For those of you who aren’t familiar with the seedy underbelly of fandom, File 770 is a garbage gossip column website run by a scumbag named Mike Glyer. His whole shtick is to be a news aggregator for the sci-fi/fantasy business and collect links from people who actually create things for a living. He play acts at being an impartial journalist, but in reality everything he does is slanted to screw over anybody he doesn’t like.

He chums the water for his horde of psychos so they can go about forming internet lynch mobs, boycotts, and black ballings. But then he pretends to be all impartial and above the fray. If you ever want to lose all faith in humanity, read the comments there. His regulars range between basement dwelling goons, creepy weirdo stalkers, and angry rainbow haired social justice warriors.

If you are in any writer’s groups with conservative or libertarian authors in them, then you’ve inevitably heard about this shithole website. We mostly call it Vile 770 or File 666. At one point or another that page has tried to start shit with every author who gets on Glyer’s bad side. Because when you are ever the nail that sticks up, the File 770 crew are the hammer that wants to knock you back down. Luckily, they’re about as effective as a Fisher Price squeaky hammer. So mostly we just mock them.

No matter how big or small you are, if you write something that draws their ire, Glyer will link to you, write some passive aggressive misleading bullshit, and then his little minions will go out of their way to slander you. You are evil and their side is all goodness and light. Usually the slander is about how insignificant and unimportant their foes are, and how they totally don’t even know who you are, which is ironic coming from comments that are bizarrely fixated with your personal details. Across the board they are jealous, spiteful, and really kind of pathetic.

I drew his ire several years ago with my campaign to show that the Hugos were biased. Since Glyer has like 40 something Hugo nominations he took that personal. Go figure. (Sadly, I wish I was exaggerating that number).  He’s been linking back to me constantly ever since, always muck raking and shit stirring. He’ll usually post some passive aggressive thing about look how evil I am, his flying monkeys get riled up, and then he acts all innocent and says he was just reporting the news.

Since I’ve got nothing but contempt for the two faced bastard, I just delete his track backs and move on. I still come up a lot over there . My guess is he really hates me because unlike most authors I don’t dance around with fake politeness. They love fake politeness. They screw you over with impunity, and when you fight back, then they are all about “tone”.

I can’t stand to read the smug bastards, but I’ve got some fans who are gluttons for punishment, so they lurk over there and collect the most psychotic comments for our amusement. Some of those folks need serious help.

Then yesterday I saw a post on Facebook about how sci-fi author Jon Del Arroz was getting screwed over by File 770 (his problems started when he came out as a Trump voter). Not my story to tell, but short version, after a series of events where Glyer did his typical shifty, backstabbing, half-truth “reporting” about Jon getting black balled from a con, Jon wasn’t allowed to defend himself, because of the usual “Tone” and “You Sound Angry” (well, duh, normal people get angry at lying scumbags).

So Jon was lamenting this situation about how the 770 vultures were prematurely dancing on his grave. Glyer had already shown up elsewhere in the thread, doing his little passive aggressive dance, where after helping to fuck over an author’s career, he pretends like he was in on the joke, and it was all in good fun.

Then the following subthread occurred. Once it got rolling a lot of people were chiming in, mostly beating Glyer like a tetherball, but for this post I cut all those out so it is just me, him, and the pertinent bits we respond to. Here is the whole thing if you’d like to read it all and judge for yourself. https://www.facebook.com/jondelarroz/posts/10208023731544306

Larry Correia Trust me. Nothing infuriates the morons on that idiot page more than your continued success. One of the main reasons I love to post about any of the good things that happen in my career is that it pisses them off to no end how after years of pronouncing my career irreparably ruined I’m still working and selling.

Mike Glyer It’s good to hear Larry’s career was not irreparably ruined

(Now I was just going to make that one comment to try and help another writer ignore the haters trying to drag him down, and then get back to work. Only Glyer had to go and respond. Several years of dealing with him have left me with zero patience and a whole lot of contempt. )

Larry Correia Go fuck yourself, Glyer.

Mark H Wandrey I can only wish for a fraction of the ‘Failure’ Larry Correia is experiencing in his career.

Dan Humphreys Mark H Wandrey amen to that, brother!

Mike Glyer Mark H Wandrey I predict you will have no trouble achieving that fraction of failure.

Dan Humphreys Well, that’s just a little passive aggressive.

Mike Glyer Psychological warfare? Medic, I’m hit!

(And there is nothing more obnoxious than when a guy who has gone out of his way to screw people then jumps in and acts like you are buds. “Ha ha, it’s so funny all those times I deceived others and portrayed you as something you are not in order to rile up my mob of psychos. Wasn’t that a hoot?” These assholes thrive on fake civility. I wasn’t in the mood. So screw it. Let’s go. )

Larry Correia I don’t do passive aggressive like Glyer. I do active aggressive. Which is why I will clearly state that Mike Glyer is a worthless chunk of human garbage, who spends his time chumming the water to entertain a bunch of basement dwelling has beens and never weres. He’s a pathetic, fundamentally dishonest, sack of crap who plays to an audience of petty, jealous, dipshits.

I keep seeing writers trying to honestly engage with Glyer. It’s a trap which will inevitably fail. At some point he will fuck you over for the amusement of his pack of idiots. He’s at best a high school mean girl stuck in an old fat Santa Claus looking body. There is no such thing as honest discourse with somebody that inherently pathetic.

Don’t waste your time. Just tell him to fuck off and get on with your life. When he links back to your blog desperately seeking controversy to drive his shitty traffic, just delete it and move on. There’s no point in engaging with him or the oddly fixated weirdos like Camelstraw Fepeldouche, the brigade of interchangeable rainbow haired harpies, or whatever Clamps is calling himself this week.

Fuck ’em, Jon. Go write books, entertain your fans, and get paid. Vile 770 is fandom’s sewer.

Mike Glyer Whereas Larry Correia is the thinnest-skinned author in sff.

Larry Correia If by “thin skinned” you mean I refuse to coddle liars and fools, sure. Why not?

But that was just another You Sound Angry. Naw. I can say with complete dispassion that you are scum. Try again, you predictable fuck.

Mike Glyer You’re also incapable of telling the truth, too. You just saw my name and started obscenely frothing at the mouth.

Larry Correia I’m telling the truth. In this case you are such trash that I can’t covey it without using obscenity.

A further example of what a lying piece of shit you are, how now you play all innocent, like my animosity for you comes out of nowhere. As if this one thread on the internet exists in a vacuum, and you haven’t already proven yourself as trustworthy as gas station sushi.

Jon is merely discovering the truth about your despicable nature. A lesson many of us have already learned.

So scamper off back to your den of idiots. They’ll believe you. Outside of that cesspool people can see you for the fucking two faced scumbag you are.

(At this point, Jonathan LaForce pointed out that he really didn’t like me when we first met, I was a lot of bad things, but dishonest wasn’t among them. After Glyers’s next comment about me lying in this very thread he got about twenty requests for a cite. None was forthcoming until today on his stupid webpage, which is what caused me to compile this blog post. But I’ll get to my supposed lie at the end.)

Mike Glyer Jonathan LaForce What a silly statement to make. He lied right here in this thread.

Larry Correia I lied right here in this thread? Yeah. I was being charitable when I said you were a high school mean girl trapped in a fat old Santa Claus body. That was completely unfair to Santa and high school girls. But you are just such a sack of shit that it is hard to come up with human comparisons.

Eric Haley This is the reason Larry Correia is one of my favorite authors!

Mike Glyer Eric Haley Because he has an uncontrollable impulse to rave obscenely?

Larry Correia Awwww… the passive aggressive character assassin is upset I use bad words in a thread about how he and his gang of clowns is trying to fuck over the career of yet another writer.

Lick my balls, Glyer.

Mike Glyer Larry Correia As soon as you graduate high school you’re going to find out there’s a lot of people who aren’t impressed by that.

Mike Glyer You guys just keep huffing and puffing, because Larry desperately needs your help reinflating his leaky ego balloon.

Mike Glyer I hope you can get that IQ transfusion you seem to desperately need.

Larry Correia So the lying character assassin thinks I’m mean and immature because I won’t accept his bullshit.

Fuck you. Insults are all you deserve, cur.

Normally when I argue with people online there is some verbal sparring and attempts at humor. Not with Glyer. With him I’ll speak plainly. He is scum.

His band of psychos is the reason my kids can’t use their real names on the internet. He feeds their asinine jealously and spite through a passive aggressive and highly biased “reporting”, all while he plays at being impartial and honest.

He’s the lowest form of liar. He follows a pattern, pick a target, “report”, usually in the most biased, shitty, sleazy way possible. Knowingly painting people as things they aren’t, then riling up the mob to destroy their reputation.

Like in Jon’s case, if the author unwittingly tries to set the record straight, Glyer will act all impartial and nice, all honey and sweetness, but he’s a viper. And as soon as it helps his shitty pathetic traffic, he starts the process over again.

I’m in author groups. He does this to everyone naive enough to buy into his act.

Even though he knows I think he is lower than whale shit, he routinely links to my blog simply because he knows it will rile up his psychos.

Then when the psychos are attacking your rep and threatening your business, he acts all nice, like oh I’m just a guy with a fanzine that reports the news, as he tosses another bucket of blood in the water.

I just delete all his trackbacks. Honestly, his blog traffic is so pathetic that on any given day he doesn’t even make the top 10 in my referrers list.

Glyer is doing his pathetic little dance here now because he can’t stand someone having his number. He likes to play at being a journalist, but he’s just a petty, sad, little man.

Now he is reduced to arguing like a little kid, trying to get the last word in, with feeble little jabs, because he simply can’t handle being exposed for the snake that he is.

And once he gets done poisoning the well against Jon, he will move onto the next author who gets out of line.

Because Glyer isn’t even a bully. He’s something worse. He’s a ring leader. He doesn’t even have the balls to be a bully. He’s a worm tongue, whispering lies, and stirring up bullies.

Mike Glyer is a piece of shit.

Larry Correia You have to understand, Glyer is a parasite. He doesn’t create anything. He has made a “career” out of aggregating information about people who do. At some point he discovered he could feel like a big man if he muck raked and screwed over some creators for the amusement of his tribe.

His one claim to fame is that an inbred circle jerk has given him like fifty awards for having a website that became obsolete the day Google was invented.

And just think, this pathetic weasel is talking about when I grow up. But in the real world I’ve done things and created things. So your useless opinion is duly noted, you wretched parasite, and I’ll just reiterate my initial response. Fuck off.

##

And as of this morning, Glyer is still over on that Facebook thread trying the “neener neener I smart you dumb” school of argument against my fans, who are having a gleeful time seeing what caliber of human being he truly is.

But anyways, apparently Glyer took my advice and scampered back to his lunatic asylum. The reason for this blog post. In one of the aforementioned writer’s groups, somebody shared this.

So… I’m a liar because his blog has more traffic than mine does? Hmmm… Okay, let’s break this down, because it is a fantastic example of the fundamental dishonest nature of the parasite we are dealing with. He’s also a great example of Brandolini’s Bullshit Asymmetry Principle, in that it takes an order of magnitude more effort to refute bullshit than to create it.  

1. I did not say that my blog had more traffic. Since I’m a novelist who blogs occasionally when I feel like it, and the only thing he does is blog, I’d certainly hope he’d win a race that I’m not even entered in.
2. However, my blog is still decently popular. And he does link to me quite a bit, always looking for conflict and clicks because he knows I am a topic that riles up his dimwitted and perpetually offended audience.
3. I never said I was the only source of his traffic, and quite the contrary, have pointed out that it is his MO to post half-truths against any writer, big or small, as long as it feeds his horde of idiots. I saw during yesterday’s tether ball match where several small time bloggers and writers talked about how biased reports about them had shown up on Glyer’s page. He’s an equal opportunity douchebag.
4. I hardly ever look at my blog stats. Jack takes care of all my web stuff for me. I’ve only ever looked at my Alexa rankings once before that I can think of, and that was back in 2015 when we switched to a new server and had to get the stats. I was surprised to be in the top 50,000 websites in the US at the time, and according to the search engine on this blog my only remark on the topic was: “According to the Alexa ratings somehow my blog is up in the top 50k of all the websites in America (and considering there has to be like 40,000 porn sites ahead of me, that’s pretty good!)”
5. However to be fair, I did assume that File 770’s traffic was weak, mostly because during Glyer’s frequent track back pleas for attention (seriously, I think he got really sad when I quit bothering to argue with him), so few people clicked through from there that I never really noticed them. When I did check my stats he never even cracked the top 10 list of referrers, and that’s all WordPress displays unless you drill down.
6. My blog content is way down over the last year. I’ve got a ton of paying writing out the door recently (check the last update post!) and blogging cuts into paying writing time. So I blog when I feel like it. If I actually gave a damn about my blog traffic, then I would simply write an article about gun control every week.
7. I haven’t seen this myself because I don’t care enough to research it, but somebody in the writing group went through Alexa and did find months where I beat him and even posted the dates into the Vile 770 comments. So if anybody made false statements, it was that messed up Santa looking fetcher, not me.

So in conclusion, Glyer reports I’m a liar because he refuted something I did not say (and from #7, possibly fucked that up too) and all the things I did actually say are correct, and worst case scenario I assumed #5, yet he still managed to paint a picture of my obscene, profane, outraged, hatemongery for his idiot followers. Well, huh… It’s almost like Glyer’s post this morning did exactly what I said his MO was. I wasn’t kidding when I called him a predictable fuck.  

But wait, there’s more! Glyer is the disingenuous gift that keeps on giving. Here are the screenshots he posted this morning displaying where he courageously refuted that nefarious thing I didn’t say.

Notice anything wonky with this next one?

Maybe I assumed his traffic was garbage because none of his legions of Chinese fans ever bothered to click his many links to my page? Maybe my problem is that my page is written in English? 😀

 

EDIT: This was just pointed out to me (didn’t notice because the print was so small), but zoom in on the bottom right corner of his Alexa stats.

His rank in the US is 337,508.  Mine is 108,792. So in the actual country which we reside in and write for I’m 230,000 websites ahead of him. 

That’s awesome. So once you take all the Chinese bots out of the equation, you screwed up your own point with evidence that you presented!  😀 HOLY SHIT, GLYER! YOU SUCK AT EVERYTHING! 😀

You had one job, Glyer! Just one job! 😀

 

EDIT 2: It keeps getting better. Now he is deleting all the comments that point out his entire post was utter nonsense since most of his readers are imaginary spambots, so–

 Understandable. I’d need to provide a Chinese translation for 92% of his readers first. 😀 

Lack of blogging time, and various questions keep rolling into the comments about When is X? When is Y? So might as well do a quick update post.

Writing

Monster Hunter Siege comes out in August.

Monster Hunter Files anthology comes out in October.

Monster Hunter Memoirs: Saints – It is a 2018 date, Toni told me what she thought it was at the con this week, but now I’m drawing a blank.

Target Rich Environment (volume 1 of my collected short stories) – 2018. Don’t have a date yet.

There is a Target Rich Environment Volume 2 collected. Don’t know the date on that yet because I want to stick Tom Stranger 2 in there after the Audible exclusive period is up. That is dependent on when Audible publishes #2.

Tom Stranger 2: A Murder of Manatees – I’m about 90% done and should be turning it in soon. It’s hilarious. The plan is for Adam Baldwin to narrate again but scheduling is going to be dependent on when he can record it.

Monster Hunter Guardian, this is a collaboration with Sarah Hoyt, and it is a Julie Shackleford novel that takes place during and immediately after the events in Monster Hunter Siege.

The sequel to Son of the Black Sword is called House of Assassins. I’m working on it now. The one after that is called Destroyer of Worlds. The current plan is to write these two back to back. I plan to turn House of Assassins in later this year. No idea on release dates yet.

I have two upcoming collaboration projects that I’ve announced. A sci-fi novel with John Brown and a fantasy novel with Steve Diamond. I do not have planned release dates for those this early.

There is a second Grimnoir trilogy planned set in the 1950s. I have not started work on those yet.

Cons and Touring

I was at FyreCon this week. It was the first time they’d done it, and the idea was to have something like an advanced LTUE for people who are really trying to make it as a writer, so less panels and more lessons. The attendance was really sparse, but I hope they are able to grow it in the future.

I taught a four hour long class on World Building. I had a good turn out. I think it went really well actually. The con charged for the master classes. Some of the instructors kept the money and got paid (totally understandable) but I just did it for free because occasionally I like teaching for fun.  I spent 3 hours going over my methods of how I world build, and then we spent an hour using that method to put together a couple of stories.

My publisher, Toni Weiskopf, came out for this. So mostly I was there to serve as her chauffeur. She thought the Layton/Ogden side of Utah was pretty, not realizing that is our ugly side and we secretly keep the awesome stuff on the other side of the mountains, so Bridget and I gave her a tour.

We were also able to have a Baen author steak dinner. When I started I was Baen’s only guy in Utah. The other night there were seven of us. For a sparsely populated state we’ve got the most widely disproportionate number of authors anywhere. 🙂

This year I will be going to GenCon, DragonCon, Tampa Comic Con, Salt Lake City Comic Con, and HonorCon (and for HonorCon I just volunteered to GM an RPG for charity).

I’ll be doing a book tour around the country for the release of Siege. http://www.baen.com/pressrelease-larrycorreiatour2017

Author Dave Butler will be joining me for the events in Texas, plugging Witchy Eye. You guys will like him. Not only is he a good writer, he’s even taller than I am and has a mustache worthy of Tom Selleck.

Yard Moose Mountain 

This project is going to take a while. Last time we built a house, it was on a lot, on an actual street, with all those little things like water and power being conveniently right there. And even with all that stuff right at our fingertips, the process still took a long time. Building somewhere that’s got none of that? After you pay for a bunch of mandatory surveys, all you need to do is get one government entity to approve one part of the project, after you get another government entity to approve that, only that government entity needs a different government entity to stamp off first, and the first available meeting with them is in 3 weeks. Then all you have to do is repeat that process for 14 different things and then you’re good to go. Simple. 🙂

So anyways, going to be working on this project forever.

 

I’ve been slacking on Book Bombs this year. Totally my fault because I’ve been really busy.

However, it is time to get back to promoting talented authors so they can get in front of more readers. The next Monster Hunter Nation BOOK BOMB will be on June 14th. (though because of the massive stats delay Amazon has implemented since I’ve started these things, I’ll actually be posting it the evening of the 13th).

The book I’ve picked is the Longest Con by Michaelbrent Collings. It is really fun. And I’m a major character in it. I thought it was just going to be a comedy, but it’s actually an urban fantasy detective novel, with a lot of comedy.

So mark your calendars, tell a friend, and let’s see how much of a boost we can give to an awesome author.

I’m back from New York City, and this week I’ll be at FyreCon in Layton Utah. It is a new event for writers.

http://www.fyrecon.com/

I’ll be teaching a four hour class on world building on Saturday. My publisher, Toni Weisskopf is also going to be here teaching. It should be a lot of fun.

 

I’ve been really productive this year (put together an anthology, put together my first short fiction collection, wrote two short stories, finished Siege, edited Saints, outlined three collaborations, and I’m 75% done with Tom Stranger 2) but the downside of that means not nearly as much blogging.

I usually write a lot of political posts, but those take time. Which sucks because there have been so many things to comment on. So instead of a big, in depth, long winded post about one topic, here’s my quick opinion on a bunch of current topics.

Trump – As a guy who was on record never liking him, who donated money to other candidates in the primary, who honestly thought he was going to lose in the general, and who thought he was going to totally suck after… Eh. I still don’t like him, but to be fair he’s been better than I expected.

He made some good picks, SecDef, SCOTUS. It’s nice to have somebody not bowing to foreign leaders, that sort of thing. Like I said, better than expected, so credit where credit is due. I’m like many Americans, in that it isn’t that we like Trump or at all trust the Republican party, it’s that we absolutely despise the Democrats and all they stand for because they’re terrible assholes who suck beyond all comprehension. We’d vote for a head of cabbage before we’d vote for a democrat. Judging by the senate, congress, governor, and state legislative races over recent years I am not alone in this feeling.

The Media- A bunch of lying assholes. I trust gas station sushi more.  I usually despise them, but lately they’ve gone off the deep end even more than usual. They’ve moved onto absurd straw grasping. I didn’t even vote for the guy, but your 98% negative coverage about bullshit like him getting two scoops of ice cream makes me wish that I had just to spite you.

The Nefarious Russians – Hey, if you’ve got actual evidence of wrongdoing, and you want to impeach, go for it. (eh, I’ll take Pence). But for that to happen it would require actual evidence of crimes being committed. And then you need to go through that whole pesky legal process. Sadly for you guys, you can’t just declare that there is a consensus among all your friends on twitter that Vladimir Putin stole the election and then get a do over where Hillary gets in. In the meantime, to those of you where every Facebook post is something about NEW DAMNING PROOF TO ARREST THE ENTIRE ADMINISTRATION you just sound like whiney assholes.

I’ve got some Facebook friends where it is really laughable, like they’re living in this little crazy bubble where Trump is going to resign tomorrow and they’re going to impeach everybody because of their overwhelming evidence of something something mumble mumble. I’m actually cool with that but only if ideally you could find a way to impeach to about six levels down so we get President Mattis. That would be awesome, thanks.

The whole thing is funny, since the nefarious hacking part merely revealed that the DNC was a bunch of corrupt anti-Bern cheaters and John Podesta was an idiot. Then there’s the whole thing where Wikileaks is making it sound like the leak came from that DNC staffer who got murdered, not the Russians. Depending on whose opinion you get that is either a whacky conspiracy theory with absolutely nothing to it, or a mighty suspicious coincidence. Beats me.  But nobody on either side has any faith in the FBI ever revealing the truth.

Which brings us to:

Comey Firing – Nobody liked him. Get over it. The week before dickweed democrats were ranting about how he needed to go. So either he was a Hillary sabotaging Trump stooge, or he was a Hillary covering Hillary stooge, make up your friggin’ minds already.

Flynn Firing – And this is where the right side of the aisle and the Trumpkin Nut Huggers sound as bad as the democrats. Whatever. Nobody liked him either. Besides, from all accounts McMaster is way better.

The Obamacare Replacement – I knew a whole lot more about Obamacare than this one. That’s because when the last one went through I had to get trained on it enough to implement it for a 250 person company. Everybody who actually had to deal with it could tell that it would be total shit. (spoiler alert, it did turn out to be total shit). Now my company consists of just me, so I did not inflict learning the details of another giant stupid healthcare bill upon myself, so I don’t really know the ins and outs of this one, or how much it will or will not suck.

BUT REPUBLICANS WANT ME TO DIE!!! Not particularly, no, but they really didn’t like having an additional $300-$800 taken out of their pocket every month to pay for shittier insurance. All I do know is that there are a whole lot of people on the internet who do not understand how the concept of “insurance” works. But we’ll just throw that on the pile with other terms like “capitalism” and “rights”.

Rights – Real quick, you can’t have a “right” to something that requires somebody else to do something for you. Holy shit, that’s fucking stupid. You can’t have a right to someone else’s labor, time, or property. That’s theirs. Not yours. Do they not teach Civics anymore?

The Montana Special Election – this is a funny one, because right now the media is doing everything in its power to find some national referendum against Trump. Which is the only reason why the media has ever, in US history, given a shit about Montana. Seriously, I live in the Rocky Mountain west, the closest those elitist fucks get to cultural exposure about this part of America is they watched Brokeback Mountain once as a requirement for their Gender Studies degree.

I wrote this on Facebook yesterday:

ME: What? A guy running for congress body slammed a pushy reporter? That is unacceptable. No matter how annoying they are, it is never right to resort to violence over something so trivial.
ME TWO MINUTES LATER: Oh, it was a GUARDIAN reporter? Heh. Heh heh heh. Ha ha ha ha. HAA HAAA. BWWAAAAAAAHAAAAAAAAAAAHAAAAA snort. (wipes eyes)
ME TEN MINUTES LATER: Still… Probably not cool.

For those of you unfamiliar with this blog or my personal history with the Guardian, go up and plug Guardian Village Idiot into the search bar, and enjoy. Because there is no more wretched hive of scum and villainy on this sorry world than the Guardian.  They are all lying, shifty, duplicitous, libelous, ignorant, shit weasels. And the only good thing I can say about them is that they fired their stupidest reporter, and his final article (ironically, about me again) was printed on my birthday, because Karma is a stone cold motherfucker.

But anyways, the republican still won, so this morning all of my liberal friends are screaming on Facebook about SO VIOLENT! THUG! HELP HELP I’M BEING OPPRESSED! HOW CAN YOU CONDONE THIS VIOLENCE!?! Which is super funny, because you guys can’t really seem to get too worked up about violence when the douchebags in Guy Fawkes masks are smashing the local Starbucks or you’re all sharing memes about “punching nazis” (which wouldn’t be so bad if you guys weren’t shit at target identification and didn’t call everybody who disagrees with you a nazi).

But here’s the thing. Republican voters fell into a couple camps on this controversy.

1. They just hate the media (which lies about them and insults them constantly) so much that they were all like “Body slam a reporter? Hell, GIVE HIM THE CHAIR!” He could have literally killed, eaten, and then worn the reporter’s skin as a face mask and they’d be happy. I’ll call this the Fuck You Get Off My Lawn contingent.
2. They don’t think violence over trivial matters is okay (even if reporters are annoying dicks), but they don’t know what actually transpired, and they know better than to ever actually believe anything that comes out of a reporter’s mouth so they gave the guy the benefit of the doubt. (and one of the witnesses backtracked her statement shortly after anyway).
3. They figured the candidate lost his temper, and was a total asshole, but electing a total asshole is better than electing a guy from the party that leaves you poor, broke, unemployed, unarmed, and paying for somebody else’s good time.

I don’t live in Montana, and didn’t pay a lick of attention until the infamous body slam (by the way, if you can still talk about your glasses right afterwards it wasn’t much of a body slam) but I’d probably have been a B. Back when I used to teach concealed carry, during the long part of the lecture where I was going on about the legalities of shooting people, and how if humanly possible it is better to avoid shooting people, one of the things I would always point out is that eye witnesses are often unreliable, and nobody selected for your jury will have ever been punched in the face. When sudden violence unfolds, most people are taken by surprise. They don’t process it well. Their accounts afterwards are often crap. Which is why I never jump to any conclusions about any story until a few days later, after the initial bullshit calms down and the evidence (if any) is gathered.

But the Guardian reporter said X happened! Yeah, but see above. Nobody trusts reporters. Was he an innocent reporter humbly going about his business when set upon by a vicious out of control republican with delusions of being Randy Macho Man Savage? Maybe. Or was he a partisan hack asshole being rude and aggressive, who got shoved down in reaction to suddenly sticking his phone in the candidate’s face? Also maybe.

So Contingent B and C said when in doubt, I’m voting for the guy who is less likely to mooch money out of my wallet. So he won. Which is really a sad commentary on how little regular America trusts reporters. If you guys want to fix that, maybe try not being such lying bastards.

Whew… That one went long, but come on, it’s the Guardian. Making fun of the Guardian is like a hobby of mine, and I’ve not been able to indulge as much since Damian’s dumbass got canned.

Terrorist Attacks – Same old, same old. It pisses me off, makes me angry, and makes me sad. I’ve written about it before, and depressingly will probably end up doing it again. https://monsterhunternation.com/2015/01/07/thoughts-on-the-islamic-terrorist-attack-in-france/ and https://monsterhunternation.com/2015/11/16/thoughts-on-paris/ and https://monsterhunternation.com/2015/12/03/guns-and-vultures/

Short version, the world is fucked up, and there are super evil people in it. And we hear from idiots on both sides of the aisle, from cartoonishly simple responses on the right, to idiotic head in the sand, let’s all hold hands, responses on the left. And we can’t ever really have a national discourse about what to actually do about it because idiots start screeching about islamophobia.

CalExit- Sadly it appears my dreams have been crushed. I had so been hoping you would be able to spread your wings and fly. Someday, California, someday.

Brianna Wu for Congress – Oh please yes. I am so in favor of her becoming the fresh new face of the DNC. I am in favor of this even more than CalExit. Please let this happen. Santa, it is all I want for Christmas.

$15 Minimum Wage – You guys really don’t know how this works, do you? I’m guessing your Gender Studies degree didn’t require Econ 101.

Universal Basic Income – Shove it, Zuckerberg.

Sexist Haters Hate Star Trek Because Misogyny – I’m guessing this is like that time those legions of people (three guys named Cooter) were super angry about a black storm trooper, and thus required hundreds of articles and blog posts boldly condemning such blatant hatemongery. Personally, not being a Trekkie, I thought the trailer looked like wooden actors pronouncing dialog of great profundity in front of sweeping CGI vistas. Which is too bad, because I think Michelle Yeoh is cool.  But anyways, sexist racist, something something, I’m super outraged and need to virtue signal so all my friends know I’m cool.

Bill Nye-  One day Neil DeGrasse Tyson declared “No one can make science more preachy and pedantic than I can!” and Bill Nye said “Hold my beer and watch this”. It’s like he tried to jump the shark and fell in its jaws. My Sex Junk is literally the worst thing ever made. My Sex Junk causes autism. My Sex Junk is worse than climate change. My Sex Junk made me renounce science and I immediately signed up for Gwyneth Paltrow’s blog to learn about the healing power of crystals. My 150 IQ daughter who wants to become a biochemist hates Bill Nye so much that she wants to someday win a Nobel Prize just so that she can insult him during her acceptance speech.

Venezuela – What? Socialism fails again? I’m shocked! SHOCKED I TELL YOU! No really. This is my shocked face.

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That should about cover it.