a drive toward a DACA deal on the terms outlined above. Red State Dems maintain allegiance to the resistance, putting their jobs in jeopardy.

Overall we think Trump had a great year.

Saturday, December 30, 2017

Star Wars: the Last Jedi

Just saw it ant I’ve been out of the theatre for 30 minutes.

Here are our initial impressions.

-a long, clunky movie.
-a contrived crisis.
-the ships lack the elegance of the original.
-Mark Hamel can’t act.
-Rey was interesting.
-so was Kylo Ren
-Luke engages in some genuine Jedi badassery.
-when they played the stock trench attack music it brought a tear to my eye because it made me miss Jedi.
-I liked some of the secondary characters.
-the Force Awakens was better.
-Rogue One was a lot better.

Friday Updates

[You know, it's Saturday, right?-Ed]

Whatever....

We've been working on Pershing's War 1919 and it feels good.

We've also written about a thousand words of The Bastard's Conquest. We have come to a crucial opening scene where either A or B can happen and each will determine the tone of the book. See Schrodinger's Cat.

We are tidying up two chapters of The AEF at War.

World War 1990: The Final Storm has multiple problems that will take some time to fix.

dead and alive

The Anti-Trump Resistance of Disney World

Via Infowars we have one Jay Malsky, shouting at the animatronic Trump:

Trump Derangement Syndrome claimed another victim after a former executive assistant at NBC decided to “protest” the president by yelling at his animatronic robot doll during a show at Disney World. 
The video clip shows Jay Malsky repeatedly screaming “lock him up” at the Trump robot while other audience members, probably concerned about their frightened children, tell him to shut up. 
One of the audience members informs Malsky that he is literally yelling at a robot, telling him, “He’s not real!” 
“I protested @realDonaldTrump at the #hallofpresidents cuz I’ll never get this close in real life probs. #lockhimup,” tweeted Malsky, eliciting a barrage of ridicule.

Dude, you protested a robot, disturbed a lot of people, and frightened some kids. Frankly, Mr. Malsky is lucky some irate parent didn't punch his lights out.

Did you know Jay Malsky is a sketch comic?

Here's his Twitter page, which to this author suggests multiple psychological disorders.

Mr. Malsky's unfortunate outburst was most likely a publicity stunt, a stunt that failed as this is the first we're hearing of his act.

We can sympathize actually, We've been trying to get a Fatwa issued against Israel Strikes for years.

Still, he'll get some cheers and kudos from the NYC tranny community.

Trump Derangement Syndrome strikes again.

Friday, December 29, 2017

Predictions 2017: A Review

Here are our predictions for 2017 with new comments on the left:

-The New England Patriots will win the Super Bowl                                     Correct, a toughie there!
-They will defeat the Seattle Seahawks                                                          Wrong, Atlanta Falcons
-The New York Giants will win a playoff game                                             Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!
-The Chicago Cubs will win the World Series                                                Wrong, Houston Astros
-The Democrats will chronically underestimate President Trump                  Correct
-President Trump's greatest enemy will be the GOPe (Ryan, McConnell)     I stand by that one
-Obamacare will be repealed quickly and easily                                            Wrong, see above
-Trump will get on splendidly with Vladimir                                                 I say correct
-Geert Wilders will be the next PM of the Netherlands                                  Wrong, and I have no idea who the NL PM is
-Marime Le Pen will narrowly lose the French presidential election             She was blown away
-Someone will try to assassinate Donald Trump                                             Can't believe this one isn't true

Review of our Trumpean Predictions coming tomorrow!

When your right 51% of the time....

In Which Newt Gingrich Agrees with William Stroock

Quoth Newt:
The great political surprise of 2018 will be the size of the Republican victory.
After members of the elite media have spent two years savaging President Trump, lying about Republican legislation, and reassuring themselves that Republican defeat was inevitable, the size of the GOP victory in 2018 will be an enormous shock.
I agree. I know I've written this somewhere before, but Newt knows a thing or two about electoral waves. As House Minority Whip he engineered the GOP Coup of 1994 and took over congress. He saw it coming when no one else did.

Ten years later, when the al Qiada sympathizers in the media leaked phony exit polls saying that Senator Jean Francois Kerry (Vichy-Fr) was going to win, Newt took one look at the poll internals and said Merde. He then went on Rush, went all over right-blogisphere to proclaim said polls Merde. I watched, read and listened to that unfold in real time.

So when Newt, a fellow alternate history author I might add, says the GOP will win bigly in 2018, the GOP will win bigly in 2018.

Talking about the sex-perverts running the media, his Newtness also notes this:

As I listened to the end of the year "analysts," I was struck by how little they know, how little they have questioned their own mistakes, and how mutually reinforcing their false information has been.
Damn straight. How wrong were these people last year? They didn't just say Trump was going to lose, Charlie Cook, Chuck Todd, Chris Everett Mathews and all the rest of them said Hillary! had a 98.6 percent chance of winning.

Meanwhile, your humble blogger had been screaming for weeks that Trump was going to win.

Who to trust now....lemme see here.. let's roll play this...fade to a JEOPARDY!

[Oh for fek sake. Why do you do this to me, lord?-Ed]

Alex Trebek:     'Humble William Stroock Reader (HWSR), you have the board.
HWSR:              'I'll take political prognosticators for a hundred, Alex.'
Alex Trebek:     [bells and buzzing] 'A Daily Double'.
HWSR:              'Hmmmmm....let's make it a true Daily Double, Alex!'
Alex Trebek:     'Answer...a brilliant author who correctly predicted Trump's victory...'
HWSR:             'Who is...William Stroock?.
Alex Trebek:     'Correct!'

So there you have it.

Charlie Cook says a blue wave is building for 2018. William Stroock says there will be a Republican realignment.

Who's the smart money on, motherfucker?

answer


Balding Boomers say Goodnight

Via the WSJ we learn that Balding Boomers are going back to college:

Pat Collins has worked as a therapist for 30 years and is looking to reinvent herself. So she has gone back to the place where she invented herself the first time—college.
“I’m not sure what I want to do next,” said Mrs. Collins, 66 years old. “I’m able to retire financially. But I’m not ready to stop working.”
Mrs. Collins is a fellow at the University of Minnesota’s Advanced Careers initiative, one of many programs at schools catering to baby boomers looking for a second act.
Schools like Harvard University and Stanford University pioneered the idea. University of Notre Dame will start a new program next fall and many other schools have expressed interest.
The Balding Boomers already ruined college once, now they have to fuck it up for another generation. Can't these people just go away, already?

Actually, back during our professorial days we would get a smattering of actual grownups in class. The oldest I ever had was in his 50's. I would address him as 'Mr' or 'sir' which is probably the most important lesson those kids learned in that class.

The Journal accosts one poor young student who says,
 “The first time I walked into the class I was like, ‘Why are there a bunch of old people in here with us?’” said Madison Smiley, a 20-year-old junior, majoring in psychology. “I was afraid it was going to feel like taking a class with my mom.”
I bet you were.

How long till one of these geezers in a group discussion says to poor Madison, 'You know, back in the 60's...' Madison, take my advise. Nod patiently, like when Granpa farts at the table or something, and bury your head in your phone as quickly as possible. If Madison's geezer classmates are anything like my dad he'll bore the kids to death with talk of his 401K.




Thursday, December 28, 2017

My Australian One Star

Via Amazon Australia, this was bound to happen:


Always a risk that an Aussie expert would read the book and savage it.

Imperial/Commonwealth ranks are a weakness of mine. I don't get 'em.

I stand my depiction of tank warfare, though. He is not the first non-American to criticize my portrayal of same. A Brit did as well. Maybe it's an Imperial/Commonwealth thing?

I agree that the Seacat sucks, but its what they had.

As far as the RAAF F-18s and HARM missiles, well, you don't know what you don't know.

I press on.


Blade Runner: Now I have a Machine Gun, Ho...Ho...Ho...

So after about an hour and twenty minutes into Blade Runner:2049 I thought I was watching a science fiction masterpiece.

And then Ryan Gosling shows up in his flying car and shoots down a couple of police cruisers.  They had machine guns? Who knew?

Actually I liked the ensuing fight scene, but the movie falls apart in the third act.

Up until then we have an excellent science fiction film. 2049 feels like and is paced like Blade Runner without being derivative or nostalgic, that is until the end when the film becomes derivative and nostalgic. Fans of the original will see it right away. You'll know its coming.

The Los Angeles of 2049 is dystopian, Blade Runner meets Soylent Green. It's snowing in Los Angeles and the city is protected from a rising ocean by a massive seawall. The place is crowded. Technology is everywhere though, Replicants, holograms, drones, etc, etc, and these are well executed.

Ryan Gosling plays K-8675309 or Kay (eh! eh!) trying to track down a child supposedly conceived by Jake Deckard and Rachel. His performance is excellent. Sylvia Hoeks plays the evil Replicant like the Terminator. Harrison Ford returns to fuck up yet another one of his classic roles.

Like the original, Blade Runner 2049 is about life, and meaning and humanity. Whose more human, the people who blow away Replicants or the Replicants and holograms that just want to be human?

Blade Runner 2049's answer is humanity is scum.




Wednesday, December 27, 2017

2017 Thoughts in Review

A good year, a hard working year, and the sun rises.*

We got World War 1990: Castro's Folly out, wrote World War 1990: ANZACs, and then wrote The Austrian Painter.

In the meantime we got Blooms about done and tidied up World War 1990: The Final Storm.

A war game we designed got killed at the last minute, probably marking the end of our involvement in that industry.

Nothing happened with Pershing in Command.

We learned one can crank out a novel really fast if one puts one's mind to it.

We got a new editor and she's fabulous.

We are about halfway finished with The AEF at War.

We learned paid advertising is a great way to waste money.




*Get the reference, get a book. Post first in comments.

Tuesday, December 26, 2017

Tuesday Tally: Christmas Edition

Top Five Christmas Presents

[Aren't you Jewish?-Ed]

I shrug non-committally.

-1980: Navrone Mountain Army Play Set. Had these until a teenager and I say confidently that somewhere in my parent's home, pieces of it still lie.

-1982: Colleco Vision. I jumped up and down and triumphantly pumped my arms in the air at the thought of being able to play Smurf Rescue.

-1984: Transformers.

-1987: Donruss Rookie Mattingly baseball card. Worth $100 at the time. When last I checked it was going for about $10. Today it hangs on the wall of my study.

-1991: Statis-Pro Football 1991 edition allowing me to play the 1990 Giants.

George Washington's Christmas

So at this time 241 years ago George Washington was gathering the remains of the Continental Army and marching them back across the Delaware.

As is well known, Washington crossed the Delaware on Christmas night and caught the Hessian in a drunken stupor after a dat of Christmas Revelry.

Over the course of the war Washington won few battles. Trenton was his most important victory.

Christmas came after six months of bloody defeat at Brooklyn Heights, Manhattan, Fort Washington, White Plains...The Redcoats had chased Washington up the Hudson River Valley and into Pennsylvania. The Continental Army was on the verge of disintegration.

Washington's masterstroke at Trenton was a desperate gamble to reverse the tide of the war, and it worked.

This clip from the 1984 miniseries captures the scene and the stakes:


A Small Movie About a Big Event

My friend Bill Katz at Urgent Agenda asked me what I thought of the film Dunkirk. This is what I told him:

I don't think its possible to understand Dunkirk without seeing director Christopher Nolan's Interstellar, which this science fiction author thinks is the best science fiction movie since 2001. Interstellar is about time, time dilation and space.

Dunkirk is about time and perception and the primal urges within man. 'You can almost see it from here,' says the colonel on the Mole, 'Home'. How does one get home? How does one find safety in a ship when you've just seen ships sunk?

This is not a movie about Whitehall and Admirals pouring over maps and Churchill staying, 'We've got to get our boys home no matter what.' and the Admirals saying, 'It's impossible' and Churchill saying, 'Well find a way.'

It's also a movie about Englishness. Look at all those lines on the beach. Look at all those soldiers queuing patiently.Think French soldiers would be acting that way? No, of course not. Panicky Frenchman fire on an English soldier while another steals a dead Tommy's uniform.

This is an English movie and a lot of Americans might not get it. I'm trying to think of an American war epic that would baffle the Brits...I dunno, Sgt. York? Apocalypse Now?

It certainly was “different,” and disappointing. I expected, or hoped for, a major historical drama, with sweep and the involvement of a nation. Instead, it seemed like an
awfully small movie about an awfully large subject.
That's exactly right.

Monday, December 25, 2017

Asleep in A Christmas Story

Like every other Gen-Xer I have my kids watching A Christmas Story right now.

Readers should feel free to quote their favorite lines in the comments.

Anyhoo, I was thinking last night...

[wow, look at you, thinking-Ed]

...thanks...anyhoo given that this movie takes place in 1939 isn't it a little weird that there is not one reference to current events whatsoever? This is obviously a movie about kids, but one would think that some reference to the war would creep in.

Was that a small point of the film? Author Gene Sheppard was born in 1921 and watched the rise of Hitler. In the back of his mind I wonder if he wasn't thinking, 'Look, America is all wrapped up in her Christmas celebration and all this kid cares about is his stupid BB gun.'

As Rick says in Casablanca, 'It's December in Casablanca what time is it in New York?...I beat their asleep in New York, I bet their asleep all over America.'


Christmas with the Disraelis

Back during our professorial days we taught a lot of British history. When we got to Benjamin Disraeli we always asked, 'Ok, class what do you think Prime Minister Disraeli did on Christmas morning? That's right, he got Chinese and went to the movies!'

Merry Christmas folks.

Sunday, December 24, 2017

The Anti-Trump Resistance of Branchburg, New Jersey

Ben Rhodes hopes a thumbs-up picture will be used in the obits of Mitch McConnell, Mike Pence, and Paul Ryan.

Rosie O'Donnell offers Senators Susan Collins and Jeff Flake  twooooo milllllion dollars to vote against tax reform.

Some whack-job Congressional Black Caucus members [that's redundant-Ed] introduce articles of impeachment.

SE Cupp leads a discussion on the Democrat's descent to insanity.

Needless to say the Democrats have not taken Trump's victory well.

We thought they freaked out after W won in 2000 and 2004, but the Dems seemed determined to out freak-out their W freak-out. We say mission accomplished!

This whack job lives around the corner from our house. We drive past his property every day.

Well reasoned, no?

At one point he had an upside-down American flag in his yard. We always assumed the town told him to take it down, but no. Someone swiped it:

BRANCHBURG - Jim Girvan considers himself pretty outspoken.
Girvan said he has posted political signs on the front lawn of his Route 28 home as well as two American flags, one he intentionally flew upside down as an expression of distress and fear since the November election. 
Girvan said a friend had told him that some people disapprove of the display, especially the flag flown upside down. 
Girvan never thought someone would actually steal it from his property. But that's exactly what happened. 
Around 7 p.m. April 1, a dark pickup pulled up to his home, the driver got out and ripped the upside-down flag out of the ground, threw it in the truck and drove off. 
"It was broad daylight," said Girvan, adding that thousands of vehicles pass by his home every day. "It was such a bold blatant act."
It wasn't us. We don't even own a pickup.

According to the article Mr. Girvan's display has been tampered with on other occasions.

It's like the landscaping version of one of those cars with eight bumper stickers on the back. You know the ones, COEEXIST...BERNIE!...I'M WITH HER...IMPEACH TRUMP!...etc...etc...

Speaking of:
BEDMINSTER - As President Donald Trump increasingly becomes a local presence with his trips to Trump National Golf Club, one area resident is garnering headlines for protesting the administration. 
Branchburg resident Jim Girvan has been organizing the People's Motorcade every Saturday this summer. It entails an entourage of cars driving by Trump National Golf Club — whether or not Trump is there — while waving flags, signs and other anti-Trump material.
Our stance is the greater the signage the more serious the mental problem.

The freak-out has become intolerable. This year we've found ourselves doing something we never thought we'd do. That is, we un-friended people on FB over their anti-Trump delusions. We can think of at least five. Sorry, weirdos.

To those asking the obvious question, no we did not hate Obama or hope for his impeachment or death. We reacted to his victory in 2008 by considering what we conservatives needed to do better. Ditto 2012.

We never thought Trump was the answer to that question., but he is.

He's driving the Dems... Insaaaaaane!*

*Free copy of the book of their choice to the person who recognizes that New York Metro area television commercial reference. Post in comments.


Saturday, December 23, 2017

Will's Good idea for Christmas

The New World, All its Power and Might

In a different 1942...

-Winston Churchill is dead.

-Edward is installed as Hitler's puppet king.

- Japan attacks Russia.

-The United States Navy blockades Europe.

-The Canadian 1st Army of six divisions assembles in Iceland.

-ANZAC forces totaling five divisions protect Egypt and the Suez Canal.

-The Indian 14th Army of six divisions occupies Palestine and the Levant.

The ring closes around Hitler's Europe.


Friday, December 22, 2017

Great Medieval Captains

As noted a few weeks ago we've been working on a quick book about Medieval Warfare. Here it is:

-Alfred the Great and his wars against the Vikings
-Charlemagne and his empire
-The Battle of Hastings
-The First Crusade, a campaign as great and successful as Alexander's
-the 4th Crusade demonstrating the tactical skill of medieval commanders.
-The organizational genius of Edward I
-Chevouchee and the Hundred Years War

These were great armies commanded by great generals. Charlemagne vanquished his Saxon enemies, peoples who had even withstood the onslaught of the mighty Roman Empire, and set in place the framework of what could have been a great state. In the 11th century, Robert Guiscard, a Norman conqueror in the tradition of William, gathered armies and fleets, triumphing in long sieges and pitched battles over both Muslim and Byzantine adversaries. During the next two centuries, Guiscard’s Crusader descendents constantly outmaneuvered Muslim and Byzantine armies, making themselves masters of much of the Middle East. In the late 13th century, King Edward I conquered Wales with strategic insight and logistical skill rivaling any modern commander. His grandson, Edward III unleashed the lethal combination of dismounted knight and English longbow against France and with an endless supply of able subordinates, brought the kingdom to its knees. These were the great armies and commanders of the middle ages, and they deserve to be remembered with their Western predecessors.


The American Shiva

Nikki Haley the Sikh-American former governor of South Carolina and current ambassador to the UN has unleashed rhetorical destruction upon that body:

We think we're in love.

[Oh god, not again-Ed]

We haven't been this aroused by a politician since Sarah Palin.

[Yeah, and how's she doing these days?-Ed]

She's pretty, but there's something about an Indian-American woman and that southern accent...

[You need some alone time, don't you?-Ed]

Do I ever.

[Couple minutes outta do it! Thanks folks, I'll be here all week!-Ed]

Anyway we say to Ambassador Haley, well done, Madam.

This morning Fox News was talking about the speech with Congressman Pete Hesgeth. The Congressman called the UN a Marxist, Jew hating toilet. We couldn't agree more and suggest the City of New York seize the building and turn it into low rent housing.

[First person to trace that Science Fiction reference gets a free copy of the book of their choice, post in the comments-Ed]

Anyhoo, Hesgeth echoed an idea we've had for a long time. Let's pull out of the UN and form a League of Democracies to do what the UN should be doing but without the taint of all those crap-hole dictator nations.

We'll start with the English Speaking Peoples and once the organization is off the ground we'll allow other nations to apply for membership. Nations like France, Germany and Belgium (which isn't really a nation at all) will have to go through a long vetting process to see if they qualify for membership.

Of course the English Speaking Peoples have a long track record of doing good in the world, don't we?

The Bastard's Conquest

We're really in a bind with this one. We spent all day thinking about The Bastard's Conquest and thinking about Pershing's War: 1919.

On the later we were so intrigued we went and looked up YouTube videos of Chauchat ARs and Lewis guns.

As we said before, there's just no ju-ju right now but there's plenty for Pershing's War.

But we're not making any Hasting's decisions. Ha! See what I did there?

[Clap...clap...clap..Ed.]

Though we can't come up with anything for the protagonist's background, character, motivations, etc, etc, we know what the first scene is. So we'll write that and see if it springs up organically.

Thursday, December 21, 2017

The Bastard's Conquest

I gotta be honest here, folks.

I'm feeling absolutely no ju-ju for this medieval novel whatsoever.

I mean, nada, nothing. I search deep within for the character,  the man and I feel nothing. Only a void. Only an emptiness. An abyss where the fire of creation is extinguished.

We must find our center, search out our katra and remember that a donut without a hole is a danish.



Pershing's War:1919?

Wither Science Fiction?

The Daily Beast laments that Star Wars made science fiction stupid:

“When you say ‘science fiction’ to Hollywood,” says Marc Bernardin a TV writer and podcaster who has been an editor for The Hollywood Reporter and the Los Angeles Times, “they see space opera and laser beams.”

Of course Star Wars isn't science fiction. Lucas gives the game away with the lead: A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. 

Star Wars is mythology.

The above article talks about some great pre-Star Wars sci fi movies. These are of course 2001, Planet of the Apes, we'd add Soylent Green among others.

Science fiction must needs a speculative element. Soylent Green takes place in 2022. We're just a few years away now, and nothing speculated in the movie or book has come to pass. The movie is jaw-dropping all the same. Here is a vision of a third world America where people live in poverty and are sustained by soy chips. Otherwise its a bland police procedural that ends too quickly. The source material, Harry Harrison's Make Room, Make Room, is better.

When trying to predict the future, the worst thing one can do is take current trends and extrapolate them to their conclusion. In 1980 no one thought the Cold War would be over by 1990. Of course in 1990 everyone thought the Japanese would rule the future....heh. Francis Fukayama prediction The End of History!  Hey, remember peak oil, or the population bomb? Try not to laugh.

There is some smart science fiction out there today. The article mentions The Expanse, which we can't recommend too strongly. Arrival deals with aliens, communication, paranoia and time perception and is destined to be one of the greatest sci fi films ever.




Tax Reform Cometh

Well alright now.

This tax reform bill is a major win for Trump and a major win for old style neo-conservative policy wonkdom.

Rates are redefined and cut, the corporate tax rate is cut, much of the code is simplified.

But we love the extra goodies. This includes opening up the Arctic Wildlife Refuge to oil exploration and most importantly the repeal of the Obamacare Individual Mandate. As far as the rest of Obamacare goes, that's policy and I don't really give a fuck.

The mandate was as vile as the Indian Removal Act or the Fugitive Slave Act, a law that redefined the relationship between state and citizen. Now it's history.

Winning

Wednesday, December 20, 2017

Dragnet Marketing

So last night I was binge watching Dragnet and waiting with baited breath to see if two officers shot in a botched liquor store robbery were going to live. As the pretty, young wife of one of the officers broke down and sobbed while the older wife of the other officer comforted her, the phone rang.

It was Readersmagnet, a book marketing firm.

We had a long talk.  It turns out that for $650 Readersmagnet will do some first rate marketing of my books. This includes book fairs, email blasts, deep contacts withing the world of literary and publicity agents.

Is it a scam? Not technically, though until recently Readersmagnet was in NYC and had just relocated to San Diego, suggesting that they're on the run from New York AG Erich Schneidermann.

Eager to see the end of Dragnet I said I didn't think the service was for me and hung up.

Young aspiring authors, Don't. Just don't. You don't need these services and you don't need marketing.

Right now World War 1990: Anzacs is in the top 20 in its category on three continents. You know what we've spent to market Anzacs? Zip. Zilch. Nada. Nothing.

The book is selling itself though this blog, my Gab.ai account, FB and Amazon.

By the way, the young officer lived but the older one passed. The shooter was found guilty of murder and sentenced to death.

The Franken Gambit Part Deux

A few weeks ago Al Franken announced his plan to resign from the Senate over groping Leann Tweeden.

Some in the media (*cough* Mike Brzezinski *cough*) kept mentioning that Ms. Tweedon was a Playboy model and so you know...Which is why home wrecker Mika should be ashamed. We think it's pretty neat that Ms. Tweedon parlayed being a model into a Minnesota radio gig. Also, the suit and glasses are totally hot and we like imagining what she's wearing underneath, because you know how a woman doing man's job wants to wear something to remind her of her femininity....

[Good God you're an idiot-Ed].

...Anyhoo, pressure mounts for Senator Al Franken to un-resign.

At least four Dem Senators now say he should stay.

In all honesty, being a creep and a butt-groper shouldn't ruin a life, not even Al Franken's.

Which is not to say we haven't enjoyed watching the man squirm. He's a first rate jerk and never was all that funny.

Also, from a conservative perspective this gives some ammo to the forces of decency to push back against the witch hunt against #yesallmen that is unfolding before our eyes.

General creepiness and sexual harassment are not the same thing as sexual assault and rape.


The following Leann Tweeden video is provided on background

I mean...damn.


Tuesday, December 19, 2017

Ye to Ambassador Haley

Tuesday Tally, Arab  Insanity Edition


The Trump Administration and Ambassador Haley simply explained reality to the UN and the Arabs. Jerusalem is the capital of Israel.

Sometimes you really have to wonder what is wrong with these people. What does reality mean in a region where hundreds of millions think Mossad controls the US, Imams proclaim the world is flat and the Saudi government funds textbooks explaining all the scientific truths in the Koran.

With that in mind here are four bits of Arab....we don't don't even know what to call it...Arab insanity?

1-The Khartoum Statement: After the Israelis deep fried the Arab's kabob in the '67 War the Arab League met at Khartoum and issued its infamous 'Three No's'; no peace, no negotiation, no recognition.

2-Egyptian Delusions: Did you know that the Egyptians think they won the '73 War? Stop laughing....no stop. Yes its true. We've patiently explained to more than one Egyptian that the Israelis took their Sphinx and neutered it. Ok, I guess Egypt won, if by winning you mean watching the Israelis smash one Egyptian army on the east bank of Suez, cross over to the west bank, smash another army and let the survivors go out of the goodness of their little Hebrew hearts. By that standard the Egyptians have 'won' four wars with the Israelis.

3- Al Jazeera, et al: When Arab 'news' networks, faker than CNN by the way, broadcast from Jerusalem they always say they are broadcasting from 'Occupied Jerusalem'.

4- Andy McNabb. In his book, Bravo Two Zero, SAS commando Andy McNabb explains that when he was captured he couldn't convince the Iraqis that he wasn't Israeli until he dropped his pants and showed them he wasn't circumcised. Seriously.

Let's wrap this up with our new favorite joke:

After the '67 war the Soviets summon Nasser to Moscow to explain the unholy shelacking they just took. Nasser says, 'Gentlemen you have it all wrong. We have studied Soviet tactics and history and your Great Patriotic War. We have lured the Jews into the Sinai...now we wait for winter!'



Monday, December 18, 2017

Thoughts on the Retirement of Francesa

For those of you outside of the New York Metro area, Mike Francesa was the lead host from 1-6:30 on 66 WFAN.

Over 30 years or so he came to be known as the 'sports pope' around here.

He first entered our own consciousness in the mid-90s when he would go on Imus in the Morning, a show to which we were fanatically loyal at the time.

Francesa had lovers and haters, just look up NY Post columnist Phil Mushnik, yikes.

Here is a great parody of him, I mean spot on:


The name dropping here is perfect.

Mike had a lot of faults but he was always prepared and always knew what he was talking about.

There were some ugly and Googleable incidents and in recent years he got grumpy and short with callers. It happens.

For several years we had to make due with crappy Washington DC sports talk; Andy Polin, Steve Czabin....uck.

In June of 2001 Mrs. Stroock and I bought a new car about two weeks before we were moving to New Jersey. Vividly we recall that night, sitting in a parking lot in front of CVS and programming stations. We were programming the DC stations and then remembered that soon we wouldn't need them anymore.

66 went in first and a few weeks later it felt good to be back.


Francesa actually makes a cameo here:


Plan for the Week

-We are giving Bloom's a read through and some ad-ons.

-We are still trying to finish that chapter on literature for the AEF ebook.

-The intro chapter for same is done, but just needs some tweaking.

-We have The Austrian Painter proof but will not be reading until January.

-We expect to have the medieval warfare book back this week.



Blooms....here's the background:

Metal Monday

Maryland Edition

There is no direct way to get from Washington DC to Dover Delaware.

One had to take Maryland 50 across the Chesapeake Bay Bridge then hook into 301 North until finally peeling off onto Route 8 East.

Retrace as necessary.

That final leg, or first if one was heading back to NOVA, was a single lane road through the Maryland backwoods. In 1998 it was like driving through the Blair Witch Project. More often then not we did the trip back to DC at night.

We mention this because 20 years ago we drove that route a lot. We lived in Northern Virginia while our fiancee lived at home in Dover while she wrapped up her senior year of college.

This was also the time in our life when we had fully abandoned rock n roll and were really into classical.

Throughout this long, lonely drive Tchaikovsky's 5th Symphony kept us company. Those interested may listen here:

 Stick with it, it gets heavy

Heading back to NOVA as one approached the Chesapeake you got in range of Washington DC sports radio. Back then the talk was all about high expectations for Juwan Howard and the Washington Wizards, the Redskins new owner, would baseball ever recover from the strike and who would the Colts take as their number one pick, Ryan Leaf or Peyton Manning.

Twenty years ago we listened along dark roads lined with leafless winter trees, and we were heading into the worst year of our life, a sensation we recall even now.




Sunday, December 17, 2017

Just sayin' Guys


Will's Good Idea for the Week of 12-17-17

For the moment we've done everything we can to World War 1990: The Final Storm.

We'll be doing some more tweaks but not this week.

In the meantime we're getting back to Whatever Happened to Jake and Patricia Bloom, this is the sequel to A Line through the Desert.

We'll be adding some stuff about Patricia and what she goes through as an army wife with a brood of kids and a husband in Iraq for the third time in five years.

Also we've been thinking about the title. We've never really liked the above but haven't had another idea until now.

How about just calling the book Blooms?


Wither Paul Ryan

In an interesting piece on Paul Ryan, Politico says the speaker is planning on packing it in.

If true this would mark the passing of a generation of conservatives such as myself.

We grew up in the age of Reagan and Bush and the only Democrat president we remembered was Jimmy Carter.

New Gingrich shaped us politically. This was the 90's, the era of policy wonkism with ideas coming up from the think tanks like Heritage and CATO and being adopted by a second generation of conservatives who wanted to reform the way government worked.

We used to have ideas on everything from garbage collection, to schools, to Medicare and Social Security reform.

Politically this never really worked and few of the ideas ever really got adopted federally. No one really gives a crap about school vouchers.

The failure of the likes of Ryan and myself led to Trump. All hail Trump.


You don't get much more Gen-X than this

Thursday, December 14, 2017

William's Norman Knight

Well, here we are, planning to start The Bastard's Conquest in two weeks and we realize we haven't done any thinking about our main character.

We know he becomes one of the Bastard's troubleshooters and have a vague idea what he does from the years 1066-1069. Lot's of action there.

He's a Norman but other than that we know little about him. Did he get along with his folks? Does he like William the Bastard? For that matter what kind of knight is he? Are we talking about a man escaping his past? Maybe a rogue in the tradition of Harry Flashman? A man trying to do right?

We have no idea.

As noted before the way we usually get our novels mapped out is to sit around and think about them. One can almost feel the fire brewing, the burst of energy. We usually refer to the process as percolation.

Whatever one calls it we better get going.




Bringing the Crazy

In recent years the GOP-e has been battling various insurgent groups within the conservative movement. The GOP-e wants nice safe Republican types, you know, Mitt Romney, while the insurgents want revolutionaries like Donald Trump.

Trump is president while Romney is not.

We just saw this play out in Alabama with Steve Bannon leading the charge against Luther Strange and giving us Roy Moore which has of course led to Doug Jones.

This is not the first time the insurgents have nominated crazy. In fact it's been happening a lot the last decade.

In 2010 the Tea Party got Sharon Angle nominated in Nevada. She had a habit of saying kooky things and lost.

That same year the Tea Party got Christine O'Donnell nominated in Delaware. She was a weirdo who cut a campaign commercial in which she proclaimed 'I am not a witch'. We argued passionately for her primary opponent, the Rhinoish Congressman Mike Castle. You see, Mrs. Stroock is from Delaware so we know the state's politics pretty well. Its a small place and once you're in you're in for life. Just ask Joe Biden.

The Tea Party really blew it there.

Then in 2012 the Missouri GOP nominated Todd Akin, please don't make us go there.

Matt Drudge Tweeted that Roy Moore was 'Too much crazy'.

Quite right.

We've argued here that the election was not about the man but the fight. Still, we wonder if in the long run we're not better off without Moore.

That's what Trump thought, which is why he backed Luther Strange. Trump knows crazy when he see's it.

Turned the Crazy up to 11

Wednesday, December 13, 2017

Cover Art

Alright, we have the Austrian Painter's cover:


Battle Extraordinaire

Come back with us to a time when television mini-series were a big, big deal.

We grew up with the Barry Bostwick portrayal of George Washington. We always loved the Battle of Monmouth as shown here. This was the biggest battle of the war and the last one in the north.

The miniseries is a tad schlocky but overall holds up quite well. This is the standard history of George Washington and pretty accurate. All the events shown in the beginning are historically accurate.




Not Georgia, but Alabama on my Mind

After reading last night a few thoughts around the internet we heard some great points.

We'll run them through our own brain...

[what brain?-Ed]

...and regurgitate them here.

Jones' win in deep red Alabama closely parallels Scot Brown's win in Deep blue MA in 2010.

That year the catalyst for the upcoming election vaporization for the Dems was Obamacare. We now suspect the tax reform bill can do the same thing.

Obama and the Dems did not heed the warnings delivered by Brown's senate win and Chris Christies' victory in NJ. Will Trump and the GOP take notice?

Not every state up in 2018 has a 30% black electorate. In those that do the Dems should be able to recreate this turnout model. Remember again the Dems are super-motivated. Trump and co. better make sure their people are super motivated.

After this, one must seriously reconsider Bannonism-Breitbartism. Someone else pointed out that Turmpism only works if you're running against Hillary!

Many caveats about Jones' victory are true. But the most important fact is Jones' victory is a disaster for the GOP, though temporary. He will be defeated in 2020. Before then the GOP is looking at a bloodbath in 2018.


Tuesday, December 12, 2017

Jones-o-geddon

On the bright side for the GOP they don't have to deal with the Moore issue anymore.

The GOP-e will be crowing that Luther Strange would have won. He would have.

Once again the polls were wrong.

The African American vote came out massively and massively for Jones, suggesting that Dems will focus on replicating effort in 2018.

Of course not every GOP senate candidate will have these ethics problems.

Still, the brainiacs better come up with something.

Is this the end of Bannon? The GOP-e certainly has a strong talking point.

Moore-o-geddon

Well today is this big day!

At stake is Steve Bannon's vision. He took on the Republican establishment by offing sitting senator Luther Strange and then led the fight against the media over allegations of sexual harassment and assault. This election is not about the man but that fight. It's also about Democrat hypocrisy.

Watch this clip of Kurt Schlichter, it's glorious:


'Then why did you vote for Bill Clinton?!'

We love Kurt Schlichter's contempt for the left.

Also at stake is the narrative. If Dems pull this off it portends certain doom for the GOP next November.

Here's what the polls have been showing, via RCP:


Yesterday two more polls came out, one showing Moore up bigly, the other showing Jones up 10.

We think the later is waaaay off and based on a totally unrealistic turnout model. Of course, back in 2012 we insisted all those polls showing Barry up by four or five points were wrong based on their turnout model. We know who was wrong on that one.

It is possible that all the other polls are wrong and this one is right. We say the Jones + 10 poll is a massive outlier. But in the last few days Barry, Senator Corey Booker and company have been touring the state trying to gin up black turnout.

We think Moore wins.

We shall see.


The Franken Gambit

This is how we know the Mueller probe is fizzling out.

The Dems are shifting from 'Russia, Russia, Russia' to 'harassment, harassment, harassment.'

Democrats know they have a yuuuge credibility problem on sexual assault. For  twenty years they've told us Bill Clinton was ok.

Just a few months okay Senator Kirsten Gillibrand of NY was telling us how great Bill Clinton is.

Now she says Trump should resign over sexual harassment allegations.

You can't #believeallwomen when you never believed Bill's many, many accusers.

That's where serial groper and Democrat senator Al Franken comes in.

Democrats can condemn Franken and call on him to resign. This is a safe move as Minnesota is a reliably blue state with a Dem governor. Whoever replaces Franken will be a Democrat.

So the battlefield is prepped.

By the way, after Roy Moore wins in Alabama tonight, Al Franken will un-resign.

The once and future senator




Tuesday Tally

Constitutional Crisis Edition

Recently we read a Mark Steyn column on General Flynn where he trotted out a criticism he's made about American politics for some time. He writes:

Third, as longtime readers, listeners and viewers know, I strongly dislike the uniquely American "presidential transition" period. As you know, in, say, the Westminster system, if a prime minister loses on a Thursday, his goes to the Palace to resign on the Friday, and he moves out of Downing Street on the weekend. The new cabinet ministers are in place the following Monday or Tuesday. The "transition" is part of the general institutional sclerosis of Washington, and certainly no friend to swamp-drainers...
We used to show this clip to our class. The students didn't get it.



There's really nothing to be done about the presidential transition as that is constitutionally directed. Heck, the inauguration used to to March 20th until they changed it in the 1930's.

Anyhoo here's three tweaks and changes to the American political system.

Three Terms: Right now the constitution limits the president to two terms. One of the consequences is 'lame-duckism' in the second term. Halfway through its hard for the president to get anything done. Second terms are always disastrous. Just ask LBJ, Nixon, W., heck, even Reagan. Add a third term.

Congressional Term Limits: We've gone back and forth on this for decades, but seeing congress in recent year has convinced us of the necessity of term limits. Senator Dianne Feinstein is 84. Congressman John Conyers is 88. Strom Thurmond served until he was 100. John Dingle served from 1950-something till 2000-something. Three terms in the senate, nine in the house.

State Appointments to the Senate: Until the the 17th Amendment, state legislatures appointed US Senators. Go back to that system. It will reduced the power of the Feds and reassert the power of the states.

Monday, December 11, 2017

Plan for the Week

For this week we're hoping to:

-Finish the submarine parts for World War 1990: The Final Storm. This damn Norwegian sub is killing me.

-Wrap up the intro chapter for the AEF at War e-book.

-Wrap of the literature chapter for same. This discusses memoirs, fiction, history, etc pumped out by AEF vets after the war.

-Finish re-editing the Middle Ages at War and get it to the editor.

Market This

Ever since we started publishing novels we've been driving costs down.

At this point in our career our greatest cost is advertising.

For years we've been tinkering with our advertising model, ratios of digital vs print etc, etc.

One of the rules we've adopted is 'one and done'. Do the ad in a magazine once and then get out. Our estimate is that the return on an ad diminishes by at least 50% on the next run. You can forget running an ad for an old book. The people who see the ad and buy the book have already done so no matter how long one waits. It is just not a good way to rope in new readers.

Frankly we've long suspected that print and digital ads are superfluous.

We've bee testing that theory with World War 1990: Anzacs. Aside from one ad buy in Australia, something we arranged as a two-fer earlier in the year ,we have bought no adds.

The results speak for themselves. World War 1990: Anzacs has cracked the top 20 in Alternate history in the UK and Australia and his hovering in the 30's here in the USA. Sales a great and at virtually no  cost.

Wither ads.

Monday Metal

Queen: A Kind of Magic.

In Radio-Ga-Ga Freddy Mercury sings about radio being his 'only friend through teenage nights'.

Well in a senior year filled with disappointment and pain A Kind of Magic was our friend. Twenty-five years on it still is.

First the lead song, the theme song for Iron Eagle:


A call to arms if we ever heard one.

Not until we were much older did we get into earlier Queen, so for a good portion of our life we thought of them as a hard rock-metal band. Between the Wayne's World moment and albums like A Kind of Magic one can see why.

For Gen-X sci-fi geeks, A Kind of Magic is more properly called Highlander, as  half the songs were in the 1985 film.

To this day we get chills from this one:

Fuck yeah.

Christopher Lambert, Sean Connery, swords....

Here's another great one:

Great solo and some nice harmonies:



A Kind of Magic, for us it has always beem

The Good, the Bad and the Lucky, Part II: The Lucky

...President Trump, we mean.

Item- last week, the media fucked up not one, not two, but three different stories about the Mueller probe. These are:

Brian Ross' lie about Kushner directing Flynn to contact the Soviets, er Ruskis, during the campaign. He contacted them during the transition.

Bloomberg's lie about Mueller subpoenaing Trump's financial records. He didn't. He subpoenaed Paul Manafort's.

CNN's lie about the date the Trump campaign was offered access to Wikileaks docs about Hillary!. CNN said the offer was made on 4 September. It wasn't. The offer came on 10 September, after the docs were already public.

So instead of talking about Flynn's plea deal we are talking about Mueller's deep ties to Hillary! and the media's catastrophic mistakes.

Can't these idiots get anything right?



Sunday, December 10, 2017

Roger Goodell-Bad for the N-F-L

CBS tells us:
As of Thursday afternoon, there are actual NFL tickets that are selling on the secondary market for under five dollars. Of course, like all good deals, these tickets do come with a catch: You need to live near Buffalo, have a high tolerance for cold weather and be willing to sit through three hours of a Colts-Bills game.
Ok, Ok, it's Indy at Buffalo. For foreign reader(s) that's like South Shoreswamp playing Upper Slobovia in a meaningless Futball match.

But it used to not matter. Buffalo has been much put upon these last twenty years or so. Here's how their last playoff game ended in 1999:


Before that from 1990-1993 the Buffalo Bills lost four Superbowls in a row. We're proud to say our own New York Giants got things going:


Still a top five moment in our life

And still the Bill's fans showed up to see their team.

What heartbreak and pain could not kill Roger Goodell could.

Let's recap what Goodell has done to the game:

-A shameful discipline policy where Ray Rice gets two games for punching out his wife but Tom Brady gets four because he might have known some balls were deflated. Oh, and Greg Hardy gets to play even after being convicted of throwing his girlfriend across the room.

-Instant replay becoming the arbiter of all things on the field; used to overturn calls where the ball moves ever so slightly. This takes away all suspense as one has to wait to see if a call 'stands' before actually celebrating. Instant replay causes needless delays, especially when every score needs to be reviewed. This has less to do with 'getting the call right' than with providing an excuse for more TV timeouts.

-Changing the rules so the passing game dominates, making defensive backs into passive backs who may only tackle the receiver after he catches the ball. Great for fantasy football, not so great for the game.

-Allowing refs to over-regulate and dominate the game. Pick up the flag? No. Don't even throw it.

-Refusing to deal with strutting, chest thumbing, look at me, hip-hop-ghetto culture addled players who jump up and down after, you know, doing things like making a tackle.

-Covering up the CTE scandal and downplaying the risk to players.

Do we even have to discuss the anthem knealers?

Of course Goodell just got a new contract.


**Via our friend William Katz

Will's Good Idea for the Week of 12-10-17

Coming soon, Great Medieval Captains.

A study of great medieval military leaders including Alfred, Charlemagne, William, Harold and the Crusaders. This study links them to the ancient Greeks and Romans and shows how Western armies of the Middle Ages were unstoppable in the east.


The NEW new Tech

Deep down, we're a Luddite.

We didn't buy CDs until we got into classical in the late 90's.

We didn't have email until 1999.

We didn't own an Ipod until 2009.

So when we started writing we envisioned moving a lot of paperbacks.

Uh, yeah, didn't happen.

Our first novel sold 19 copies the first month. It never again approached that number of paperback sales.

When we published our second novel we wondered whether or not we should put it in Amazon Kindle.

Hahahahahaha! Ahhhhhhhahhahahahaha!

Having not learned our lesson, we have for a long time resisted enrolling our book in Kindle Unlimited and Kindle Select.

[Dumb Yank-Ed]

Well lets just say in the ten days or so since we enrolled our books in KU the number of pages read have been accumulating like a giant snowball running down the Matterhorn.

[This is why you should always listen to me-Ed]

Yes mummy.

Our first novel. We've never quite done right by it. But you can, gentle reader.

The Good, the Bad and the Lucky: Part I, the Good

Well, last Friday must have been positively orgasmic for the Anti-Trump people.

You just know some urbanite, hipster D-bag types were out celebrating Mueller's indictment of General Flynn under the assumption that he was flipping on Kushner or maybe even Trump and that soon we'd be hearing rumors and rumblings of impeachment.

They no doubt expected some Monday leaks.

Yeah, no.

Instead all week we've been learning about the deep ties between the Mueller probe, the Obama justice department, and the Hillary! campaign.

Behold:

Deputy Director Andy McCabe: Oversaw the Hillary! email probe. His wife ran for Virginia state senate and received money from Clinton Crony Terry Mcauliffe.

Agent Peter Storzk: found no wrong-doing in the Hillary! email probe, even after Huma Abedin and Cheryl Mills lied to the FBI, and oversaw Flynn investigation. He lied to Flynn about the reasons for meeting with Feds and bashed Trump in texts to his mistress.

Andrew Weissman: Mueller's 'pit bull' and 'right hand man' attended Hillary!'s election night party and congratulated interim AG Sally Yates for defying a lawful directive from the president.

Jeannie Rhee: Another Mueller team Lawyer. Rhee donated to Hillary!'s campaign.

Aran Zebly: Yet another lawyer with deep ties to Hillary! He represented the guy who maintained Hillary!'s illegal server, in his bathroom.

Mueller Himself: Reveled to be a close associate of the fired James Comey.

Gee, wonder whose leaking all this info to the media?

From a political standpoint the timing is brilliant. Last week 's narrative should have been 'Russia, Russia, Russia'. Instead it was 'Mueller, Mueller, Mueller'.

Dodgers legend Branch Rickey once said luck is the residue of design. By holding onto his information and leaking it at precisely the right moment Trump has turned a bad situation into a good narrative.





Friday, December 8, 2017

Not the Public, Not the Police

In the 1830s Prime Minister Robert Peel founded the first modern police force. In his nine rules of policing, Peel declared, 'The police are the public and the public are the police.'

There are two interesting trials of the police here in the United States.

We have the trial Officer Philip Brailsford who murdered Daniel Shaver while he lay on the floor, and Michael Slager, who murdered a man as he was running away after a routine traffic stop. Both happened on camera.

In both cases the footage is horrifying.  Brailsford makes one's blood boil. He screams commands, curses, tells the late Mr. Shaver that if he makes a mistake he will die. Shaver made a mistake and he died, or was murdered really.

One of the things our professors taught us early on in the study of military history is that 'I wasn't there, I could never judge the actions of a general' is unacceptable.

We'll apply that rule here with both officers. In Slager's case a suspect running away cannot be a threat to the police officer. In Brailsford's case, neither can a man lying prone on the floor.  It almost seems like Brailsford was looking for an excuse to blow away the late Mr. Shaver. He scrawled, 'Sorry you're fucked,' on his AR-15 dust cover.

Brailsford, who we hope the Shaver family sues into oblivion, does not strike this civilian as the kind of man he wants on his police force.

It seems to us that in these situations police  are obsessed with 'officer safety'.

Hence the corpses.




Officer Philip Brailsford, beat cop?