I used to cover Charmed (The CW) but stepped away near the end of last season (season three). Season four started last week.
I wasn't happy with Charmed last season for 2 reasons. First, Maggie is not that interesting and the dumpy, fat actress that plays her looked even worse after a bad perm. It looked like a really bad home perm. And she's too fat to do the action scenes. But they try tomake her the star of the series. It's supposed to be about 3 sisters. And yet they shoved fatty down our throats.
Second, Mel didn't get any action. Mel's a lesbian. The show got a lot of credit for having a lesbian in a main role. But season three had Mel being a nun basically. And when they had no more excuses for not letting her have love scenes, they made her pregnant via the future. That was really it for me. We had Mel being romanced by four or five men in season three and her older sister couldn't even get any on camera?
Maggie and Mel are still on. My favorite character was Macy. But that sister got killed off at the end of last season.
Now, as season four starts, they're looking for the other sister that they didn't know existed. The sisters are witches. They need to have ''the power of three'' to be the strongest they can. In the original, Shanna Dougherty was fired at the end of season three because Alyssa Milano demanded it. That's when, season four of the original, Rose McGowan showed up as the previously unknown sister Piper. Now the reboot
So this e. Mpisode was about introducing us to Kaela (short for Michaela) played by Lucy Barrett. She's the other sister that they didn't know about. She's been haunted by some visions and sketched them in her sketch book. When Mel and Maggie end up at the bus she's living in, they see that the bus has many paintings including one of the little charmed token. She's been sketching what she sees.
They're not sure she's their sister until they're attacked and because Kaela's with them, they have the power of three.
The other thing to note is that the episode opened with Mel in a bar with a woman. Maybe season four will find Mel being treated like an equal? I hope. I'll hang around a bit to see. If homophobia resurfaces, however, I'm out.
This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot:"
Friday, March 18, 2022. The selling of the latest war sure resembles the selling of the Iraq War.
Starting with Jackson Hinkle.
Jackson exposes the lies of THE OLD SQUIRTY DUKES Ana and Cenk. Their audience has gone. Tehir lies continue. Their friends are less and less and some have found out that they can longer propagandize the way they used to -- for example, TURNER CLASSIC MOVIES is not going to put up with you sneaking your propaganda when you're supposed to be discussing movies -- not only that, they made him actually spend a few bucks on suits so he doesn't look like such a slob. But Ana and Cenk continue plowing at the street corner. They're hoping someone's going to come along with a five or a ten who needs a ahlf-and-half or a hand job or something.
And it's good that they can fall back on that because they're lying has been exposed and they have no real power anymore.
They are Joe Biden, in the bathroom, standing at the sink, front of their boxers pulled out as they stare at the withered appendage and cray as they shriek, "Grow! Grow!"
It's just not happening.
And whilt ehy're paid to deliver the vote to the Democratic Party -- that's what the Katenzberg deal was all about, they're not going to be able to do that. First off, their audiences has shrivled -- again, like Joe's member. Secondly, they're not Bette Midler.
She's the idiot who Tweets photos of selective children to try to promote the war. She Tweets that she's willing to pay more for gas, et al, because she cares.
She doesn't give a s**t. This is the woman with ties to Jeffrey Epstein and, sadly, that's the least of her problems when it comes to her personal associates. Hollywood enever embraced Bette because she's gutter trash. The music industry out of New York and New Jersey, a roughter crowd, one with more ties to the mafia, embraced her. The mafia controlled the divers she perfomred in. Those are her roots. Do not mistake her for genteel. She's gutter trash and she always be.
But in the world of reality, people aren't thrilled to be paying for any war. Let alone a war that should not have been started, a war that involved no attack on the US. In the roundtable last night for the gina & krista round-robin, we had a person who can't drive due to vision issues explain how he's now -- this week -- paying two dollars more for each cab ride. Now Bettte may be overjoyed in her mob-palace by the ocean, but those people who worked for their money and didn't consort with organized crime? They don't have all the spare change Bette does.
And people are feeling it -- this war and Joe's impotence -- every where -- at the grocery store, at the gas pump. This is an election year.
The key question is always: ARe you better off now than you were before?
And, no, Americans are not. Fiancnially, they are not better off.
And the Anas and Cenks can lie all they want and try to portray Ukraine as a country populated with faireis and sprites, but the reality is that, in 2014, the US installed neo-nazis. That's who is being backed in this war. Some people have such a problem with the reality that the US government backed and empowered the Talbian.
But they did.
It was 'strategic.'
And it came back to bite the world in the ass after Jimmy Carter was out of office.
For 'stragey' that empowers thugs, you have to have whores who will sell it as 'humanity' and as 'human rights' and as 'a just cause.'
There is no just cause for the US in the issue of Ukraine.
Joe Biden is a failure as a president and Americans feel it every time they go to the gas pump or to the grocery store.
A far-away war is not going to make their lives better. Backing a neo-nzai group in Ukraine is not going to make life better for Ukrainians.
CBS -didn't punish Charlie D'Agata for his racist remarks on air because that was the talking poitn. They were all usupposed to sell the war to the American people and one of the talking points was, "They look just like us." That was supposed to help us identify with Ukraine. Charlie ran a little further with the talking poitn than some but he wasn't suspended or fired -- he should have been suspended -- for his remarks.
And then you get the Twitter brigade led by Bette and other incomptents. Ukraine is not a US issue and certainly not an issue worth pouring millions of US tax dollars into.
They are trying to enforce a lie. So they target others. That's what's going on with the trashing of Tulsi Gabbard and Tucker Carlson.
They are trying to hit the two with a 2 v 4 to intimidate everyone.
Viewers of THE VIEW have to wonder what happened to free speech and The Constitution? I believe Whoopi ate them.
Funding the government of Ukraine and its wars does not beneift Americans. That's reality. And when politicians try to explain it, they fail.
They can't explain.
The selling of this war is not working. Has--beens like Bette Midler are failing at selling it, the media is failing at selling it, censors like Whoopi and Ana can't sell it, politicians can't sell it.
They've dumbe it down, they've shored it up. It won't play. It won't sell.
And as a defense -- the costs of Ukraine -- for Joe's ineptitude won't work as a cover. It has exposed Joe as not up for the job of president. A real president would have been making deals with the oil rich countries by now. Joe has a problem in the Middle East, doesn't he?
The way he betrayed the Kurds non-stop as Vice President may be news to Americans. It's not to the Middle Est. They followed it in real time. They know he betrayed his 'friends.' Why the hell would they trust him if he betrays even his own friends. The State Dept is workign voertime right not trying to cme up with deals and it's so hard for them because Joe is the president. Liar Joe.
Joe's not doing much better with people in the US.
The start of these misguided efforts? It's always their high point. They don't increase in popularity several weeks after. No, they decrease. And there is no strong support for what the US is doing. Poll after poll, if you dig into it, you'll see the support that there is soft support. And it's already waining.
Whoopi wants to inflict fear in people. That's why she invoked the Rosenbergs. That's how trashy and corrupt she is. Julis and Ethel Rosenberg woere executed. That's nothing for America to be proud of. That's a stain ont he country.
If Julius was guilty of passing information to the USSR -- if -- Ethel was not. And we saw an out of control US government charge her and use her to try to intimidate her husband. Railroad her and try to force him to do what they wanted. Mob behavior,
An innocent woman was put to her death because of hysteria, frenzy and a corrupt US government. And Whoopi wants to bring that back.
That is outrageous.
I don't believe Julius was guilty. But we can set that saide for a ,nger discussion. Ethel was not guilty. The US government used her as leverage. And she was assassinated by the US government.
That's nothing to be proud of. That's nothing to cheer for or to desire. But somehow, screwed up, uneducated Whoopi Goldberg went on TV, on the public airwaves, and made a call for that.
It's outrageous.
And it's outrageous to listen to those politicians trying to sell war. Nancy Pelosi wants you to know that Russia invaded Ukraine, that it could use chemical weapons, that . . .
The US invaded Iraq. Nancy damn well knows that. The US used chemical weapons on Iraq.
We could go on and on.
But Nancy Pelosi thinks she has some ethical ground to stand on. Every reason she cites -- true or false -- for the US being in this war only serves to remind Americans of what our governent did, a government Nancy is a part of. There is no push for helping the Iraqi children.
A burn pit may have caused Beau Biden's death. So Joe cares -- a little -- about burn pits. At least what they did to his son. Most of Joe's stands can be traced to Beau. Again, as I've said repeatedly here, I'm so shocked that Hunter hasn't used the truth to defend himself on personal issues. There is no defense for his corruption and unethical business dealings. However, I am surprised that a defense was not made regarding a personal issud. Some day someone's going to say it, going to out it. Won't be me today but Joe doesn't do anything, doesn't alter a previous opinion, unless it has to do with Beau.
Maybe if Beau could have fathered -- or maybe, later on, adopted -- an Iraqi child, Joe would care about the Iraqi children?
At any rate, the US government is no tnoble. It's deeply corrupt and it's become a threat to people around the world. Stealing Americans money to fund wars won't whitewash reality about that.
The US destroyed Iraq. It's in no position to lecture or finger point.
Today in Iraq, the violence continues. CGTN notes:
Four Katyusha rockets on Thursday struck the Balad Air Base, Iraq's largest military air base north of the capital Baghdad, a local security source has said.
The rockets landed at the Balad Air Base in Salahudin Province, some 90 kilometers north of Baghdad, causing no casualties, Xinhua reported citing the provincial police Colonel Mohammed al-Bazi.
Three of the rockets hit a building inside the base, causing minor damage, while the fourth landed in an empty area, al-Bazi said, adding that the rockets were fired from the neighboring province of Diyala.
As we wind down, an ethical note on Joe Biden.
That's Kit on HARD LENS MEDIA discussing Glenn Greenwald's latest report. Here's an excerpt:
This disinformation campaign about the Biden emails was then used by Big Tech to justify brute censorship of any reporting on or discussion of this story: easily the most severe case of pre-election censorship in modern American political history. Twitter locked The New York Post's Twitter account for close to two weeks due to its refusal to obey Twitter's orders to delete any reference to its reporting. The social media site also blocked any and all references to the reporting by all users; Twitter users were barred even from linking to the story in private chats with one another. Facebook, through its spokesman, the life-long DNC operative Andy Stone, announced that they would algorithmically suppress discussion of the reporting to ensure it did not spread, pending a “fact check[] by Facebook's third-party fact checking partners” which, needless to say, never came — precisely because the archive was indisputably authentic.
The archive's authenticity, as I documented in a video report from September, was clear from the start. Indeed, as I described in that report, I staked my career on its authenticity when I demanded that The Intercept publish my analysis of these revelations, and then resigned when its vehemently anti-Trump editors censored any discussion of those emails precisely because it was indisputable that the archive was authentic (The Intercept's former New York Times reporter James Risen was given the green light by these same editors to spread and endorse the CIA's lie, as he insisted that laptop should be ignored because “a group of former intelligence officials issued a letter saying that the Giuliani laptop story has the classic trademarks of Russian disinformation.") I knew the archive was real because all the relevant journalistic metrics that one evaluates to verify large archives of this type — including the Snowden archive and the Brazil archive which I used to report a series of investigative exposés — left no doubt that it was genuine (that includes documented verification from third parties who were included in the email chains and who showed that the emails they had in their possession matched the ones in the archive word-for-word).
Any residual doubts that the Biden archive was genuine — and there should have been none — were shattered when a reporter from Politico, Ben Schreckinger, published a book last September, entitled "The Bidens: Inside the First Family’s Fifty-Year Rise to Power," in which his new reporting proved that the key emails on which The New York Post relied were entirely authentic. Among other things, Schreckinger interviewed several people included in the email chains who provided confirmation that the emails in their possession matched the ones in the Post's archive word for word. He also obtained documents from the Swedish government that were identical to key documents in the archive. His own outlet, Politico, was one of the few to even acknowledge his book. While ignoring the fact that they were the first to spread the lie that the emails were "Russian disinformation,” Politico editors — under the headline “Double Trouble for Biden”— admitted that the book “finds evidence that some of the purported Hunter Biden laptop material is genuine, including two emails at the center of last October’s controversy.”
The vital revelations in Schreckinger's book were almost completely ignored by the very same corporate media outlets that published the CIA's now-debunked lies. They just pretended it never happened. Grappling with it would have forced them to acknowledge a fact quite devastating to whatever remaining credibility they have: namely, that they all ratified and spread a coordinated disinformation campaign in order to elect Joe Biden and defeat Donald Trump. With strength in numbers, and knowing that they speak only to and for liberals who are happy if they lie to help Democrats, they all joined hands in an implicit vow of silence and simply ignored the new proof in Schreckinger's book that, in the days leading up to the 2020 election, they all endorsed a disinformation campaign.
It will now be much harder to avoid confronting the reality of what they did, though it is highly likely that they will continue to do so. This morning, The New York Times published an article about the broad, ongoing FBI criminal investigation into Hunter Biden's international business and tax activities. Prior to the election, the Times, to their credit, was one of the few to apply skepticism to the CIA's pre-election lie, noting on October 22 that “no concrete evidence has emerged that the laptop contains Russian disinformation.” Because the activities of Hunter Biden now under FBI investigation directly pertain to the emails first revealed by The Post, the reporters needed to rely upon the laptop's archive to amplify and inform their reporting. That, in turn, required The New York Times to verify the authenticity of this laptop and its origins — exactly what, according to their reporters, they successfully did:
People familiar with the investigation said prosecutors had examined emails between Mr. Biden, Mr. Archer and others about Burisma and other foreign business activity. Those emails were obtained by The New York Times from a cache of files that appears to have come from a laptop abandoned by Mr. Biden in a Delaware repair shop. The email and others in the cache were authenticated by people familiar with them and with the investigation.
That this cache of emails was authentic was clear from the start. Any doubts were obliterated by publication of Schreckinger's book six months ago. Now the Paper of Record itself explicitly states not only that the emails “were authenticated” but also that the original story from The Post about how they obtained these materials — they “come from a laptop abandoned by Mr. Biden in a Delaware repair shop” — “appears” to be true.
What this means is that, in the crucial days leading up to the 2020 presidential election, most of the corporate media spread an absolute lie about The New York Post's reporting in order to mislead and manipulate the American electorate. It means that Big Tech monopolies, along with Twitter, censored this story based on a lie from “the intelligence community.” It means that Facebook's promise from its DNC operative that it would suppress discussion of the reporting in order to conduct a "fact-check” of these documents was a fraud because if an honest one had been conducted, it would have proven that Facebook’s censorship decree was based on a lie. It means that millions of Americans were denied the ability to hear about reporting on the candidate leading all polls to become the next president, and instead were subjected to a barrage of lies about the provenance (Russia did it) and authenticity (disinformation!) of these documents.
The objections to noting all of this today are drearily predictable. Reporting on Hunter Biden is irrelevant since he was not himself a candidate (what made the reporting relevant was what it revealed about the involvement of Joe Biden in these deals). Given the war in Ukraine, now is not the time to discuss all of this (despite the fact that they are usually ignored, there are always horrific wars being waged even if the victims are not as sympathetic as European Ukrainians and the perpetrators are the film's Good Guys and not the Bad Guys). The real reason most liberals and their media allies do not want to hear about any of this is because they believe that the means they used (deliberately lying to the public with CIA disinformation) are justified by their noble ends (defeating Trump).
Whatever else is true, both the CIA/media disinformation campaign in the weeks before the 2020 election and the resulting regime of brute censorship imposed by Big Tech are of historic significance. Democrats and their new allies in the establishment wing of the Republican Party may be more excited by war in Ukraine than the subversion of their own election by the unholy trinity of the intelligence community, the corporate press, and Big Tech. But today's admission by The New York Times that this archive and the emails in it were real all along proves that a gigantic fraud was perpetrated by the country's most powerful institutions. What matters far more than the interest level of various partisan factions is the core truths about U.S. democracy revealed by this tawdry spectacle.
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