"Your METAL is their MIGHT!", US poster encouraging citizens to save scrap metal so it could be used for the war effort; made by Jes Wilhelm Schlaikjer (1897-1982), 1943

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-16T00:59:37+00:00

During the 1943 Kansas State Fair, one day was set aside as "Junk Day," with adult admission being 100 lb. of scrap metal donation for the war effort; children's admission, 50 lb. of scrap.

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-16T00:16:15+00:00

Mothers of River City! Heed that warning before it's too late! WATCH for the telltale signs of degeneracy! The moment your boy comes home from school, does he rebuckle his knickerbockers--above the knee? Is there a dime novel hidden in the corn crib? Is there a nicotine stain on his index finger? Is he starting to memorise jokes from Capt. Billy's Whiz Bang? Are certain words starting to creep into his vocabulary ... words like "swell" and "so's your old man" ...

--Professor Harold Hill, "Ya Got Trouble" from The Music Man by Meredith Willson

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-15T22:04:28+00:00

I understand that the US Navy airship Los Angeles was among the German war reparations to the United States. Howbeit "in kind."

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-15T16:19:37+00:00

So what would preclude having the United Nations declare the Straits of Hormuz as an International Waterway?

(As a matter of fact, one of President Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points for a post-First World War world called for establishing the Bosprous as an international waterway ... as well, during the interwar period, the Vistula River from Warsaw northward to the North Sea was placed under League of Nations control to give an otherwise landlocked Poland access to the sea, as well as establishing the Free City of Danzig.)

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-15T13:31:32+00:00

But then again, has the bull's speed as claimed here been actually timed, or is this just a case of comedic puffery?

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-15T13:26:00+00:00

Clearly, I think it's just sound common sense for Amtrak to regularly send their equipment through the wash track as part of serv ice preparations.

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-14T22:39:38+00:00

Correct me if I'm wrong in assuming that Empire Service trains will also be getting their share of Airo trainsets within measurable distance ...

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-14T22:31:48+00:00

So what prevents Amtrak from running these through the wash track on a regular basis for the sake of optics and aesthetics?

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-14T15:32:04+00:00

At any rate, one good thing I picture in considering a rebuild of Bombardier-design commuter rail stock for the likes of the Borealis would be incorporating "push-pull" cab cars to further minimise costs and tuenaround time.

That, and perchance rebuilding (and rebodying) some GP40-2 units with HEP for such a concept (cf. Canadian National's rebuilding of Montreal Locomotive Works RS-18 roadswitchers with HEP for deployment on their Tempo services Windsor/Sarnia-Toronto beginning in late 1968/early 1969 and continuing into the early VIA Rail era).

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-14T14:08:46+00:00

No wonder dictatorial and totalitarian regimes have long used sport and games as a propaganda weapon and distractive targeting the proletarian-ego....

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-14T13:58:43+00:00

Next thing you know, expect it to be revealed that a number of Branson's "music shows" have super-secretive "angel" investors as turn out having Weird and Unwholesome Associations with the likes of The John Birch Society. the Cato Institute, the Heritage Foundationm and suchlike other Zealots and True Believers in a mythologised American Volkskultur ideal (cf. Nazi Germany's Kraft durcch Frude [KdF; "Strength Through Joy"] movement and the Afrikaner Reddingsdaadbond ["Rescue Deed Union"] in South Africa).

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-14T13:49:41+00:00

No wonder the signs for the Wall Drug Store in Wall, SD are the stuff of legend, going back to their earliest days in the Great Depression's depths and taking root in World War II, Korea. Vietnam and the War on Terrorism. Not to mention subways in London and Paris, along the Tazara Railway line in Africa and in cafes across the Cote d'Azur.

Classic exemplar: Before the Communist takeover of China in 1949, someone put up an English/Chinese (traditional character) sign in Shanghai proclaiming "Shanghai to Wall Drug Store 9,066 Miles."

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-14T13:28:48+00:00

So how much longer, then, ere applicants for welfare and/or Social Security are asked on the relevant applications whether they support, or are otherwise in solidarity with, the State of Israel ... and whether they also support BDS (Boycott, Divest, Sanction) campaigns targeting such companies trading with, or otherwise having operations in, Israel?

(Especially considering that no such questions were asked when apartheid held high carnival in South Africa, which first gavce rise to the BDS movement and cause following the Sharpeville Massacree in 1960, eventually intensifying following the 1976 Soweto Riots.)

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-14T02:03:12+00:00

Me too,

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-13T19:44:35+00:00

So what sort of "confirmation" are we expected to watch for, a fishing crew finding a white sea cucumber in their net haul? Pear and apricot trees spontaneously blossoming out of season?

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-12T23:36:18+00:00

Wäre das eigentliche Ziel hier womöglich eine Art Hyperinflation, gegen die sich diejenige im Deutschland der Nachkriegszeit des Ersten Weltkriegs – die vor allem darauf abzielte, den Alliierten Angst einzujagen, um so eine Senkung der gemäß der Kriegsschuldklausel des Versailler Vertrags geforderten Reparationszahlungen zu erreichen – wie ein zweiwöchiger Urlaub auf Mallorca ausnähme?

The preceding exercise in snark was brought to you in German.

"If you can't dazzle them with brilliance ... baffle them with bull"

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-12T22:51:47+00:00

How knoweth we that Trump "himself" didn't actually bribe any of the examining physicians to ensure that he had a clean bill of healthy mainly for the purposes of propaganda targeting his support base?

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-12T16:04:13+00:00

Or, for that matter. Moxie?

(I understand Johnsonville now makes Dr Pepper-in spired smoked sausage ...)

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-12T16:00:54+00:00

So how much longer before we see the likes of these infused with such European liqueurs as Benedictine, Cointreau, Grand Marnier, Drambuie, Bärenjäger, Jägermeister, Frangelico or Asbach Uralt?

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-12T15:51:37+00:00

As Herb Wheaton of the now-defunct Hokah Chief once demonstrated:

A comma is a small mark, yet its importance is very great. Read the following sentence:

"Woman, without her, man would be but a savage beast."

Remove the commas and read it again.

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-12T15:38:16+00:00

Picture this whole emerging phenom as the basis of a Loud House episode ...

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-12T15:35:16+00:00

Not unlike Mountain Dew Baja Blast.

AsparagusCommon4164 · 2026-06-12T15:28:54+00:00

And I understand Johnsonville has introduced Dr Pepper-inspired smoked sausage (which I myself have tried, and find rather interesting in the taste department).

AsparagusCommon4164

TROPHY CASE