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“A slave stood behind the conqueror, holding a golden crown, and whispering in his ear a warning: that all glory is fleeting.” – Patton

Patton hated fighting against the German fighting tank. No one likes the Peter Panzer.

Last month I did a post on books. The response was amazing, and had lots of comments from folks that aren’t regular commenters. It also cost me about $50 in books that are now on my shelf and in the “to read” pile. And I thank you folks for that. Now I won’t get through my “to read” pile until 2254.

To follow up, I thought I’d bring up movies. Manly movies. This summer, Pugsley and The Boy and I spent several nights watching Man Movies. These were movies that I selected that exhibited manly virtues. I’ll go through some of them below.

I’ve selected movies that are greater than 17 years old. Why? Because of the second movie on the list. Otherwise it would be 20 years, and that’s a long time. My friend drove a limo for 20 years, and now in this economy has nothing to chauffer it.

One question I’ll answer about each one is does the movie pass the three criteria of the Bechdel Test? The Bechdel Test was devised by (really) 1980’s lesbian women to use as a criteria on what movies to watch. I’m not very optimistic that good Man Movies will pass this test:

1. The movie has to have at least two women,
2. who talk to each other,
3. about something other than a man.

And no, none of these movies are about the invention of braille, even though I’ve heard that’s a great feel-good movie.

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First up:

Patton

Patton was my favorite movie the first time I watched it. How old was I? I was still in the PJ and Saturday morning cartoon set. As long-term readers might have guessed, I have a passion for history. General Patton (because of the movie Patton) is a primary reason I developed that love.

Patton also has a personal connection to the Wilder family. Pa Wilder was yelled at personally by General Patton. It turns out that Pa had been sent with orders to deliver supplies to a unit that didn’t exist. So, he’d stop and ask where the (I’m making this up) 551^st Infantry Division was. There was no 551^st Infantry. The United States Army was purposely trolling any spies that were in France. When Pa Wilder ended up at Patton’s 3^rd Army and asked for the 551^st, Patton yelled at Pa and then took all of the supplies. And all of the trucks. All of them. Pa Wilder and his company had to hop a ride to get back to Paris.

I walked in and The Mrs. was yelling at the TV: “Don’t go into the church, you moron!” She always gets emotional at our wedding videos.

I’m surprised Patton didn’t tell Pa and his Company to grab their M-1’s and hoof it to Bastogne.

(Note for newer readers who can do math: Ma and Pa Wilder adopted me after the wolves who raised me on Wilder Mountain decided I was too wild for them to continue having me around. Pa Wilder would be grandpa age, since I’m firmly a Gen X kid.)

One night this summer The Mrs. went to bed fairly early. I realized that neither Pugsley nor The Boy had seen Patton. The movie is nearly three hours in length. I expected that they’d watch a few minutes of it, pat me on the head for my love of this outdated movie, and move on.

Nope. They sat, riveted. When they had to go to the bathroom? “Hey, Dad, pause it, please.”

Does Patton pass the Bechdel Test? No. The only women I recall in the movie are a Garden Society that Patton gives a speech to. They have no lines. Would Patton be stronger if there was some subplot involving a young and brave female supersoldier who could fight even better than all the men because she’s the bestest ever?

Of course not.

I had trophy for winning a limbo competition, but it was stolen. How low can you get?

What Patton does, though, is inspire. He was a fountain of bravery and strength. He was probably the best fighting general the United States had in Europe. Patton’s sense of determination and destiny? The stuff of legend. Patton won Oscars® for Best Picture, Best Actor, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, and Most Manliest Movie Ever Made Up To 1970.

Not a second is wasted. The Boy and Pugsley finished the movie with me around 2AM on a Sunday morning. Good times.

Master and Commander: The Far Side of The World

I first watched this movie with The Boy when he was very young. Master and Commander tells the tale of fictional Captain Jack Aubrey and his ship’s surgeon as they sail on adventures during the Napoleonic wars before the French started surrendering every month when the power bill came in.

If you’re sad that you have never sailed across the Atlantic Ocean, remember, neither has the Titanic

The stunning thing about this movie is that it’s 100% Manly, even though it was made in 2003. The ship is crewed by men. They try to kill French men, who are in turn also manly. The only women seen in the movie are some native women who bring supplies to Captain Aubrey’s ship, the H.M.S. Surprise. Bechdel Test? Fail.

The rest of the movie?

Combat. Strategy. Honor. Tons of honor: there’s even a suicide done for the sake of honor.

And also a responsibility. In one scene, a 14 year old is left in command of the H.M.S. Surprise. The honor and responsibility are not lost on him: a continuing theme of this movie is the responsibility of command. Sure, if you’re the Captain you get the biggest bedroom on the ship. But the cost of that is responsible for every man on the ship, and even the ship itself.

The cinematography is amazing – and the H.M.S. Surprise is a real sailing ship. The movie didn’t make a bunch of money at the box office. That’s okay. At least they made it.

Russell Crowe plays Captain Aubrey. It’s his best role in any movie I’ve seen him in.

Zulu

The Battle of Rourke’s Drift is one of those, “did this really happen?” history moments. Several thousand Zulu warriors (3,000? 4,000?) attacked a small mission in South Africa in 1879. Who was left to defend it? About 150 troops, but only 120 of them were able to fight.

And who was in charge? An engineer. Lt. John Chard, who was described later as, “one of the most unambitious and ugly men” that particular general had ever met. That general had to award him the Victoria Cross (VC), which is the highest award Great Britain has for bravery. Smells like envy to me since the general never earned a VC himself. Also, 11 Victoria Crosses were awarded to soldiers at Rourke’s Drift. That’s not 1% of every Victoria Cross ever awarded.

But it’s close to 1% of all of them. Ever.

I did find a great new machine at the gym – it does everything: Chips. Cookies. Candy bars.

The 1964 movie Zulu is about that battle. It’s fairly unique in that the leader of the Zulu warriors attacking the British soldiers is played by the grandson of the Zulu chief who actually did attack Rourke’s Drift. Stanley Baker and Michael Caine play Lt. John Chard and Lt. Gonville Bromhead. Yes. That’s a real name. Someone actually named their child Michael.

Why is this movie great?

Well, it obviously fails the Bechdel Test, since there are zero conversations between women about anything.

But neither soldier really wants to command. Both of them (in real life) were described as wanting to smoke pipes and fish rather than work hard. Chard assumes command because he has to – he became a Lieutenant first.

The only way to win against 33 to 1 odds? Discipline. And the British soldiers showed it in abundance. They fought smartly, as a group. The movie is well paced, and Stanley Baker and Michael Caine tear up the screen. There are some historical inaccuracies, but it’s a movie, not a documentary.

Why is it manly?

Duty. Ingenuity. Unwillingness to give up.

The Thing

Since there are no women at all in The Thing (1982), it becomes the fourth out of four movies to fail the Bechdel Test. I’m thinking that 1980’s lesbian women probably aren’t good judges of movies I’ll like based on a criteria that has nothing to do with what makes a good movie. Good thing the Oscars® are joining them and demanding that arbitrary criteria are included in selecting the Best Picture Oscar™!

Chuck Norris was abducted by aliens. Once. That’s how we know that UFOs aren’t real.

The Thing was never in danger of winning an Oscar®. It’s a gore-fest John Carpenter movie. And it’s wonderful. If you don’t like horror movies – it’s not for you. But in this movie, Kurt Russell does his best Clint Eastwood imitation for the duration of the film and starts the movie by pouring scotch into a chess computer because it beats him.

The basic plot is that a small group of men are cut off from the world in Antarctica. Antarctica means “no bears.” Arctic means, from the Greek word, arktos, which means “bear.” Antarctica means the opposite, which would be no bears. But Kurt Russell has a manly beard that would make any bear claim him as their own.

The Thing is a great movie.

There is suspense. Just like evaluating a member of Congress, there is that moment when you have no idea who is good and who is bad.

But there is also the manly moment – when Kurt Russell stands up and decides he’s going to stop the alien. Is it because he’s a good guy? Yes. He decided fairly early in the movie that he was probably going to die, but that he would sacrifice everything so that a shape-shifting alien wouldn’t be able to escape Antarctica and become Billary Clinton.

The Thing again returns to the theme of being a man: Liking humans more than aliens. Willing to fight to the last to stop those aliens. Adapting to extreme changes in reality during the span of days.

I have a much longer list, but those are the four that made the cut for a very short list.

Your suggestions?

“Murder, arson, terror, I’ll agree to anything that gives us power. Power! And we can’t have power if we compromise. Even though it takes years, terror and power.” – Nicholas and Alexandria

Hmmm, ever notice that people started worrying about Global Warming® when the Soviets collapsed? I guess they missed the Cold War.

We’re in the middle of the biggest changes that we’ve seen in the country since World War II or the Great Depression. After WWII, the cities filled up. Coming back from the war, soldiers found that far fewer farmers were needed. Dorito® farmers were also impacted, even if they had a cool ranch.

The centralization of the cities offered the chance to work at huge manufacturing facilities. This was driven as United States took the industry developed to build Sherman tanks and other weapons of mass destruction and converted them to building cars and washing machines. Clarification – they didn’t convert the Sherman tanks into washing machines. But I kinda wished they had – the spin cycle would have been cool, and it probably would only have taken 150 gallons of gasoline per load.

Sure, there were lots of small manufacturing plants scattered across small towns everywhere – there are a few still operating in Modern Mayberry – but the big job creation was in the big cities. As factories have been offshored and closed down, many of the jobs that pulled people into cities have gone away. Cities in many cases (but not all) are now anchored by office jobs – things like finance, insurance, real estate and professional services. Which is nice, because they’ll need insurance after this year.

I’m going to protest the next riot by going out and buying a television.

As I predicted in past posts, we’re seeing the Fall of the Cities as people look around and ask themselves, “Why am I buying a 1,000 square foot two-bedroom house that costs a million dollars to live here?” It was a question I was asking even before the Wu-Flu©. But COVID-19 was the gasoline on the, er, bonfire of the cities that finally got the people living there to ask it, too.

• First, it showed how cities are hotspots for spreading disease. Except during peaceful protests.
• Second, work from home showed how few jobs needed to go in to the office every day to keep the large companies going. Why do you need to be in New York City working in a cubicle when you could do the same job from the middle of Missouri with a phone connection? One business I’ve heard of dropped its use of offices from five skyscraper floors down to two. And they don’t anticipate ever using those spare three floors again.
• Third, it created economic chaos, unemployment, and uncertainty. This creates fear in the lives of people doing their work on a day to day basis. How will they pay for PEZ®? How will they get a job when millions are unemployed, and companies are failing?

My friend Dante was involved in PETA protests, but stopped. Dante’s in fur now.

• Fourth, it separated people from each other in their daily lives. Even the masks, which (whatever their efficacy) are preventing normal human interaction in most cities. Some states have mandated that anyone outside of their house has to wear a mask. Not when within six feet of one another – just anyone who is outside. Additionally, people need to see each other’s faces – that’s how we bond and interact. People need people. Even the most introverted person needs human contact at some interval.
• Fifth, the result of this was a moment in time that could be made into a crisis of crime and destruction. This allowed BLM® and Antifa™ an opportunity. And that opportunity wouldn’t be wasted.

Antifa® isn’t new – it’s been around since the 1930’s. It started in Germany under the name Antifaschistische Aktion, and was set up (surprise!) as part of the Stalinist wing of the German commies. Today in the United States, they use the exact same symbol, and exact same name, Antifaschistische Aktion.

I knew there were problems with Antifa™ in this black and white photo, but I couldn’t see the red flags.

The original organization started even before there was fascism in Germany of any significance. Fascism was defined by the commies as capitalist society in general. So, unless you’re a communist (and if you’re a regular reader of this site, you’re not) this means you. Antifa© puts the world into two buckets:

• Good: Antifa© members.
• Bad: Everyone else. And, honestly, they’re not so sure that some of the communists might not need some quality time in Spokane Gulag.

Antifa© has led riots across the country. They are systematically attempting to destroy the United States, and they’ve decided to start in the cities. And people are starting to move out. The patterns are varied. One YouTuber® I watch occasionally said he’s done with San Francisco. His wife had a successful business. Had. Now it’s folding up. He cited the figure that 1400 of 2500 street-level businesses in San Francisco were just gone.

What’s the difference between a gender studies degree and being homeless? About five years.

Now he and his wife are gone. They haven’t decided which “red state” they’re moving to but they’ve already left San Francisco. He did directly promise to leave his Blue State ways behind him. He has the recognition that it wasn’t an accident that San Francisco is a mess, rather it was the result of decades of bad decisions. Given that his job can be done anywhere he has an Internet connection, nearly every place in the United States is an option.

The same thing is happening in New York City. People are leapfrogging out of the cities to the suburbs. People in the suburbs are moving rural. They’ve seen what’s happening, and have decided they’ll take whatever real estate gains they can get, and go.

Now an additional crisis has been created:

As such, we’re witnessing a great migration of people out of the cities, and out of Blue States. But that’s not enough, is it? The goal isn’t to own the cities, the goal is to eliminate fascists. Which is everyone who isn’t in Antifa®. How better to do that then to create yet another crisis. It looks like that’s exactly what someone has done.

The fires spreading across the West? At least some of the fires burning all over the West were intentionally set – see various stories at the bottom. It appears that places like Facebook® are banning stories where anyone says that Antifa© is lighting the fire. So, no matter how it looks like it’s something exactly like what Antifa™ would do, and in locations where Antifa™ hangs out, and done by people who look like they could be on an Antifa® recruiting poster, it surely can’t be Antifa©, right?

The fires have been devastating – at least 600,000 people in Oregon have been placed under an evacuation order. Large numbers of these fires were caused, on purpose.

Sounds like a weapon of mass destruction to me . . . .

Old pic ctsy: Bundesarchiv, B 145 Bild-P046279 / Weinrother, Carl / CC-BY-SA 3.0

“I hired you to raise the vocabulary level of this paper. I want to keep the journalistic level very low.” – Transylvania 6-5000

How can we change history if you have your own copy?  Paging Winston Smith – we need to edit the past.

Every once in a while it’s good to try new things.  This post probably a one-time thing, but I had all this material, and couldn’t resist.

What is it?

It’s a list of stories where the media was so biased that they performed anatomically impossible acts to sell their stories.  I have double this number of examples, but I consciously steered away from more sensitive topics where the media contradicted itself. 

Why?

Well, I described one of the examples I had with The Mrs. 

The Mrs.:  “Don’t use it.”

John Wilder:  “Why?  I fact checked it.  It’s legitimate.  Both stories are still on their web site.”

The Mrs.:  “It detracts from the message.  It may be true, but people will just focus on the subject, and not the point you’re making.”

I took The Mrs.’ advice.  I skipped that example.  And 27 others.  I could have doubled the post length with more examples of unintended irony or media just contradicting themselves on Tuesday because Monday’s message wasn’t convenient.

The Mrs. is right. 

The message isn’t the topic of the contradiction, it’s the contradiction itself.  The topic of the contradiction was more sensitive than the ones presented below.  If you wanted to convince someone of the lie, showing them a lie without the baggage might be more helpful.  That’s my theory. 

I didn’t create any of these, I caught ‘em wild on the Internet.  If you know of any that are factually inaccurate, please do let me know.  I didn’t check all sources, and anything added in the image itself isn’t mine. 

The snarky comments below? Those are mine.

Remember, these are the people that are attempting to convince you how to vote in the next election.  These are the people who want to control your views.  These are the people who want to be immune from your comments, and, in the case of the Vice® comment above, not be held to account for the things they said in the past. History is inconvenient.  As you will see.

When is a wiretap not a wiretap?  Well, did they really use wires?

As we all know, old ladies with walkers commit 50% of the crimes in the United States.

To make CNN happy, all Joe has to do is fog a mirror.

It’s a conspiracy theory that George did the thing he bragged about doing?

Democracy dies in darkness?  How about irony?  Does that need a tanning bed?

Is it Schrödinger’s murder rate, which is neither down nor up?

Oh, and Schrödinger’s ratings, too!

If the White farmers move to the United States, would they be African Americans?

I think these two were posted within an hour of each other.  Those crazy night shift guys!

Well, she has a point.  I mean, as long as they’re attacking businesses, it’s not domestic, right?

Ahh, England.  You’ll only be in here once, right?  Oh.  More to come?

Apparently family leave is awesome, unless you’re a woman.  Which is anyone in 2020.

Whew!  How things change in a month!  Did Khan need a diaper, too?  

So, does that mean the Vikings can kick the Maori out of New Zealand? 

Literally no one could have seen this coming, right?  Must be racism.

It’s vital to know about certain candidates, right?  Must be a guy thing?

Oh, not a guy thing.  Hmm.  What could the reason be?

Joe Biden denies that his dementia is dementia is fair?

We reject the idea that people are stealing the things we said people are stealing.

The fires that the scientists predicted nearly a year in advance?  It’s misleading to say that we mismanaged them.  Bigot.

Whew!  Fact free journalism that’s based on convincing people to do the things we want!  Zimmerman, get on that right away!

Ahhh, the Left has him now!

Get that girl a GoGurt, stat!  She’s been saved by the entire population of Syria!

I’m naked.  Except for my jeans, underwear, socks, and the shirt I have.  Oh, and the cellphone.  Totally naked.  

Hmm, so if a person gets out of prison after spending decades in for being in a terrorist group doing terrorist things and was caught with hundreds of pounds of explosives?  Well, kind of a terrorist.  But what a great resume to get a board seat on a charity with nearly a billion dollars on the books!

Same writer.  I guess that only Some Woman Lives Matter?  

Yasmin just can’t catch a break.  Allegedly.  What a fantastic American.

Get a television show, fascist.  Then people know you’re telling the truth.

Guard your mind.  What are they pumping into it?

 

 

“Random chance seems to have operated in our favor.” – Star Trek (TOS)

My high school buddy moved to Chicago and told me it isn’t that violent.  He’s a tailgunnner on a school bus.

Once or twice a year, I decide I’m going to relax with a post.  Instead of the tightly-constructed gems of wit and wisdom, it’s just a list of things I’m thinking about.

• A fish wouldn’t understand what water is, no more than an American would understand what Western Civilization is. Only one of them tastes good with tartar sauce.
• Mark Twain knew that most people can’t tell a good event from a bad one. The best things in my life have come from events that, at the time, felt awful.  Think about a baby just before birth – nice and warm and then twisting and constricting and exposure to cold and harsh light.  How could the baby ever have beer unless it was born??   I’ve learned.  I wait to see what happened before I judge if something is good or bad.  This makes me look like some sort of Zen-master when I’m calm and everyone else is panicking.
• War in the twentieth century was built around maneuver and destruction of the enemy’s capability to fight. War in the twenty-first century will be built around information and the destruction of the economy before the fight can begin.

• The Boy and Pugsley went out to Wal-Mart® today to go shopping. They announced a weird and perplexing list of shortages.  We may have moved into a scarcity economy.  At least we have Netflix®, right?
• Western Civilization (i.e., freedom) has been under attack for over 100 years.
• Mandatory vaccinations were approved by a Supreme Court decision. That same Supreme Court ruled that you could have mandatory sterilization of mentally inferior people.  Be careful what you cite.
• COVID-19 might be the seed for the final breakup of the United States. Just like the sniper said to his ex-girlfriend:  “I won’t miss you!”

• Why does the Left get bent out of shape about Russia? I think it’s because during an interview, Vladimir Putin was asked if a woman could become president of Russia.  Putin responded, “No, because I am not a woman.”
• Antifa® appears to be a group of middle-class kids with daddy-issues who can still afford tattoos, piercings, and black clothing. If they win, I’d love to see their faces as they learn during harvest season that potatoes don’t originate at Whole Foods®.
• 650,000 people moved out of California last year. Number moving to Modern Mayberry?    Good luck, Idaho!
• Would we even know that COVID-19® existed without the media?
• In the minds of most of the Center and Right, Black Lives Matter® is 100% tied to violence and looting.
• What if the role of 2020 is to play, “Think that’s cool, 2020? Hold my beer?” as everything rolls of the edge?    Don’t worry about that or prepare for it.  It’ll be fine.
• The Redpill is a meme from The Matrix (1999). It means that you understand what reality actually is.  Heck those LGBT+ folks won’t take a straight answer.
• Gingko Biloba is a plant that’s not really related to anything on Earth for the last 270,000,000 years. It’s almost as old as your mom.

• Cancel culture is hilarious, since right now it’s eating the Left. Remember what Napoleon said:  “Never interrupt your enemy when they’re making a mistake.”
• Free markets (within a nation) are still better than any alternative we’ve found. Free markets between nations is a neat goal – as long as the nations are free.  But they’re not.
• Joe Biden may be the first politician who thinks they won an election against Ronald Reagan.
• I woke up this morning and my hip hurt, probably for something I did in one Thursday in 2013. Is my hip officially cancelled?

• The most consequential invention of the 2000’s is the iPhone®. It’s also the most destructive invention of my lifetime.
• During my lifetime, it was certain that the Soviets, Japanese, and Chinese would become the most powerful economic power on Earth. Now?  The Soviets don’t exist, and the Japanese have become focused on anime and talking cats.
• Marriage that produces kids and lasts is good.
• The new definition of far-right extremist includes: a desire to be monogamous and marry and have kids, avoiding drugs and porn and alcohol, reading books and hiking.

• The undercover Rightwing political operation to completely discredit Leftists, codenamed: “Just Let Joe Biden Speak” is apparently working.
• Hierarchy is necessary for a civilized society to survive.
• The United States has 140 operational bombers. Not in a bomber wing or squadron.  140 bombers.    60 or so of them (B-52) entered service in 1955 and, although not quite as old as Joe Biden, are pretty old.
• Don’t let Russia determine the 2020 election! Demand Voter ID!

• If COVID-19 has killed more businesses than people, was a lockdown the right call?
• Ever notice that since the British gave up all of their guns, that now teenage kids in Great Britain can get put into jail for offensive jokes that teenage kids make?
• Imagine what seven billion people on the planet could do if they just left each other alone?
• The first rule of being in a gunfight? Have a gun. (Jeff Cooper)

• Long time readers would be surprised to know that I do have appreciation for some metric measures: 9mm, 7.62x39mm, and 5.56mm.
• What happens when rent is no longer deferred and the unemployment checks stop?
• If the aliens ever come? Don’t get on the ships.  How to Serve Man is a cookbook.

“By assimilating other beings into our collective, we are bringing them closer to perfection.” – Star Trek: First Contact

The best thing about being in Antifa®? You never have to worry about taking off work to protest.

I heard with great excitement that Antifa® and #BlackLivesMatter™ had formed a new government. I was excited. It turns out that they sliced out a chunk of Seattle – six city blocks – and declared it the C.H.A.Z. Chaz isn’t just some guy that went to Princeton and polished Buffy while dating Daddy’s Rolls Royce. I mean, polished the Rolls while dating Princeton. But, anyway, it’s not that Chaz.

No. This C.H.A.Z. is the Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone.

1PM, Wednesday:

I figured if starting their own autonomous zone was good enough for Antifa©, it was probably good enough for me, because what can’t I learn from a group of perpetually pampered trust fund baristas who haven’t managed to learn how to run a checking account?

I called a family council to discuss the decision, all while understanding that the concept of “family” was an outdated concept based on Heterosexual Privilege. In attendance at this first meeting of the as yet unnamed collective was me (John Wilder), The Mrs., The Boy (Home From College), and Pugsley (Snarky Teen Who Is Now Taller Than Me As Of Wednesday).

John Wilder: “Family, I think it’s time to stick it to the patriarchy.”

The Boy: “Pop. I hate to tell you this, you are the patriarchy.”

Pugsley: “Heh heh – you said stick it. Besides, what’s the favorite song of the patriarchy?”

The Mrs.: (Not looking up from the Wall Street Journal®) “It’s Reigning Men.”

Pugsley: “Score one for Mom!”

John Wilder: “No, this is serious. We must strike a symbolic blow for (I paused) something. I guess.”

The Mrs.: (Looking up from reading The Wall Street Journal®) “What are you up to now? Does it involve finally getting the hardwood floors installed or getting the garage cleaned out including that motorcycle of yours that hasn’t started since Johnny Depp ran out of money? If so, count me in. And while you’re at it, please clean the camping gear out of the rec room – there’s enough gear for the 82^nd Airborne to conquer (she paused) Poland. Or France. France would be quicker. They probably wouldn’t even notice.”

I’d love to visit the caliphate on the Seine, especially in spring! (Reprinted with permission.)

John Wilder: “Good. It’s unanimous. I think we should name our new autonomous zone . . . Johnstown, in honor of me, the founder. We could have a symbolic flag. Hey! We could use the Kool-Aid® man. The Kool-Aid™ man could symbolize our fight to crash right through capitalism! Oh yeah!”

The Boy: “Ummm, I think that was already taken. (Thinking.) Oh, no, that was Jonestown, where a group of feel-good San Francisco liberals tried to create a peaceful, racially mixed utopian communal society in the South American jungle. Dad, I don’t think that ended well. And you might want to re-think the Kool-Aid®.”

And they told me my second choice for the name of the collective, Heaven’s Gate, was another bad idea.

John Wilder: (Grudgingly) “Okay, you have a good point. Dang. And Johnstown had such a nice ring to it, like something that a newscaster would say. Okay. How about something more inclusive. What about the Wilder Autonomous Collective.”

Pugsley: “Well, if you want to go Full Soviet, and I don’t ever advise anyone to go Full Soviet, you need a Kommissar, right? That would make it the Wilder Autonomous Collective Kommissarat. But don’t turn around. Der Kommissar is in town.”

John Wilder: “Sounds great! But it’s not catchy enough. W.A.C.K. sounds silly.”

The Mrs.: “Y’all.”

John Wilder: “Y’all?”

The Mrs.: (Not looking up from the Wall Street Journal®) “Well, you must be true to the cultural roots of the collective. So, add Y’all to the end.”

I thought about fighting – no one in the house ever used “Y’all” on a regular basis. But in the interest of encouraging harmony, I didn’t fight.

John Wilder: “So, it’s agreed – The Wilder Autonomous Collective Kommisarat, Y’all. We’ll call it W.A.C.K.Y. for short.”

3PM, Wednesday:

In the interest of creating a truly autonomous collective, the first thing I did was go out to the street. We have a little vault where the water valve is. I turned it off.

The Mrs.: “John, would you call the county? Is there a problem with the water?”

John Wilder: “I turned it off at the street. If we are going to be an autonomous collective, we have to be, well, autonomous.”

The Mrs. would not let me Spice Weasel the water.

The Mrs.: “You’re not cutting off the water when I want to take a shower. What exactly is your genius plan for water?”

John Wilder: “Well, there’s the pond out back. We can bring in water and after we filter it and boil it you can use it for a sponge bath. Sound good?”

The Mrs.: “No. That sounds awful. Go back to the street and turn it back on. Right now. What other nonsense do you have planned?”

John Wilder: “Electricity. We should get rid of it. That’s how The Man gets you.”

The Mrs.: “Unless you are going to harvest the energy of a Pugsley’s teenage angst, you’re not turning the power off on a humid and hot day like this. Look (pointing at my legs) even your ankles are sweating. And that’s with the air conditioning on.”

Well, everyone has sweaty ankles, right?

Chaz is the man, right?

7 PM, Wednesday:

I decided to go door-to-door to my neighbors to ask if they wanted to join W.A.C.K.Y. They declined. I asked them to donate $500 to a fund for their personal defense. They declined. Maybe I need to bring guns and some large people next time to politely convince them of the peaceful aim of our collective? Because of that, I set up a border around W.A.C.K.Y. using a spray-painted line that says: “Do not cross unless you want to be W.A.C.K.Y.”

7 AM, Thursday:

I worked all night long and came up with a list of the W.A.C.K.Y. demands:

• The Modern Mayberry Sheriff’s Department and attached court system are beyond reform. We do not request reform, we demand.  We demand that they apologize for giving me that ticket for rolling that four-way stop back in 2013 even though the judge dismissed it and it cost me nothing.
• In the transitionary period between now and the dismantlement of the Modern Mayberry Sheriff’s Department, we demand that they give us a ride in the Dodge® Charger they got last year. And allow us to turn on the siren.
• We demand that not the County government, nor the State government, but that the Federal government launch a full-scale investigation into why I got that ticket for rolling that four-way stop back in 2013.
• We demand reparations for victims of all people who were unjustly accused of rolling four-way stops.
• We demand a retrial of all balding men who got tickets, by a jury of their peers in their community. Oh, that’s the law already? Never mind.
• We demand decriminalization of almost maybe rolling a four-way stop, and amnesty for drivers generally, but specifically those involved in what has been termed “The Going to Wal-Mart® for Grilling Supplies Rebellion” against the terrorist cell that previously occupied this area known as the Mayberry Sheriff’s Department. This includes the immediate release of all people who grill that are currently being held in prison.
• We demand that the funding previously used for Socialized Health and Medicine, free public housing, and Naturalization services for illegal aliens be given to us as steaks and grilling supplies.

I had The Mrs. post my demands on Facebook®. The only reply that she would share with me was, “Looks like John has a case of the Mondays!”

One advantage of having your own autonomous collective? You never have a case of the Mondays, because life never changes and you don’t get weekends off.

6PM, Thursday:

I look in the fridge. The fridge is mostly full, but the items – a large pot with half a boiled potato, lettuce from the Pleistocene, and something that may be meatloaf or might be celery is on the bottom shelf. It gets worse from there.

The Mrs. is in the other room, so I ask her, “Hey, what’s for dinner?”

The Mrs.: “Well, I was going to go to Wal-Mart® and pick up some steaks and bratwurst and ingredients for a homemade fettuccine Alfredo. But you erected a concrete and steel barricade in the driveway that reminded me of the Berlin Wall, so all I have is pimento loaf and ramen.

They say that communism causes hunger. Now I see the ugly truth. It does. Can anyone spare some steak for the W.A.C.K.Y. people? I really don’t like pimento loaf, which always reminded me of bologna’s pimply friend.

Okay, none of that happened, except for the C.H.A.Z. business in Seattle. That’s real. And the funny thing is that the fictional Wilder Autonomous Collective Kommissarat, Ya’ll was more successful in every way to C.H.A.Z. Here are actual things that have happened at C.H.A.Z. up to this writing:

• C.H.A.Z. ran out of food on day two. Communism in the Internet age is even faster than the old Soviet version. That’s progress, comrade!
• They went from “no police” to having a gang chasing down and beating up people for putting graffiti on graffiti that the gang liked. I’m sure modern, trained police with body cameras would have launched a graffiti artist into the Sun, so he got off lightly!
• They installed a garden to feed themselves by putting dirt on top of cardboard and then putting plastic potted plants on top of the dirt. They put Christmas lights around the garden, I guess because that helps communist plants grow? Regardless, I’m sure they’ll be able to feed at least one of their citizens, if that citizen is wheelchair bound and doesn’t breathe too heavily.
• Issued a list of demands LINK.
• They roughed up local businesses looking for “contributions” of $500 each for “protection.” Is that a daily, weekly or monthly payment? No one knows.
• Someone offered C.H.A.Z a cow. A milk cow. C.H.A.Z. was against this. Why? The cow doesn’t produce soy milk. Also? Milk is rape. Yes. Liberals think that a cow having to have a calf to become a milk cow is rape. You cannot make this stuff up.
• Turned a coffee shop into a “public stage.”
• Created a public speech area as well, because six blocks requires two stages.
• Turned a baseball field into a “relaxation and therapy zone.”
• Turned a wannabe rapper into a warlord who runs the local goon squad. No body cameras or courts. Yay! What an efficient system. Have a gun in C.H.A.Z.? Guess you’re in charge now!
• Instituted borders, even though they think that Federal immigration laws should be abolished.

I based the list of demands above on theirs. It looked like it was written by a group of earnest fourth graders using words they don’t quite understand but who whine at a 11^th grade level.

C.H.A.Z. is more W.A.C.K.Y. than W.A.C.K.Y. ever was.

The only difference is that I know that I’m joking.