Good Morning Digital Neighbors! Happy Thursday to all you fine souls across the Locals-verse. I see the Crowder drama continues and the proponent of the contract is the Daily Wire. I like both content providers, so I am not too involved in the fight, I can understand Crowder's concern and I am somewhat empathetic as the Daily Wire tries to build its business. I am biased in many ways to give the DW as pass while at the same time pondering if this is the nature of business and what that means in our modern world.
Not all corporations are default evil, impersonal or just interested in the bottom line. But many are consumed by the lure of greater prosperity. Prosperity - is not an evil in itself, it is a very good thing. The love of prosperity is the issue. The One ring as it were bends all to its will if you spend too much time admiring it and developing a love for your new precious. Believing your press is always a dangerous endeavor. When you come to think I have "arrived" and I am not in a position of cooperation but one of dictation the change in attitude is always being whispered into your ear.
The WEF has so many one rings on their fingers they look like Liberace and erroneously think they are the wisest and most thoughtful of the species. If you don't know Liberace, give your search engine a whirl, he defined flamboyant. WEF is the epitome of the corporations gone bad and turned into self-serving "betters" that view the rest of humanity as just so much chattel. I doubt anything will make them change their mind towards the plebs. Hopefully nations will not just roll over and yield to their demands because the WEF likes to put the squeeze on anyone not complying.
Hasbro-WotC stepped in their corporate BS big time back in September when the proposed change in the gaming environment. When it leaked out a few weeks ago it hit the fan. It is a small niche of hobbyists, but vocal enough to cause concern for Has-troll. I think the mistake of this corporation was the mistaken notion that "we own the IP" and thus we can act as if we own the hobbyist. Has-troll & WotC sat on the dram for more than a week, which is an eternity in the life of the inter-webs. They let others determine the talking points for over a week while they sat back and I guess thought it would go away. When they finally acted, the rolled out the corporate newspeak with all of its jargon laden crap. It was a half-hearted apology at best and not well received. They continue to try and massage the message but the Suits at Has-troll & War on the Consumer have played a very poor hand of corporate poker.
As I type this I am listening to the DW response to Steven Crowder and I think they are doing it in a more direct manner. If the DW is transparent, and I am biased to think they are, they are handling this as well as anyone can in the world of inter-web dramas. In our age of distraction and boredom few things wake us up from our bored reality than drama. Many of us are so freaking bored with ourselves, our lack of curiosity, creativity and personal exploration & growth that drama is the substitute for a life well lived.
While it is easy to malign corporations as impersonal entities and soulless beasts, individuals can be just a guilty of hubris and exaggerated self import. It it soo early to tell how the dust will settle on this small drama, I am hoping it all works out for Crowder and the DW. I hope the Harbo-WotC learns a painful lesson in customer service. (Has that reality disappeared in the last few decades? Company-Corporations know what is best - so eat what they serve and tell them you like it.) The public can say no. Disney is learning that lesson by creating WOKE evangelistic content and aligning with the Left in the culture war and the lie of the "don't say gay bill."
I think Jeremy Boring of the DW is trying to handle this with clarity and actual dialogue. I could easily be wrong, but at this stage and the immediacy of the response lends me to give DW the benefit of the doubt. That it is taking place on the inter-webs is unfortunate. Much like a brawl in the streets, a crowd gathers only hoping to see injury to either party and carrying nothing about them. There are many who hope that all parties involved in the Crowder-DW dustup will destroy each others. If both parties are capable of actual dialogue and discernment reconciliation can eventually happen. That is my hope but even people of very similar mindsets can be tainted by pride and injury so that they crawfish into positions that are virtually intractable without major embarrassment. Many would rather live with the pain of loss and diminishment than admit they were mistaken or wrong. 2020 and its aftermath has led to a loss of many relationships. The stage was set in 2016 with various derangement syndromes and the lid blew off in 2020 with Covid-mania.
You will find no reconciliation on the LEFT, EVER. It is the cult that destroys and feels completely justified in doing it. The Left understands reconciliation only as concession and capitulation. There are no mutual wins, just correcting the wrongs of the past and punishing those who promoted them. Put on the ring and surrender your will to your betters. Don't join the cult, maintain your will and your humanity.
Today marks the three hundred and thirtieth birthday of the Frenchman François-Marie Arouet, better known by his nom de plume, Voltaire (1694-1778).
Born into a bourgeois family during the reign of Louis XIV, the “Sun King” (r. 1643-1715), Voltaire suffered tragedy at a young age when his mother died. Never close with his father or brother, Voltaire exhibited a rebellious attitude toward authority from his youth. His brilliant mind was fostered in the care of the Society of Jesus, who introduced him to the joys of literature and theater. Despite his later criticisms against the Church, Voltaire, throughout his life, fondly recalled his dedicated Jesuit teachers.
Although he spent time as a civil servant in the French embassy to the Hague, Voltaire’s main love was writing—an endeavor where he excelled in various genres, including poetry, which led to his appointment as the royal court poet for King Louis XV. Widely recognized as one of the greatest French writers, and even hyperbolically referred to by ...
Padre - Tom Miller invites you to a Coffee Talk, Speakeasies, Schmoozes, Tea Times, Afterhours and other gatherings.
https://teams.live.com/meet/93792382189049?p=DiBHsYfuECPgDrG7vO
2026 Coffee Talk with the ADD Irregulars
Thursday, January 1, 2026
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Occurs every day starting 1/1 until 12/31/2027
Coffee Talk - Daily beginning at 6:00 AM Central Time Zone - USA
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Good morning, digital neighbors! Blessed Sabbath to all my neighbors in Judaism and happy Saturday to all the rest of us! How about a few quotes on autumn for this fine autumn morning and a trip down memory lane for some of us? Have a great day, my friends!
"Listen! the wind is rising, and the air is wild with leaves, / We have had our summer evenings, now for October eves!" – Humbert Wolfe, "Autumn (Resignation)" (1926)
"Again the wind / flakes gold-leaf from the trees and the painting darkens— / as if a thousand penitents kissed an icon / till it thinned back to bare wood, / without diminishment." – Jane Hirshfield, "Autumn" (The Paris Review, 1988)
"Autumn is the mellower season, and what we lose in flowers we more than gain in fruits." – Samuel Butler, The Way of All Flesh (1903)
When I think of autumn and childhood, I always think of this old Disney cartoon. I probably watch it every autumn in the days leading up to Halloween. Enjoy!
...
XIII
The Proud Minister
One day there came into the Garden a man in torn clothes badly bruised and cut, who said to the Lover, “In the name of the Beloved I demand your help.”
So the Lover and the Disciple let him in and dressed his wounds and prepared the best of the vegetables from the Garden for him to eat. When his wounds had been dressed and he had eaten and rested the Lover asked him how he had fallen into this plight, to which the man replied, “I was Minister of the Beloved in a city near this place, where I preached His gospel and expounded His doctrine to the people. I pointed out to them how their sins had made them wholly hateful to the Beloved and how therefore they were utterly beyond the range of His love and He would condemn them to eternal torments, whereon some fell into despair and wept bitterly but many were angry. One day the magistrates called me before them and begged me to leave the city and preach elsewhere for they said I had made many people so angry and desperate that they feared there might be a riot and they might not be able to protect me but that I might suffer some injury. I, however, very zealous for the Beloved and believing that the magistrates only feared that their own sins might be proclaimed, preached the more vehemently, denounced the magistrates and made it abundantly clear that the whole wicked city was foredoomed to eternal punishment by the just provision of the Beloved. Whereon a mob, stirred up no doubt by the corrupt and venal magistrates, fell upon me with sticks and stones, nearly killing me and driving me out of the city in the state in which I came to you.”
“My friend,” said the Lover, “this was not a good deed of yours, for besides denying the unfathomable compassion of the Beloved, you have by your obstinacy caused these people to commit a grievous sin, and this cannot be pleasing to the Beloved, that through you who profess to be His minister the people should become worse. Surely you remember that He Himself said, ‘If they persecute you in one city flee to another.’”
Therefore the man was very angry, and cursing the Lover, said, “I see that I have had a very false report of you and I do not believe that you are a servant of the Beloved at all. When I came to you so injured for the Beloved’s sake you set before me only herbs and fruits although the garden is full of birds which you could have killed to make me a worthy meal. I shall proclaim everywhere that you are no true servant of the Beloved but a mere falterer who dares not suffer in the cause of the Beloved. Be sure that you are foreordained to eternal torments who suffer nothing here.”
For the man was so blinded by his own pride that he could not perceive the scars on the hands and feet and the brows of the Lover nor how the cloth beneath the armpits of his tunic was dyed with a red dye. So he went out of the Garden cursing and shouting.
But the Lover looked sad and said, “A man like this does much harm to the cause of the Beloved, for by thus speaking falsely about the Beloved he may bring men to fear Him but none to love Him, and by love alone can any man approach the Beloved.”
